15: grumpy

grumpy, i'm grumpy,
take down the walls!
i'm angsty, i'm moody,
i might fuckin bawl!

the restlessness wades
in, it's awful and bleak,
some days i just hate
this shit, sometimes
it's a week!

my insides are goo,
and my head is aflame!
maybe that's not true
but i still feel this shame

singing to myself, though,
even in anger,
it simmers something down so
the shit might not linger

all i've asked of the demons
is that when they leave
they leave me no poison
no scars that won't leave

14: big love

sometimes big love 

starts from somewhere inside 

you, & it rushes outward

to a figure beside

you, and it feels

unbelievable how big

it is, how destined

to fail, how singular

in its rush 

to this figure at this

landscape, the landscape

of your life. look how

sturdy it seems, when all

the love rushes to him. 

your leaves are all

angled his way, you

grow when he shines.

when this big love is stoppered

at it's drain, it feels like a fuckin

punch in the gut, a sudden violence

to your life, its mountains, its fabric

yards, its minute hands turning

onwards, your empty bed, you.

the bigger the love the

bigger the hurt, the

simplest math you have known.

but look here, when there's no one

to have your big love - look how

full you still are, how it pours

out anyway, how there's 

hundreds of smaller

loves you often forget,

your landscape still glowing

with this clarity of love, a rainbow

in your potted plant, a pretty boy

who sings to you, a friend who

always calls. look, this light

upon your face, this endless

light upon your walls.

13: body

for days I do nothing

but tend to the body.

the body needs tending.

sometimes I call it

my body. but that is foolish

too, it is not mine. if anything,

I am its.

with hard fingers I try

to ease the knots in this neck.

I stretch over and over. hear 

everything crack. 

I let this slow day

be a day of clarity.

clarity, I write on my wall.

then pleasure.

12: you

i am you

and you

are me

she said

to me

in this room

approaching midnight

all the cushions

wrinkle into stars

and the songs 

sit in the walls 

I am alone here, yes,

but am tangled in so many

lives. I want to be only

a column of air

tonight

11: step

by step

maybe life is changing

despite everything anyway

most moments have been

fleeting away even as I was in them

most weeks have been

the texture of cold-cereal-sludge 

passing down the throat easy but

mostly unpleasant 

sometimes to pause the step

and turn briefly around

can be such a gift: maybe time

passed and was not only pain

maybe everything is changing

slow leaf unfurling 

maybe this is what it is

to know patience, watching for

the slow glow rather than 

the quick light and sound 

in this step I'd like to breathe

deep and fill up my lungs far as

they go all flappy chest and air

maybe tonight I'll go to sleep

feeling glad

who knows tomorrow I might

wake and feel a slow glow

10: faith

this will not work
this hiding away

take three deep breaths to remind
your body that you are safe

allow the eyelids to droop
allow the shoulders to curl

remember the flake of the dark
soft blue blanket against your skin

ashamed or not, here you are
another day, you survived

this is where faith is required
when faced with the bowl of night

do you pour in your hopes
can you truly assume
that tomorrow will be clean
as air, that everything heavy
will pass into the earth
when your body
is willing to rest?

9: things i must change

some days my life 

feels like the news:

all general disaster

chaos at a turn

nothing that i can 

control

but even just that

you see? the first thing

i'll change 

when i can

is this: i'll stop trying

to make it all

make sense

i'll stop trying to control

*

but i circle around and

again return: should i not

be able to master

myself

better than this, a lion 

that paws, a dog that

smears rugs and barks

at the kids? what sort 

of weak person-tamer 

am i, what sort

of lowly will?

*

so change the self

but do not pretend

that the life of the self

is yours to mend

it's a car you drive

but its limbs extend yours

and, despite caution, it

sometimes explodes?

*

if i'm the one

that tames, and i

refuse this taming,

then do i still

eventually win?

in the sense of a

beast that accidentally eats

its own poor, unwise flesh?

8: grace

not much feels currently
graced with grace
not much feels
ready to bloom

not much has stuck by
when i tried to hold on
not much remains
sturdy and true

but there was something
almost a music
even when the moon
slicked away

there was a low humming
an alien buzz
even in the dark
and deep pools

sometimes just a friend
asking about
sometimes a meal
surprisingly good

often the sun when it
peers through clouds
makes a day easier
to get by

most often i know
it's the oldest of all
lights that have
followed me down

the self making wisdom
inside of a pen
that scratches when paper
is unrolled

here there is something
i can only call
grace
even when all brightness
fails

something forgiving
that goes on growing
even when i
look away

7: say no to yourself

go on. can you
do it? have you ever
been able? did somebody
forget to teach you
this, do all the others
know how? are you
somewhere broken?

how will you learn?

6: slippery

poetry is slippery
perhaps the slipperiest
slope on which
to attempt a
political stance

political stances
that change the world
must be sturdy
unambiguous
even ambitious

poetry, poor fool,
cannot help but look
many ways at once

how it focuses
on irrelevant details
the snatch of light
on a cactus arm
the dust that floats
like minor stars

poetry is a houseplant
that blooms perhaps best
in the muddiest, most
complex soil

if you give poetry
one answer
she huffs
she turns
whips out another word
from behind your ear
like a coin, and you
are stunned like a child
who did not know
magic once

yet i keep trying to say
something that isn't about
the trees
in words, something that
hurts and narrows eyes
and sometimes yells

how do i give her
space here?