" I will not have my life narrowed down. I will not bow down to somebody else's whim or to someone else's ignorance" - bell hooks

chilling wind in the air

dust on the lid of your eyes

blow, consume, fill

be the water to my stone

“The marks humans leave are too often scars.”
                                                         ― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

eventually, there is 

not a me and you

there is we and

the pain we share. 

whether we might 

so softly subtly 

acknowledge this silence 

a trembling elephant,

pressing its skin 

against rough bark 

and in the unbearable moments

look past the ever presence instead

find the playful underbelly of fear

and follow to some greater unknown

forward, together, and shed

carefully this distance, unspeakable

distance and volatility 

find our breath find

vulnerable membranes that cleft

we to me and you.

 "May the pain you have known and the conflict you have experienced give you the strength to walk through life facing each new situation with courage and optimism." - Winston Churchill

in between air the pain seeps in

radiating from the toes to the top of head

spine radiating, control an attempt, as possible 

as holding air, as the present moment, and the next

trust that this air brings peace and wholeness

 

"If you put shame in a Petri dish, it needs three things to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence and judgment. If you put the same amount of shame in a Petri dish and douse it with empathy, it can't survive" brene brown

A seed thrives nestled 

exposed to warmth sun and rain

does not always become a tree

A seed punched between concrete slabs

denied its own sanctuary

yet may still become a tree

 

 

"Maybe the moon may learn,

Tired of that courtly fashion,

A new dance turn." william butler yeats

burnt brown moon

i see you looking

smouldering leaves

searching, inviting

white outlines vast

i see what you see

 

“Sexy does not come from the shape of a body, but the fire in a soul."

bungling burbling heart lead me to the field

where we know who we are: home

 and where the water runs wild and free

  

“I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what." Harper Lee

bungling burbling heart lead me to the field

where we know we are home and where

every scent on the wind smells of what 

we created and what dazzling orchestras 

of humans and machines that we've had

the luck to lead and follow into just the

right spots, where fans dangle from ceilings

by thinly held rope like vines reaching 

so far back we barely remember the feel

how fire can play, how we can get lost

in tall fields of grass by the library

how every zoo is an excuse to don an english

accent and be a tourist in summer with sticky legs

and hands that stick to your honda seat cushions

just like our tongues wagged in the air of midwest

 highway breeze images may look closer than they

appear and there in that field you are. and i smile

and you smile and i nod and i hope you nod in response. 

 

“Men must live and create. Live life to the point of tears." Albert Camus

there's really no path nor should there be. there's no there

there.  i don't know where this path goes, nor do i even know

where the last ones went. but i do know that with this path

i will carry love and will open to my skin to the possibility

of love, no matter how hard the doors might be glued

with fear, with failure, with regrets, i'll breathe into the cracks

and let them flourish until there is no between anymore

just me and there and all of it together.