concerted

the world looked different. maybe because of my friend. she came back from nicaragua to visit, someone in her family had passed on. she gave me central american eyes. we had breakfast at dennys and shared photographs and stories. emotions were forefront on her face. i have trouble trusting, do you, too? but you gotta let someone in. i went to seven eleven and thought about it. turned in my winning poker card for two. one for me and one for you. thanks for the flowers. reruns of the streets of san francisco. karl malden tore it up. thanks for the love. we came together just right. i bought two cokes. one for me and one for you. some lady came in and barked at the guy behind the counter. do you have this? do you have that? no we do not. people can be so demanding. i saw a kid in the backseat of a car. he was hanging out his head alongside the small dog in his arms. both of them with their heads out the window. smiling. panting. happy to be alive. some pop song twisted as they drove through the parking lot. someone's drinking malt liquor on a saturday afternoon. i'm sure thankful it's not me.

another loss - vi

faith is porous on the streets. you only have what you see, and anyone wants you to believe there's somethin more for you, if only you trust them for a moment. you gotta keep your faith deep in your heart, and not extend it to those who would use you... i tried explainin' to you about your bike, and how i needed to switch it out for mine, and could get it back to you tomorrow if that was okay. but you lost some confidence in me and could i blame you? we did not run in the same circles anymore. we argued for a while. i implored you the bmx was safe inside my new digs on Magnolia. i offered you collateral if you wanted, i would leave my rings with you. if you wanted we could go and get it later. you thought about it and either you extended some faith in me or else you didn't wanna argue anymore, and let it lie. i helped you pack your stuff and clean your place so you could get your deposit back, and you let me shower there before checking out, because where i was going, well, they might have had the law behind them and plenty of cash, but these corrupt attorneys letting me a room, well, they coulda been arrested for uncleanliness...

china. usa. bodhi

If china and the usa can meet for tea
 in the south china sea
what a dream this
    would be

then will i know my chinese brother
who wears the knitted hat
like me

given us by our nephews
to keep warm
in the mountains

in the valleys
in the winter

a dream is only worth
making real. like the two silver hearts
i wear around my neck
on a silver chain

as my sister. in china
given us by our young nieces
replacing our hearts
from their scattered
pieces across the world

jasmine tea
in the south china sea
you and me

i give you my cup
you give me yours
and fire up our ceramics
 against any twitter
polemics

arms locked at the elbows
we drink slowly

drink up. you and me
from the sunset west
looking east where she
shall rise again

red. blue and white
in the south china
sea

lighting the single candle
given us by an elder. in faith

by the bodhi
tree

Journal # 06.17.16

i may not be a geometry star, but i know how to leave the seven ball behind the eight and take your money on the nine, i might have lost our debate, but i can talk you out of getting behind the wheel, drowned in imperial pints as we are, together at last side by side in some pub, living outta memory, under overcast skies, looking in your eyes. i may not vote this time around, but that don't mean i don't know my rights, kid, in no swing state and we are colored blue and shaped like an ass, too. and i vote for you. i have been broken-hearted a hundred times over, but we will get her rolling again just takes a little tender love and care, ima mechanic of love, wavin' white towel flags to your window, you see, look up in your eyes, those wild and overcast skies, you stare down at me all wonderin' am i dangerous? will you fall for me again, will i charm you somehow from the outside in, and a bottle of gin, i might not hold a steady job, but see me beside you sunrise to sunset, holdin on to us yet, down calm like the charm, any unfortunate scenario, say, four or five alarm, seven ball behind the eight, and hopeful to disarm all that old unchallenged hate got you heavy, deep in the past where it's buried, someone who hurt you, and so you need help, you need love, you need someone you can trust. will i be the fortunate one? can i be careful and gentle with you? acknowledge every tear fallin off your face, pushed out on to the streets hand in hand for all tomorrows, or maybe just right now. dangerous now, come here. dangerous now, me and you and there's no other way.

the temples

I wasn't on anything, I was just on . 
I was circumstantial.

You told me and you told me again and you told me one more time, and sure I heard you but why would that change anything? I was still gonna hit the streets late at night and up to no good. Your social was not my social, even if we both had ice cream. I cannot even relate, and you think just cause we are related I ought to, like it was good form, I oughta conform to your standard. The whole attitude was circumstantial. And the circumstance was the influence you had over me, waving it like a badge in my face, demanding, demanding!

Laughter.
Clasping of hands behind head.
Pulling elbows in tight against the ears.
The temples.

And if you were to hit the streets with me, what would that be like? Can I imagine it, or will you come into my thoughts with a big fat roll of duct tape and mark my internal off like a crime scene? I don't care if you consider all my lifestyle, irrelevant. What am I gonna tell you, anyway, as you lean upon your own misunderstanding? What I care about, is whether you care how I feel when you cast away all I have become and am becoming...

With a letter
with a look
with a social media
snub.

Hey you! I can dream for us, can't I? I can dream we can meet on equal terms on soft ground some day. Over easy at the diner in nobody's home town. WIth no control over the music in the atmosphere. They might be playing dubstep in 20 years. No more Sinatra. You might need a cane to walk. Ageism tossed in there with the hash browns. But will you stay closed off at the end of a smoke? Not in my dream. In my dream

I will be holding
you tight. Rubbing your
 temples to
sleep.

reading backwards

i dont know why but i did grow up in the USA thinking that what was bad for me was good for me and went after it like a turkey hunter after thanksgiving dinner in a secret desire to die. i dont know why but i made it here. where we renounce all that and try to live for the living and its like reading backwards sometimes its so hard. i dont know what but whatever it is it doesnt matter much cause it comes and it goes. i dont know who but they usually love me or hate me and are equally essential if im gonna understand. i don't know when but if its not now i oughta not bother with it. i dont know where but feel safest at home. i dont know how this all happened but i did start over and starting from scratch is the hardest cause youve got nothing to back you and you pray someone will take you for your word though they must be a fool to do that. i dont know how but not without faith and not without help and knowing what happens (and its nothing nice) when you stop trying and dont give in just give up. its like reading backwards sometimes its so hard.

Belonging - Journal # 06.17

Belonging. I long to be among friends. To be seen and understood and appreciated. The freedom to say what I feel like saying without getting shot down. To laugh with friends. To not suffer undue judgment and cruelty and gossip. Gossip is abusive. I long to feel comfortable and move about a room without worrying or feeling self-conscious. Sometimes I think it is me, that I am the one causing this stress on myself. Last night I was with a couple of good friends who know me well. I realized that no, I was wrong. I am simply sensitive to my environment, and for good reason. Because I have been in truly threatening worlds and have been badly hurt because I was extra trusting of strangers or acquaintances who did not have a place for me in their heart, and treated me accordingly. So I am cautious and careful. And I am very relieved tonight, to see this is not any permanent scar, but simply a reaction to changes in my environment, based on experience. Because around my friends last night? I was happy go lucky high energy madameoiselle sweet sugar remoulade, all smiles! Thank god for good friends! xxx

Journal # 02.24.15

A chance. Lives are lost in confusion. A helpless feeling anticipates a real chance for a lot of happiness. Wouldn't you want to make someone smile if you could? Textbook.Very simple. Be kind and helpful and selfless.

 Life is never textbook. Quite the contrary. I once enjoyed the sensation of a man's eyes on me. I was younger. I wanted eyes on me. Life happened and I crossed over somewhere. But to see someone's eyes light up like that! In a dreary working existence, in a seaside working-class town? To know I had a part in it. The smile that followed suit. The expressions. The flowers and friendship, listening and sharing, the efforts to understand you. And a boundary line drawn clear. I drew it between you and me. You saw it. I made myself clear. I know I did. You made sure I knew how much you respected me for it. I thought we had a spectacular friendship. Textbook.

Life is never textbook. I gave freely something you said you needed. You surprised me. Some fantastic extraordinary attentiveness! You found the place where my story was bookmarked. Where I could not go on until an obstacle was removed from my path. You removed it! Often without telling me. Suddenly there's a bike light, so I can ride safely to an important destination. A key, so I can open a particular door. An opportunity. Out there in the wilderness you found a name, or address, or a phone number. A pen, so I could write it all down.

All was really well for a while. Sunshine giving the cool morning dew a chance to sublimate and fly.

But what when the morning was frost, and the sun hidden? What then? A hanging fog. The dew drops fall into the earth, and are swallowed by darkness. The sea at night becomes swollen and dark, and all the eyes in the world are shut tight, except yours. And yours, once so full of light, got avarice and grew a monster. A monster behind the eyes. Devoid of feeling. The eyes became a body and the body became intoxicated, and turned a friend into an enemy and took me...

Maybe that was the moment I crossed over. Maybe. Only I say maybe because nothing feels certain anymore. When you took me without asking. Much later, after great and poisonous bouts of ferocity and trembling, I discovered maybe I could still love. I don't know how, but thank God. Thank God I can still love maybe.

The lost of lost weekends (revisited)

Lost of Lost Weekends

My friends, my close friends, my less than close friends, my new friends and old ones, the loved ones, the tough ones, the tests we endure, the balance of days coming together.  Then the sun rises, again, and you find one another, and stand by and cry and try to find the heart, and it comes so natural like a Lexus start, clean and quiet, eyes meet eyes in subtle surprise; the things unsaid, the weight like lead... falling off your shoulders. And now your older, and see it to contextually, in the texture of the connection, see? And the sublimation occurs, two hearts collide, energy synch dream! Friends seldom seen and then it's like a dream again. Seen again. But why so far apart? You fight it, stomping your feet til the dust comes up. The trust come up and recede again, like the lost of lost weekends -- a painful trend

left you wishing and crying for more, feeling the living and dying, feeling right down to your core. It hurts but it means something, too. So be there in spirit, you say it, you mean it! I can lose the colloquilism, touch the vernacular, turn it inside out and make it spectacular. This will work at any distance, like quantum physics, like a system. The charges we send us, like photons the light moves. The energy hits airwaves you catch on your itunes. The paradigm keeps shifting its tectonic plates. The dishes they fall on the floor we explore, find out what we are made of. The texture, the real thing, we thirst and manifest and burst on the scene. Listen and you may hear it. The tear. The salt. The water. So simple, like tide rush cool over your feet in the sand! The way we understand one another, like a sister, like a brother. This is a rush cause its true: your family is those who mean something to you.