The Cold

I've set out the hay

In the shit-filled cave inside

But there's no sign of a comet or

Falling star coming

To obliterate the dark.

They call holidays an option for a reason...

It's cold.

A house in schism.

They're only taking women and children in the shelters.

There's a warm glow on the hearth,

And tears running down cheeks

Songs, jingle bells.

A flush on cheeks, warm greetings

And raised voices

Everything is red and green.

Envy and greed

And hope deferred.

I wanted...

My stomach twists and I have

Trouble breathing

This year has got to be different.

You come home and then you go home.

Are these birth pains or some game of throes

Shaking life withdrawal-like,

Another year dies homeless body on ice.

The red ribbon marks our sacred wounds, knots inside

The evergreen sucks life but it's done and gone.

An advent waiting for it all to be over.

Lights stretch a constellation along

The gossiping eaves of each house

Where the ghosts of Christmases past

Remind us of abuse, embarrassment, dashed hopes, and

The tinsel bite of arguments

Passed along like old fruitcake.

The commercial promises--vanity,

Holidays are about family,

Oh how I love thee, let me keep the

For Christ's sake,

Count the divorces.

Comfort and joy,

Not for us on the outside.

Weeds and Wishes

Scatter shot gunshy
It's not like I was sowing wild oats as much as just
Tossing seeds where I'd thought they might grow
Not too much left of my heart though
Trying to put the script back together
Love's an excuse to get hurt

I try on the lines...
It all feels like Dejá Vú
If there's such thing as a "one"
I blew that boat to kingdom come eight years gone 
Gather.  Wince.  Repeat. 
There are things I do when I love someone.
Things that remind me that I've loved before, but even
Acquaintances have their pet names and rituals

I've never been unfaithful
But now I know I'm capable.
No one has asked for all of me
In quite some time
And now?
Time to gather up the dandelions
Blown at passers by.

I pretty much like everyone
At least I try.
Usually loving someone
Means I stop trying to make them mine.

They tell me I should marry
I want to
The girls ask me how old I am
If I have a family,
If I want to marry an American girl,
I know what all the questions mean.
But I've made it 28 years without
Breaking more than a handful of hearts
Or sleeping (in the sexual sense) with anyone's current
Or future wife.

Hope is a thing with fangs
That tears at the soul
And won't leave you alone.
The what-if-parade of
Next year's models
Will catch you and not let go.
Possibilities
Tearing at your throat.
And I've almost never seen a marriage
That I would want.

I've almost found room in my heart
To fit a whole world inside
It bursts, and I don't know how
To make it mine
And what do I have to give?
A broken wish, a scattered dandelion.

Hope is a thing with fangs
That tears at the soul
And won't leave you alone.

Love in Six Acts

Act One:  A Deal with the Devil

Deep blue eyes caught me on the brink.

Starting to sink,

I made a deal

To let myself fall,

Distraction from the pain,

A cynical calculated crush.

Next to your name in my phone I wrote "Beautiful."

Tears without explanation

You reeled me in, and

You kept your distance,

And you never once mentioned your boyfriend.

Act Two:  Translation

Summer transformed frost into melody

I am taken aback by how well you understand me

Plowing through songs, trying on lines,

Debating their merits, and trying not to

Notice the smooth curves of your sides.

A forgotten heart began to sing a new language.

And it was ours, and finally mine.

Freedom, passion, voices rise.

And mingle in a open sky.

Act Three:  The Fall

I entertained the idea of a kiss,

And that idea flowered into a near-obsession;

Just

a

kiss.

We just kept walking, tired.

Sat down by the stars streaming by

In the river below.

And I began to touch,

Longing for that kiss,

That thing you wouldn't give,
And I took your heart,

And your body in my hands.

Innocent you invited me to stay over;

I ran away, knowing my limits and afraid--

It's the hardest I've ran since the Garden State--

When I came back no one was home.

No one knows.

And it was then I realized we could probably

Never manage just friends.

And it was then I realized that I'm still the

Selfish man I've always been.

Act Four:  Forgiveness

We sat on opposite ends of the bench.

I know you had flashbacks to that night and maybe

You still do.

It was the end.  For the time being.

But you made me cry with the things you said.

And in the phone I changed beautiful to "forgave."

Act Five: 

Boundaries

There are things we don't talk about.

Things we don't say.

Lulls in the conversation where we look away.

Act Six:  More than Just Friends

Just friends...but when you smile

By my side on the mashrutka,

It's all I can do not to lean in for a kiss.

The ropes course, fearless you showed me a new side of you

And it keeps on coming,

Each day something new, after all this time,

How much more do I not know about you?

I decided to go to the mountains

To say good-bye, or perhaps to say

I didn't know how to.

I tried to explain all this,

You didn't care

You just wanted to be there.

So I put my arms around you,

Together in the twilight,

I think I could've let you go,

But then the men who followed us, the

Fear of losing you,
Was too much.

We decided to date.

A week later you said you never wanted to speak again

That wasn't true.

But the dating was done. 

And what now?

I guess I'm just thankful

That you're still around.

And maybe this time,

Now that we understand

We're not meant for marriage together

We're learning how to love

Wings

I used to think faith was a thing with wings,
perchin in the soul,
Just one little scare and it's all ready to fly the coop
and give up hope.
That if you touched those little wings,
They'd flake off in your hands
Like dust.

I used to think that Atheist books and rated-R films were all gonna send me straight to hell,
That if my windshield cracked or shattered,
I'd get bugs in my teeth, but you know,
I think the thing that been killing my soul more than all that is this little
Voice in my head telling me that my heart and soul ain't somethin
I can bring to church or work.
That God's a oversenstive model that can't handle
What I really think about her.  You know,
People don't like to see all that personal shit.
I've been lying to myself 'n God.
You know, I can be pretty good, I could convince most anyone,
Got the answers, know what there is to know.
And honestly I'm terrified that answers boy is gonna shut up the poet.
Concrete my eyes so that I won't ever be able to see the wind again,
Just mirrors and diagrams and smoke.
I can be pretty good, and the worst part is,
I convinced myself that I wasn't the bad guy at all.
That's when I started to fall.

The God I met is a lot more like a dragon than a dove.
Greedy, terrifying, awe-inspiring, beautiful.
And I'm gonna be honest, it's a lot easier for me to
Go before him when I'm not alone and I don't feel like a screwup, got my
Full armor against God on, all my good deeds, my list of sacrifices, and all my
Abstinences, it's all trash.
I'm still afraid that voice like thunder
Will burn me up in smoke.
And I'm not talking about Hell, I don't know nothing bout all that.
But I know I'm gonna get burned, by the hell within or the flames without.

I realized all the debaters were just talking themselves round in circles. 
That the best apologetics is probably just an apology.
I've been hesitant to put my pen to the paper because I'm afraid to do God an injustice
And I'm afraid that if you knew that I like God you won't like me.
All my prayers are like paper cranes with broken wings,
Ain't nobody flying if things left up to me.
But you know I realized that butterflies have been around a long time
They survived the dinosaur holocaust and
The wars and they're still flying and they're not
Even all streamlined like swallows for catching the breeze,
Just a two-dimensional piece of paper,
A simple kid like me.
And I realized that while perhaps putting too much of my fingerprints all over this thing
Could give it a broken wing
Faith ain't going anywhere,
The problem's always been me. 
And even when I shove my Bible to the back of the closet and stop
Praying, I know, and I know what I've seen.
It's hard to look a dragon in the eye and forget what you've seen,
It's hard to hold a hummingbird on your fingertips and not change.
It's hard to look in the mirror at me.
It's harder for me to not believe.

Dig

Dig

Chink of the shovel in your wrist

            as it hits rock

Resounding aftershocks

Of the windstorm that blew off

            all our fig leaves

 Rotting fruit left in the dirt

The whittlin' knife on the bark

The cutter's searching

Who the hell am I?

Yet assuming the answer already

The tunnels beneath molehills

The world of earthworms

Brutus Jones lost in formless fearings (himself)

Why the hell did I cuss over spilled coffee?

Why the hell does the earth sprout mountains in Colorado

And swallow Israelites in the wilderness?

The heart of

            Kurtz's intended and denial

The heart of

            Rick Warren leading us in a rousing chorus

            of "I'll never screw up again God!"

            Such large lies.

Dig, damn it

Don't get lost in those stupid

            lines some boy trying to be clever

Get underground and throw away your

            girl pants

The mountains are ribs like an ark

Follow the veins of quartz

            until you find that place

            where you are golden

            That place where you realize that

            Gold tastes as good as granite

            And does about as much good

                        As the stones they threw at Stephen

Slit the sentry's throat

Cut the breakers

Dim the lights

Kierkegaard's burning theater

No, cut the drama

Who the hell are you?

            (not all that glitters)

Climb down the to its end

            (Why?  You must ask Why? of yourself)

Suspended in the midst of every imperfect

            motive

Every heavenly smile you faked while

            biting your lip the blood, the taste

            you were too afraid to take

Killing those I hate over and over and over and over

            (In my mind)

And having sex with sisters

            (Or at least their photos online)

On Saturday I found myself huddled in the

            corner of one of the underground magazines at

            Fort Pickens

            (This was after I murdered the sentry

            And realized after taking his place

            That I was guarding an empty temple)

            Somewhere beneath the vaulted ceilings of my left rib cage

                        My eyes were weary and the remains of

                        Emily's bird lie scattered

                        (I had gotten hungry)

But at any rate, Ivan was howling outside

            pushing pine needles through trees

            like toothpicks in sandwiches

And I realized I'd been down here

            for quite some time and well,

            it's terribly lonely to be alone in your heart

            and the best defenses I could offer

            were an obsolete fort in a world of smart bombs

            that's right world, take your best shot,

I am crouched beneath the wall

            wind howling and bullets whizzing

            Ryan said standing is like jumping on knives

The charges deep at the base of the dam

            And if I press this button

The trees from St. Helens

The cow on a roof

And tightly sealed shaken up

            Emotions will foam through town

            And I'm not really sure how my friends

                        would take it if they saw who I really

                        was, if I was the things inside and

                        not a .

Somewhere north of my spleen,

            I began to realize        

That that Amy Grant song about turning the Titanic around
            was about 80 years too late

That if Dickinson's bird was hatched in here

            it sure as hell didn't come from me

Basically I can't control myself

The "very things I want to do"
I write preachy poems about.

And God if you don't kick my sorry

            ass over that wall

I will never live

            and never care again

And if I don't stand up like a man

Then I really think Myshkin and Jesus

            Were idiots.

Quite frankly I'm scared

If I slaughter the circus animals performing

            in the temple courts

Reader, as we pass on the sidewalk

            This time I don't divert my eyes

            Might be able to see

                        that right now I'm lost, broken and insecure

            Lifting my foot out of the boat

                        because I'm sick and tired

                        of covering for God when I think He should

                                    come through

            Cuz God I don't understand what the hell You're doing

                        and it hurts like hell

            I still believe just not like a child

            I'm coming out hands up

I've spent twenty years drawing designs in mud

            If you're willing Lord, come inside

            I'll wait

I think I can see Your fingerprints somewhere

            around the bottom, where you were

            the clay is changed

But I'm not drawing any more pictures tonight

You've broken my collarbone

Now come make things right.            

 

Temporary Bandage on a Permanent Wound

Picking at the scab

Scratching at the scar

Nobody knows where you are

All you've built

Career, a home

You're setting fire to the lawn

It's just a temporary bandage

On a permanent wound

Your father's not really your father

And now they're all dead and gone

But you've still got the scars

You're still trying to prove

Who you are

You've tried so hard

To live the story

To make a happy home

But inside, you feel a knocking

This could never be mine

And the flames are something spectacular

Now they'll all feel your wounds

Now you've finally been unmasked

And you've burned your bridges too

It's just a temporary bandage

On a permanent wound

Applause is roaring

But you don't hear a thing

Just that little voice inside of you

It's not enough, it's never enough

Now the only thing you've left to prove

Is that the man you've built

Isn't you

It's just a temporary bandage

On a permanent wound

It's just a temporary bandage

On a permanent wound