I looked
Inside
There wasn’t much
To hide
I told myself
But lied
A lie
It was
Because
There was
So much
Just such
A heap
A leap
I said
Of faith
To try
Undo
The lie
And face
The space
Below
Beyond
Of reach
Too low
I thought
But wrong
I was
Because
I see it now
The light
I fought
I fight
To keep
The hiding
Stuff at bay
Fight still
I will
What dark
May come
With day
I know you are giving me my space
but
I’m not sure I want that anymore
I’m not sure you
even have your people looking here anymore
because it’s been so long.
I am ready, even though you think I need more time
You are the one.
But I am starting to think
this whole thing
is in my head.
I know that you are busy
and have a lot going on
so much so it would be hard to find time for me.
I am not needy
and I do not need a lot of affection
but I would like to know
that this is still real.
You hit me hard in the past
I am not asking for that again.
Just something
to let me know
you’re still there.
-Chicago Craigslist, Missed Connections
It was a blonde girl like you and sick like you but not your age or anywhere close so I knew it wasn’t you. But she was dead and you’ve been almost dead a few times now so I didn’t totally rule it out.
Hey dead girl, hey. In your photo you look a lot like the person I fight and have fought, pushed and shoved with love so much. But you aren’t her. You’re the remains of someone now and there’s the bubblings of anger and regret and the feeling that someone didn’t do enough, couldn’t swallow up all the fear and anger stuffs. And so now she’s not whole, taking in the air and galloping through life, wondering what’s to come.
Just remains.
Hey not yet dead girl, hey. I want everything for you, trust me, even when we bark and hiss like a couple of beasties tearing up our bodies’ never-healed pus —I still want to wrap it all up, the world, its futures and presents, and hand it on over to you. Forget the past, we don’t need that anymore, even if it lives in us forever anyway. And if you won’t take it and fight me still, I’ll keep on wanting it for you just the same.
For some reason
I can’t stop thinking about you
I see you everywhere
and
you must see me too
Because I hardly think
I’m the follower
You have always anticipated my moods
and shifted hues accordingly
I’m really lucky to have you
And he was really lucky to have you too
You are one of those things
I think
that defined me before I had a chance to choose
but something I quickly fell for after a long second thought
At my best you spread across me soft and light
you lift me frothy toward rest
And even if is all an illusion
you guide me
See you here and there
-Chicago Craigslist, Missed Connections
Standing outside on the balcony
trying to feel my dead uncle
Is he in the palms somewhere?
Swaying in the dark
charcoal greens, all the color of ash.
Is he in the ocean?
Waves dancing up to meet nothing
then dancing back into a bigger
nothingness.
Is he in the laughter and the chandeliers?
Clinking, tinkling.
Where is his merry?
Where is he?
Not in the sea, the smiles, the trees
No.
Only me now.
With faintest blood whispers
unspoken by anything here.
Gone is the word.
Gone.
But still I look, still fawn
Eyes cast over everything,
dancing back.
I was right
It was the ocean
Not just a trick of the sky
Harder flying high
To size the man made
from the not
Man is a thick black block
A straight shape with no mistakes
A stake here and there
Mine!
But on the line’s other side
A sea as blue as dreams of blue
With darker pools deeper than sleep
And bottoms uncharted, willingly so
Where creatures happily left alone
Merrily sing of lives untouched
An unfamiliar song
We can only hold our breath so long
Twelve perched
right at their glassy edge
How you can love a thing, find its beauty
even with parts that fall apart so fast
Stem cut, thorny, blood even through the praise
I recognize you, I think
You’re the perpetual victim,
the one who left, came back then left again
Reminder: Must be careful around pricking things
In that darkened place
I am just waking
Witnessing flowers, room, the whole slipperiness of reality
Pick a spot and focus, isn’t that what they say
Picture a field of tulips
Or nothingness, that always works too
Shake off a few monsters for a spell
then time to wake and sleep
and wake and feel the feeling
of the trying to remember
then sleep and wake and walk and smell and look until again remembering how you wanted to
forget
If this is life
It’s hard to tell
The edges are colder
and less green
than first hoped
Time is colored, grey
and slogs dutifully
into places I’d rather not say
How many hours
spent staring at electric boxes?
Stale things that peer back
but don’t grab my hand
The promise of out
peeks here
only in drips
The wet waxy leaf
of the plant above my head
thrusts upward
cut abruptly by a florescent wood sky
I look up too
trying to see past it all
Remembering a vague promise
of skies less fixed
and vows never to sit so long
In a place with so little light
I had a cold
And so shouldn’t have been able to smell
The sickness
Where once the cat lie
But there it was anyway
A dying scent
Faded but feral
Arching up to meet us still
Isn’t death like that?
A cat
But then it’s like so many things
And then again
Unlike anything at all
Black man, blue line. Blue shoes, clean jeans. Warm fleece, sweatshirt, both clean. And now that the train isn’t doing its train thing so well, muttering, trying to swat away the cold coming in from the very wide open doors. Rocking, whispering turning into something louder than whispering, he addresses the blonde sitting across from him who keeps shaking her head no, no, no – like pushing away a dream gone wrong.
And then, just as we’re reaching the point, as they say, of no return, the doors close and the hurt appears to lessen. He goes back to staring out the window silently, still rocking. As the train pulls into the next station, he gets up to get off.
Despite the clean clothes, a bad smell rises up, as indicated by the scrunchy face another blonde with pink lipstick makes as he passes her by.
Open the train, he commands to no one. And as if it’s heard him, the train obeys. He gets off only to get immediately on an el car going the other way.
An infinite loop.
In the place where he sat lies a pamphlet: “Where is the kingdom of god?” On its cover, a white woman with her eyes closed sits towards the front, lamenting, perhaps, the misplaced kingdom of her dreams, but at the center stands a black man. Eyes wide open, seeming to lament nothing while questioning everything.
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