In the time since I’ve departed

It seems that now I live

With a string tied ‘round my heart

With an increasing amount of give.

At the start, the string restricted.

I could hardly breathe, let alone walk.

You pinched the end and walked behind me,

So I could make it down the block.

In months to follow, you loosened your grasp.

Which made sense; you had use for your hand.

I could walk in the daylight, giving the string no thought

Until nightfall, when you’d tug at the strand.

These days, I’m peeved at the string’s existence,

And that you still could pull as you please.

That I can dance with another, and twirl them around it,

And then trip, and be brought to my knees.

I wish to be freed; I can’t imagine you need

To hold this string to live.

For now, I’ll ponder its fibres

And who once I admired,

With an increasing amount of give.

I stand at the unassuming stall 

And lament

Whilst silently wondering where you have went.

I met you, I’m sure 

That day at the mooring docks 

The sun hitting your skin 

With the gloss of the coated rocks.

You walked at the beach with me 

Until you left me at the shore.

You promised that although you’d boarded

You’d furthermore moor at the dock

Both near and yet not to me,

I struggle to understand 

Why you drifted out to sea.

Perhaps you sleepwalked

And happened upon a knife.

Then, your drowsy saws to the line

Are the source of my strife.

Or a clumsy trip into the valiant steer,

Where you mis-happed your way to a place far from here. 

I suppose that it’s not for me to understand. 

I extended my grip.

I offered my hand.

You struggled to take it with the ease you once had.

In another life, I may have predicted, a tad.

Still, my peace is not an answer,

All it has meant

That I may stand with more poise 

At this stall to lament.

I can honesty say I didn’t anticipate this day;

Perhaps, in comfort, I’ve settled.

We met in our prime, loosened with time,

And soon, in each other’s affairs we both meddled.

Hours spent together, or hours spent alone? 

It felt silly to wage a distinction.

We were thoughtless as sand, familiar as our own hands, 

And I was yours with conviction.

And still, as I mindlessly sifted the sand,

It seems you may have slipped through the gaps.

Where, for most of these years, we could walk with no compass,

You seem to be opting for maps.

I wonder where you’ve gone, if I’ve done something wrong,

Or if now your life is levelled.

I simply must pray that back to me you’ll find your way. 

Perhaps, in comfort… I’ve settled.

No ghosts haunt the island where the cedars meet the sand…

Be it through crucifix or crone, sacred is that land.

Wind hath flattened the ferns, 

And fire hath enforced its terms,

But steady stands The Isle,

Prevailing every trial.

The beach stones stack 

And the nights are black.

And chortle on, do the village youth.

The hazy dawns,

And dew-soaked lawns

Have witnessed many forms of truth.

Yes, no ghosts haunt the island where the cedars meet the sand…

Be it through crucifix or crone… sacred is that land.

Baby girl, you do a lot 

But are kept within time’s strangling walls.

You ponder issues beyond your scope,

Struggling tiredly through youthful halls.

You weight-trained with a feather,

Only to be handed the weight of the world.

Keeping the heavy and delicate from falling and breaking,

You are far from “just a girl.”

Rather, “just a girl” is what you should be: full of whispers, and giggles, and tears.

Dumb trips and young falls should be your glassy eyes’ origins,

Not filtration for those beyond your years.

Baby girl, I wish I could squeeze you so tight,

And tell you that you’ll be okay.

I’d lament with you, because for the time-being

Most things will not go your way.

I’d tell you to believe that little brave voice, 

Who whispers, and begs you be loud.

It is that little brave voice who steers you beyond, 

To your own whispering, giggling crowd.

And baby girl,

Soon you will put down the thing

Pressing you into the floor,

Your tears will soon flow for your own, home-made woes,

No walls can contain you anymore.

Three walking figures

Lit in dim light

Occupy a road

On an unideal night.

One in a black trench,

One wearing beige,

One jacketless; hoping the first will engage.

One held her head low,

One exemplified her age,

The last studied the first like a dirty textbook page.

All three at the same point, walking side-by-side.

The trio at varying crests and dips of adolescents’ ride.

Three walking figures

On an unideal night,

Bodies distant, shadows tethered.

My… what a sight.

Where does one find silence

When the windstorm is so loud?

Can truth reflect in darkness

When the mirrors have shattered to shrouds?

How can one see what stands ahead

If they refuse to lift their eyes?

If they walk through life content

With picking up the nearest disguise?

Is my truth diminished

From lack of years, or depth of chest?

Or rather, it erased,

By one deciding they know best?

My years of life are few,

And my story trimmed in gold.

And yet, I feel content

In not doing what I’m told.

I’ll seal my walls to make my silence,

Though the storm thunders away.

I’ll strike matches until my arms break

If I may source the smallest ray.

I won’t clean up the broken mirror,

I’d rather dress my feet in shoes.

And if one refuses to lift their gaze

I’ll lament the sights they lose.

No matter the method of the sale,

I doubt I can be sold.

Yes… I think I will be just fine

Not doing what I’m told.

I come home from a busy day,

Not at all the worst,

Not the best.

I open the door of my little room,

To be met by someone I detest.

Dirty, and heavy and cracking the floor,

My boulder looks me dead in the eye.

He waves to me, with a knowing look

As I put down my bags and sigh.

“You know what I’m here for,”

He says without feeling,

And I lay down as if to rest.

He stands up with struggle,

Then climbs up the bed,

And sits comfortably on my chest.

“I haven’t seen you much lately,”

I say through my teeth,

My ribs shaking under his weight.

“If you’re here for the big stuff,

Then I am afraid that you have, for once, arrived late.”

“The date needn’t matter,” he says, leaning back

On my lungs as a comfortable guest.

“I can come visit you any time, date, or place!

You could be crushed by me or just caressed.

Like days such as now, when you stand with furrowed brow

Not the worst of days, not the best.”

Tomorrow is a day

I’ve waited for with years of plenty.

Since I was closer to my birth

Than to that of ten or twenty.

I sit and ponder a maple tree,

And just beyond: the sea.

The seas and trees have been steadfast friends

As rocks moved under me.

Tomorrow is a day that changes much,

Yet changes little.

Eighteen years are now an archive,

And the rest ahead? A riddle.

I’d like to think I have a clue;

Hints in the riddle’s lines.

Little glimmers in a mound of rock,

A tiny piece that knowingly shines.

Yet the archives make the sturdy rock

So it may house such shimmers

The library is lit brightly,

The room before me: set to dimmers.

But some things, I hope,

Will never change, in another eighteen years:

When an older me will approach the door

To change the dimmer gears.

Even then, with archives anew,

And that library free to see,

Out the window,

Away from time,

You’ll find

Me,

And the sea,

And the maple tree.

From the archives (Summer 2022)

There’s a place

That is special

In the middle of the sea,

This place was once mine

Or I thought it to be.

A place where grand antlers

Pointed up to a sky

That smiled at me,

With a sunny wink of an eye.

Where I’d build all of nothing,

With no goal in sight,

But I gave it my all

As my own strong knight.

A place where I’d run

With a Morning Dew’s *SPLASH*

As the heat of the day

Met the dusty truck dash.

Where the children would giggle

As if time were devoid.

This place, and its glory

I now avoid.

Wind has plowed the forest,

Not even deer can get through.

And the soil has absorbed

My dear friend, Morning Dew.

It seems as if most things

I treasured have gone,

The Dew no longer

Holds hand with the dawn.

Where once I built nothing,

I needn’t dare try.

For my tools disappeared

From my distracted eye.

My special place

In the middle of the sea

Is no longer mine,

Like I thought it to be.