I’M COMING BACK HOME

I’m not going anywhere, you’re not going anywhere.
We’re not going anywhere. A little time
won’t change that. What I saw before
may still hold true, or maybe
it was buried and lost.

Every place you run to,
everywhere you turn, you find pain.
I have to walk across the desert
just to shed this skin. We can only find our way
by touch, in search of some kind of redemption.

(January 26, 2009)

TAKE ME WITH YOU

I close my eyes, the dawn is
coming. There is more warmth
even before the sunrise. Love
me down more and more.

The road is now visible—
mud and thorny rose stems
line the path to the end,
the petals on either side, and beyond that,
no evidence of humanity—
only green hills as far as the eye can see.

I am not the first person on this
road (there are footprints of greater ones in the mud), but
I am alone and barefoot. My head will hang low,
there will be tears in my eyes—
I can see that. Some will be
with me, but invisibly—
a voice that says, “I’ll be by your side.”

What is gone won’t be relived, it’s found its way
into my blood.
There are few regrets.

I open my eyes.
It is day out.

(January 8, 2009)

LATELY

From here, the bridge lights
burn brightly. That I could
get lost in that silence
between here and there…

It’s easy to be strong, to give it all up,
to move on. But something keeps you
standing there in silence, not letting things
get lost in a dark sea and
forgotten completely.

The lights on the bridge flicker.

(January 6, 2009)