Little Silver Cup

Page by page the letters fall,

Are crumpled, smashed, and thrown,

Unto this silver cup I call, 

Tonight I am alone.

Smoking musky words abroad,

Into the evening air,

These embers flay the fuming fraud

Burned up in my despair. 

Consumed by fire, words ignite

The sacrifice is justly made

As tear stained pages fill the night,

Rending hearts, our price is paid.

Within this little cup I pour

Your promises and paper lies,

Purging evil, I’ll ignore

The ashes as they rise.

Page by page, my tribute’s cast

Every letter sets me free.

Look no more on what is past,

But what I intend to be.

Sights and Sounds

There was a siren in the night.

Blood stained asphalt.

 My mother screaming 

“Oh my God.”

While Irene and I 

 Huddled near the shoulder.

“We shouldn’t have run;

I thought we could make it.”

Merry Christmas, everybody.

Hospital lights blinked,

Machines yawned.

I was tired too, but more angry

Than anything else.

I didn’t want to be there.

Not with all the patronizing

Church ladies,

Swarming in with their 

Condolences and flowers.

 
I often wished it had been me,

Me that had been hit,

Me that had almost died.

I wonder if Irene ever felt the same?

I wonder what it was like to watch 

Her mom struggle for two years in recovery?

Irene always said life was hell growing up.

Her mom never really loved her.

I wonder if the accident changed that?

When Irene’s mom got hit, 

My brain told me it was my fault.

That I shouldn’t have yelled “Go!”.

Years later, Irene’s brain told her 

That she likes girls.

And I have always wondered

What those two things have in common.

What if I am the reason Irene

Decided to cross the road?

Just Friends

I didn’t know what to think the first time he asked me. Standing there, trembling in the night’s cold air, I nodded hesitantly. What did I have to lose? It’s not like I’d signed a marriage contract or anything. It was just a date. One night, two friends, and endless possibilities. We’d been close for over a year now; no harm in giving “us” a try. He smiled. 

A week later, curled up on the grass, twigs biting my bare toes, I poured my story out to him. I hugged my knees and let the words rush out. I figured he should know. The safety pins in my pockets, Courtney’s fingers in mine. My head pressed against the cold toilet seat every night after dinner. My naked words just wanted someone to accept them. But he was ashamed. 

Just friends, he said, as if that’s what we weren’t already. Just friends and nothing else. But he meant something more like, your story scares me. Because really “just friends” aren’t friends at all. “Just friends” means, you screwed up and I don’t know how to say it nicely. “Just friends” means I thought you were better. “Just friends” means goodbye.

Pain Letting

As little red rubies sprout from her skin, 

Popping up like weeds from soft, pale, blue veins,

She wishes she could see his face again

And trade each loss for ruby-studded pain.

Her face, stone cold, as she watches her blood;

Daddy would never want Callie to cry

And so she plugs the constant raging flood

With pins and needles, lie upon lie.

The blood, they say, is where all life is found;

She carved a spring of youth upon her wrist.

But in the letting, lost a dearer sound.

Her heart grew quiet, slipped into the mist. 

I promised him I’d live out all his dreams,

But life, I’ve learned, is harder than it seems.

Mattel Model

Darkened hallway, dimly lit

Creaking door, silence split.

Muffled cries, childish pleas

Tear-stained hands, blackened knees.

This was home, now it’s not.

Where I broke, I forgot.

Like my naked dolls I lay;

Here becomes my soul’s display.

Daddy mock me,

Mommy frock me,

Parents play me well.

Those who dress me,

Those who bless me,

Break my naive spell.

My Barbie sits with hollow eyes

With empty chest and matted hair

She beg forgiveness from her lies

And wonders if I care.

The game abandoned long ago

I leave her on the floor,

I’ve learned the secrets big girls know

And I don’t care no more.

Pages from a Memoir

Memories, I imagine, are 

Like musty pages mottled 

By erosion, creeping far

Into the bottled

Recesses of my brain.

The yellowed pages are worn

Thin by joy and pain.

And numbers 28, I’ve sworn

I will never forget. Though,

I’ve found that letters blur.

Memories come and go-

I remember how her

Hand traced my arching spine,

But forget about her smile

And the love I thought was mine.

Each kiss I put on file,

Each hug and promise too,

But returned with empty fingers

My library fee is overdue.

She is a book that lingers,

Leaving little to the mind

Except for the smell of old

Binding. And yet, I find

As each new story does unfold 

A sort of joy in looking back. 

Each dog-eared page, beckoning,

Promises colors painted black

As letters mark my reckoning.

I breath this paradox, paradise,

This worm within a history. 

And find I’m bound by every vice,

By stories who’ve forgotten me.

Am I a book too brown, too marred

Or yet a classic still? 

What price we pay for stories scarred

Without an ending, lifted quill.

Too deep a question; soon forget

The musings of our creed.

Think instead on of how we met: 

A book I’d like to read. 

Not That Easy

The sound of nervous chatter

Corrupts the silent dawn

As a thousand restless bodies,

Suited in black, lithe and limber,

Swarm near the shore.

The gravel stings

Like bees beneath my feet.

I hear the gun and a frenzy begins.

Slicing through the water,

I become little more 

Than an arm here and a leg there. 

Clambering up the bank,

Wet, tired, chilled to the bone,

I claw at my shell, 

Ripping and running, slipping,

As I flee to the next stage. 

Gears whizzing, I fly

Down my first hill, wet hair trailing.

Sweaty palms stuck to the handlebars,

The air seems laced with poison;

Here the battle begins

And time becomes my biggest contender.

Skidding to a stop, my white knuckles

Grip the brakes and my knees tremble.

I find my footing, vision hazy,

And begin running.

Barely breathing, I cough hard,

Wiping mucous from my mouth,

Sweat pouring into my eyes.

I know this is the last lap.

I push my body harder

And fall across the finish line. 

Life is not like a triathlon.

Ebb Tide

The moonlight on your skin

Pollutes my purposed mind,

Distracts me once again

From the words I try to find.  

We’re perched upon the stand

Above the lurching tide;

My sandy, empty hand,

Curled, hopeful, at my side.

The rushing of the sea

Mocks my roaring heart;

The stars spin above me:

Our sand castles fall apart.

As time slips though my fingers,

You start to pull away.

The lifeguard in me lingers

Knowing we can’t stay. 

Down the shore an echo,

Whispers faintly through the night,

It’s time to go, time to go...

It’s time to say goodnight.

Silver Lining

As summer rain does whisper on the sand,

Hot kisses of an August sun turn grey.

Wet bodies scurry, sandy to dry land,

And lazy towels sprawl empty where they lay.

The yawning chairs, and dripping parasols

Gawk, shivering in silence at the scene.

A long way off, a saddened seagull calls;

His solitary voice sounds harsh and mean.

Lighting flashes above the crashing seas,

As thunder rumbles, rolling to the shore.

In wake, a chill and eerie sort of peace

Falls tremulous, where terror shook before.

Laughter lights the sunset of this terrain:

Two love-soaked dreamers, running the rain. 

Little Frank

I was the last one off the bus,

Stumbling over my long skirt,

Bogged down by bags and backpacks,

Gracelessly dropped onto African dirt.

Twenty-three hours, too little sleep,

With greasy hair and heavy eyes,

He was the only one left waiting,

For the last muzungu surprise.

He flashed a smile, white as the sun,

And grabbed me by the hand.

He dragged me weary, bags and all,

Across the red Ugandan sand. 

He walked me through the orphanage,

His little bare feet doubled my stride.

Pointing and smiling, he welcomed me home,

He never left my side.

Acacia tress and crimson sunsets,

The dirt and sun and sweat,

Beating drums, lugandan hymns,

These things I won’t forget.

The goal they told us: Go be love.

Such love I’d never known.

Hugging strangers, sharing rice-

These can’t be taught, but shown.

In one short week my world was changed,

But not because of me- 

Because a little orphan boy 

Showed me how to see.

The church calls me a missionary

Who brings lost souls to light;

He called me mukwano, friend,

The difference, black and white.