静

静 the white people translate to tranquility?
静 stirs inside of me, I am still but not tranquil
stare at the framed character on the wall
which white person put that up?
counting up the days you’ve been gone
counting down the nights you’ll be back
a daily routine follows familiar strokes
the daily soul travels uneven tracks

静 the yellow people taught me as still
静 stirs loudly within since you’ve been gone
I am not tranquil staring at this writing on the wall
And who would be?
to have the days count them up
and the nights stare them down
each act of self love following familiar tracks
the soul dragging with every stroke

surrounded by so much stillness
the force inside anything but
ricochet between the walls of rib cage
waiting to spill out from
every pore of this body onto
every surface of you
seeping
into
pushing gently deeply
within
to fill
and nourish
and
love

[October 15, 2019]

I don't

I don't admit to understand what it is like to have your plight
I do admit I admire you for your ability to carry forth in spite
I don't admit I know how to say all the right things at the right
time
I do admit I
can't forget the way you held my right
hand in yours
and my left hand in your left
as I embraced you
to sleep

You hang your sweater off a pinkened shoulder

You hang your detachment off a crooked sweetness

I wonder how you chaffed your shoulder

I wonder how you bent your sweetness

You bring empty beer glasses back to the bar

You bring full paint bottles up to the bronx

I wonder at your red hot conscientiousness

I wonder at your clean white approach

So I want

to know if you were born at dawn

to see you swirl red with white

You gauge my color, canvas fill with novel base

You sip your beer, glass refill with empty space

I wonder at the space between two strokes

I wonder at the space within your curls

So I naturally want

to narrow space with paint

to fill each curl with fingers

So naturally

I wonder

I write her
I love her
I owe her
    nothing

No lines
No games
No props
    everything

slow

I am so slow, too slow to see myself seeing the strange way by which you paint your eye brows, dance your vocal chords as I miss your friends' outstretched hands prolonging stranger land as I think how stranger you delay to extend your arm only upon noticing me notice you. 

And I am still too slow to hold your hand longer, few milliseconds longer, few differences different, to how conscientious I am imagining, hoping you watching me five seconds before I am lost in your clothes flanking a story that makes me dumb like the undulations of muscles in your bare arms I am running imaginary hands, laying imaginary lips the first four seconds I laid cautionary eyes chasing them from chasing you.

The Fight to Lose

I.
we fight a finite fight
we fight to feel different to feel better to feel safe
we fight to win
and we lose the infinite 

II.
To not care for the symbols of society is to depart
and therein conundrum of our species
We fear to depart safety in numbers
Numbers who taught us what is humanity

but if I 
look intently for the Truth without
listen intently to the Truth within

Fear and Bravery become yesteryear
as the Earth under my feet becomes Waves
and in the stead of my legs appear fins
with an Ocean ahead to flow and move and love

to depart and create 
what is humanity