We Want to Be All or Nothing

December 2^nd, 2010

But we have to be this

That

And those

All at once

None being sole.

In all being many

Nothing is plural,

And you’re left with something

Neither boy nor girl.

All fight for dominance

For the first light of day

To the last thought of night

Where none are finished

In the fulfillment of love

Leaving frustrated and jealous

Those left in bed

That wants a special place

This earth can’t bear.

Thus suffers our soul

Along a black hole:

Wanting entirety

Left knowing that given eternity

It is left with its like

Also lacking

And lusting—

Limited,

Until beyond time

Voids collapse

In darkness,

Deaf to the end

When all becomes nothing,

In respiting light,

Relinquishing unattainable rectitude

And rigor.

A Completed Bridge

November 5, 2010

New signs in many windows

Plants now lining the road,

New sidewalks already overgrown.

A hill for a lawn

A statue put on

The road where I used to live.

The route for its speed

Has gone wayward

Or merged

The path

Of the party has been paved.

And as much as I’ve now built

In place, time, absence

The completion still feels lacking,

While the construction was left

Previtae the building of a new house

Has begun whose plans

Encompass rooms in greater number

But elements that more encumber

The message behind the front foor.

How Does Four Years

May 15^th, 2009

Separated by one

Become a dream?

It came alive for two weeks

After an absence of the same,

In form diminished.

So much greater is it from a year

In the faces of friends

In buildings changed

In halls where my name

Is no longer spoken

The bells ring.

Is it enough to erase

A connection

Once as deep as the school’s

religion?

Angst from a test,

Long days of learning,

Late nights with friends,

Laughs in the lamp-light.

They are whispers to any who listen,

But burdens of life dead to me

As I live on

In other places

With other people.

The buildings

Sidewalks

Trees echo

The past:

Conversations

Realizations

Run-ins with people

Too long unseen.

Foreign at first

They reagard you.

Standing regarded

They’re distant--

Miles measured in feet.

As I am an outsider

Where is my place?

The bells ring again,

But only I hear them,

If only they tolled for me.