I see you in her
I wake a hundred times a night
to hear, to see, to feel you breathe;
on tenterhooks for any sign
of struggling, or spit-up, or a gurgling wheeze.
And when you finally dissolve
(with heavy eyes, and wrapped in place),
I roll to my side to see your mum’s eyes
but what I see instead is your face.
In my half-awake state, sometimes I’d see Summer when looking at Ashley sleeping.
No matter what, you made it through
No matter what, you made it through,
and I’m so proud of you.
Our love began in saddened eyes,
coincidentally shared by two;
no matter what, you made it through.
Your dream return to Texas skies;
you freed your heart to go pursue,
and I’m so proud of you.
You took my dream and recognized
how many shots to make it true.
No matter what, you made it through.
There are not many who trusts and tries
this many times to say “I do”,
and I’m so proud of you.
Till forty weeks you exercised,
then pushed the miracle that you grew.
No matter what, you made it through,
and I’m so proud (so in love) with you.
This is not a poem. This is not a test.
I am a poet.
I am a photographer.
I am not a drinker.
I love my coffee in the morning,
my tea in the afternoon,
but alcohol is not part of my plan,
it is a rare treat.
I am a husband,
I am a father,
I keep my body fit
and my mind sharp,
I do not waste my time in a haze,
I do not lose the early mornings to pain.
I am intelligent,
I make good, long-term decisions,
I am funny,
and I form strong relationships,
I do not have drinking buddies,
I do not go out on the piss,
I treat my drinks with ceremony, and respect.
I am alive,
I am interested in experiencing the world,
I do not numb myself from it,
I do not romanticize the image of drinking whiskey,
I recognize that cocktails are fun,
I partake only on occasion,
but enjoy making them for others, too.
—
Update: it took till March 2024 to actually commit to this vision of myself.
Something is different
Maybe it was the cold morning,
bundled up on our walk for coffee,
hustling back so I could head to the hospital,
car seat inspections,
practicing the motions of buckling in,
maybe it was that imagining,
or the nostalgia of brewing a cup of tea
to stave off the parking lot chill,
there’s just something different in my vision,
in that part of me that’s self aware
and aware of everything around me,
it feels like a center is forming,
an inward force that pulls it all together,
a dazzling core that opens my eyes,
it is love, I think,
an evolution thereof,
in a way I have never quite felt before.
unswallowed
Deep, impending moments
press their weight into the fabric of our being
a gravity that pulls us to the inevitable core
and we claw claw claw at anything that’ll keep us unswallowed
Wouldn’t it be easier
Wouldn’t it be easier
if all the sins were buried too;
turned to ashes like the flesh
that brought to life the quiet crude
which should have stayed a fantasy,
and even then examined hard;
for all the living in that moment,
the life of love that you discard.
Wouldn’t it be easier
if all my family showed me ‘how’
instead of all how not to be,
as if I could simply not allow
the drink, the smoke, the wondering eye
to rise in me like the meeting of storms,
not lessons learned or lines in sand,
my soul holds on to prior forms.
Wouldn’t it be easier
to treat you as an effigy
and not a victim of an ancient thread
that binds us not with empathy
but mutual disappointment
for what we could not overcome;
an unattended funeral awaits for those
who falter and succumb.
Now you can’t see the mountain
Now you can’t see the mountain,
the smoke that silks the hazy green,
the layers on layers of silhouette peaks,
the sheer descent that seeks the deep,
the heat, the breeze, the forever-view
that better men have led me to.
It used to be
It used to be that when the waves
delivered me toward the shore,
the ocean reeled and wound the strings
that knotted through my salty heart.
It used to be that the shrinking land
in turn diminished every woe,
and opened up the world beyond
the sun, the moon, the forever-fold.
It used to be…but the gravity has shifted,
in the heart of this nation are the dreams that I have lifted,
are the roots that I’ve buried,
are the branches that I’ve tended;
full-steam ahead, before I’m dead,
let it grow where once it ended.
Effigy
This campfire is an effigy
of the man I was before your heart
began to beat like pulsing flames,
and drew from me the soot and dark.
All the things they say will go away,
I throw them to the fire and pray
the trade is fair, and the tales are true;
that life will never be the same with you.
There is no rush
I know we say we cannot wait,
but take your time, there is no rush;
too soon you’ll bloom, outgrow your room,
and leave our home with hollow hush.
Of course we’re excited for the moments,
but they’ll end as fast as they begin,
so let’s savor what we can never again:
watching you grow even now from within.
I know we say we cannot wait,
but take your time.
There is no rush.
It won’t be our last
When we fell in love, we fell in fast,
fueled by the loss of loves we surpassed,
but this time it’s forever; for every year that’ll pass,
each kiss is a promise that it won’t be our last.
Before you were even you
Remind me, when I’m old and blue,
when all that’s left are empty rooms,
how much I feared the love that grew
before you were even you.
Indulge me when I’m working through,
adjusting from the life I knew,
where once was one, now three from two,
before you were even you.
Forgive me when I’m feeling new,
when all I know feels half untrue;
what little time to try accrue,
before you were even you.
Believe me, when I’m got, I’m glue.
Where hopes are few, we’ll hold them too.
And I know it seems impossible,
but I felt a little clue…
the universe reached out to me
before you were even you.
Feeling Green
Imagine if that’s all it took;
of all the ways that goodness slipped,
to find it soon upon the hook
two days afar since when you sipped.
And still! It promises no harm.
And yet! It poses as a cure.
For how it gleams and glows with charm.
For why your faith must yet endure.
You’ve long awaited feeling green -
that pang to undermine wears old -
what was foresaw shall be foreseen
as greens unfold as mines to gold.
Standing Still
I envy those who bear the rain -
already soaked, why spoil the fun -
they are the same who know that pain
is but endured, and not outrun.
It passes (as they knew it would) -
head-starts on all who turned and fled;
I oversee what’s understood:
their standing still to get ahead.
How they became
We rise toward the freedom-peak,
and summit at the clear survey,
expecting higher scales to seek,
but find that down’s the only way.
We clamber from the panic-crowd,
and back away from every fate,
retreating into empty clouds
that snare our steps with hollow weight.
We fall right through the nothing-edge,
and lucky if we catch upon
ascending air that forms a ledge
on which to furl and fossil on.
We wake to days that other’s don’t,
and count the ways we’ve lived the same,
contending that it can’t - it won’t -
become of us how they became.
Every day, I choose you
Don’t fear the fervor of my leisure;
each venture falls as fast it rose.
As love, as lust (as every pleasure),
they’ve all made way for greener throes;
that is except for all I treasure:
this life (to which all others measure)
that I choose each day as hard I chose
before,
again,
evermore again.
Increment
There was never an urgency.
’Pinned’ in my messages, ‘Starred’ in my chats,
sound advice and mentorship at my fingertips,
banking on years of challenging questions,
astute insights, and a-ha moments.
But those chats now lay inactive -
‘12 days ago’ -
and they will increment for every day to come.
Hurt
Nothing fazed you.
Never scared to challenge a norm,
always ready for the next big adventure,
the next cage fight…
I had it down as ‘bravery’,
or some feverish determination
to never let this world keep you down;
to keep anyone down.
Nothing fazed you.
Never panicked by dire circumstance,
always channeling your focus for good,
for teaching us objective truths,
but I never knew the reason…
you never feared temporary discomfort
because nothing in this world could hurt you
more than you hurt already.
Mike
Was I toasting to you?
Compelled to smoke an Excalibur
and finish off a bottle of Rabbit Hole,
what deep pain was I trying to overcome
on behalf of a friend so many miles away?
Was that why I couldn’t sleep last night?
A sledgehammer held in the darkness.
Whose soul could relax and lay to rest?
Only the body ignorant of what has occurred.
How is it that you inspired so many,
only to martyr yourself to where we will not follow?
Your mentorship was not done!
We were not done!
But now I wonder if the calm behind your eyes
was death, all along.
I await each stage of this grief now knowing
that I don’t have you to call.
There are so many ways you helped me grow,
and I thank you for them all.