wild, open green

holding up the fog with pointed fingers,

a fence of vacant spiderwebs, a patch of wildflowers,

a toppled sign reading Janet Morris Memorial Garden.

i want to find out how many strides stretch

between me and the treeline,

to hold the hands which

buried the bulbs and scattered the seeds,

to know the woman

for whom the milkweed and the irises grow.

all in the same moment

i hear a bark echo from the ribs of a dog,

a bullet spit from the metal mouth of a shotgun,

the jarring cry of a crow,

a distant highway’s mechanical thrum.

dawn spills over us, me and the earth

and all its music,

day breaking like the yolk of an egg

in the cast iron skillet of night,

like God’s yellow highlighter

drug across the green page of this moment.

two sunlit bodies go still at the sight of mine,

a doe and her fawn, frozen in the tallgrass.

i gaze, unflinching,

wondering,

what metaphor could ever suffice here?

we were strangers, minutes ago

padding softly through our lives,

now face to beautiful face, unmoving,

yet never in my little life

so moved.

there’s a sort of violence about it,

a slow and sweet-smelling psychopathy

which would have otherwise remained anonymous

had i let the orange be an orange,

but immediately it was not just an orange,

it was my orange,

and that was the door.

i heard hunger’s footsteps in the hall

and made haste to take my time,

held the fruit up to my ear as though it were a conch shell

and i might hear the orchard on the other side.

i listened for the sun, for the chlorophyll

snaking through the veins of the leaves,

for the quiet song of gravity.

i listened but there was no sound,

no orange blossom unfolding,

no seed turning in the womb of the earth,

only my own appetite leaning against the

skin of my fingertips.

then suddenly

there was an awful sound like murder—

a crack in the door, a wound,

one white thread of light whispering

enter, enter,

and i could not stop myself,

slipping my thumbnail underneath

to pry peel from what was precious and mine.

i could not stop, but neither could i ignore

how the tangerine so resembled the moon,

all cratered and curled in on itself,

intact by some partial gravity, perhaps hope,

perhaps fear.

i swear i felt the fruit flinch.

i considered, then, that if the orange was the moon,

then i was a black hole,

obsidian mouth hinged wide as a grave,

like i imagine the gate to hell would appear

were it decorated like heaven,

studded with stars like pearls,

or perhaps sores,

regardless, the dark vision was sufficient

to still my hands.

i set the half-dressed orange before me,

beheld my waning gibbous,

my waxing remorse.

it appeared so small, so childlike

there in front of me,

and i’d never felt so vast and starving in my life.

i felt like a man, a lowercase god,

somebody who doesn’t say sorry.

apologetically, my fingers resumed their work.

tell me, is this what it felt like?

enjoying me in season,

delicate in your tearing me apart?

did you hate yourself as my threads snapped?

as the parts of me let go of one another,

rocked back into the crater of your palm,

some of me scattering across the floor mat

on the passenger side of your Toyota Prius?

do you loathe yourself, still,

every time you talk with your hands,

or stroke your beard,

catching in your nostrils

my citrus-scented memory?

now, with the sweet acid of clementine

in my throat, i know what it’s like to be you—

eternally hungry, afraid of your own hands,

drumming to the music your intestines make

inside your body, as though

dinner is not already on your kitchen table

where your wife prays that it’s not true,

that you won’t come home with

yellow fingernails and flattery

that reeks of me.

i sit with my knees up

at the kitchen table

cleaning the peanut butter from my teeth

while my oldest brother

tells me a story;

his voice competes with

the sizzling of bacon strips

on the stove

the days have already melted together

in my mind,

like honey in a hot cup of coffee;

it must be summer

freshman year

now exists only in retrospect,

and from this two-day distance

every failure becomes

painfully plain to see

in this moment

hugging my knees to my chest

i am so aware that i am a child

with everything to learn

and so much more

this morning in the city,

the late april sun lollygags

behind a carbon dioxide curtain.

my cappuccino has gone cold;

i just shiver and wait.

It has been a long while since I've logged on here. I have been totally changed by Jesus since then. Part of me wants to delete all my old posts and start fresh, but so much would be lost from those seasons of my life. So I am keeping them. But I am not that same poet or person, by His grace. May that hope and joy be evident in every poem from this point forward.

glances whispers rumors spark feelings without names igniting icy rage tinted jealous jarred thoughts unglued scattered lacking sentence structure because my mind has no lines no boundaries no control when wandering wanders too far i can’t retrieve the wanderers from the wilderness so i weep for the nameless soldiers of the war within the battles beneath breasts behind smiles masking chaos at its snowcapped peak cracking sliding an avalanche of aimless agony burying the excess emotions undesirable and ugly for no eyes but His and even those glint suspicious with partiality unspoken prejudice unrevealed instead put away privately but sensed and unraveled at the battlegrounds now a graveyard littered with death but bursting with new life choking out the mundane existence until the mundane departs and superficial standards still stand they still stand they still stand i can’t stand it any longer

i have been under the impression

that the bright places belong to me

that being a bright place was for me, only me

but now i have a hallway light

to chase the nightmares from my bedroom

and bring the colour back to my walls

and i can once again make out

all the milk tea cans i’ve collected

when i realize that you're in the next room

in the pitch black

feeling consumed, chewed and swallowed

into the belly of depression

i'd like to be your eyes

to be a little bright spot in your dark, dark world

i think i found some bright places

so i could be a bright place

for you, maybe more than me

a home in which hair ties are hazards

here i learn the scrutiny of

fluorescent lights

on every scab

every square inch of skin that

ordinarily stays a secret

only known to myself and my razorblade

now

i’m watching old movies with new strangers

and spotting tree frogs on the windows

ten minute phone calls

and two tshirts for the week

i don’t remember what time it is,

not even what day

quite frankly

i don’t know where i am exactly

or why i am wherever i am

or who is holding this blue marker

and hoping Mrs. Maribel won’t take it

before i finish this poem

but i’ll be okay

i’m just gonna go sit a while

with other sick people

and let myself laugh

for a time

i find myself

reading old poems

for a distraction

because

i can't tell them

that i want to disappear

that i still can't believe

after seven days in the hospital

and longer than that

in my bible

i wish i had never said a word

never been born to say a word

because all i know how to do

is let people down

mornings

have always been

for procrastinating being alive

listening to sad songs

to start the day

just in case i forgot who i was

while i was sleeping

mornings mean

watching the sun

set fire to the pictures of violence

littering my twin bedsheets

from the night

i yawn and stretch my shoulders

in the dull heat of the flames

every morning

when i wave hello to my walls again

darkness clings to me

it clings to me

like dust clings to old sweaters

like viruses cling to young bodies

and it is heavy,

this darkness

this morning,

the demons complimented

my music taste

and i cut my wired headphones

with purple scissors

every morning,

and every moment

between mornings,

i am standing on a battlefield

with a ballpoint pen between my fingers

and in the soft flesh of my belly

i inscribe poems

telling myself, i'm winning! i'm winning!

but i'm just bleeding

this morning

i realize

i've married myself to darkness

and called it a coping mechanism

this morning

and the last

i have prayed for light

but it is difficult to know

if the sun is rising or falling

(am i finally winning?

was it ever mine to win?)

this morning

i feel bloated with questions

and prayers that i don't want to pray

and unfinished poems

to scribble onto sketchbook pages

instead of skin

i yawn

and i stretch

and i brush my hair

and i pray anyways

for Light

because i want to understand what it's like to see

and to win

and to dream in colors that aren't red

and to dance

and to be alive again

i pray in poetry

and sometimes in no words at all

but still i pray

because this morning

there is nothing else left for me to do