Uncommonly common

Gone like faith 

On Sunday 

Like my namesake

Written on the back of a leaf 

Floated on runoff 

Swept under the city 

Between the grates 

But I returned 

To the crisp dry pages 

Of open-ended opportunities 

Of mass confessions 

I set my eyes on fire 

And feet directly into the coals 

To know 

I'm alive 

I live 

In every verse of longing 

I'm nurtured by poets

Long since dead 

Who had faith in their hands 

Who sweet talked the spirit 

To dabble in their inkwells 

Who found rafters and a noose 

Who reopened scars because

They changed their mind

About changing their mind 

Who emptied bottles like bullets 

Into their mouths 

Because they couldn't bear to be common 

Because they were dying to be original 

Did they let their names float away 

Did they know the spirit couldn't leave

Their words 

Even as their bodies hanged 

Did they lose faith 

Or take to the grave

That 26 letters can only be arranged 

In so many ways