Mr. Wakefield

shame on me for not bringing this to you earlier.

quiet mirth

When the last of them turn south
And this city rolls to a stop
Think of me, dear

With the silence settling slowly and with patience
Like smoke in the lungs
I know that you would like it here

You would breathe this in like pine forests
Crawl through its branches
And climb towards the sun

You would thank me for what it has to offer
And what you will become

Astrology

i pass them as they sit
at the long bar of the diner
where i waste my nights

they meet me with their eyes as i depart
then follow up with the slightest nod
and we understand each other

i'm reminded in those moments
that the longing to be balanced
and steady, and decent
lives in every man

The Gift of Fire

I spend years on the edge of the world
sheltered from it
I watch the coronas trace the concentric circles of energy beneath me
I bide my time and gather my rest

I expel
my energy firing in bursts
jumps
just high enough to glimpse the fault lines

I imagine
if the tonnage shifted from Atlas' throngs
with arms like tree trunks
and legs of stretched iron

I realize
the burden
that would ring louder and show brighter
than I could ever bare to falter upon

but when I hear you in the other room
with a distracted fascination
at the center of your voice

I am muted and dulled
I wonder myself weak

about a persisting burden of righteousness
and for you to want the same

And as you turn the corner and fix your gaze to mine
I know nothing of the gravity from these myths
I shun it's pull
I bask in it's fiery corona

I know only that we are still so young
and Atlas can wait another winter
I know it

one hundred strangers

in a few hours it will be the international day of peace
i'm neck deep in quiet
the love of a waning september

the winds will soon grow cold and harsh,

but for now it feels hot and empty
like the ice; its needed
like the starkness of it will wake me

I don't seem to catch the leaves changing
as if they go from deep green to shining gold in a matter of hours
as if they fall overnight

as if the markets pack up
and the streets grow from grey to white

when porch swings go silent
and the two young lovers part ways for the winter

he goes to georgia,
where the wind simply chills
and the frosts are cause for conversation

she goes to maine,
where she is lost in the torrent
and the people are able to collectively marvel
each night,
in the calm silence of snowfall.

these legs are for flight.

Quetico Deep

When the winds blew us East, that's where we wandered
Then North to the wild, our virgin boots squandered

I felt you beside me, this trail of wrath and water
Speaking from the trees; the lull whispers
Look no farther

Sleep, steady sleep
In the cool, darkness of night

So soon, the trail it heads
So long, the soul will fight

Endless fields of blueberries, not yet ripe
Reap young one, reap
Let us bring you this life

Fill our hearts to warmth
And your body to brim
Let it bask before the choir; before our recess.
Before the fields grow weak and thin
Before the basins of rivers do split

Let the northern trail stand
And awaken the fruit within

Vera Davis

When the lamps were turned low
and the birds grew silent
I stopped in my tracks and marveled

You traveled the world like you owned it
Lived out the years
Beat the life from them like they owed you an answer

Living in the sunlight
As we followed you to it

I still wonder sometimes
If you found what you were looking for

"thy sea is so great, and my boat is so small"
-Unknown Author
Phrase displayed on the JFK presidential desk.

White Wooden Dresser

I look towards all the late night storms that await me
the heaviest snow in the middle of summer

If only I could have kept you there, among the marks
Let you become that permanent

I could have felt you dwell
And allowed you to speak

In the last of the rain we left
packed up the shelter, strolled home


I would remember that storm
I was drenched in it


Up to my thighs in the last of your words
It slowed me
Made me stumble, an asphyxiation
you would never understand


Strides through a field of not yet concrete
Where one imagines
When it will fix


When running is no more
And the heart is fast


Just sit
And breathe it all back in

j.w. baz

blue sunlight through a hotel curtain on valentines day

sometimes we are nowhere
and i get there so much faster than you

i think it eats away at the mystery beneath your ribs
a little each day

i know this feeling
like an itch that almost burns

it sits and scratches
it bides and twists


it begs to speak.

we stood so tall

my grandmother sits
she tells me stories
reminds of things
like happiness and wisdom, and that
America is so very young

she reminds me that
Love is the end of a fleeting fire
a flicker. and then another.
a thing so profound and persistent
a thing so dumbfounding

she sings to me her past
in the low, cold vibration of blues
in the winds of a southern Illinois pasture
in the spark of midnight fires

and in the rhythm of waves
as warships of men
who stood so tall
departed our glorious coasts

"Cool of a temperate breeze from dark skies to wet grass
we fell in a field it seems now a thousand summers passed
when our kite lines first crossed
we tied them into knots
and to finally fly apart
we had to cut them off.

Since then it's been a book you read in reverse
you understand less as the pages turn"

-Pink Bullets

We read by the stars that night, and the past remained;
like snowfall.

Diffusion

Just know that
I see the things that move beneath the surface
within you

just know that
the purest ground shows
the tainted parts upon it

when the soil is so thin across the concrete
and even nimble footsteps leave it flawed

just know that I see you
hiding among the cold perfection
and agile grip

just know that
I've already left.

The Light, So Wicked

I turned the lights off and you glowed,
glowed like the sun's reflection upon our most selfish moon.

And when we began to swallow the nights
so fast that they played back with blur;
we ran and sputtered like film strips.

I felt this story coming,
knew it to be streaming across my breast bones and into my heart.

I breathed in it's rapture,
feasted on essence,
winced at a fleeting future,

and died at the side of it's salt-ridden bed.

We run so fast
and they flee so perfectly.

and at night,
our minds are rented out like parking spaces.

Lending ourselves to the deepest dreams.

As if I remembered your voice,
that the days were still spring,
that my bones could still rest among your solid, solid shoulders.

the last audible revelry

We imagine each other like the civil war characters that we still wish to be.

a humble bravery
a simple calm
a blinding lust
a practiced plea
and a knowing question that is so, so hard to see answered.

all in a weekend's work.

[Sometimes forgive. Never forget.]

I implore you to see the simplicity of the wind
the symmetry of the snowflake
the vastness of a warm night

I ask you to see past the tired and sunken eyes
the stubble chin
to a tipsy night confessional

I see them out there...
watch them fumble around in the darkness of the holy days
chilled liquor down throats
and if so privileged, across backs
as smooth as marble

7

I woke up that morning with open eyed blur,
short hair, cold toes, mute and unsure.

The beauty I remember, the shakiness.

It lay, draped across my shoulders in the light of a morning
too very familiar for the last salutation
to be so far away