My eye, my left eye
the one not pressed against
the pillow…
my eye sees the numbers fall
off
down
away…the alarm clock
is happy to tell
me,
point out that
the day
started without
me.
My mind wanders away to…
you, your
smell drifting from the pillow
where you
were
last
and are still on my skin, on my
mind, my
eye watches the day
start and I
think
watch
dream that now
this moment
this spark, this…
”now” is not
enough
to hold the memory
the ghost, the
smell
sound of
you. And I don’t
know what
will.

Growing up I wanted to be…
what? I don’t remember, I don’t
really remember.
I wanted to be grown up I think and that was
the long
and
short of it

Now I am grown up and I have a
daughter, a reflection
of my DNA, a
piece of me
out in the world.

I don’t know who she is.

As a father I was dismal, removed, a
failure in most
respects…except
the
bank account.

Even then I was always, always
always
looking for the next opportunity, the
next career boost, the
next
big thing for
family, for
quality of
life.

ha ha ha that is funny

And I usually took them, went there, did that
uprooted
relocated
changed for
the
better…and that
is funny
too.

I don’t know who she is.

Maybe, I’ve never known and now
now
now she is a million
miles away but
she has always been
a million miles
away.

Even when she sat next to me
the same room
the same
house,
town
state.

I don’t know who she is…and…
don’t know how
to
find her.

In the deepest part of night…long past the ebb of day
I lay watching the bed shadow come through the open door
saw it lay down beside me; uncurl it’s dreams from its face
close it’s eyes, draw deep breaths and begin to snore

I wondered why a mere bed shadow is allowed to sleep so sound
while lost and egg-eyed I stared at singing shifting bedroom walls
waiting for a moment, a singular instant so profound
instead listening to sadness in the wind as its empty future calls

It is not sorrow that I feel in return…and I don’t feel sympathy
It is not anonymity projected inside my un-closeable eyes
It is an expectation sitting right there on the bed beside me
An expectation that I will follow wherever and whatever the future decides

I am the future
I am the past
I am the answers
of all questions asked.

Dreamless with dry lips…tangled legs…laying prone across the bed
my mind wanders into low earth orbit, into cluttered near space
a freeform space projectile reflecting the stars; blue and red
and reflecting what I have been thinking about…about the human race

Are we really moving forward on this rock at a thousand miles an hour?
Will we be able to rise above ourselves and shed the bonds to this earth ?
Do we really even need to leave? Or will we hide and tremble, shake and cower?
Still just scrambling humans; forever chasing ourselves in the mud and dirt…

I am the future
I am the past
I am the answers
of all questions asked.

I let myself sleep after awhile (I was the one who had designed my lack of peace)
And I will be the one who will be the architect of my forward movement when awake
The bed shadow moves closer; its dreams curl up into my body, covering my face
my mind never moves, never feels the projectile returning… causing the bed to quake.

I am the future
I am the past
If only this were true
If only this were true…

Hey, the world woke me up

this morning, said

hi, what’s up

it didn’t

end

didn’t erupt

didn’t do much

of

anything

good

great

didn’t want

to wake up

didn’t, but

am glad, am

…up.

A car alarm at 6 am;

really? On

Saturday morning…

really?

I rolled over to

no

one

to the cooler

side

of the

bed…not cooler as

in “let’s hang out, more people

like me better

than you”

but…sigh…too complicated

I rolled

over

and…

smiled.

 

The quiet hits me first, the

absence of falling

noise…a billion

drips at once crashing

leaves, grass, branches, vinyl siding

roof tiles

weekend plans…

The sun was hiding as if

as if

embarrassment

were

possible. Clouds;

pushed away

by

unruly

hands making short work,

elbowed and shouldered

aside.

A quick and fierce

glow

cement warms

steams

dream sequence as

air dances

waves of heat sliding upward

taking rain

back

where it

started.

The air sparkles

clean and

new…and

today becomes

what it

should

be.

 

Two opposing ideas held
in thought, in my
head; balanced…a knife edge
their molecular makeup
vibrating in
time, in
tune with the universe, the
ever and the all.
Dismal and sorrowful:
irresistible force
meet
immovable
object…
the nanometer space
between
light
and dark; comfort
and pain.
Screaming to the nothingness inside…I can’t
escape its inevitability…
nothing my
senses can
discern;
can
choose between;
madness
limitless and
unlivable and wholly the creation
of my own
failure to
decide…
and the depths of
a
soul, of
dreams unrealized…never
to be disrupted
by
dawn.

I spent a long, long, long time watching
the world turn, the universe slide
by…watched as I grew and lived
cried, laughed, learned…and
am still lying silent in bed
with my eyes
closed.
Not really in bed but
there as I was
5
6
7
years old.
Wondering what lies meant when
I hardly knew
truth….wondering
aloud with no one
listening.
Older and wiser
(ha ha) now…
and still wondering aloud
why the truth lives in
my bones…and
lies
live on my skin.
Getting to them
(the truths)
involves much more
than simply
opening my eyes
but
but
but; I’ll start
there.

I woke up today and the earth was
spinning
I didn’t feel it, didn’t know it, didn’t
think about it…but…
standing on the moon I might have seen
it, like it was in my hand, slowly passing under
me;
slowly at a thousand miles an hour.
Today was spinning past me like a garden
hose…no handle…high pressure water
spraying
a wet spewing snake
spinning.
I can see it now but like
I’m not
there, standing close
but not
there…removed.
I saw today spin away and spin back and
felt my feet; flat
on the earth.
Spinning but so big, so big, so
slow…I felt in control like
I want to be in control, want
to hold on…
Earth is an illusion.
It’s always
spinning…
I just don’t
know it until…it’s so far away
that
I can hold it
in
my hand.

 

It is not made of concrete, not
steel or stone, or
embedded in our consciousness;
indentured to our DNA.
It is not required to
understand its passage, know
its transience, see its
effects.
It is everywhere we look, it
is all we are, can be, can
know yet…is…
unknowable; nowhere…and
nothing we can ever be.
Time stretches and
we see a piece, a line, a
passing frame…we
cannot understand the completeness
the
massive amount of
nothing it is…as…
it devolves into fragments of memory riding
shotgun on
slow moving thoughts toward
our end, our own
shadows.
It is a line that began before
us…will stretch past…
now;
into a future
we cannot know…yet…
by its nature
its
essence, we feel
it slide by, feel it
grab, pull us
forward
toward
the place
where there is
no
end.