In an attempt to understand the wind
I became the ocean
And allowed it to breeze over me
Softly
All of my questions hanging
Like nautical miles
Cast upon wakes
Hanging
Delicate ripples
Dancing con-currently
And laughing
But these questions hummed quietly
Into seashells
The winds responses -
Hollow –
It was then that I felt the winds
Sorrow
A love gone unanswered
Tornado over sunrise today’s
And forlorn tomorrows
In an attempt to understand the wind
I became the ocean
And allowed it to breeze over me
Soulfully
All of its questions
Wondering
Like imagination
Of idle dreams
Wondering
Immortal teardrops
Summoning oceans
But the emotions hummed quietly
Into breezes
The oceans responses –
Hollow –
It was then I understood
The √me is i
I transfuse the wind
In the ocean
And remark the ocean
In the sky
“I” transcend questions
My answers hummed earthquakes
Into seashells
Pressed against the ear of a deaf child
His response –
A smile -
When the world finally collapsed in
On itself –
I asked if there would still be poetry
But my words collapsed in on themselves
To weak to bear the weight
Of such a metaphor
When the world finally collapsed in
On itself –
You stood there in the rain smiling
Arms palm turned upwards
Raindrops echoing the tears that wouldn’t come
Hands saying nothing more than –
(A simple) Thank you
When the world finally collapsed in
On itself –
I put my words in a box
And tied it with shoelaces and bubble gum
Because nothing is more haunting than the
Scent of childhood
Pushed way (way) back under the bed
Beside baseball cards and broken dreams
When they told me poetry was dead
I said –
Well then –
I guess we’re all fucked
So they chained me to a wall
And my whole world collapsed in on itself
Like a warm hug
And I smiled
Each night the warden would
Sing country tunes, y’all
When I just wanted to rock
And offered me cigarettes
But smoke is simple fires draped in warm blankets
And I don’t much like the taste of decay
And as the world lay crumbling
I stayed chained to that wall
Laughing at the understanding that
Death rhymes with breath
And they can’t take either one away from me
We all never felt more alone
Than the day the world collapsed in on itself
But I never gave up on love
And my mother never used warm hugs
As collateral
And the raindrops washed the tears
That couldn’t come
And my palms turned downward
Hands praying nothing more
Than to warm fires kissed in cold blankets
Thanking whoever chained me to this wall
Because when the world finally collapsed in
on itself–
There was no need for poetry
And love alliterated
Bending backwards on itself
Until Love
Became E-V-O-L
And despite our shortcomings as a people
We L-I-V-E-D on
As despite our shortcomings as people
We never thought to switch the O and I
Because this is bigger than U and I
And despite our shortcomings as people
We never felt so alone than a single i
So we let it die
Chained to that wall
And we
E-V-O-L-V-E-D
I tattooed her smile on my tongue
So every time I laughed
She would come
But I was inked
And lacerated
With evolution
I had adapted from madmen
And beg-hers
Each night she would show me her moon
And cry when I held her
Leaving footsteps
On the insides of eyelids
Fingerprints
That cried
When I did
I tried to leave
But I was inked
I ate the seven layers of your soul
And prepared for the judgment in my pants
It was a baby boy
He wasn’t yours
He was born – still
Yet whispered
The name of my grandmother
The-A held silent
And danced upon his tongue
We have come to the conclusion
That mathematician’s were mistaken
It takes a child to multiply
A smile by a heartbeat
And divide the solution by a hum
Raised to the power of OHM
Thus proving the exponential
Growth of a kiss -
That love increases
By a number no less than its root to the
Seventh power
The square root of me is i
I love you
The-A held silent
As my grandmother loved
As my mother loves