Posts for June 5, 2026 (page 4)

but I did walk with my nephew

visiting from Colorado

who explained the mycorrhizal –

fungal web to me like a scientist

not a third grader

as he pedaled Pop’s bike

up Victory

to show me his pit stops

the spinning thing

(a double glass pinwheel),

the one pretty flower bed,

the rain wire “like we have”

and the Black Lives Matter sign

“Because black lives DO MATTER!!!”

I grinned as he turned there

to coast down the hill

just as his cousin joined us

to say, “time to go home”

and I thought to myself

he’s gonna be alright

not the heartstrings 
themselves but
to vitiate
the tethers 
to let snap back 
from detours the arteries 
to their course intended
as much a part of everything
as fire’s flow from well-sealed bellows 
as Eucharist from chalice to your lips

Along the lines of
beauty, easy to follow down your face,
could we find similarities like
darts on a round board?
Every shared freckle a three,
faces dotted and dissimilar, a lost
game we can still play together.
Here we are alike, here we are
indifferent, here we are different.
Just like the type of twins that aren’t,
kaleidoscoped in what we share. I
loved your brown eyes.
My green never seemed so
never ending.
Over the slope of your nose, the scrunch of your
pursed lips, so
quick to a smile.
Remember then? Was it really
so easy to forget what you loved,
to find something worth staying for in me?
Under that roof, this roof, it should never have been
vacant as it is.
We were never so similar to be recognized as a whole, yet
X marked the spot they could find us. Look in
your brown mirror eyes, for the sparkles of a
zenith we once shared.

Maybe I should write about the bioluminesence:
tiny glittering pins, pure daylight blue as you swish
your arms through the water. About my friends
far into the bay, splashing & tossing rings of light
at a purple horizon. About rubbing salt stains
out of our bathing suits in the bathroom sink &
patching blisters on her heels. About my anxiety
I tugged too hard & became wrong.
The ocean was warm & we stared back at it
arms & legs all gooseflesh then walked in silence.
We sat in the hotel room eating bread & pasta &
watching 3 am cable. We left the door open.
It was there & then it was gone.

It’s the cutest game ever,

how my dog suckers me

into rubbing her belly.

Laying on the floor,

blocking my path,

baring her pink tummy,

mischief in her eyes,

daring me to even think

about passing by

without petting her.

I turn the corner from the kitchen

and she rolls over in the green chair,

demanding affection.

One sunny day, she would not come in

from the backyard.

I walked all the way over

to check on her

just for her to grin

and go belly up

as if to say,

“Gotcha!

I’m not going anywhere

‘til I get some pet pets.”

Even when she is in my girlfriend’s lap,

already being showered with attention,

she flashes me her tummy

expectantly.

A good tummy rub trap can happen

any time

anywhere

without warning

when least expected,

and it’s always impossible to resist.

Such is the peril of loving something.

I kiss her forehead every chance I get.

I put the phone down when we play.

I rub her tummy each and every instance

that it is offered.

For time is its own trap.

Someday the house will be empty

of everything except memory.

Scout bees sought the empty
first, signaled others to fill the space
in the hollow hive towers—a new colony

of scout bees sought the empty
hole where I’ve lost so much family.
The honey returned heady with grace.

Scout bees found the empty
first, a signal for others to fill the space.

We grew up ashamed of who we were
but we were proud of our shame

I never thought I was invisible.
I stand out like a scarecrow painted in hot pink.
and I never knew why I loved being percieved,
or why listening to metallica helped me sleep.
but I’ve always been this way.
I loved mis-matching my clothes as a kid,
singing and dancing in public,
embarressing myself every time I go in public.

I even tried convincing myself I was basic,
just to see what it was like to try to fit in.
But I lost friends and it didn’t end well.
I never lost anyone for the way I dressed
but it still helped me realize something.
I can’t find myself when I’m lost in a field someone else made.
I have to plant the root of the stockings,
I have to search my own field.
Even if that means I’m alone in that journy,
It means I’ll find people who can give me better support.

I feel invisible to my family.
Ignored.
annoying.
ungreatful.
but I can’t lie to them or myself.
even if it means I’ll get a jugdmental look every time I walk down the stairs.
Their eyes shoot like daggers in my heart,
A dagger signed “no one will love you”
and those words course through my blood.

It never helps when someone else adds a dagger.
trust broken off too harsh.
but at least I have myself.
Even if it makes me want to get my own dagger,
stab myself til I start to listen.

Its hard to be myself in a family who doesnt share my field.
Thats why music has become my family.

Is it possible to shower in 2026
without thinking about data centers
or dried up watersheds
or the ocean
or folks in my own state
in my own county
who struggle for access to clean water?

It feels luxurious—
hot cascade scalding off the grime,
soap bubbling up across my skin,
everything circling the drain as I try
to enjoy the sensation of getting clean, 
fingers pruning up
just as I turn off the stream.

I pause to consider
what it means to have water
at the flick of a faucet
running right into my house
to sinks and tubs and toilets.
How relatively new it is in human history
how quick we got used to it
how quick it could go away.

And in too many places, it already has.