My teeth, despite being electric,
cannot hold back the curses.
Many portions of bone green despite age.
Hate & fear surge forth through the vessels,
limping back blue and love by veins.
My eyes a dada overlay feeding images
back to willful neurons that don’t fire on all cylinders.
My voice cracks, hums, croaks, drops
into the low vibration of birthing stars.
Fingers a folded texture, hair unbound,
muscle memory a gun alternately loaded
with blanks & hollow points.   

I adore all of this.
I am a text that cultivates ambiguity.

Once I was a maniac.
I called Diane Di Prima ( a famous beat poet of the 60s) and left a message on her voice mail, “I love you.” The audacity
She called me back. The shock.
…so, when I entered that cafe in San Francisco and she was actually there, tears streamed down my face. The Joy.

like old Li Bai
I plunge into the river
drunk on poetry
            trying to catch
………the moon

The pitcher squares his CAP
He nods to the CATCHER
A steely glance to FIRST BASE
He throws another WALK
New batters step into POSITION
A swing and a MISS
Waiting for the SWEET-SPOT
Outfielders on GUARD
A fly ball goes FOUL
He checks his SWING
Then he hits a TRIPLE
Behind him comes a BASE HIT
One comes HOME
But a crushing DOUBLE PLAY
Ends the INNING
Tie GAME
Bottom of the NINTH
In steps a FINISHER
The Umpire sweeps HOME PLATE
All eyes on the BALL
Player after PLAYER
Two STRIKE OUT
Bases LOADED
HOME-RUN
Game WON!

I write a poem 
about how I feel
about your actions,
staying in my feels.
What had happened was…

Most don’t know
they get a poem.
After it’s written
I’m over it!

The Oprah of poetry,
you get a poem
and you get poem,
everybody gets a poem!

Moving on to the next offender.
This is equal opportunity poetry.
Never without free material.
Never recreating bad interactions.

The creative part is the poetry 
of putting feelings into senses.
Most of life is suppressing emotion, 
I’m pouring mine out on the page rather
than throwing it in someone’s face.

Not changing the world
only my reaction to it,
mentally healthier for it.
And the offender is free to offend others.
Hopefully, creating more poets from it.
Whew, the benevolence of it all is remarkable!

Stephanie

Bloom open in the space between lovers,
between every faceless person who never
loved you how you deserved to be loved,
everything that drew blood, everyone
who eclipsed you, older but never wiser.
It is not your fault that their hands mangled
the good in you, pressing in like slick clay,
crumpling your heart in their overgrown fists.
Set yourself free, need less, be more, loved
regardless. Do not beg for it, it will come to you
without calling, without bared teeth hungry
for a bite of your softness. You will be soft,
but you will be strong, you will love yourself
even in the dark alone. This is a promise.

Jacob

Unsheath your heart, bare arms, be the one
you needed for yourself. Pull the teeth from
the people who deserve it. Do not ignore
your own ache. Do not dismiss the haunted images
that pour from the woodwork in the quiet moments
of shaking sadness. Fear none. Separate the good 
from the rest, pull apart your ribs to find it there.
Eat some. Live some. Smoke less. Please
stay funny. Please lighten the room like you do.
Be the good. Fight for it, but you must still fight
for yourself first. Let the taste wash out, let
the tang of the past dissolve, swallow the sun.
Let it turn your insides gold. When you open
your eyes see the truth, see yourself alive.

Amy

You are just a girl, remember that’s all 
you need to be, and that you will always be more.
There will be children who love you. There will be
a time when you are set free from every chain
that nooses your ankles. You will run freely
in the dark to clear your head, and there will be 
no devil on your back. And even the angels
will be silent. You don’t need their guidance.
You are your own angel. You are a mother of many
beautiful things. Your voice will forever ramble
like a brook through the spaces you inhabit.
Take a moment to breathe. Feel it fully, truly
saturating your heart with oxygen. Use it wisely
to make light, to grow love, to be free, to run.

Lillian

Your heart is the color of lavender. You are so young
that it is terrifying. Let the blue sky fold into your hair,
let life unfurl in the basin of your palms. Be young.
Stay young. Stay radiant in the face of torrential rain.
Never let yourself get touched by the downpour, let it wash
around you, let yourself stay warm and dry and safe.
Use the water to grow, soak your roots, and flower.
Write your poems. Do not let anyone tell you differently.
Remember the last line. Live by it. Forever be the poem.
Let the bad dream of it all fade in the violet daybreak,
unfold towards the sun like a wildflower. Make sugar,
be sweet. Be mindful of you words, know your power,
use it for tenderness. Stay tender, stay gentle, stay.
Don’t grow out of your radiance, your beauty, your strength.

The Rest

Let your names dissolve, your whole beautiful hearts
devolve into just fractions, stained from being pressed 
against the hearts of everyone you meet. Get free, leave,
but leave a memory behind. The shape of a face, the poem,
the half-smile, the bad joke, the story, the place, the shadow.
Your memory flickers but it is never less significant. 
Be memorialized in the tiny things. Every person met,
ever person needed to be met, every human connection
means something profound. Believe in fate. Be the reason
someone else believes in fate. This is what you leave.
Find yourself as a lifeboat. Be your own damn lifeboat,
be the lifeboat for someone else who needs it. Find yourself 
hoping. Be the hope, small, yet enough. Please stay safe,
stay well, stay in the background of a memory, stay alive.

I hope this reaches you.

I called my nana last night
singing happy birthday
and she replies with delight.
She asks how I’m doing,
what summer trips I have planned,
conversation flows smoothly
until it stops…

“How did you refer to her, again?”
my nana asks after telling her
I was traveling with them,
a friend.

“They’re nonbinary.” I reply.
My nana is silent, except for
a judgemental hum.
Then that conversation
is pushed to the side.
We continue talking,
like something earthshattering
hadn’t just been left on the wayside.

I came out to her
a couple summers ago now.
Not fully, just told her I was Bi,
that I liked women and guys.
She was confused,
“How does that work with your husband?”
“I can love him and be attracted to women,
just because I like the same sex too
doesn’t mean I won’t love him through and through.”
It was hard to explain under her puzzled gaze,
like I was in a gallery on display,
awaiting harsh judgment or praise.

She told me she would always love me,
“…no matter what.” Yet, love and understanding
don’t always go hand in hand. It is easy to love.
Harder to rewrite your beliefs so that you see
the true self within me.

I have no idea how to tell her,
that I’m nonbinary too.
I haven’t told any of my blood,
except my loyal brother
who loves me through and through.

Should I tell my whole family tree
who I am, or keep it inside,
until they all die?
Would telling them
truly render me free
or cut down the tall trees
and cause deforestation
all around me?

i smear sagey hue on canvas near as tall
as me, squeegee heavy in both hands.
all across the surface we go. soon to dip
fingers heavy into blue–pull across, then
up and down at left edge.     rinse.       
        contemplate.      i sense the light lilac
of shaggy bees balm outside the window,
pour white, mix red and extra blue, bit
by bit til comfort sways. swipe this up
from bottom left to high right, think down
and back around. a triangle fills itself. a streak
of white appears, smiles. i add touches of red—
love-nature wishes with fingers leaving
prints. think yellow.     no, not for today.
i listen to quiet stirrings then chirps echo
from outside and green flutters dance
in my gut.     i destroy all.
another story to be told.

Rabbi

I watch you trudge through the night
your tallis and Torah   
keeping you warm
as you leave your village behind
Where are you going I wonder
What will you find on your journey
I don’t know
though I know
your trek began years ago
on a wall in my grandparent’s home
Now you hang in my house
Stilll you leave your village behind
Not a peep
as my family sleeps
You just take your Torah and go

                                      —  After a copy of Marc Chagall’s “Rabbi with Torah”
                                          painted by Audrey  Moskowitz  

(Excerpt from William James’ “Energies of Men” speech delivered in 1907 on the nature of structural versus functional psychology)

___ _______ ___ arousing __ ___ ________ _______ ideas may_ ____ __ be ____________ ____ as a wire __ _____ ____ alive with electricity_ ___ at another time __ dead. Here our insight ____ ______ _____ ___ ___ __ ___ ____ ____ _______ __ _______ ______ __ ________ _______ _ _____ ____ shall __ _ ____ _____ depend more on the ______ ____ _____ mind __ __ ________ than on the idea itself.

Beside ___ susceptibilities determined by _____ education ____ __ _____ ________ peculiarities of character_ _____ are lines _____ which men ______ as men tend to be inflammable __ _____. __ Certain objects _________ awaken love, anger, or cupidity, so certain ideas naturally awaken the energies of loyalty, courage, endurance, or devotion. When _____ _____ ___ effective in a_ ____________ life, their effect is often very great ______. They may transfigure it, unlocking innumerable powers which, but for the idea would never have come into play.

‘Fatherland,’ ‘The Union,’ ‘Holy Church,’ the Monroe Doctrine,’ Truth,’ ‘Science,’ ‘Liberty,’ ___________ ______ ‘Rome or Death,’ etc., are __ many examples of energy-releasing abstract ideas.

The ______ nature of ___ ____ phrases is __ essential ______ of their _______ power. They are forces __ ______ __ __________ in which no other force produces equivalent effects, and each is a force __ ______ only in _ specific _____ __ men.

On June nights I don a gown
of palm leaf peppered with red-
eyed, black-bodied, golden-winged
cicadas & their frenetic rasping.  

I sail over grass with feet the color
of grass, each toe a rough blade
pointing the way through waves
of meadow, & my heart—a ruddy
sailor—follows stars in the cloth of sky.  

From an oak tree whose leaves
are fingers tapping a breezy rhythm
on midnight stretched like a drum,
a crow in profile sings his sable song.  

No one knows about my nocturnal
traipsing or the quarter moon I carry,
even as it cuts my palms so they bleed
citrines & marigolds, sears them
with a light that blazes all the more  

blond for having fallen
from the witching hour.    

~inspired by Catrin Welz-Stein’s “The Sole Witness”