in the basement a glassed-in cabinet
houses a horde of stuffed rabbits
who starred in stories 
demanded by our daughter from her carseat
on daily commutes

Quit making that noise,
the nurse said. Other people 
are in pain here, too. 

an empty mint tin  

I may fill it with baby teeth   
or a handful of pennies   
to rattle and scare
the ghosts away,
or start a collection
of buttons  
made of shell or bone   

something to refill it
with purpose   

But who I am fooling?  
It will go back in drawer  

keeping its promise

Good morning, good morning,
we say as we pass
each other in the hall
between bathroom and beds
sleep still leaking
from our eyes
the sun just tapping
against the blinds
father and daughter
the two early risers
in a house of three,
counting pets seven,
this molasses dance
with a girl on the edge
of becoming someone
I won’t soon recognize
some morning
when saying good morning
is too much to bear.

train whistle…
reading Kerouac again
road dreaming

I can’t begrudge him that
disagreement is allowed
seeing as we are so diversified
humans come with different capacities
somewhere along the line we carved narrow passageways
disallowing divergence
divisiveness grew when we could no longer transgress these corridors
returning to the expanded view where walls crumble to become fertilizer for the fields long neglected
I think this is what we crave.
thinking these carvings tell a story of learned experience
we’ve created a world with definitions too tight to button.
he lives his way experiencing what he will
I live mine hoping
for more.

Nothing exists but pain –
breath-sucking, inescapable
smother. I’m drowning

in a sea of it, my ears 
full of wordless 
tortured-animal wails

which emanate, somehow,
from my own lungs. 
My body is a melon

halved by a slow knife.
Orange flashes inside eyelids,
garbled voices, blood

spilled over white sheets.
Time is agony. Death
might be welcome until

the howls abruptly give way 
to kitten cries close by
from someone new – 

beautiful bruised plum 
of a creature drawn to light 
from the depths of my womb. 

I don’t know how love
instantly overtakes ache,
but I marvel at the eclipse.

it’s always been

I pull up a blank page often
And stare at that empty space.

I wonder why I’m not brilliant enough to fill it.
I want to be one of the greats. 

I do not fear the void.
I want to be consumed by it. 

I will fill it’s emptiness.
no longer screaming into nothing,
but into the space I have became. 

Despite my intentions,
my wants, my wishes.

I am often left speechless.
not sure what to say,
not sure what to write, 
or how to feel.

So I scream into the emptiness 
praying it screams back.