Rotting Ghost
There is a ghost in my walls,
wailing and weeping.
He creeps like mildew,
consuming the bones
of my home.
I see him in my reflection,
his eyes glow with
cooling embers of life.
There is a ghost in my walls,
wailing and weeping.
He creeps like mildew,
consuming the bones
of my home.
I see him in my reflection,
his eyes glow with
cooling embers of life.
It’s official;
It just wasn’t going to be you.
Frankly,
I have gained new tastes.
An appetite for full-throttle
adoration. I told him I am
at my wit’s end with dreamers.
I am finished with wannabe
muses.
I am sickened by
the rigamaroll of rudimentary relations.
it is too much for me.
it all means so little
your poems are short
your songs are sad
and your hair is oily
what happened to your heart?
are you nervous for junior year?
you’re still in sophmore slump
your stories are bored
and your books are dead
The child I push on the swing
screams with delight
Higher higher she screams
Her laughter is totally free
Does not know the future
This is just as it is supposed to be
May she go through childhood
without too many bumps and scrapes
Survives her first broken heart
Reaches for her dreams with resolve
Finds her special purpose
Comes around now and then
when I am wrinkled and old
Sees me push her child on this swing
Prayer works. Just not in the
way expected. A real
Father-knows-best scenario,
the trust has to be there.
Kneeling in the dark, night
after night, voicing my
concerns, my doubt, my creeping
suspicions. I open myself
up to God and it is
up to God what happens.
I question every decision
until I’m proven wrong.
This becomes our normal,
a tete-a-tete where I cause
God to vet his plans through
me, I charge debts, saying
You owe me a good life!
ignoring that which I
already have: a good life.
I heard birds sing this morning
Nestled in the home of their branches
Among the dying tree outside my window
As the snow flurried down
Peeping through the slit in the curtains
I yell to the baby birds
To fly away as this is not their time
To hold space in their decaying nest
My breath a small cold cloud escaping my lips
Why do we stay longer than we should
Why do I hope it shall pass or all to be well
When we see the imminent destruction around us
Knowing that branches can only hold for so long
Beginning to break underneath the weight
Still clinging to the hope we can still fly away
At any point before it’s too late
Why must I cling to this
A continued sense of hope
That something else, or even someone else
Will save me when I am to save myself
I wish to rise out of my grave of twigs
My little nest I keep buried in
Lifting my tired head to be with the snow
And simply fly away
Before the tree branch snaps
Before it comes crashing down
Before I lose everything
Before I lose myself
An exhausted bee lit on my knee
and stared directly at me.
Then he said,
“I think it best
if I have a rest
before I take off again.
As you surely must know,
I help living things grow.”
Then, after a pause, he asked,
“What is it you do?”
I thought of my days
and the odd, random ways
I had spent them all.
Then I seemed to recall
a once earnest dream
and how true it might seem.
I replied to the bee,
“Oh, me? I’m a pediatrician.
So you see, friendly bee,
I, just like you,
help things grow up too.”
I don’t know why
I told that lie.
I just couldn’t admit
for employment I’m unfit
even though he seemed to me
a very understanding bee.
Campus at night smells like
brick sweat, walnut fruit
coal plant, Fabuloso
finding which doors
are still unlocked at 11 pm
men hiding in bushes
masked by the whisper
of irrigation sprinklers
across the coffee ground dirt
broken cement that sparkles wet
like adrenaline, 200 mg ibuprofen
200 years of dust left in the pan
after they tried to sweep it away
like woodgrain, like being afraid
like I’m here,
again,
again,
again.
