If tonight is the night, Lord let it be a cool one with lunar breezes lifting me to a place just high enough to look down and get a little queasy at the height of what I’ve endured. Let it be a quiet night for cats, even the orange ones, who never seem to need a reason to howl, but rather let me pass so peacefully from this world that even the whiskers of my bedfellow are not disturbed. Let the street be still, oh Lord, when I slip through my front door’s keyhole and join the June mist gathering above the grass, and on the blades of the windshield wipers. Let it be a mercy, Lord, a merciful sigh please lord please and not a desperate choking gurgling gasp. Lord grant my bedtime story the dignity of an end, and my lullaby a harmony to match. 

but my hamstrings feel the difference. It takes muscle
to unmake oneself; I’m at it every morning these days,
slinking to the gym before anyone is awake. You’ve lost weight,
the nurse says, reviewing a list of my recent arguments. Exercise
caution when speaking to a mirror. Sometimes your words
and your lips don’t line up and all you can do is wait
it out. Like that time over the phone when I told you
sorry it’s been a while, yes, I’ll be better—

the things we do for silence. On the other side
of the glass my left foot is my right but I’m still
in reverse, receding. A performance of motion. If I could
really go back, don’t you know I would? Don’t
you miss me? When you asked me not to change
I did my best. No one feels the earth turning,
but it never comes around the same—

I was distracted
by the unforgivable
way you look at me.

in the briny billows
crustaceans cover the depths
limestone lifeforms litter
their skeletal remains
onto balmy  beaches
collected, displayed
in a glass coffin
on a bathroom shelf

What are the facts?
Objective reality already manipulated into a story
That differs depending on who tells it,
And those who have already heard the tale
Have formed opinions just as quickly,
And I must manage them all.

I hear what has *possibly* happened,
Calculate the liklihood of each event
According to who said what and why,
Then decide what *should* happen,
And weave my threads through people’s minds,
Twisting their reality into mine.

They gave me this control, after all,
They asked for guidance, so guidance I shall give.
If they hand me the strings, I must learn to puppet.

I know the cause is just,
Though my methods are less so.

fasting drained

temperature dropping

inside

the curled up seeding blooms of

wild carrot tops

draw him

out

a front door

to gnarled corner

holed roads without

sidewalks

ten words guessed

to find “roads”

feet and air

forward

forward

unique this lethargy

of the fast

the only lethargy

that calls out to move

**Title is a lyric taken from the song “It’s Been a While” by Staind**

The stage at the back
of the karaoke bar beckons,
warm with its draperies of neon
and spotlights
like suns.

A hot mic begs to be touched,
cradled, or even
kissed.

An itching gets into my soul
that my mind tries to scratch
with memories
of singing.

Remember when this was what we did
almost every night of the week,
hanging our aprons up
at the restaurant down the street
to scream out our steams
in front of teeming drunken crowds?

The way we could command
attention
solo
or in duets.

Everybody cheered
my first time,
when the DJ declared me
a karaoke virgin.

Nobody believed it
by the time I came down
from that stage.

“It’s Been a While” by Staind
was my song of choice that night
and I belted it out
with all the years I’d spent listening.

You said I was finally a real regular.

Over the years,
higher notes were reached
and repertoires inflated.
The DJ, calling me up,
now declared
Y’all are about to get Phil’d.

He wasn’t wrong.

The night was a playground
back then.
5 a.m. was a bedtime.
More than once
the White Castle next door
was the place to sleep.
Those made for the longest mornings.

But then you get let go
from that restaurant down the street.
Suddenly life is a scramble,
figuring out week to week
scrounging together a new routine
that never finds a way to loop back in
the karaoke bar called home for so long,
the brothers and sisters of found family.

I think about you
from time to time
when a somber, guitar-picked riff
floats through my ears.

Those were good days.

Good days, indeed.

subterranean exothermic cacophony
fireball on speedial bleeding
patina plasma part horizon

valiant triangles endeavor
equilateral acupressure ignored
words are swords for slow serration

time sees pooled hate evaporate
as escaped enclaves reconvene
mar recovery self jeopardy

People talk about artists
as though creativity
were evidence
of depth.

A person can paint
light falling across a table.
Capture longing
with remarkable precision.

Mix exactly the right colors
to convince strangers
they have encountered truth.

And still be lying.

The painter spoke often
about beauty.
The necessity of vulnerability
and connection with his subjects.

These ideas arrived
with impressive frequency.
Like recurring motifs
in a gallery exhibition.

I mistook repetition
for sincerity.

A common error.

I thought there was
something else
binding the conversation.

His mother left
when he was eight.
Mine left
when I was ten.

Two children
standing in adjacent storylines.

Different houses.

The same storm.

Or so I believed.

We spoke the language
of abandonment
with fluency.

The hypervigilance.
The self-sufficiency.

The habit of searching faces
for signs of departure.

I felt
shared suffering
produced shared understanding.

That pain functioned
like a passport.
Proof of entry
into the same country.

This turns out
to be untrue.

People can survive
the same wound
and emerge speaking
entirely different languages.

Or decide not to speak the truth at all.

The paintings were real.
The conversations happened.
The meals were consumed.

The stars appeared
on schedule.

The only fictional element
was intention.

I kept searching
for hidden complexity.

A wound.

A contradiction.
A fear of intimacy.

Something elaborate enough
to justify the confusion.

Eventually,
the explanation arrived.

Not as revelation.

As reduction.

Sometimes a labyrinth
turns out to be
a straight line.

Sometimes a person
describing transcendence
is simply trying
to get laid.

This was disappointing.
Not because desire
is disappointing.
Quite the opposite.

But because I had mistaken
the frame
for the artwork.

Mistaken charm
for character.

Mistaken quick wit
for wisdom.

Mistaken a shared history
for a shared heart.

The paintings remain.
Some of them
are genuinely beautiful.

I suspect what
bothers me
is how often truth
and performance
occupy the same canvas.

How a person
can accurately depict light

without ever intending
to illuminate anything.

Where ridges rise like weathered prayers,
And morning clings in silver mist,
The rivers carry whispered names
On currents memory has kissed.

Old tipples rust beneath the vines,
Their labors swallowed leaf by leaf;
The hills remember every hand
That carved out hope from coal and grief.

Porches lean beneath the stars,
Their stories older than the pines;
Each rocking chair a testament
To stubborn hearts and harder times.

Church bells drift through narrow hollows,
Calling souls by faith, not fame.
Voices join in humble hymns,
Though every singer bears a scarred name.

Children skip flat stones on creeks
Where crawdads hide beneath the shale,
Learning every bend and bank
Like chapters in a family tale.

The autumn paints the mountains gold,
While winter wraps them deep in white;
Spring awakens dogwood blooms,
And summer hums with firefly light.

Some folks leave beyond the hills,
To chase horizons broad and bright;
Yet something in the mountain wind
Still calls them softly every night.

For roots grow deep where hardship lives,
And love takes hold in stubborn clay.
The land may bend beneath its burdens,
But never gives its soul away.

So if you wander winding roads
Where fog embraces dawn’s first glow,
You’ll find a people mountain-made—
Strong as the streams that never slow.

Their wealth was measured not in gold,
Though richer treasures once were mined;
But in the grit of calloused hands,
And hearts no hardship could unwind.

The mountains keep their secrets well,
Yet one they’ll gladly let you see:
That home is more than earth and stone—
It’s who you’ve been, and who you’ll be.