You Reign

Tiny glass weighs in my hand of endless glitter-rubied grace
and chastises me in heaven's voices.
I could rest in the anger and pain more than the crystal-etched promises
but for the heavy rose-blood cup.
Glistens between thumb
rushes against me with the awful word
'grace'.

First taste left me exhausted with sweet, sweaty dancing
but this leaves my back in shreds and feet slow
to question if my words ever penetrate past,
or simply die
between this praise-dappled arch-way and that shadowed jail.

Juice warms in my fingers as I sense it's length, falter at its color.
Shining red against the world, speaks of heaven and life between my fingers.
Admired the easy red-lettered words, but these same are cruel
in breathless,
chested spurts that I
must
for
give.
Knowing the silky-white scars will always fleck chest and back.
Forgive.
Sirens nearly drown out your soft, uncompromising words.
Fall under pews to dusty crimson carpet in fevered anger
mistaken as prayer.

Refuse to quiet, instead you scream out in thunderous red
shakes hot tears in my mouth.
You never healed
the holes in your hands- image throbs in my vision. And so,
I breathe, and breathe.
breathe.
for light to brighten the air around me, for humming in my ears
to love my enemies.
The room is frozen, filled with tiny red cups.
Nothing shifted, but the constant rhythm of your scars compels me.

Lift,
and lips breathe out those stumbled, fructose-sour words of blessing.
Swallow
spoon of grape-flavored life.

Forward

Said that I would bleed
rushing red
promised tears
and cautioned pain

I feared that future
dressed in hate and chains

and now I fear the
downcast eyes
the disappointed sighs

that your love would be removed
or permanently altered

but I'm not bleeding
because He bled for me.
and the tears which fill my eyes
refuse to fall
because He cried for me
the pain I was promised
He felt for me

I'm exhausted at the thought
It floors me
I'm so loved

I was terrified.
Now replaced
with worry and wonder

I question if you would still love me
But his love?
I don't understand it.
But this much I know:
He loves me.
And that's unchangeable.

Fills me up
and sets me to fly
It scares me
and frees me
That fabulous love

He took my pain. Held it in his hands and feet and back.
He bled. And screamed and ached.
So I don't have to.

Set me free
To bring hope
peace
would be too small
Love that propells
and excellerates
Your love causes me to move

If I could rewind
would I different do?
I need not linger there
because He loves me
and it makes me
run.

My bedroom floor

I cried until it was a carpet of soggy, snotty tissues
And breathed the silent, earthquake sobs.

I screamed to crack the quiet.
And prayed. But there was no miracle.

So I read. And consumed the words without digestion for something to fill my mind.

Now I cannot pause.
If even for a moment my mind was not occupied this vicious loneliness
would pour in and consume me.

And the floor would overflow, smothering me in my own used tears.
And the shaking sobs would separate my body.

I survive.
But surviving is far from living the marvelous life I was intended.

Once, I knew how to really live.
But the sorrow attacked my mind and ate away the knowledge.
I must re-learn how to be alive.
Until the lessons, I can only survive.

Block.

I misplaced my words
they were right there! At the corner
bold and deliberate.

So, either they have been
abducted
or they ran away of their own accord,
afraid of the future I'd planned for them.

I fear that they have run, for there
is no evidence of foul-play
or demand of ransom which would be typical

Perhaps it's for the better.
It may have been a waste; too perfect
in poetry can repulse and strip away that color

If you find my words- those perfect
phrases that may pop into your head
or dibble from your lips
and you just know they couldn't come from you

please care for them, but you
need not return them to me, because
they chose to leave
and I am not one to force my words.

but, if you can recall the phrase
they formed themselves into
I am curious on how they arranged
and what the finished product was.

Not that I wouldn't have loved them dearly,
but there are others.
I have an endless supply,
it just the distribution schedule which troubles me.

When we fight.

It started in the clouds
with tiny cottages
sometimes far-off huts or mansions
and as we grew
the dwellings became smaller, more compact

I was warned and
You were warned
and still we did not surrender
but held eachother more fiercely

Sometimes I cannot see the cracks,
only the bright house we've painted over our conversations
Initially, any clouds would make walls fall out
and the floors erupt
I would cry, and you would scream

And now it only seems that sometimes our hopes,
strung along the banister untwist
themselves
and must be re-tied
perhaps in different places

Or other times, one of us re-paints the walls
without consent
and the other clings to a bare patch,
although it looks ridiculous,
begging that it remain untouched

But the house no longer self-destructs and I feel safe to move in

I won't apologize, and I am not sorry
not for tears, not for the remodeling
No argument would I replace.
Leave your loud words floating in the air
Don't replace the missing steps.

No one promised ease, they guaranteed the other.
A move-in ready bungalow
won't equal what I've learned
when the door flew off
or the roof floated away

That night, after blaming eachother
we slept under the stars
and contemplated how to secure another.
The new roof is heavier
and no matter how strong a wind blows
it doesn't move

Our secret smiles and the softer kisses
only evolved from repairing the broken windows.
which took days
and made the neighbors question our sanity

I don't mind if we've dreamed a 'fixer-upper'
Or even if we damage it once-in-a-while
As long as we keep repairing every time.

We mutually imagined that we would buy our home,
instead, we're paying more
and building it from stratch.
It's unique, sometimes ideal and completely our own.

The award

yes, i've heard you
but always with assistants
could it just be enough
could it just be Alone?

you said it tonight
followed by a screaming crowd
please, just let it stand
it's so strong, so real when it's Alone

won't ask again
a silent resolution
for me.
for me Alone.

i said as clearly as i could
even said the very words
hope you didn't listen
if nothing changed...
it's better that you didn't hear

i've heard you say it
i've only ever heard it said
then followed with assistants
i wish it were left Alone

wouldn't re-word
not further explain
just leave a silence
so i don't question if you heard

have you listened to my life?
glanced at any activity or action?
bustling in requests of approval

a grin just slapped me
a little more free
wasted so much in waiting
to see
to really believe

for it to be Alone
no more assistants,
the sentence full of only words

tried to really listen
and fell asleep to many voices
awarding me the words
followed by no assistants
which made me absolutely believe

now...
i'm doing it for me.

Alone.

The Sometimes Children

find my way
following a slow trail of children
tripping water-carved ravines
in the darkness
their skin glowing like oil
despite the moon

path is dry
maze of empty ditches
would fill like rivers
if the needed rain
that friendly flooding
the pilgrims sleep through
or stand
lifting soaked newsprint umbrellas


two
hundred
children

arriving for bed
students gather and read
some just pretend
as the memories get later past
bedtime
the better the photo
to wrap the numbers
capture faces and army tents
solid even cement beds

i don't speak acholi or lango
or any other tongue
but they know
and i know
the bigger the eyes
the longer the scars
the deeper the pockets
(of those who read these interviews)
prying into people's lives
their saddest story best to sell

three girls select me with their smiles
ask the one who laughs
big and wide

to discover a name which defines-
grace hope
because somehow, she still smiles
takes her seat beside the stranger
tells me who's her crush
what subjects she likes
and what they call
her 'marks' in school
but what i'll not forget
(i thought about today
no reason to remember
driving in the rain)

the world-vision library
balanced on a wooden bench
carving her every word
into a notebook on my knee

three years ago
three years ago she was nine
slept in the bushes flat against the ground
waking in the grass to the sound of footsteps
and fear
before the shelters
when it was the bus park
filled with trucks and vans
and ruts
and rapists

once
she slept at home with her mother
the rebels: the children
that kill and steal
took her and her sister (who was hardly four)

but the words i can't forget
looking into the sweet
brown eyes
of a girl who could easily be my friend
who has my hobbies
and laughs like me
who, in her skin and school uniform
could be any normal girl
she calmly
a little more quietly said

"sometimes"

(my question
a question i hope
to never
ask again)
she told me her duty
as they tried to twist her mind
what she was forced
to do
to the ones who wouldn't work
or walk
(as i said.
its not my problem
not my war
other people; other children
if you want
i'll give

cant be so hard to stop an army
end a war
that never began)

amazed as
i heard my own voice
splintering the mumbled quiet
of fifty children studying
chatting before
they head for sleep
away from home family and
any resemblence of a bed

"did you ever beat anyone to death?"
and she quietly answered
“sometimes”

Rest in Peace

does he know?
the man who cleans off the graffiti
blue that slowly runs
down the side of someone's shed
screaming out the memory
of a boy-become-statistic

the sprayed epitaph
you walk past each day
to never let him go
to never let you heal

so we tell you to forget

wake up from loud nightmares
ringing in your ears
that mix with sirens
both remembered and real
leaves you screaming all alone
for years you've been standing in that alley
screaming in the night

so we tell you to forget

but you can still remember
the warm liquid on your hands
holding the last moments flowing from your friend

so we tell you to forget

the tears of bright blue blood
in the letters resprayed monthly
the landlord barks threats
behind the screen
too scared to step
because of all these gangsters

none of them are boys
the body of a member
slain between the streets
a lossless death, one problem gone

so we tell you to forget

sweat of your palms
hands shaking, as that one finger jerks
another shot, another scream.
forget.
forget the sound. forget the faces.

but we never showed you
and this is the only way you know
it's how the asphalt taught you to heal

sirens screeching to the pounding of your heart
and now, it's just you
for years you'll be standing in the cell,
screaming in the night

so we tell you to remember

remember the blood on your hands
so that you will change, be reformed
tatoo the crime onto your skin

the blue paint, slowly running down
forget
forget
remember
remember