The Pouring

Some part of you inside opens up
and pours words out like a waterfall.
Like a tap. And they splatter on the page
not like that. Not like tears. Though sometimes
you still cry. Not like the bitter patter of pain,
but like wine from a decanter. Or spring water
from some ancient rock. From a jug with a lip.
So that the words pour in a liquid cord of beauty.
and begin to take some shape or form that makes
a little bit of sense.

But they collapse at the slightest touch.
Being so fluid and poured from the jug of your heart
they are displaced by any form or weight that is brought to bear
or interrupts their pouring. And you wonder, where do they go?
What dry lake bed holds the liquid cord of beauty? Into
whose cup does the water descend? This you will never know.
Only let the words pour, when and where they may. Do not
worry about wasting them. Only fear that they remain unwritten.
That they go unspoken. That they dont get poured.

How white the tomb

When your room was emptied
of the former days,
Those days of lost photographs
and other shrouded rooms,
when your heart was emptied
of its joy and sliced from you like a limb,
How many nights did you bleed on your bed?
Feeling the phantom nerves?
How dark were the streets when you awoke
that winter morning?
How vacant the white crib?
How empty the tomb that day?

Ascension of a neighbor

I never realized that you
cared about me until after you'd gone
I always thought of you as this
berating, critical father standing
in my skull like a little despot
That part of me that never
should have been there

But is

And that's what kept me away
from you and your suffering
You and your sad, playful eyes

The fear...

But you brought me a plate of
leftovers from your Christmas lunch
And I said thank you
You had a picture of Jesus
Hanging in your hallway
which startled me
You offered me a hand with things
But I never knew you cared
until after you'd gone
And thats what changed things