She says -
new eyes
new karma
and no, I won't kiss you
though I have thought about if for a while
and we have danced the dance of attraction.

no.
she says

there is more to the action than the reaction
which is primal
and there is more to the result then just
knowledge

there is the now
and there is the result.

i can't forgive myself for the thinking of it
no, i can't beat the charges of engagement
with an engaged woman.

intricacies play out
they succumb to the moments
imperfect and perfect.

we are merely curious beings
in a world of non answers.

truth be told
i shared my thoughts first
she held back
but relayed a knowledge
of my intentions

take shape of the world
and find yourself fighting the karma
of the unshakable.
she won't have the later

what are you looking for?
in your books
from unheard voices
and bound confinements?

desire to have is as innate
as the desire to breath

what will you find?
what are you looking for?

it won't be me
as sure as the day will turn light in your eyes.

we are engaged beings
to our morals
to our establishments
to our hosts

but never to our secrets.

something like ease..

in these days of solitude i am learning
and i'm leaning in hard to the habits that have made this machine in me thrust forward in this attempt at life.
i recognize that i am not the most disciplined of energies
and my tendency to fall inward is most present in the absence of structure.
this can be a dangerous thing
as in it's wake it leaves me accomplishing little to nothing.

left to my own devices i will circle my thoughts
dream of big things then dissolve into aimlessly wandering in my here nor there.

i am no fool and recognize that my motivation is directly correlated to the absence or presence of sunshine.

a creativity that waxes and wanes
an attention span that loves to get lost in words-
i am a keeper of letters
and words
and occasionally anger, sadness and utter joy.

I'd have dismissed taking myself seriously years ago and given in to the earlier revelation that maybe i'm just crazy
but that was too comforting and i wanted to make that craziness mean something outside of my head.

i am amazed at how much talent can go to waste simply due to lack of motivation. i fear that my last words will be, "why didn't i do more?!"
i take it a day at a time and live by the ebb and flow of these tiny little fish swimming called emotions and they don't remind me that it's sink or swim-
i relearn this only when i'm coughing and choking and gasping for air.

i'm living easy these days just watching things go by at the speed of cognition and my center is realigning with something deeper in me- something that busy ate up and inattention ignored.

i am getting here
and i'm getting closer to the me in melissa
or
 was it adriana?

a driving will..

he says things are broken-
way past mending

i take a moment and wait for that last hammer to fall
and i wait until he finds the madness finding its way out of his body.

i remind him that there have been bigger obstacles
and even bigger assholes
than him

and i see his shoulders fall
and i see the fury ease from his eyes
until that lyrical lie he's been telling himself for years
finds it way into his head again.

i sit in the dusty spaces full- yet incomplete
and i wait till the latest dust up settles
and we tackle the things i never got to say to you
things maybe a little sister could have forced her big brother to hear
and i know we never got that chance so i'm a little more patient now
and i'm checking my judgement at the first admission of wrongdoing and weakness

 today it's me who's doing the listening
and i get a closer look at what it was like for you
being victim time and time again to the vices that always had you pinned.

today- 46 years ago entered the world a promise and an intent
that would lose it's way 42 years later.
i'm coming up on you now brother mike
soon those numbers will belong to me
and i'm gonna count myself through the days till i get passed the date you moved on
and i'm gonna keep on marching to whatever truth that i owe myself to claims me
unless i find it first

and i'm gonna send the messages on to you to fill you in on what you've missed

but in the meantime i'm gonna keep trying to right the man in front of me with whatever i've got
with as little
and as much that i know

things that  i never saw in you
that i never got close enough to say

and then i'm gonna try and tell it to little brother et
and i'm gonna settle the score to the things i could never fix
but never gave up trying to

and i'm gonna show him that things aren't passed mending
and remind him that he can choose to not be the asshole he's been
and he can start looking at himself instead of everyone around him
and see that finger shaking back at him

it may be a long shot
but it's really the only option i've been given
to make this worth what it should have been to you.

Fires in the basement of accountability..

I'm not asking you to rescue me
I'm holding on just fine
to the chaos around me
that finds it's way into my resting place

I know you can't expect to find new meaning when you only listen through the same old earphones; tattered
 broken and barely clear.

I tell myself that I'm more visible and more awake when I'm listening
but sometimes it feels good to let it go and give in to the visible lines that get lower on that bottle
that voice that gets muddled the more I give in to it's offerings

I am better and I am alive
and that is better than most of what I see day in and day out.
It's been a series of shocks and
rolling along the bloodied line of mistakes
but I'm still here and I'm still feeling the misty reminders showering me from above.

I've earned my keep in this place we call home
and though I may never hear anything but judgement rollin' off your blonde hair blue eyed native face
I've got plenty spaces to fill myself with before I go after the likes of you.

Someone's singing to me about the karma police
and though I hope to hear their sirens I sure do hope they pass me by
on their way to you.

These days I'm sensitive to the way we don't look at each other when we speak
and I'm aware of how the lines that connected us divert as they get closer.
I hear the broken when I see the smile
and I carry on when I see the doubt
and I question the intent when I see the forced intimacy
that has no place in these violent spaces we sleep in

A world that keeps the lights up bright
but the truth locked inside the
burned up churches that were never as sacred as they were secret.

A melancholy fire of blues, greens and oranges
that holds connection adrift
and a purposeful meaning prisoner.

If I can buy your trust
does that mean I can claim your virtue?


Flowers still grow despite the sun and snow falling all at once
they just hold on to their petals a while longer
before giving it up.

You clearly see the message has been lost by the messenger-
it's about tangents and
tantrums

letters mean something at the same time as meaning nothing
or
something that maybe you just don't comprehend?

Resistance

and then we are done...

4 two one and the days before..

4.21.15

I lose myself

I’ve lost myself 

again

and the act of looking out of dirty windows to a clearing, temperamental sky

only reminds me that I’m not sure what I’m looking for out there

Yet it gives me some solace

that I’m still eagerly looking outside

for something.

Today that something is you

it is some symbol

that you are still near me

that this day that the two of you were born means not that you are missing

but that you were once here.

Like a broken phone booth telephone I call the same number over and over again

and my father’s voice is never as happy on the day before

or on this day.

He is full of sorrow.

The day he arrived only serves as a reminder that he’s now missing his son

and his father.

I can’t help but feel the sadness again 

though I promise myself that these things will get easier

you know-

 the more my memory slips

and the more I carry on

but it never has

and I am not certain it ever will.

Numbers are significant

They serve as labels

and they serve as reminders

of something tangible

and something removed.

My biggest mistake continues to be that I am removed

that I am beyond the recent past 

and I am continuously surprised at how foolish I am to think I’ve got these sorts of things figured out.

My quiet serves as a reminder that inside I am burning

I am burning for things I do not know

spaces I do not know

that I may never know

and I am dissatisfied with not having a reason

a purpose

a way to justify getting into those spaces

without a trace

without anyone ever knowing I was even there.

Spaces that are bodies

spaces that are minds

and spaces where things that I do not share

are known.

I am a little lost in this translation of my most recent transformation

This woman who feels close to me

who knows me

and who I’ve grown into

is still aloof to my curious groping

Who is this I?

Who is this woman that I experience every single day

who carries my weight

who looks back at me

who rests her worries on my shoulders?

I’d like to tell her that it should be no surprise that any conviction of the heart comes with steep consequences

I’d like to tell her that the surprises that she thrusts us into always take more time then she’s got

or willing to agree to

to sort out.

It is days like this, 

weeks like these 

that force an opening

that force a reckoning

to any and everyone sitting quietly in the corners

known or unknown

And when I look out the window I recognize

that the clearing sky has turned cloudy and bruised once again

forcing me to go back to the beginning

The beginning that reminds me of you…

tucking in to you

i want to be close to you
i want to know the smell of you

i want to know the taste in between your lips
and smiles you save only for me.

you are a mystery-
a mad distraction to me
that makes me want to break myself into a million pieces just so i can float next to you.

i've always wanted something bigger
bigger than me
bigger than the sum of all the broken parts

and here we are

so full
of it

so full of this conviction
that we deserve a big love
even if we are sometimes afraid to create it

i am done walking through the empty spaces
with a picture
in my mind
of what it feels like to be complete

full on love
that is my own

that is yours.

you say you love the way i love you

baby it's taken a million broken hearts to hear that.
it's taken me glueing so many mis-placed parts together
to hear that.

it's taken me hearing my own voice
and trusting my own love
to hear that.

but i finally hear it and
i've finally found the right combination that allows me to see through my barriers.

i am in love
with a million divides
that part the many parts of me

but still i am full enough
to be whole
and offer a whole
part of something

that sees through you
and sees through me.
and neither one of us is safe
to the curiosity
and determination
that i have
to hold on to this.

i'd like to think you have something bigger than what i've known
that's never gonna give it up
and never gonna see anything through but the us we've come to know
and i'm ready for that
i'm ready for your kind of love

because everyone sees that this is the thing that i should do
and sees that this is what i want to do
and the subtle difference is that i do what i want to do
and never what everyone wants me to do.

and baby i want to love you

till the love and blood runs thin
 and then dry in me.

the light of day that runs in circles

there are signs all around me
and music in my ears and space

i want to stretch out

my mind
my thoughts
my hurts
my secrets

and i will tell you this

i believe in magic
the more i recognize the syncronicities in life.
sometimes things make sense in the most profound ways
and then sometimes things take you for a ride
and leave you on a corner that you never intended to find.

but those unfamiliar corners are the places to find part of yourself
no matter how fucked up you feel about it or yourself.
those are the perfect moments that change your life in some small way.

those are the moments that make you thankful that you can start all over.

there are times that i'm thankful i get to dress up
be somebody else for a while
but sometimes when i'm not myself
i'm someone else-

she walked over to me
swaying with a smile i've recognized from so many times before
not in her but in an intentional
confusion

she planted her mouth on mine and reached for something more
something i wanted to give back
and we swayed
and played inside that kiss for a minute
then
the embrace was released and
she danced on to the next mouth and soul to taste.

i thought about her for a few days after that
and all the complexities she offered the world
and i thought
better than to dwell on a moment with a lost woman
because after all-
she was the kind that no one could hold on to
but only loosely.

but for a minute i was the star of her show
and a gypsy that made me feel alive.

pieces misplaced..

there are just some moody days
when i feel like falling in love
give me some light
give me some energy
and i'll do the rest

we've come across a thousand words
and we've backtracked even more
from days long gone

she says i hope i can make it up to you someday
and then reminds me that she loves me.
i let silence answer her words on my screen-
sometimes words aren't enough to fill the gap
that 38 yrs creates..

i turn and think of you
and i think how you've lived pretty exclusively
left love on the outside of your heart
and i think that these are days you can't get back
they are days you may someday regret not filling with love
of another
or with another.

i read that love is as practical as anything else
and i want to tell you that
but instead i hold that truth a little closer
and i promise to love you a little more

i am feeling a little lost
but not for mis-direction
but more because i've been dreaming lately
and my dreams aren't the things of contentedness
they are struggles and rips at the seams
and boundaries that have been ignored and stepped upon.
the boundaries that permanently scar-

i am feeling a little bit angry that despite realizing i've outgrown her
she still creeps into my life and reveals her insensitive memories
and even more careless impressions of me from a past we've been passed out of.

i'd love to fall in love
with an idea
with a secret understanding
but today i will settle with words

and the realization that i'm a little bit tired
and a little bit scared of what's yet to come
the same way that i worry about being more than a little misunderstood..

vinyls seats and torn napkins..an old letter opens.

she says it's good for the both of us
and i can't help but sink a little deeper into the the vowels and adjectives we use to explain how we witness each other.

i speak and foolishly tell her all too much so much of the time
but as she bends lower and tucks her hair behind her ears as she does out of habit
i want to reach over and just touch her face
witness her a little closer
weaken her defenses
if even for a moment

to see if she's actually listening.

we are all never truly listening i swear.
out of nowhere, if even in my damnedest attempts, i am caught off guard
i am distracted
by who i am and who i want to be
by what i am feeling
by what i want to say

i am suddenly an old man
an old woman
broken and deaf
and at just the wrong moment in existence

and then the moment is gone.

i am sometimes the temporary visitor
with a half packed suitcase
one door here and one
in the next moment
or next lifetime.

i tell myself
that this is no way to live a life
but i swear it happens
and then it doesn't.

and in some moments
i'm frozen
stuck in the moment
a head tilted back
lips parted open
breath moving slowly in and out

eyes closed
and a waiting is happening.

that is where i am right now.

mesmerized and still.
and i'm listening
with everything i have.

angelic voice in my ears
slowly stripping the defenses i've spent a few lifetimes honing
and like a dress
i find myself bare with my cover around my ankles
naked in some false hope
that served no purpose at all.

i am as random as they come
and i'm as flattened as the the tallest building is tall.

if you need to call up to my towers
or find the love that resides in this body of mass and water
you need nothing but a willingness to climb
and be tested by some faulty elevators

but know you will rest easy
once you get higher..

the redeemer in us..

melancholy and sticky i lay here trying to fit into all the situations i can imagine myself in

sticky with you like glue on my fingers
running with drum sticks looking for  the skins to beat a rhythm of myself into

you'll never know how the disingenuous talk has worn on me
i think of the millions of words my eyes have crossed
and the millions more my ears have suffered.

there is nothing that surprises me more than the absolute truth in the matters of the heart.
i walk in
bent on the moment
and i greet all the dogs at my feet and in my bed
and i find a woman silently reading from some book that will bring us closer to our truth
and i find myself further from mine

the irony passes over me for but a moment
then in the next breath i walk over to kiss her
kiss her like yesterday was only ours
and like tomorrow will never arrive.

i am no fool
i know how things can change
i know how allegiance can be traded like the skin on our backs, if they aren't the right hue
but i digress
and willingly give into these moments of chaos searching for the grace that i want us to exist in
if only in my ever changing mind

you'll never know i am the least involved in the making sense part of this
i am at the mercy of my expansive heart and even more boundless mind.

i let you see this side of me
messy and faltering
crashing in and upside the tidal walls that are supposed to contain this

call them breaker walls-
and i will tell you of a death or two.

angst in the pores of my misunderstanding
and clarity in my intent

we are the same in our dissimalar take on the subscription filled world.
we are the same in our principles
we are different in our expressions and risk taking

perhaps a bridge will unite us
as the words coax us closer
to finding some similar
understanding

of what scares us most.
we can take on these big things
the two of us
all we need is a table
a moment
and a few orders to work us out

meet me anywhere and we'll unfold all of this

two worlds
a million hang ups
and one meaning
in what it's all about..

links and smokey mirrors

i overcorrected she said
as she slowly slides out of her seat and away from me

this is how these things fall to pieces
the romanticism in the world explodes in the tiniest moments of intimacy
it just falls where it will fall

i'm riding along this wave of newest self discovery
i'm hovering along the walls of shadows
looking for ways to lose myself
when i suddenly am forced to reckon with the idiot truth in the matter

you can't run fast enough away from some truths that find their way to the doorstep of your consciousness.

i ran into your lover last week and she seemed happy with her new love
sort of like she's forgotten herself in the new direction
we spoke
and we ate
and we talked about things that were things but not things at the same time

and i recalled how at one time i was a regular in her life
and how i was more of a regular in your life
and i realized how neither of you fit the key i held
neither stuck around long enough to stay tuned

it is what it is
and that's the way it inevitably goes.

but on to you i find my mind
and my imagination

a slow departure from the distractions
i want to understand the strum and the quick tempo inside of me
that you give rhythm to

somehow i lost myself along the way
and as much as i wish i could
as much as i would
there is no simple complete solution.

oh how i wonder
and how i melt into the made up situations

then i wake up
and walk around with this proverbial boner
waiting to bone the way to the middle
of the truth

if only it was that simple.

i dive and i swell
all about you
all inside of you
and i wake up feeling just as confused..

witness

4.22

new world immigrant reaches out to first world indigenous
the exchange was more than complicated.

it impacted me much like the failed response:
leaving me confused and hopeful just the same.
that somewhere, somehow
the new people of our land haven't forgotten or unlearned how to care for the ones who founded it..

you said tonight
you can illicit a reaction in much the same way you can push a button.
you sat across from me, splayed across the vinyl recliner taking the same pain as i was
 saying nothing
breathing deep as i was reminding you from across the room
you know i will always tell you just what i want to tell you
and you will tell me in your own way things that i will understand.

it's about semantics
and it's about the in between questions that don't get answered by living in the now
the questions live inside the moments lived on auto pilot and lived in the moment

we trust differently.

i know i am a lonely love
i have my limits in letting others in
and you have a hard time getting close enough to see the opening.

you think i know what i'm talking about
but in reality
my fingers miss the abstract letters of recognition on the typerwriter i first learned emotion on
and my mind switches gears where there are none

oh how i miss the challenge my friend
how i miss the roll call to be present in conversation

we take those chances and show our vulnerabilities
we dive deep to find new oxygen for each other.

when i return to me
i ask myself why i'd ever want to leave the space when i'm closer to everything
but the dismal distractions find their way to me inevitably
and i trade my exotic space of awareness for the strange fruit  that they hang in front of my tired eyes

waiting on a friend..

be just who you are she says
as she leans in close enough for me to smell tomorrow on her

how can i wake up wishing for a different set of circumstances?
circumstances that omit so much of what i thought i wanted.
how do you reconcile the realization that what seems to work for everyone else
doesn't come close to fitting this proverbial womanly self?

sitting awkwardly in a place i've sat a million times before in passing
feels different when i'm waiting for her to come out.
i'm smart enough to know the seeming escape that so closely symbolizes who you are to me now
is not the exact direction i'm heading.

i'm merely feeling things at a level of clarity that i've seemingly been too distracted to see before.
perhaps i'm more awake.
take away the toys, the gadgets and the lover
and things break down to simple again
and become more easily swallowed..

saci (ghost boy in the whirlwind)

you say i met you in the midst of you own great depression
i walked in to see you, this man amazing
yet to be
i didn't think much
and taught you how to dance.

that moment
you broken and lost
missed me by a few unmeasured observational moments.

from then on you would be my b boy and i would be your sweet and tangye.

no love lost in the distance
we would ebb and flow out of each other's lives for some time

i have something that belongs to you
something i have been meaning to tell you i've had.

i forgot about it in the midst of the next big super storm that would hit NY
which was your death.

not yet processed i keep coming back to your page to remind myself of the new truth.

when she told me
i wasn't really sure what she meant
but as the days have settled and things have not changed
i have sat with the silence and tried to feel you

perhaps you have been drifting in and about
and i have witnessed you in my dreams

i hear laughter
which is how i choose to remember you and all the others that have been lost to my touch

i don't feel the urgency of you being confused about who and where you are-
i feel you are content b boy.

the calm i walked in on that day may have been a disillusioned sense of grief
but it is settled now
and i am happy for you in this new found standing.

your favorite plate which has now become my favorite
will continue to present me with food and a reminder that we are all feeding ourselves the same truths
of how ugly and beautiful this life can be

thank you for the lessons i have yet to learn in your passing my brown, queer brother.
i am grateful to have an angel at your caliber to guide me into my own transformation

but then again you belong to the world and everyone you have touched in spirit, word, and laughter

sending you off b boy is not something i wanted to do just yet
we had more laughs and silly realizations to share.

but now you are everyone's ghost
and light.

from here to gone i will recall you brandon boy
and maybe one day i will get close enough to tell you i love you...

blood ties remade...

louder
lips speak louder.

she tells me she went there to bring me home.

i was capsized by the very small place in the world that i felt i occupied.
death
and truth
all held a strong precedent to the forgiveness that came before.

i tell her now
sitting in the comfort of our home
that i never thought i could provide for her
or myself-
i tell her
that my life has been first and foremost a lesson in forgiveness.

simply put.

i would be an orphan yet again if i was stunned by the inflexibility of forgineness.

but then again, wouldn't we all.

so here we are, walking wounded in the world believing that we are martyrs for learning to forgive the biggest and baddest trespasses against us
regardless of religion inside.

never a victim
but merely in the places that didn't have our best interests in mind,
we walked into a moment that was unforgiving and weak with someone who was even weaker and forgive less.

no sense to walk out of what we walked in to
we witnessed
and recognized,
even if years or decades later,
that something,
some body was not where it was meant to be.

nevertheless
we moved through that moment
and into and onto another.

our scar tissue thicker and stronger the more wounded we became
the more resilient we were.

i have never wanted it to have been any different, really.
i have merely said,
shit happens,
and it breaks you
or it doesn't.

i have chosen to live by the later
and i am fine.

so, back to her strong sense of non forgiving
she is a self appointed reckoner of misdeeds in my life
she holds those memories and she holds the list of mis doings against me.

i tell her to breathe into the space between me and those past moments
to fill up the space the same ways i have

but she stands guard differently than the others
she is more awake.

i now know why that is.

she is my keeper
and to ask any different of her
would be asking her not to be her.

for her solidarity to me
i feel safe
i feel strong

and i feel more room to forgive..

under your breath..

seriously i'd give anything for her to give me a minute in her mind.
so much time in this life of mine showcasing,
reminiscing,
replaying,
remembering words she said and then the words she never said thereafter.

i have loved this girl/woman since i was 13. i mean seriously been in LOVE with his woman/girl since i was young. i have tried to make myself important to her but in reality i am nothing but aluminum cans in a bag to her. i am unable to move forward from her despite how far ahead i push.

first love is never ending the same way yelling 'falling timber' never loses it's meaning.

i don't know how to stop it,
how to digress,
or forget her.
she denies me and the memory of what she taught me. married with 2 kids she is hardly the lesbian vixen she was in 10th grade.
hell, none of us are.
but still i crave, and i want some recognition in her, something to admit that she remembers those adolescent moments where she moved me from girl to young woman.

same but not the same with those boys with their endless needs. i don't feel the need to reconnect there. i may have loved those boys and men but with tracy there is no comparing.
with her i want to go learn my lesson in love again and again despite the ceaseless heartache that would endure.

i am still manifesting her to me in some way. i don't want some drawn out love affair some 23 yrs later
i just want some recognition.

tell me, there's nothing wrong in that. i just want to end the back room yearning so i can bury the memory.

parsons bed...

it takes a while to shake this shit loose in me

it takes a while for me to step into the moments where i can make sense between the heart and mind.

in my ears i hear a profound rhythm and despite not having made one of my own in quite some time- i appreciate the movement and precision entering me.

i am ready to strip down
i ready to remove the city on my skin
and let the road take me away

it's been long enough that i know i don't belong
and i know i need to get back to something simpler.

it's sickening to never be reminded, in a world fabricated,
that we are merely moving in empty cycles that don't resemble and often overwrite our true intentions.

i am a perfect poster child for consumption. i want and i want.
i told her of how i wanted another in the beginning, someone who i thought beautiful and broken who was not even close to being fixed the way we endlessly work to be fixed. i asked her who she would want if she could have that moment of abandon and of course she mentions some top tier, totally together woman who no one could ever hope to evolve to, successfully.

i sat in admittance of failure in my lustful wish of make out dreams and i sat straight up and said- i recognize and am drawn to the unfinished soul merely because it's a comforting reminder that we all have work to do. why would i lust for the "perfect" being, unless i was convinced i was settling for failure?

needless to say i love my choice despite how faulty and human she is. it only made me love my ellen more, because i recognize how close to fine she is, which is so unlike me.

and i like that.

dizzy, loud and free...

time..
as i follow through the awkward movements of moving forward
i am suddenly summoned back
to the time when things were intact-
a little-
or perhaps more than they were thereafter.

i am reckoned by the mail i received
and the message shortly beforehand
and then again by the introductions that came many years and lifetimes after.

loudly they call my name which i recognize in the formalized spelling and swift emails.
i miss you all i think to myself
and then again i don't.
the faces and places that we shared remind me that life has moved forward
that life has carried on with and without the ones i have loved.

i am contemplating returning.
to those very places that wounded me.

words said by a big brother
darkness and ill intent all live in those places
in that state
that i was resigned to grow up in.

in one way or another
i want to return,
says the woman i am now.
i never want to return,
says the memories of the child that still resides in my bones, done growing and getting older.

i have memories

and some are not pretty.
some moved me up in the experiences i shared,
the loves i found,
and the stones i turned without direction.

in those places i have friends
some who never knew
some who had their own stories
i never asked to know.

still, we ask and we crave to see those faces that knew us when we were young
and presumably innocent.

i crave those faces
for reasons that have nothing to do with my place and my knowing in the world,
pushed further along in the worldly experience than i had a right to know back then.

i crave those faces because they set me up to return to a place where love lived.

and that is enough to release the unreconciled child in me.

do as i say...

I don't know how to make myself less available.

i tell this to few who know me and i get feedback that helps if only i could hear it.

i am lost.
i am in transition.

and i feel fucked up.

i am bleeding and
it's a full moon.
venus is passing the sun
and i feel compelled to allow the chaos to take a hold.

i climbed the fence
and i danced in the rain.
i am challenging my laptop to the rain
as i refuse to sit inside
and be un assertive to the weather that feeds my mood.

i am here
with who i am
and i am confused.

i am digging deep
for no reason other than it suits me
and i am no closer to conclusion.

the book(s) i've read
in the last year that almost marks the full year since your death
dizzy me in the forceful reminder of you being gone now for almost a year, brother.

they force me to believe
and give me strange ideas
as to who and where you are now
and further more how you are here with me.

i follow your shadows as they reveal themselves
and i call your name.

i call the names of others whom i don't yet know

and they all respond in their own way.

i don't know how to gap the living from the dead but i make sense of my reality as best i can.

i ask you brother to show me the way and i hope that you are still in a realm that includes me.
i get distracted messages and i hear myself in the midst telling me to just notice the silence of things and listen.

i am trying to listen
and i am also trying to ask the right questions.

i walk away sometimes defeated by my own voice
my insecurities
and i am reminded, by the right people, to stay true to myself.

i beg of the world one thing.

to call me out on my shit

and the world today said-
if you were listening right to yourself
you wouldn't need the outside world..

i heard it and i didn't.

i want interaction.
i know i can't do this on my own.
i need leaders
and i need mentors
i have been asking for them
and they have yet to appear the way i can recognize.

i know i have to first quiet my own discourse to see it
to feel it.

and i'm on my way.

but sometimes my own feet don't move fast enough...