I Don't Like Anything I Wrote Today It's All Too Depressing And I'm Not Depressed I Don't Think

A drop of vanilla escapes The glass vial; It lingers, it lingers, It lingers on the table Before it breaks.

It seeps slowly, then Suddenly into the grooves, Spreading vanilla into The pores of the wood.

Vanilla infuses with The table, into a tiny Stain, into a small Splotch of warmth And subtle hospitality.

What are the laws of nature? Can you tell me? I can only think of one That energy cannot be created Or destroyed That it can only reconstruct One form into another

So what makes a flower bloom? Did I give the blossom My energy? I assume it comes from somewhere Within the soil, the stem But let me believe I can transform Into a beautiful thing too

I crave the stability Of change The comings and goings Of people Of emotions Of attachments And the letting go

More specifically I crave the consistency Of growth The calm acceptance Of loss The parallels between Two lives flexing And bending and crossing

I crave the certainty That comes with Evolving beside My beloved Sailing down a river That splits And to where?

I crave the security Of knowing Nothing Wrapped in a warm Blanket of presence No future to make me Feel so uncertain

Little spider by the window Resting in the shade I like your coloring I like the web you made

You're hanging upside down In your messy little nest I wonder if you're hungry Or eating tiny pests

I don't know where you came from You suddenly appeared I hope you stay a while I like that you are here

An artist can insert light into the world Reach into their own acid stomach Pulling out their intestines Shining, glowing, posing as hope Let me make it so Let me take my own guts in my hands Twist them and turn them Into a blue and red balloon animal Give it to our tired country The rotten thing does not fester Inside me today. Can I do it? I want to take pieces of myself That have atrophied and heal them Turn them into something resembling art

Lose Focus - Drew Alexander

“Oh can you count the miles between us, like constellations in your eyes”

I feel a kinship with birds and spiders One eats the other The smaller one is feared The larger one is adored

A bird is artistic and beautiful A spider creates beautiful art A spider catches its prey in the art A bird catches a spider for a little snack

What is the usefulness Of regret? When the days and months Move ever forward And moments passed Are like photos, Some were not taken As well as others

There is a Transcendence in The letting go The long farewell to Yesterday's bowed head Presently washed clean, Hung out to dry In the ever persistent Cleansing of sun

Why wish for any decision To have gone another way? Would the lines On palms, in diaries Have brought us here If we made a choice With our head Not our heart Or simply on impulse?

Where do moths live in winter? Where do wild chickens go? I see them out now that it's spring But how did they brave the snow?

How do frogs slow their bodies To sleep within the ice? Who else shelters in the walls With the warm and cozy mice?

I wonder if the fish feel cold When all the lakes freeze over Now I welcome back the friends I haven't seen since last October

Though the finches and the foxes Have been here all year long I just saw the first chipmunk Since all of them had gone

How do rabbits breathe In all the ground they are under? I guess that I could look it up But it's more fun to wonder

Touch may not be necessary for me That warm, skin to skin connection Has never felt as vital as an emotional one

Until I find myself clawing at a stranger Until I am turning my head to the side Avoiding kisses, because that's too intimate And my body wasn't asking for intimacy

In all honesty, I don't even like being touched I avoid situations that involve closeness No need to hug anyone just for the hell of it

Until I wrap my arms around a lover Who's name I've mixed up with the last one's I never picture the ones I really crave Who's touches I am actually yearning for

Certainly I can live my life without touch I don't need it like I do good food or drink It does not sustain my soul like poetry does

Until I remember all the ways I've burned The way you struck your fingers like matches On my hands, on my lips, the entirety of me Inside our fire I have wanted and wanted

But that's really all distant memory now I think I'll slide touch up high on my bookshelf Somewhere between fantasy and memoir