My dad can beat up your dad, but he'd rather just lay hands on him

My father wears suits to work.

My mother still helps him match his ties to his shirts

so he always looks presentable – in my eyes, his only real flaw

is not being able to differentiate between black and navy in twilight.

He flavors his morning mocha with a mixture of gospel and binary.

The mochas replaced his coffee because caffeine isn’t good

for his blood pressure. He sees the contradiction here,

but refuses to talk about it. He’s funny like that sometimes.

My father stands 60 feet tall. His hands can span a family,

bring them all together to pretend pumpkin pie

is an appropriate cover-up for bruises,

support his six surviving older siblings on the strength

of his knees; my father repairs homes with his footsteps.

He lays foundations with supplication, builds walls

with his wailing, lays roof with his hands stretching

skyward. My father finds peace in prayer.

I have learned to find peace in the silence that often follows them.

He has learned to be happy that I find any peace at all.

My father used to launch me and my brother across his room

with his legs, carpet-bombing his bed with toddlers over and over.

His legs were missile silos.

This served as target practice for having to re-launch his children

back into the world far too many times. I have yet to hear a complaint.

My father’s voice is a storm when I am desert, bringing thunder and life.

His words fall heavy like the fattest of raindrops;

my cracked skin may take some time to absorb what he offers,

but I store them all in a pool in my belly for when the dry times return.

I know that I never need to go prodigal.

When I was 10 years old, I was being bullied by a neighbor kid.

As he held me by my throat, I yelled out “I rebuke you in Jesus’ name!”

He let me go. Upon telling my father this story,

he affirmed my suspicion that a large angel

had clearly thrown this kid across the yard in my defense.

Years later, while recounting this tale,

he recanted, told me that the boy probably threw himself

off of me because he thought I was crazy.

This was the first time my father unintentionally taught me to question.

My father moves mountains with his mutterings.

But sometimes we are on opposite sides of a canyon

we can’t cross for our shovels.

They don’t work as fast as the backhoes that built it.

When I was a child, my father taught me that my eternal soul is his responsibility.

He said that he would be judged for how he raised me, told me that his father was always watching. He meant God. He called him Abba, which means father in Greek. He said that God became the father he never had.

My father is the reason for my contentment and my restlessness.

He is every poem I’ll ever write,

every demon I will ever battle.

My father is afraid that

I won’t be at his right hand in Heaven.

He also taught me that God is love.

He taught me to love.

My father, I see God in you. You have done your job. 

Chicago winters are the longest ever

I have grown tired of slush-covered streets and Ramen noodle dinners. My poems come

slowly and with far less frequency than I claim. Most nights named “at home writing” 

involve too few words and too much wine. My weeks have consisted of half-working the 

job I already quit and half-writing the applications for jobs to replace it, and all I want 

right now is another beer and another bowl of greens and another episode of some poorly 

written but somehow still captivating television show.

Chicago, you’re pushing it with the days and nights inside.

With all of this snow, ALL SIX FEET, I used to long for mountains

 but now I long for flamethrowers.

You are an animal I have not yet raced with, city streets, and you are a lot faster than you look. 

You’re a relentless competitor. I have gotten good at convincing myself that I am 

winning when I am not. I have spun my wheels in Shenandoah river sands and Oklahoma 

gypsum pits. I welcome the traction of your concrete.

Chicago, I need you to be as alive as I was led to believe.

I’m growing accustomed to your grays and browns, but

I need to see your vibrant colors. I need to smell your breath.

I know you take far more pride in your presentation than these odors

of salt truck diesel fumes, these dressings of oily snow and months-buried

garbage. You are way, way sexier than that. I know this because I’ve been

hanging with your poets. Your artists. Your musicians. I’d love to sashay

with them across your parks, but that’s a little difficult when our heels keep getting frozen to your skin, Chicago!

The walls of my apartment are alive, but choking on the snowmelt. My carpet 

is soaked for the cracks in the foundation. There is a massive hole in my kitchen floor where I have placed my dreams. I bury them in coffee grounds and cigarette ashes. They make for good compost, but I’m ready to move them to outdoor plots. I want to help your colors reveal themselves. I’m finally putting down roots.

salvation

1)      The couch was tweed and I was five.

You told me that Jesus loves me. You told me that

He wants to save me. So I poured out my heart

Matthew, John, and Romans over the couch cushions.

I was saved now.

2)      My feet were pool-bottom tender; wet hair plastered

to my forehead like over-sheltered innocence. The two men

approached me in the locker room. It was the first time I had seen

another man’s penis. My mother’s voice bouncing off the lockers

was grace in action. This was the first time I learned that salvation

comes in many forms.

3)      She told me that she loved me outside her mother’s office.

It had been a week and a half since I said it for the first time.

It is so good to feel loved. The salvation of love is too sweet a gift.

I hope to one day permit myself to feel that again.

4)      His hand formed to the shape of my throat and pulled me up

onto the stage with no malice in his heart. The thumps

in my chest matching the beat of the drum track. This was rapture.

This was the first time I realized that I hear music differently.

5)      Someone decided he needed to break into the lockers

in the gym, and several students and I lost money

and belongings. I called my mom. She called my dad.

They prayed. I received everything back except

my ring with the cross on it.

6)      Sometimes, when I relish in something as simple

as a hot shower and a cold beer

at the end of a shitty day.

7)      Every time I cross the Chesapeake bay

and no matter what time of year,

what type of weather,

my windows come down so I can

breathe in the salt air

8)      Every time my parents tell me

that they are proud of me, even though

I don’t always feel proud of myself.

9)      Every single time I close my eyes

and remember how blessed I am

to live the life that I live.

  

10)  The first time I was kissed

like she fucking meant it.

Salvation is personal. And it is not finite.

For some there is a god involved.

For some, it is a moment deemed holy only by the one

experiencing it. Ask me to tell you another. Then hold your ear to my chest.

I will say it out loud, and you will hear only “Saved” echoing back.

This is my Collective. This is my Holy.

This is my Salvation.

You never really say goodbye to red dirt...

Oklahoma, you are so generous to let me wear your skin.
You cling to my face in breeze or gust so I don't forget
your windwords in their absence.

You wear crimson and clover as work-worn wranglers by day
and nothing but the classiest of little black dresses by night;
you grow exponentially irresistible.

You paint boots copper sunset on towering plateaus.
Your red dirt is armor unmatched; your people etch you
into their skin with sunbeam-smile pride.

I hold you chained to me like a pocket watch;
even when you slip from my hands, you only fall so far.

Every reunion will be Ferris wheel belly drops and rodeo heartbeats.
I ache something fierce for you already.
I'm glad that through even the strongest of storms,
you never really wash away.

Triumph - a found poem

He died at age 66.

   - Something in the air -

When the boatmen push away

he leaps up,

scowls

“Of course it made a wonderful story.”

Uncle Larry

There are few things in life more soothing, more comforting, than a hug from a loved one. For some, they’re even medicinal in a way. Research has shown that 8-10 meaningful touches are needed per day to maintain happiness and wholeness in spirit. For a brief moment, all worry and care and pain and suffering can be drowned out by the sound, the feeling, of another’s heartbeat against your own.  What if this were the only effective medicine you had? And what if fear and ignorance denied you of it?

            Lawrence Walton Young was born on July 1^st, 1952 into a troubled home. He was the sixth of eight children. This man was my uncle. He was thrust into a life far less satisfying than he deserved. From youth, he was denied the love he needed by an abusive-turned-absent father. In 1959, when my Uncle Larry was seven years old, his parents separated for four years. From the ages of 7-11…very formative years for a young boy…Uncle Larry learned what it meant to experience a lack of love, and for the rest of his life would be driven to seek this love an acceptance from other sources. My father, Uncle Larry’s younger brother, told me that Larry was, “…smarter than all of us.” But even still, without guidance and nurturing, all Larry could think to do was to run in search of the love and acceptance he so desperately needed.

            In 1970, at the age of 18, Uncle Larry joined the US Army. As a member of the infantry, he proved to be an excellent soldier. He was awarded a variety of recognitions, including being a sharpshooter. In January 1971, he was sent to Vietnam. By April, he was at Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, DC. He had earned two purple hearts during his four months in country, the second one because of mortar fire that tore through his left leg, damaging it so badly that he should have lost it. But he didn’t…he healed. And though he was told he shouldn’t ever walk right again, he did that too. Uncle Larry was a fighter. He received a medical discharge and at 19 years old he was back to where he had been before, no longer a part of the place where he had found some semblance of the acceptance that he craved.

            Having already experimented with drugs and alcohol prior to his joining the Army, Uncle Larry returned to these things with a newfound fervency. The horrors that his 18-year-old eyes had witnessed in Vietnam only served to fuel his desires for numbed emotions. Through his experimentation, he came across a drug known as BAM. Popularized in the early 70s, this form of methamphetamine was taken intravenously. Though Uncle Larry’s drug and alcohol use, and again, a deep-seeded need for affection, inevitably led to promiscuity, it was eventually determined by my uncle that the sharing of needles was what led to his contraction of HIV in 1989. He was 36 years old. My father and my pastor were in the room with him when he got the news. He was devastated. And through all of his trials and struggles and addictions, my Uncle Larry was still a man. I want you to know this: Habits do not always have to shape the individual. My Uncle Larry went through the hard and terribly awkward task of calling and informing all the women he had come in contact with of his unfortunate diagnosis. I can only imagine that this was one of the most difficult things he had to accomplish in his life, but nevertheless he did it.

            Uncle Larry was diagnosed at a time when AIDS was emerging rapidly and little was known about how it worked or how to fight it. Paying for everything himself, my uncle tried expensive herbal teas, dietary changes, exercise, and of course AZT. However, his lack of knowledge about the ease of transmission and how badly it decimates the immune system ultimately allowed for Uncle Larry’s life choices post-diagnosis to counteract his attempts at fighting the disease. He continued in his alcohol and drug use, as well as his promiscuity, though he was far more careful in methods of prevention of the spread of the disease. I say this not to judge or condemn my uncle in any way, or to present him in a negative light, but rather to illustrate the power of addiction and the extreme loneliness and self-destruction that his situation led him into. Unless you have been diagnosed with this disease, one can only imagine that this man, whose actions sought only to bring him some sort of approval by someone, somewhere, these actions, this quest for belonging and emotional reprieve now condemned him to death.

            Uncle Larry drank himself to a stroke in 1993, and he spent the majority of the remainder of his battle with AIDS in the VA Hospital in Beckley, West Virginia. During this time, a second stroke ravaged his body, further depleting his immune system and driving him closer to his death. Far more devastating than this, though, was the most times, though not always only, perceived rejection he continued to feel from his family. People continued to be frightened of this seemingly unstoppable virus, and even love for a brother could not overcome this fear. My uncle’s siblings did not visit him nearly as often as they should have, certainly not as often as he needed them to. And this continued absence in his time of need is what, I feel, eventually led to his inability to fight any longer.

            My Uncle Larry passed on March 22^nd, 1995. He was 42 years old. I was nine and had seen him only a handful of rememberable times, most in the hospital. His six year battle with AIDS ended with a military funeral. My father has one of his purple hearts and the flag from the ceremony. My Uncle Jerry has the other Purple Heart and the rest of Uncle Larry’s medals. And now, 22 years after my uncle’s diagnosis, we still have no publicly known cure for AIDS. But something that is known, has always been known, is that there is little that can destroy the bonds of love and family, and the human spirit. I exhort all who can hear me right now to remember that no matter what, love. Without boundaries, love. Without limitation, love. Without ceasing, without condition, without hesitation, love. And hug those you love as often as you can. Though your loved one may pass with a broken body, let them go with a whole and overflowing heart. 

Train Love

Let’s get married,

she says.

When?

Yesterday,

she says.

Impossible, I say.

Time

She responds,

Time is fictional.

It was made for trains.

I wrote the railway a letter.

I told them that they didn’t need to stop

here anymore.

Our wedding day will always be yesterday.

Our anniversary will be tomorrow.

We will never celebrate it.

Anniversaries disrupt continuity.

We will not be hash marks on a doorframe.

We will be marked by the growth of mountains

and the erosion of stone

This heart beat is a stutter-step

Keep this dime-store orchestra body

in unison with your lilting hands.

She packs her batons

in her grandmother’s suitcase.

She is ready for this journey.

I will follow.

Sailboat

1)      You are a regatta in a rainstorm.

All thunderbolts and lifejackets,

you are hell-bent on capsize.

Hulls scream splinters in retort;

Poseidon nods his approval,

you strike worthy in his sight.

But no one cries out to him for aid.

Sometimes waves crest higher than your faith.

2)      My palms are rope-shredded and baby pink.

My fingertips are teeth-tattered, but can still

elicit tones beautiful from string.

Let me sing you complacent.

Calm your ragged breath,

hold your inhale a bit longer.

Fill your lungs to aching with this respite.

3)      An albatross glazes itself like fine pottery across the sky

leaving thirteen years of continuous flight

in his wing-beat-less wake.

He has seen storms like you before

but he long ago molted away his fear of you.

He knows to go over you now.

He knows that flying through you is a death sentence.

4)      The thing about the eye of the storm

is that it’s temporary. And you know

that when this harpy of a hurricane returns
it will be far more destructive than

prior winds could have prepared you for.

If the definition of insanity is repeating the same action and

expecting a different result, then why do I still expect answers

to prayers continually offered in various languages

when my sanity is all I have left.

Yet I continue with my mallet, repairing the gaps

in my storm-stretched framework as though it will make a difference.

5)      Blustering back as though you own

every ocean-bound vessel, your return

is an uneven firefight.

Your winds turn over graves still left

half-buried from your last trip through,

showing no mercy in your swath

of destruction. You target the weak seams first.

Lowering my sails serves to reduce the size of my bulls-eye hide

but your aim is pinpoint. Here’s to hoping

I still know how to shake a bogie.

6)      My father has been teaching me how to sail

since I can remember. We had lessons every Sunday.

His father never taught him much of anything,

so maybe that’s why it’s so hard to let go. 

I need to see him happy before myself.

7)      My shipwreck heart sinks like a sieve

every time I travel through your tempestuous weather.

Your winds blow fiercer than my boats can handle.

But there is enough wood at the bottom of my chest

to construct an armada and I’m still not afraid of your

bluster. You will not beat me. I will sail again.

                      

In here, we are righteous

Standing here among these hearts

and minds, intertwined and tangled

like lovers’ limbs,

we are reminded

     of what we are

     and what we are not.

Stained

uniform pieces litter

floor and bodies but we

do not focus on the negligible.

The important things…

they are found in air around us,

bouncing off each other like atoms,

truth and fellowship.

In here,

we are giants.

Far larger than the fates

that conspire against us,

we tower over them

like terrible lizards.

They don’t frighten us in here.

Our teeth are larger than theirs.

We have survived asteroids.

This is more than mortar and

stone. This place is sanctuary.

We remember who we are

in here.

We are flesh and sinew.

We are mind, will, and emotions.

We are temples unto ourselves.

Wash yourself holy in our smoke.

In here,

we present to each other

offerings of concrete

for faulty foundations.

In here,

we are equals.

Wearied souls who find rest in the

rejuvenation of each other.

In here,

we are quenched.

We are self-governing.

In here,

we are righteous.

Discoveries in my kitchen at two a.m.

1. My family goes through hummus 

    like its candy. There is a Ziploc bag
    of fortune cookies in the pantry.
    Four different types of salsa
    in the refrigerator and no tortilla chips.
    I am the only member of my family who speaks
    another language efficiently.

2. There is a single dirty cat pawprint 

    on the floor. Only one.
    This makes the direction it faces arbitrary,
    though I cannot help but wonder
    what the single pawprint is made of.
    There is nothing this color on the counter,
    and the cats don’t go outside.
    Sometimes footprints are just 

    arbitrary. Sometimes dirt is 

    unexplainable.

3. There are more vitamins and
    supplements and additives in
    the pantry than food. My brother
    is the only family member who works out.
    My mother is a pseudo-vegetarian,
    my sister and I retired from this diet. 

    There is no need for so many pills.
    I don’t know who takes all 

    the vitamins. I just want the food.

4. Dark Mocha Almond granola bars do not
    sound appetizing at this time
    of night. I like all of these things.
    I even like them together. But I need
    something more filling. Late night cravings
    should be fully sated for fear
    of returning in the form of crazy dreams
    or werewolf transformations. I read
    an article where a twenty-six-year-old
    woman didn’t understand why three men
    backed out of marrying her;
    she also has Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder
    and goes self-admittedly bat-shit-crazy
    for five days a month. She likens herself
    unto a werewolf. I don’t want this.
    I need something more satisfying
    than a granola bar.

5. I cannot decide between thin-sliced honey
    turkey and an apple. My mother
    is sleeping in her bedroom which
    is off of the living room which
    is off of the kitchen in which
    I am making more noise
    than I should be at this hour.
    My father is on a mission trip.
    I know she misses him. She should
    sleep. Apples crunch too loud.
    My mother picks good apples.
    I choose the turkey.

Sometimes angels are made by mistake

She giggles as much when she's happy
as she does when she's nervous.
It's hard for me to tell
the difference between the two
Sometimes it's harder for her

Her smile doesn't easily mask her ageless insecurities
mapped out on teenage arms
Some call her broken.
Label her as stained and unforgiven
Unforgivable, even
Even...

Odd how Lucifer was once an angel of light, and
though she never thought herself equal to God,
sometimes she still tries to see His face
between calling out His name in vain and taking him in pill form
A pharmaceutical communion, fingering her pills
like rosary beads
Say ten "Hail Mary's"
Take five Mollies
Cry out one loud "Our Father"

Maybe it's all the same to her
It's hard to make a distinction between heaven
and hell when you live both simultaneously,
had to save yourself from a freefall
when your angels are falling with you
Her parents,
upon learning of their 15-year-old
daughter's meth addiction,
decided to make it a family affair
All three of them spent
the next 18 months forgetting
how to be a family
by shooting up together

Three years later,
having missed too much school to
graduate on time,
she's not sure whether finishing is
even worth it.
But she's finally learning
to feel
to breathe deeply
to heal slowly
Her mouth crinkles when she smile
Her eyes, heavy with sleep,
cannot close without the voice
of a stranger chasing nightmares
from her head
Like so many wolves in sheep's clothing
she is faithful to both her
faith in God and her
lack thereof in man.

And his heart,
the one holding the light at the end of the tunnel
So quickly she strides towards it
Anxious for salvation
Expectant on its extinction
Keep walking
He may be the one to
save you

...or he may not be, but remember
Faith is defined as belief in
something not yet seen and
Faith in something is better
than feeling helpless
So keep believing
in whatever it is that
holds you up.

Salvation will come.

You are all Atlas

Man.

Old hirsute wizened weathered troubled man

I see you.

Not just your face but the stories it tells

Through crooked grin

It’s in hallowed eyes

Begging to be remembered

History places too many in the background

This is for you, man

For the man who tasted sweat on his lips and knew

This was the taste of life

Who discovered that sweat and tears taste the same;

Sweat, tears and blood flavor the soil

Something palpable and human and ancient.

The man who carved history from the back of the earth

Hands calloused, marred like the ground

These are the hands of Man,

The marks of Man, the pride of Man,

Grizzled specimen of survival and struggle and selflessness

I will remember you

I will call you uncle, brother, cousin, friend

Hold your head high you

Appalachian champion, you

Southern gentlemen, you

Dust bowl denizen, you

Patroller of the Pacific Northwest

You are a history of perseverance and failure

And perseverance and success.

Building block of a

Solid sort

You are Whitman,

Your words bring earth to page to life

You are Sooner, you are Settler, you are epitome.

You are my Uncle, 30 years of days

in dark earth belly.

You are my father, putting

God and family before himself

You are me

And my father, and my grandfather,

And his father

You are us.

Thank you for carrying us

You carry us so well.

sunlight on mirrors

There are times when even though my window has been closed for days and no apparent natural light has come into my room[natural meaning of nature and into meaning a metaphorical entrance through tempered glass], I still feel as though it snakes its way throughmyblinds ontomybed acrossmyfloor hitting my face, reflecting off my old mirror [my mirror being the one I purchased and not made so as to see myself allegedly] and this sunlight, this uninvited, precocious, intergalactic traveler[intergalactic being the expanse though which it journeys and traveler being one who travels for that sake alone]; this invades my room without regard to my present state and expects me to just accept its presence, much like that of air or sneezing or losing one sock, something expectantly inevitable, while maybejustmaybe I had something better to do than cheer up and breathe and smile and enjoy life and warmth and be satisfied.

Unaddled

Having you was privilege.

Needing you was breathing.

Losing you was…

Having you was needing you was losing you was

Spinning the cylinder was

Open and taste…was

Chasing you was like playing

Russian roulette with a gun where

Someone had loaded the rest of the chambers when

I wasn’t looking; when

It came to be my turn to

Bite the bullet

I bit hard and it

Bit back harder, shattering my

Smitten smile into

Cavity-laden snowflakes so convincing,

The neighborhood children grabbed their

Snowsuits and toboggans for playtime in my wake.

Their parents blame me for

Leading their children astray

With false promises of recreation because

Today’s children may not be taken in by

Artificiality but they’re

Far too accepting of it.

And I’ve grown weary of gumming

Everything I put my mouth to so

I’m cutting new teeth on my only

Photo of you, gnawing at the edges until they’re

So tattered it seems as though

Someone has ripped you from reality;

The reality is my reality is altered

In your absence and

While my teeth have grown back in,

While I am able to chew and swallow again,

Things still don’t quite taste right.

And that gun is sitting on the nightstand,

Hammer cocked; and the fear that someone

Has loaded the rest of the chambers again is

Starting to wear off; it just looks

So damn appetizing.

But I’ve yet to determine if these

Pangs in my stomach are

truly of hunger or

just a fear of not finding

something of substance to

sate these primal tempests

in my gullet the way that

you did.

So I’ll continue my teething

Like privilege

Like breathing

Like nothing has changed

Like we’re both still the same

Like that gun isn’t taunting me

Like the chambers are empty

Like tomorrow will be different

Like Youth is asking its parents to show them what real is

Like real still is

Like real life tastes nothing of gunmetal

And I smile again

A big toothy grin

White as snowflakes

And you’re bitter as I walk away.

Chill out, lady

and I said to her
Honey
I hear you, but
your cookie-cutter
flower petal
make-no-mistake
tone is quite
deafening to the ear
Your message
lost among the static of
fly-by-night
bumble bee
runway landings; oh
can't you ever make
a statement without
epiphany and
expectation of
concession
?

the oceans we knew and the jewelry we have

We saw it coming

from far off

We were aware of

this wave from nowhere

We did nothing to stop it

And don’t you think for a

moment that I didn’t want to

I was patiently waiting for

your cue

It never came

Breaking slowly over us

the tide of our own remorse

We drank it in greedily

Mouths opened wide like

Young fledglings we were

We were not ready for this life

These duties

We

should have turned in our badges

At the first sign of trouble

But we held them like

Breath

Easy and fulfilling are not

Synonymous

Hardness like fire-scorched

Steel or diamonds –

Herein lies fulfillment

Yet we settled for nickel and

dime store mood rings

As though we could compass our way

through life based

on the color of a stone

on our right middle fingers

When you rely on body heat

to make your most important decisions

Your answers become arbitrary

and mood rings are unreliable when

you’re already

dead inside anyway

Think about it

And next time you wash

the remnants of the day

from your hands, try to

leave the little green circle

around your right middle finger

It’s all we have left

Don't move, be still

Don't move, be still

pussy cat. Your

whiskers are giving away

your position in the windblown.

We see you there.

Try not to breathe too loudly. You'll

disturb the monster. She's

never pleasant when

she's awakened without

just cause. I know

because I've done it before.

See my scar? A reminder of

past mistakes isn't a preventer of

new ones in and of itself, so

hush. Be still. Lie.

rise and fall of a parking lot god

So this one time I got punched
in my right jaw
by a man high on PCP
for no reason other than I
was walking through a parking lot
he forgot to inform me was
his devil's playground
angel dust coursing through his veins
he thought himself god of the pavement
the drugstore, his castle
the cars, his chariots
"Mind me!" he slurs through drooled grunts
as fist connects with metal and glass
then flesh, finding me at fault for
entering his domain without his permission
my trespass not quickly forgiven
no offer of daily bread
his will to be done in his personal
asphalt kingdom of heaven

his prayer is slightly different than mine.

as the police placed him in steel
did he ever realize
while coming down
that even devils come
as angels of light

to the young girl who thinks she is a grown woman

So I recently joined a free online dating site
or two
as a means by which to meet people
ok, women people
in my new city of Tulsa
and I've noticed a pattern
I cannot ignore

To the young girl who thinks she is a grown woman
Two babies
One 12 weeks old
The other two years
Tired of losers and assholes
Looking for a real man

Stop it
Stop with the pictures of you in your bikini from above
Stop with the kissy faces and lyrics from bad country songs
Stop with thinking you're more than the child you still are
You're not yet a real woman so
How can you be looking for a real man?
You have babies but you're
Still a baby yourself 
Don't tell me you're grown
because you have prematurely had to grow up
Forced to change diapers
and wipe spit-up
off of your Forever 21 top and

Abercrombie jeans 

This isn't Maury Povich
Acting like an adult and being one
are completely different
I'm sorry

Sorry for whatever circumstances forced you to
grow up before you should have
Now I know
There are always stories with
extenuating circumstances but
that's a different poem
This here is for you
The girl who earned this life path
Through conscious decisions
You were irresponsible
Birds and bees don't stop flying around
your bed or couch or back seat or truck
just because you're 15 and invincible
We all thought that once
And as of yet no one has pulled it off
Sex won't make him love you
Neither will fatherhood
You are not an easy bake oven
a nine month ingredient dump
You are worth more than that
Show me your value
You are youth
Show me grace. Smile.
You give life to those around you
Live yours for you
You are beautiful
Your eyes carry secrets man has forgotten
You need to remember this

And I'm willing to concede that
this isn't entirely your fault
Expectations of women today
can be so damn confusing with
the disparities between how
you're expected to act in public
versus the bedroom
Women in the public eye
using their children
and the way in which they made them
as media magnets
This is what meets their eyes daily
and eventually it takes its toll on a
young woman's heart and mind
Whores for attention so often get labeled
as the other when their babies are mistaken
for rouge, lipstick, and an invitation
"She's got kids so you know she puts out"
"But she's so sweet...how could that
have happened to such a young girl?
What a shame..."
Since when did children become shame...
That's why you're here
on this site
looking for a real man

And I'm a nice guy
but at 25 I know I am not ready
to father a child
and a girlfriend
And don't mistake my

concession for coddling
I'm willing to support you being
A mother to your child and
a young girl to yourself but
someone has to help you to realize that
albeit too soon, it's grown-up time now
So you won't be hearing from me 
other than in this poem 
Cause I may be a real man but
I'm not what you need
I pray that you find it

let's not be elephants

I wrote this poem with a sharpie pen
Fine point
Black ink
It is not my normal choice of pen
I'm picky like you
I used it because you said it was your favorite to write with
I wanted to write you

Wanted to see you in these letters scratched across
my notebook the way I did in your marginal notes
in books you gave me. Books you knew I'd enjoy
We always enjoyed books
No one else could discuss literature with me
for hours, but somehow we managed to
return to it consistently
We loved it
I'm pretty sure it loved us
Did we?

You've cut me off again
I am no longer allowed to contact you directly
so I wrote this poem instead
channeling you through this sharpie pen
I'll respect your wishes this time
Respect that
Respect you
Forget us
If that is what you want

It's said
Elephants can die of a broken heart
Let's not be elephants
Let's be something else
something smaller
something with less blood
less heart
let's be something solitary
that only comes together briefly
once in a lifetime
never repeating but
leaving a permanent impact
I couldn't think of what to be
so I looked it up

I'd say let's be lemmings
only I won't follow you over a cliff
or
let's be honey badgers
cause frankly
honey badger don't give a shit
Better yet, let's be armadillos
hidden behind our armor
we'll look like little grey
soccer balls
Don't kick us
we're breathing

And that's just it
we're breathing
You once were my "What if..."
Now you're my "I had you once"
And it was what I'd hoped
albeit too short and
we're still breathing

You're here (still)
And I'm sure you will be
for some time
In my mind
In my heart
In this ink
Because I wrote this poem with a sharpie pen
Fine point
Black ink
And I don't really like it
But I can see you
I always will
Despite your armadillo armor
You're here
Still
Stay a while longer
I know I will
I'm only halfway there