Anthem for the Revolution

Search, and, by all means, begin again. Indefinitely. One might also say explore, invent, imitate, elaborate. Then analyze, modify, and pick back up again. Experience. Try everything. Even new styles, crazy clothes, a character, the endless possibilities. Diversify. Embrace. Build yourself boundaries. But leap beyond them. Give yourself rules. But break them. Be intelligent, humorous, sentimental, spontaneous. Begin by stepping out of your skin and observing, letting your fingers brush over your life, letting your gaze linger on the shapes and colors, lines, dimensions. Dance. Sing. Alone. Or in a crowd. Eventually you’ll find yourself and assert yourself. But don’t speak too much—rather act. Be.

Poetry Is

Poetry is life.
Poetry is rays of light on a cloudy day,
Oxygen,
The true vocal cord.
Poetry is the bits of food stuck in your esophagus,
Funnel cake,
A pleasant mirage,
The most beautiful distraction.
Poetry is my dying words,
Life’s ingredients label,
Tylenol.
It is wisdom,
A lighthouse,
A path,
Paint,
Or perhaps it’s the canvas.
Poetry is comfortable,
An expanding room,
A counselor.
Poetry is the dialogue of pigeons,
The overflow of the heart.
Poetry is the conversation between two nurses as they ease their patient off of life-support.
Poetry is the robin guarding her nest,
The dog barking at a treed squirrel,
The lovesong of fallen leaves.
Poetry is the lost tennis shoe on the side of the road,
And empty chair,
The cursive T,
The smell of freshly baked cookies.
Poetry is hip-hop,
Rap,
R&B,
But mostly Polka.
Poetry is the unfurled rose,
The quiet basement,
The wrinkles of a raisin.
Poetry is an orange spray-tan,
Antique lampshade,
The full junk-drawer.
It’s a white-washed fence,
The record player,
Lint in you blue-jean pockets.
Poetry is everything, everything.
Everything but words.

Packing Lunch

My mother clinched to sliced apples
Diced with lemon juice
As if they were a life preserver.
It’s Monday morning
And the sun’s setting
Behind stained windows,
PB&J fingers.
Dinosaur shaped breads look most
Fantasmic
When you’re half-asleep,
Crust still a sty in your left tear duct,
A cork for the years ahead of you.
Mother puts a silver,
Glistening silver,
Bag of smiley fruit gummies
In the lunchbox and closes the lid,
A Yoohoo! poking his head out from behind
A turtleneck.
The food tastes best when there’s a note
On the lunchbox floor:
XOXO, Mom.
I often got lost in the diameter of
The O’s,
The X’s arms being wrapped around me.
Never letting go.
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
I’m five years old.
It’s my first day of school.
My little body is sitting on a cafeteria
Seat two-times the size of me.
I didn’t make friends easily.
I open the lunch pale and inhale
A deep whiff of home .
Hugs.
Tears.
Thirty years from now
I’ll be sitting at a lunch table
On the other side of the world.
Inhaling.
Waiting for the scent.
Inhaling.