The Day Love Wins
My song belies my tumult
Lonely
I grapple for understanding
In a chamber full of confidants
My world convulsing
Still in the liminal
I feel sorrow but also hope
Hands of saints pull me from the ashes
for his death has saved me
We are one body
But set ourselves adrift in the sea of judgment
It is not devotion but practice
Deep listening deep seeing
That allows us to cast aside our shields of difference
Leading with love
Scattering meliorism to the four directions
In December of 2024 the music director of our church asked if I would like to collaborate on a choral anthem to debut at Easter service. I nearly wept when he asked me. My friend Jarrod had wanted to put my poems to music. He was killed in a car crash a week after we graduated high school. This was an amazing opportunity, and I look forward to more collaborations in the future.
Boot Cotton Mills
On black and white New York Streets
I stood with Dean Moriarty
Snow fell on discarded vending machines
Arrayed along a sagging chain-link fence
I felt the rumble of the freight cars
As I dragged on my last cigarette
Watching the scroll unfurl
Enamored with the marvelous idea
Of traversing the country unbidden
Preserving the memories
I could not relive
Persuasion
The shadow dancers return
Questioning and dissecting
The minutiae of my life
I light another cigarette
Splash more rum into my glass
Remember the woman
Who hung herself behind the barn
Faith can no longer be my escape hatch
I whisper to the birds
I can still be a hope merchant
If I don’t run away from my footsteps in my shadow
Good Morning the Automaster
I’m waiting for new tires
A rusted roofing nail
The catalyst of this outing
I’ve passed the time
Reading the news
Reading poetry to counter act my despair of reading the news
Observing conversations
A salesman paces
There are not many cars to sell
I can’t think of anything worse than selling cars
There is a museum here
A cluttered hallway
Filled with kitschy oddities
In stark contrast to the sleek dealership
The complimentary coffee
Is hot but weak
The stage coaches are now leaving the building
I’m still waiting
Stretched out in an April sun beam
Smiling to myself
Because
Rutabaga sounds more like the name of an angry gnome
Than a root vegetable
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Quietly Making Noise 