A thousand stark crosses

Plotted on a green hill

Once moving a thousand miles an hour

Now stand still.

At life’s bloody terminus

We are told they are the purest of all of us

The rolling front blending together

Police tape lines the yard

I walk past

Baby blue house in cookie-cutter neighborhood

I look down and it says welcome

I quickly step in and close the door

so the camera flashes don’t glimpse inside

Even if the school desks

Are perfectly aligned

And the chairs evenly spaced

And the walls precisely decorated

And the white boards

Sparkling white,

This is not my place.

The smile I wear is fake.

Constantly fighting to escape your

embrace,

The proof of my struggles remains on

my face.

Through tears in the dark I turn over

to see-

A stranger, a monster, lying next to me

We caught her,

Slowly dying,

Submerged in water,

Alone and crying,

Slowly dying,

As she falls,

Alone and crying.

The sinner crawls.

As she falls,

I heard the voice,

The sinner crawls,

showers are often taken for granted

a comfort for the morning, afternoon, late night, whenever

consistently enveloping you in that same warm blanket

always at that perfect angle

so you never have to put in unnecessary effort

Everyone thinks I am super happy

But I’m not...

Everyone thinks I just don’t have any problems

But I do...

Everyone thinks I am just happy with myself

But I’m not...

Everyone thinks that I can just make everything in my life okay

I hear walkie talkies – kusssshhhhh.

People talking, “Blah, blah, blah, bleep.”

I hear toilets flush.

Basketballs bounce and swoosh.

This place is full of it: empty. 

The twisted metal trees

Rise up from the heap

Magpies hop about

The glittering savannah

And crows harass the mice

Nesting in the chewed

Leather seat

Of a Volkswagen

A scruffy dog

Stalks the crows

Since the first breath of life,

one adventure to the next,

I can only reflect back in fondness

to the scattered pieces of my heart.

This here is real.

There are no stories

about happy homes and whole hearts

where we come from.

No fancy cars.

We got no big houses but big dreams.

This is crack fiends at midnight,

babies crying, sleeping on wooden floors.

The losses we experience

The victories we achieve…

They become intertwined

With the places we inhabit

As we go about our lives.

Meaning and memory tie us to these places

So that even when we leave somewhere,

There’s a girl that I see sometimes.

She pops up from time to time.

Day to day.

She’s a lot of things.

God, she’s beautiful.

And, isn’t she just so funny?

The fire hisses, flickering,

as it lay encaged by a thick black sheath of iron.

Cloth stockings droop down− bare and bereaved.

Pure, white snow is drifting

down from the blank upper atmosphere.

The gray and white dog routinely scampers

Sitting on my grandpa Larry’s lap,

laughing and smiling.

Going everywhere on the cart smiling.

Smiling the way he laughs.

Going to the hospital trying to smile,

but I can’t.

Rushing to his room I run.

The ties to your ancestry

Binding a great family tree,

With this can you be truly free?

Now you have these choices three:

Embrace your blood,

An old-new bud.

Refuse the bonds

For fields beyond.

I have not changed at all.

It is not true that

I have changed for the better from experience.

It is genuine when I say that

I have not tried to apologize for my past wrongdoings.

I am false when I claim that

I was once told that we must take adventures to know where we truly belong, meaning that we have to search to find the perfect place for ourselves. I do not necessarily agree or disagree with this statement.

Place: noun, defined as a portion of space available or designated for or being used by someone; i.e. one’s spot at the table, or if you think like me, one’s place in this world.

Some of us haven’t quite found a place

We wander with suitcases full of self-doubt and worry

We flit from person to person seeking acceptance

We run from place to place

searching for a passion where we can direct the never ending flow of time

What do you do when the place you call home

Is one that you no longer recognize; when you

Forget that place is no mere function of space,

But also a function of time; and the

Crystalline memories you can still see,

This place, that place, there are so many in which I can be,

But I choose that one, the one where I can be free.

It can be a place where the sun shines at the crack of dawn,

A place that is so dreamy it can make me yawn.

I couldn’t see the ocean, I couldn’t see the waves.

I didn’t even know there were waves.

Just a blue blur, like paint splattered on a blank canvas

Tripping over nothing,

Catching something that wasn’t there

A trick of the mind it was.

Down the winding path I stroll, through woods dark

And deep, where mystery and magic roam.

A swift stream runs here; high above, a lark

Sings sweet and clear, in a voice that calls “home.”

Onwards, a low growl comes from some deep cave

there was a river/in the black hills/that my favorite trail followed/with pine trees lining

its banks/of hard ground and towering rocks//i would beg my father/to walk that trail/

as far as it went/as many days as i could//and as we walked he would/recite poems from

It’s been five days,

But more than five days have been accomplished

It doesn’t feel like years have past,

Only that the beginning seems like years ago

It’s time to leave, to another world

But the world we leave will never leave us

i could break beneath the weight of

atmosphere.

these stars, balanced atop my head

are heavier than the sun,

lending their light

across a universe, a lifetime

to shatter my insides in their silence.

Hadfield gazed out the small glass window,

a portal to home.

Through the opening, an inspiring sight,

the bright sunlight shone.

Swirling colors, pushing to the horizon,

a palette of aquamarine,