To those who keep me afloat over waves
Who hold me close under caring watchful eyes
Who anchor my feet to soil
When all I want is to flee
But all I need is calm love
You keep my earth turning
You keep my sun rising
You keep my moon glowing
Even in the darkest pitches of nights
So here’s to you, you wonderful ones
May I grow to be even half as good
As you deserve from me
December 29–30, 2024
Visiting a friend
Feet crunching on frozen snow
I am warmed inside
Loved and well rested
Hearing rain on window panes
I am real again
2024 has come and gone
As it comes to a close
I look back on it all
The joys and the woes
A year busy and full
Losses and celebrations
Successes and failures
Trials and tribulations
Planting our sticks
Through this hell of a year
One thing’s for certain
I’m so glad you were here
For M.
December 28, 2024
Our wounds cannot outgrow us…
Or can they?
Can they grow and grow and grow further
Until they eclipse us
Rendering us their mere shadow?
I want to write beyond my own head
I want to write The World Out There
All that comes out if I try
Is a tangled mess of shoelaces
Jumbled together trying to feed me a curb
A knotted mayhem trying everything they can
To break my teeth
I brave The World Out There to find
Snarled miniature tumbleweeds
Fighting to clog my windpipe
Dry and dusty threads trying so damn hard
To choke me to death
How do we describe an absent thing we’ve never fully touched
How do we uncover what will always be a mystery
How do we write what we don’t know
What we can’t know
December 27, 2024
You thief of pleasure
Comfort-robber
You shape-shifter
Grabbing and pinching
Tensing and releasing at your whim
Deceptive enough not to hurt outright
But still wrong enough to be sure I feel you
…
These precious few
I will serve them however I can
They may not want it
They may not ask for it
But whether they like it or not
I’ll give as I can
This is what I am!
This is how I’m human.
I withdraw and hide
Or fall silent for a time
As the need takes me
But I return when I can
With no less love than before
May I never lose to spite and bitterness
The side of me that brings me back
December 24, 2024
I was riding high
Fully charged
Shining happy
Until the awakening
Then the reservoir ran low
Now I’m reduced to just
Just reduced…
Reduced to…
Reduced
Anglerfish roam my seas with dead bulbs
Ugly as hell with gaping jaws of crooked teeth
They have no enchantment left
So luring nothing they now go hungry
And the darkest words
Are free to swim as they please
If my guardians starve to death
How can I ever come back to safety
December 22-24, 2024
Opening the door
Finding a joyful surprise
You’re awake already
Standing right there
Smiling at the sight of me
With your entire self
…
Cold winter stillness
Blues and whites under night skies
Quiets a wild heart
Under cedar boughs
How long can I continue
Half living, half dead