memory games

I would say I'm sorry.
Given the chance,
I would say I'm sorry.
But that's because it's now.
In an hour, maybe even a few minutes,
I won't care.
I will emerge from memory
numb again to past decisions.
But right now--
these minutes of aftershock
from a triggered sense,
the sound of a song we claimed "ours,"
or a letter I found
with a picture of you--
I would say I'm sorry
and ask you for a second chance.
I'm in the past.

Not for much longer . . .
I'm re-reading now,
fighting the urge to edit, now erase.
And now laugh--
"He wishes the past different!
As though his wanting now
could be his wanting then!"
I chastise the me of five minutes ago,
chastising the me of five years ago,
a fool to play with time.

trickle down blood
trickle down rain
embrace the curse
of living in pain
the sanity
of going insane

nothing consoled

When in love's pain,

there is
nowhere to go
nowhere to be
nothing to say
nothing to free
your soul from suffering.

It's drifting in space with claustrophobia
or motion sickness from the earth's spin.
It's freezing at 100 degrees Fahrenheit
or burning at the other end.
It's death by wanting
yet forced to live each moment more.
No search can end the suffering
nor find the right in every sore.

If at least it were the noble thing
If at least I sensed some glory
If at least I were the martyr king
in some heroic story

But it's none of these,
not ev'n at least.
In simplest terms it's boring.
For sits the man restoring
nothing by his sitting
and nothing by his spinning
of the harshest words--
the ones meant for his ridding
of the pain.
Not even rain
can drown his sickness whole
and leave him sleep, that peaceful role
of happy men, of kings extolled.

The suffered sits, nothing consoled.

before their time

those first tulips
early to the season
pioneers of spring
the sacrifice of unborn colors--
will freeze to death before they see it

they die for living too early
for being passionate
wearing winter down
they fall in final gusts and flurries
before daybreak

then was I born
awakened to sunlit seasons
alive upon the graves of seers

walls

The walls are tumbling faster now
and I watch, hands empty and dry.
I hear wind and rock,
the grind and tear of ancient layers of wisdom.
When it falls I may look at it for a long time,
stare at the words that no longer exist,
the feelings that no longer are.
And turn and walk on.