I don’t call it by name

Because that’s an invitation-

I live on the river bed,

Underneath civilization;

I’m so still, but I feel the constant flow.

I didn’t know-

Rock-bottom isn’t a location,

But a perspective;

An after-taste of damnation

Intensifies redemptive mouthfuls.

I sank like doubtful,

But His fingers lifted my fixations

From a muddy grave.

I rely on His instigations

To prevent my constant sinking.

And the ebb and flow I’m drinking

Is His pulling me from desolation,

And my thanks,

And my falling from consecration

To my familiar perspective.

My sin is introspective

And narcissistic contemplation-

And are these blues

Sin- or the excavation

Of repentance and remembrance?

Her once golden array
Flowing down around her supple limbs
When all was new and the day
Tangled around her sun-dark skin as
Sheets of desire, spilled Cabernet,
Wasted hours on foolish whims.

These winters, cold and cruel,
Unleashed unholy, jealous rage
She was passion- a capricious fool
Laying uncovered until engaged
The flawless fell to brutal-
The ageless aged.

She wanders wild, confused,
Clutching her threadbare shawl
Her lovers long ago excused
Her unbowed features fall
Into the wrinkle, spot, and bruised
By the loss of her enthralled

She roams in search of her wailing wall.

Depression is the next seduction.

Stuck in another deconstruction,

I hate the long transitions

Stuck in my own sedition-

How long are these traditions,

These binary oppositions-

I wish I could follow instruction.

I wish I didn’t speak destruction.

I miss the walks on the sandy shore-

I know I don’t belong there anymore.

No one thought I’d find subsistence.

It’s hard to break the habit of resistance.

I want proximity that isn’t coincidence.

Every part of life is long-distance.

I’ve walked all the new roads before

There’s nothing left here to explore.

I feel trapped in a world of vanity-

Ego is the worst profanity,

And we’ve built our towers high.

I wish I could still see the sky.

I wish I could hear the tide.

The waves are just implied,

But they were once my sanity.

What do I contribute to humanity?

I wish I could find my purpose.

I’m sick of the three-ring circus

Everyone is a juggler at a cheap fair

Everything stays in the air.

I meant to be more prepared.

I’ve dropped everything on a prayer,

And a cluttered surface.

I forget when I get nervous.

I need to take a walk to remind me,

I need for You to find me.

I’m good at shutting out the noise,

Carving fancy decoys-

Some towers need to be destroyed.

Deconstruct these cheap ploys,

Show me again Your glory,

Tell me again our story.

Two weeks in the ground,

and the family’s dried up

so he carries them home-

his bride’s dead shrubs.

“Oh, he loves me still,

still, he loves.”

She places the black blooms

in the front room, unforgotten

she admires the dry petals

crisp like starched cotton

He eats quiet, sleeps fast,

and leaves with no kiss,

to tend stones and bones

and she tends his.

“Oh, he loves me still,

still, he loves.”

Roses need not open red

with petals silk to skin.

Beauty is, in life, in death,

where it is seen akin.

Throwing decisions over my shoulder

Grains of salt to the fates

Waiting and watching and working

I can’t concentrate

On the weight of these days.

Brooding inside me, in my neurosis,

All the pieces fit,

Falling into my obsessions,

The passions I won’t submit

And who will acquit me in my guilt?

One day more, one more week,

And I know how to fight

Addiction with distraction

Ignore what incites

But I’m not contrite enough

to marathon.

Darken the lights and dim the senses,

These days are long, and senseless,

Feel the same old something different,

Something deliberate or irreverent

To break the ice and crack the dam

Or wash away what I am.