Ethereal
In my chest
a raw, flippant beating
taken but breathing
in your smell
frost and rose red
a chill on my skin
just looking at you
petals to pupils
dilate, and my diaphragm
folds at the bend
the arch of your spine
like a branch
your arms enveloping
the moment encased
I wish to stay
forever or longer
with you
Sometimes I feel like life is
Breathing in
Water
Breathe it out quick
Get your work done
In lights that feel
Far dimmer than
You remember
Sinking away from the surface
Breathing in
Water
Breathe it out quick
And hope the woods can
Cure every wrongness in your
Head
Face
Aim
Voice
I know the red leaves should
Make me happy
So why am I still
Breathing in
Water
Breathe it out quick
The leaves float
Higher than I can move
My frozen lungs
In a cold lake
I don’t want to
Go back
I don’t want to
Go back
I don’t want to
Breathing in
Water
Breathing in
Water
Breathing in
Father and boy play catch with a football. The sister does a handstand and splits her legs to form a V. Father throws down the field, through the V, into the arms of the boy. Touchdown, Michigan! The mother and the aunt stand off to the side, cheering. Then they return back to conversation. A dog rolls around on the grass at their feet.
Palmer Field, 3:00PM, 11/23/2023
what can a camera do that a dictionary can’t? it paints by neuron, by light and shadow. pictures worth a thousand words elicit no response. speechlessness is an iron fist. an emotion takes over, hot and fervent and bubbling, and it trembles in my fingertips and slides down the back of my spine. this is what it means to live in this pinprick of reality: between pages of characters that build worlds behind the back of your eyes. between photobooks of tyranny, of sunshine, of delicious meals and happy families, of you, and only you.
How good dinner was yesterday! Nobody was on their screens, everybody was having fun playing…
Booksweet, 8:00PM, 11/22/2023
we are bonded beyond eternity to the screens that ru(i)n our lives. i wonder if they will have a place to sit in the future. let the phones eat, crows the mother. the child stacks a row of electronics around a tea party table. they feast on our information and suck the binary marrow out of our bones. airplane mode is on, but there are no more airplanes — they were hunted to extinction years ago. the smoking fuselage, wild with spice and oil and crispy metal skin, sits in the middle of the dinner table. father raises the knife. the world turns black.
This is going to be our last game! We’re graduating! Come here.
Michigan Stadium, 1:00PM, 11/25/2023
the campus hibernates for a week. the bus stations lie empty, perhaps in anticipation or fear. nobody wants to poke the sleeping dragon, wake the transient wolverine. a stadium roused to madness, doused with a frigid, fracturing, fractal wind. it crawls up your skin and burrows with infinitely thin claws. is every culture a mosaic, or is every mosaic a component of culture? will you find the pigskin stained on church windows or raised on the top of flagpoles? of course, the answer is yes.
The Crane
Climbing the crane
peeling pupils up and up
facing the clouds to touch
to hold
in my hands
like pillows resting
on my palms
a stillness in my chest
brings meaning to the air
I breathe because I want to feel
like any of this matters
The orange-tinted western sky patterned with wisps of clouds
The fronts of rushing cars and trucks in the streets below
The windows of brick and steel buildings that I walk past
The waxing white moon above that can’t be captured by camera
The lamps that glimmer and shine in the dark and overtake my eyes
The intermittent yellow blinks of fireflies I hold in my palm
The strings of electrical white that illuminate a Toronto tapestry
The neon blue and melting wax of the lamp I brought with me
The monitor screen I write this on in the comforts of my room
All of them lighten my burden with their glow
You tell me in too little words that our time is limited
Your eyes staring straight ahead while stroking my arm
To what end will I time out
Till you lose me while talking about the now
In limited dim lit doom who am I to assume
That you would want to whether waning weather with me
Am I so semi permanent
Is it so easy to slip away
Still I find myself slipping to sleep
Slumped against some warmth
Waiting while wanting
Wilting when knowing
