The Rise of the Band Geeks, Episode 5: Beanie

O pom-pom graced atop the knitted dome

Secured by laces tipped with aglets clear;

Beneath thee soft-striped stitches tightly roam

In chevrons spanning from thee to the ear.

O stitches stretched into a snug caress

Around the fragile flesh and mind and hair

You trap soft heat and ward off cruel duress

That would arise were this pale pate left bare.

O flesh, that warmth may bless thy frigid heart

Nestled within thee, that the stitches may

Envelop fragile you from the game’s start

And shield you till night voids the might of day.

May ev’ry precious strand upon your head

Of the band beanie undermine cold’s dread.

The Poetry Snapshot: The Night Shift

Curtains pulled back to midnight,
And a stage of dancing stars.
Too brief, this autumn light.
Stolen, but never ours.

Meadowbrook Amphitheater

Ours was never a bite
into a crisp apple autumn sky.
A bright, chilled dewy cry.
No.

Ours was the brink of a buoyant horizon,
turned to shade in the blink of an eye.
Tied down by an emerging moon.
For one moment, the pulse in this room ceases,
as the death of day show steals our breath.

Welcome to The Night Shift.
Time drenched in thrifted emotions,
sharing silence in slow motion.
In the midst of darkness,
we create color.

Shadowed vision,
but you catch a broken smile
and words unspoken.
It’s always one touch forward,
but two thoughts back.

In my corner of nightfall
I set down all composure.
I’ve been here before,
been here often.
Moonbeams feel no pressure to enter my window,
for I can navigate transience with my eyes closed.

Evolving Emotions: Forevermore

I feel your presence beside me

On the frigid, unforgiving Earth

On the lonely wooden park bench

On the gentle bed we shared

 

I hear your voice 

In the corridor you passed

In the kitchen you cherished

In the doorway to our home

 

I smell you in all that is beautiful

A hint of lavender in someone’s hair

A box of oranges sold at the market

A loaf of bread I find at the bakery

 

I surmise that I’ve see you

Maybe?

Maybe not. 

Perhaps it is madness

 

It’s hard to discern

The wishes and whims

The truth and sacred lies

 

Perhaps, I witness what I was too blind to see yesterday

No matter

 

Alas,

We are apart

But soon

We will feel each other’s warmth

In a plane unlike this one

 

My joy

My love

My apparition forevermore 

 

Evolving Emotions: Inquisition

What if I were?

Would my peers avoid me

Would my parents dismiss me

Would my God disown me

Would my universe mock me

 

What if I were?

Would I deny it

Would I despise myself

Would my mind denounce my thoughts

Would I curb my yearnings

Would my eyes avert their judging gaze

 

From the sight of her

Her dimples

Her smile

Her laugh

Her special beauty to behold

 

What if I were?

Would I love myself in time

 

Acceptance drives acceptance

If you were to love yourself wholly and completely

If you were to take on your internal quarrels valiantly

If you were to embrace those different from yourself

If you were to take them in with open arms

 

Maybe that love would double

Triple

Quadruple

Until it fills the very room

Crowding out the scrutiny

Expunging the former negativity

 

Love you

Love others

Maybe those around you will learn

To love themselves

 

What if you were you?

 

The Rise of the Band Geeks, Episode 2: The Last Band Geek on Earth

Amidst the spongy grass and gray pebbles dotted with flecks of quartz

Along paved trails that sluice through the leaf-frosted earth

Beside the brick structures segmented by imposing windows

Stands the last band geek on earth.

 

She stretches a bruised arm up into the sky

Bats at the wisps of cotton-like fog

Her hand fades into the silver and becomes the clouds

But her feet never leave the ground.

 

Tucked away behind the band hall and the slabs of pavement erupting from the dirt

Strewn across the coarse, fractured pavement and triangles of glass

Her wrecked

Resolve skitters along the slate aggregate and collides with dislodged rock.

 

And who is she,

Stretched betwixt the heavens and purgatory, lost in her own dust and her swirls of mist,

The engraving of her failure pressed into her flesh with nature’s stylus,

To dissolve in the muffled fall dawn and let her hair assail the wind?

 

Who is she,

Alone on the cement steps of the band hall with her uniform of sweatpants,

A phantom that is and yet never was

Destined for nebulae and neutron stars?

 

Who was she to believe

That when the band ascended into the constellations for their weekend away from Earth,

She’d journey with them?