Sora

Did we know?
—in that moment
when our eyes met across that room, 
across oceans of time, pain, and place—
Did we know a secret magnetism
was calling us home?
Green on blue map markings,
course-correcting bearings
among all the…

You don't know. 
how could you? 

that beautiful 
mind dendrites 
twist to endure 
even the harshest 
of environments 
that this is survival 
that this is adaptation 
that what you 
call insanity 
is actually a reasonable response 
to unreasonable circumstance

The years wear hard
a subtle shaping
of winded word and salt tear
on the stone artifacts of time and memory. 
I watch the tired sweep of your crafted hands 
Even as your eyes pool before me. 
I watch and…

The shadows lengthen quickly 
On the last day with my grandmother 
I want to remember every detail 
How she likes her tea weak 
The subtle bite of the Dutch cheese 
Always found in her 
Just adequately stocked fridge 
The quietudes…

night descends 
dark stripping 
innuendos of day 
revealing debris 
of every little #hurt 

I try to float 
on the eventide 
churning still 
until the small voice 
of my son finds me 

together we 
lash our solitudes 
hands fastened 
and drift…

the residue remains 
gunshot particles of 
every word wound 
and relational bullet 
taken and given 
in time's magazine 
of pastlove 
i want to wash it 
from the recoiled beats 
of your bruised heart 
wipe you clean 
even as i know …

Take my hand love 
take it and hold tight 
for we are both here 
cornered by the snarling rage 
that is your depression 
Take my hand 
and let the subtle pressure 
of my squeezing presence 
be enough 
to know I…

My love, you are my home 
Key fitted perfectly 
to unlock 
the safety of belonging 

You are my home 
Enfolding space I come 
to disrobe myself 
of pretense 
of emotional distance 
of defense 
to stand in the smallness 
of my…

You come to me 
with tears in your heart 
holes and rips in the shape 
of all the orphaned stories 
that are lost to you 
a song that is scratched 
in a skipping loop 
jumbled poetics 
searching for their meaning 

…

Your invitation didn't note
that masks were required

when I joined your
October masquerade
I came naked face
tender hands
as we fluid bonded
within the musical strains
of our mutual pleasure

and when, beneath
the soft snowfall
of November's…

they find me
these broken boy men
wounded
by the isolationist culture
that created them

they sit before me
bleeding
their words, trauma, and light
(but never their tears)
into the chalice of my understanding

my mother instinct
has always…

He bullies me still
long past the carnage of divorce
in barbed words and cold dismissal
of the stretch scarred landscape
of my motherhood.

He writes and rewrites
the history of our together
as though his pain could
change the…