A form of warm summers adapt at no will,
But deliver it somewhere apart.
For someone to scream at me is words for my ears.
For another to whisper is lines I can’t hear.

But a ball can’t be rolling too fast or too slow,
‘Lest you walk up a street and don’t know where to go.
Yet you know there’s an artist, or a thinker, benign
For a lack of cold cash to send sprinkling.
For a face on a dollar bill is the past we ignore
And interpret, too much, incorrectly.

Like the guns that some look to for protection…
From what?
Another’s guns, loaded by angel dust- the drug.
Not the tiny specks of light I see dancing sometimes
When I take off my glasses and peer up toward the daytime.
‘Cause sky-blue calms me down; yes, it’s there for a reason:
To send our heads glowing with passion in season.

There are plenty of things I can’t know to be known
And there’s even more I cannot do on my own.
But I can tell you a thing that I know to be true:
I purchase what’s cheap.
Or what reminds me of You.

Like some water that forms in the clouds up above,
And rains down upon us at times we should love
To sit at a doorstep and see what it’s for:
A cleanse of wild spirits we may not feel anymore.

But that’s just me and how I’m feeling right now.
And my feelings change often, ’cause they should anyhow.
‘Cause a mood is just a ring that someone somewhere invented
To put a color on feelings we haven’t adapted.

And yes, I believe there is something I feel
That is something a bit more than some may think is real.
But I’m certain – yes, certain – that tricks are the mind
Finding bones in the river and sticks in your side.
When a tree is a tree, it grows toward the sunshine,
Even ’round what is blocking its growth.
The roots take their space depending on how
The ground is beneath it.
You can see it.

But so, I am darkness tonight-
I don’t know.
I go where I’m going.
And I notice what’s new.
I’m those that care deeply for another’s own sake
Or even what’s parted on pews.
I’ve never been read like a devil.
I’ve always been glanced at like sets.
‘Cause I don’t really care what dogma presents
Because it was wrought by some weapons
And stupidity and death.
When life is the answer to the question of why,
There remains every moment of ones own reasons to cry.

To cry for the heavens surrounding the past
That form every lifetime, again and again.

But maybe I’m wrong, and who really cares
When fun is a thing I can’t hold in a stare
By myself, smoking cigarettes I have to go find
And spend all my dollars, and find only dimes
On the floor of a subway car,
With a man playing songs
For people with headphones on-
Hell, I’m one of them often.

And when sirens go by,
I’m just hoping they’re nice
But it isn’t myself who is worried at night.

It’s those far too young
And those far too lonely.
It’s those whose overcoat matches the sky.
I don’t know.
I’m a poet.
I’m a man raised by guilt.
And all I really want
Is someone to listen to my music.
And read my words.
And see that I’m gifted.
And hand me a paycheck I earned with my mind
That nobody charged me
To gain on my own.

Almost thirty years of learning.
Almost thirty years of practice.
And all I really should be saying is

this:

Do not to cocaine.
And don’t lick some tablets.
And don’t smoke a thing you can’t pick from the earth.
And watch what your eyes may be saying to another.
And listen to your language:
We are sisters and brothers.
Not enemies, wilted beneath a fine Spring sunshine.
And not patterns depicted by God’s only light.
We are shapes in the dust.
There is them.
There is us.
And only when I’m looking for rhymes
Does it make all the sense to myself.
If you don’t understand something,
Then ask yourself help.

And if it’s the middle of the night, and the church doors are locked,
Wonder why,
And go aching for a dollar from a stranger.
And pray that there’s 24 hour fast food.
Brands know their meaning.
Religion?
I’m fooled.