Capturing Parallels

Pretending nothing happened?
Telling lies for we must not tell the truth?
Every time you accidentally mention my name,
brush me off your shoulder, edge a little closer
on a floral couch…

When I rested my head on your shoulder
on the train I wished you were mine again.
Even if you were disguised behind
a handsome strangers eyes,
the softness of your shirt gave rise
to the silentest of cries.

I could not believe that this dream
was sure to leave. I look for you night
after night until I get your face just right.
It’s comforting, there is no ring.

Sometimes, these strangers speak what you cannot.
Sometimes I think: I think, you like him, I think he likes you.
Thanks, smiling foreign dude!

A butterscotch shot, you’ll feel it in your sleep
with no hint lingering on your waking kiss.

I roll out of bed and try to remember
if I was dreaming of now or September,
under oak and apple trees
while we run from cops, skin our knees.

If this were the last moment of my life,
I would be sad. Accepting that this moment,
aside from all the noise of machines in the distance and
the strange fellow with the grey hooded sweatshirt
that just walked by is perfect:

I am sitting in the shade. I hear the spinning spokes
of a ten speed bike as I want for the clock to strike
the afternoon with four loud booms.

Chimes that string the leaves together
only so they can grow weak and detach…

I am sitting in the shade I hear the spinning spokes
of a ten speed bike as I want for the clock to strike
the afternoon with four loud booms.

Chimes that string the leaves together
only so they can grow weak and detach.

Halloween Night

A three-year-old witch costume  rips. She shivers and sparkles under a dripping moon her matching shoes marching ahead, her matching hat getting caught by the bark of an outstretched tree branch. Excitement, fun size skittles scatter into undistinguished black bags. Plastic orange pumpkin buckets swing keeping a cadence of hard candies. Dum dums drum and thrash the insides of werewolves and Tinkerbells alike. Little angels wiggle their soggy wings toward warm minivans at 8:01 when waiting mothers finally disband the demons.

Garage Sale

A tattooed mother and her two daughters, one quiet eating an ice cream cone the other spoiled, outspoken and done up like a Barbie doll. An old black guy came looking for rakes, shovels and hoes. The man handed us two dollars, Zach handed him a green plastic rake.

We kept doing that, selling things that weren’t for sale. Marking down useless things collected and displayed on the lawn. I accepted an eight dollar check from a neighbor that I haven’t cashed yet and an army recruiter took a piss-soaked leather couch off our hands for twenty bucks. He actually had nineteen dollars and forty-two cents.

A stringy haired woman with heavy eyelids untangled gaudy grandmother jewelry in a plastic bin. “You’re in my light.” The fuzzy-headed teenager stopped hovering over his mother and ran towards Rainbow Drive, tearing leaves from our tree, throwing helicopter flowers in the street as cars sped by gawking at our cluttered garage.

“Switch me.” The mother maneuvered her three-legged walker, pushing her blonde daughter back so she could get at the next shelf. She ended up buying three seasons of a TV show on DVD and two nearly identical cross necklaces. Before they left the girl snatched one, “That’s mine!” I didn’t see which color.