A Few Thoughts on Leaving

i ran

since i was a small child 

i ran

i ran into the forest

escaping the shouts of an angry, ill equipped father

i ran up the street

to escape the ennui of meth-addicted rural washington state

i ran into a garage

filled with guitars, beer and cigarettes

i ran to the city

where i thought i would finally be set free

nothing comes free or easy to me anymore

even sitting here as i stare out the window

onto the browns a bright yellows that have become the leaves

they will fall

this tree will be left bare

and I will cry

not because of the passing season

but because i grew up in a place that holds no meaning anymore

not because of the shouting on the streets

but because the streets that used to hold peace and solace

hold no peace and no sense of belonging

still, i love these hills

i love these people

even their passive aggressive stares

i love my mother

i love her gaze

the suffering that has worn its way into her soft, leathery skin

i love my sisters

their neuroses 

their aggressive love

i love my brothers

their anger

and their hard-fought illusions

i even love my father

he has clawed and gnawed his way

through a life that has abandoned him

yet, in his own way

he clings to a God that loves him

much better, more often and more completely than I do

but most of all

i love a woman

her beautiful black hair

her piercing brown eyes

the curves that line her body

her tender face

her soft skin

her warm embrace

i love her so deeply

with a deepness that cannot be undone

not by betrayal

shouting or fear

she loves completely and wholly

she will go with me wherever i go

so as we set off on a new adventure

she smiles with tears in her eyes

and says "OK. Let's go."

Free Your(selves)

i keep trying to to move ahead without moving anywhere
there's this old mirror in the basement of some house in the suburbs
it's dusty and decrepid and beautiful
and it tells the tales of self deceit and malice and fear

and somewhere in between there's someone just like me
staring with dead eyes into a himself
begging for some courage

then the courage comes
you say what you need to say
with grace and compassion and love
but it doesn't matter

what you really say no one will hear
they will only hear what the cracks reveal
shit, i'm the same way
i listen through the holes in the door
and i only listen for the beautiful sounds
the sounds that magnify my glory
and my joy and my peace

but with a glad ferocity
i bury disrupting moments of sound
that dig into the soul like a knife
bearing what's life of my dignity and pride and my worth

"don't fuck with my identity," we say
"let me be!"

but we're truly never left along
there's someone who digs and pries
and gets below the surface of things

but when He gets there
our entire world falls apart
all the patience, kindness and grace
we pride ourselves on having so much of
is vanished

Shaking in my Boots

the cruelty of my being born
is very real and underpronounced
in a bleak postcard
filled with blood, sweat, placenta and filth.
and love.

So, why are we all so unafraid?

Waiting in the Wings, Motherfucker.

in the wings i wait for you
to step this way
and then i move in closer
to find you alone in your
vulnerability
i strike with a verse
and you go down
you argue that there is no "down"

...then we both wake up

Bad Breakups Gone Great

just like that old bootleg
we wrecklessly taped on some
cracked and rainy Seattle street
way back in '01
and just like the words i can never take back
we don't matter to each other anymore

Somethings Never Change

she sits and waits on the edge of my plans
we laugh it off and wait for some mountain town
but we both know what it is
it's sadness that we don't understand
i've never had it together

Jokes

with a click of the wrist
i am whole again
cue the joke