just hangs there

My mouth is a star. It shines on you like a projector, extensive catalogues of my affection hang in the air between us.

hold me bill murray

Love this site.

I'm learning the art of songwriting this summer

From this guy. Lizzie of Earwig. They are pretty awesome.
I've always wanted to write a song and it's time to learn.
I feel like it's stretching my writing in a new way.
I've been collecting words.
Lots of them.
Eavesdropping on people and writing down the things they say to each other.
It's wild what we just say in the world.
Out loud.
People are communicating and dangerous and open all around you if you just listen. 

I hope by the end of summer to record a song with Lizzie. 
Earwig will have a new album out soon. It's exciting. 
This is an older song from Earwig. It had a lot of radio play. 
I wish I could meet this Ron House fellow.
He sounds so interesting.
Sometimes he is referenced in Bela's amazing story filled blog. 
Sometimes I think there should be a big, fat novel written about the Columbus, Ohio music scene. 
Anyhoo, make sure to follow Lizard on Twitter. 
And be excited for a song. Soon. xxxxx

Don't let it scare you

I would do those things
you think about
under the safe blanket of thought
on the inside
hidden
little locks
I would do those things
because I can see through walls
all the way to the other side
where your brain is on fire
I'm your superman
don't let it scare you

heart of

Parked car in driveway.
Neil Young pours from the radio.
The windows of the house are lit like fire
and we sing softly to each other. 
Our voices harmonize out of habit.
We sing at car windows, our mouths moving.
If it were winter, we would fog it up.

awareness

I’ll baptize you
catechise you
pray for you
undress you
whatever you need
to feel
holy smokes
don’t you know what 
you are are to me
like a diamond in the sky
the whole sky
a fat moon
hot wind
the smell of fire
we walk and talk of your
great perfect sadness
the one you carry
like stones in your blue jeans
like heavy coats
misunderstood street signs
gibberish
when you hold me 
I feel the weight

They say love is virtue

Route 33 knows all of my secrets.

I stop at the river and take off all my clothes. I jump in and pretend that my eyes are cameras. That my fingers are microphones. I take the history of this place. I pull myself up to the bank and my fingers bury into the Ohio mud. I trust this mud, it's been here for years.

i find this poem captivating

Starfish

This is what life does. It lets you walk up to 
the store to buy breakfast and the paper, on a 
stiff knee. It lets you choose the way you have 
your eggs, your coffee. Then it sits a fisherman 
down beside you at the counter who say, Last night, 
the channel was full of starfish. And you wonder,
is this a message, finally, or just another day?

Life lets you take the dog for a walk down to the
pond, where whole generations of biological 
processes are boiling beneath the mud. Reeds
speak to you of the natural world: they whisper,
they sing. And herons pass by. Are you old 
enough to appreciate the moment? Too old?
There is movement beneath the water, but it 
may be nothing. There may be nothing going on.

And then life suggests that you remember the 
years you ran around, the years you developed
a shocking lifestyle, advocated careless abandon,
owned a chilly heart. Upon reflection, you are
genuinely surprised to find how quiet you have
become. And then life lets you go home to think
about all this. Which you do, for quite a long time.

Later, you wake up beside your old love, the one
who never had any conditions, the one who waited
you out. This is life’s way of letting you know that
you are lucky. (It won’t give you smart or brave,
so you’ll have to settle for lucky.) Because you 
were born at a good time. Because you were able 
to listen when people spoke to you. Because you
stopped when you should have and started again.

So life lets you have a sandwich, and pie for your
late night dessert. (Pie for the dog, as well.) And 
then life sends you back to bed, to dreamland, 
while outside, the starfish drift through the channel, 
with smiles on their starry faces as they head
out to deep water, to the far and boundless sea.

 -Eleanor Lerman

it's spring

I dreamt that you took your hands and covered me in joy. The moon was high and we were in a garden shed. My hands shook. I asked you to tell me all the true things you ever knew. Just put me back together. It's spring. The earth will know what to do with me. I don't know how my garden grows. 

it put its face up to my face so I could see

girl

the short space of the place

like a tin can telephone
your voice travels to me
mama
mama
mama
sweet and clear like true love
like teenage hearts
like bird songs

I am your mama
your love bomb
your rock and roll
your Saturday night
I want to spend days
counting the hairs 
on your head
weeks memorizing the
exact timbre of your baby voice
years listening to you
say my name

there is a map to the end of the world
to the place where we die without remorse
or regret
or still sadness
and the key
the clues
live in the mouth of a child
in the short space of the place 
we call home

the price you'd have to pay

there's most likely a place to go
where we know all the math
how to spell everything
words just fall from our lips
create spirals
dazzling truths
whirling dervishes of the perfect
everything is so fine and other affirmations are pumped through speakers
you sit on a stool by my desk
and read to me
the sun slices through sheer curtains

I read that Anne Sexton said,

"Poetry led me by the hand out of madness."

she killed herself but for a bit she sailed on and lived in this place I bet
she knew how to get there
where the key hung
the price you'd have to pay

lick your finger and stick it in the air

places I have been

stellar

The distance between all the words I don't say is magnificent. It's like space. I read books about the universe to my boy and his eyes are wide like the sun. We talk about supernovas. Luminosity. The way one can outshine the galaxy for a brief time. So powerful and so dangerous. I whisper softly over his pale hair. I silently tell him that his mama is a supernova. I say it three times. He doesn’t hear me. I don’t think anyone can.

there has to be

I stay up late and get up early. I see raccoons in the backyard and then wait for the birds to tell me things. It's like if I sleep I may not be there to get the message. There is a message, there has to be. When I do sleep I have very big dreams. I try and hold them. I try and whisper them down to this place I live.

I almost named you William Wild.

you are all the round mouth kisses in the world. you are fat hands and dimples and my heart takes off like an airplane when i see you from across any old place. the living room. the backyard. the parking lot. i think about how you came to this family like something out of the blue. bluebirds. boxes. the mailman brings surprises. and you make me happy like a girl. i hold you in the crook of my arm and you tell me things. all the important nonsense. all the magic you know. the things we have lost from being old. you say spells. incantations. i am lost in you. you whisper me into a puddle. we sit together with my back up against the wall in your room and look out the window at the beautiful sky.

do you want to sit and listen
for a bit
a campfire chat
a fireside glow
I will tell you stories
stripped down narratives
hot verbs
shaky nouns
the story of a heart
I will give you tiny sips
from my silver flask
warm booze
tickle your toes
I may even kiss you
I can't help it
I lean into love
just a peck though
just a soft slow kiss
to remind you
that you are alive
and your blood pumps hard and fast
like tigers
like soldiers off to war