lost contact walking
in circles around franklin
village you wanted to be alone
at the festival of rockets
you paid for everything
we met at the coffeepot
concert steamer summers
spent in a young galaxy
where we both loved
desert guitars
the avenue droughts
and cold
basements
(originally published in Rabid Oak, Spring 2022)
Maybe I’m not as angsty.
Don’t need to drown
in the drone of lost
love. The haunted house
no longer my dwelling.
My ghost still the past
but not possessed by
obsession. The passage
of time a lapis lazuli–
ten years of wisdom
in which my sadness
may look the same,
but now able to withstand
a storm without music.
(originally published in Stickman Review, Fall 2022)
Skinny Love isn’t your strongest (red
guitar grass blades, guzzles of beer)
the world doesn’t know your name
still I walk infinity eights through
your friend’s backyard evading dormant
dog droppings while the strumming lands
soft & sweet, butterflies on my cheek.
I’ll find a blanket somewhere to sit on
under the awning, a shade for when it rains
(originally published in Ink Pantry, Winter 2022)
I know it was probably an isolated incident.
Still, we have tickets to see Future Islands
in Pittsburgh less than a week
after the bombing at Ariana Grande’s
concert in Manchester. You and me
and two close friends will be in close
proximity to throngs of strangers
for what has become a popular band.
I know it was probably an isolated
incident, but it does not take a tragedy
for a concert to become full of sudden
lights and screaming. I am not looking to fear
anything. But I am thinking of the children
who left their homes that night with the sunrise
in their eyes, expecting to cry only
at first familiar beat of their favorite song.
And I am thinking of the parents,
stopping at the arena with a car full
of excited kids, telling them to be safe
before watching their beloved become
silhouettes passing first into crowd
then crowded door. And I am thinking
of parents picking up their kids with
a frantic search through running bodies
and lights but only finding smoke
and sirens and sobbing, songs
we fear we’ll hear.
(originally published in Constellations, Winter 2021)
In the inner sanctum of throbbing
bodies, I groove hard beyond slow
walk of long-haired superstars,
headlight-eyed, mumbling inside
microphones amplified starward.
Diving deep into this band the
first time– an alien soundscape
of guitar echo and half-familiar
nostalgia for when we could live
forever, tapping wine bottles
with drumsticks to the rhythmic
thrum of how our lives were
going, no interruptions, propellor
hats attached and forever flying,
no batteries included, unnecessary.
(originally published in Roi Faneant, Summer 2022)