If there’s one 
thing that nobody 
seems to miss 
is a nightmare 
so then why 
do some people 
regurgitate their pasts
like a game 
of bar dice
shaking and shaking 
and then tossing 
expecting some outcome 
beyond what’s possible 
there are just 
so many dice
in a cup 
and just so 
many dots on
a dice so
what do they 
expect to roll
like their pasts
how many nightmares 
does one need 
to have before 
one accepts that 
their pasts will 
never be anything 
beyond a nightmare 

Some people are 
by very nature 
incapable of change
and what’s often 
worse unwilling to 
worry not about 
them pay them 
no heed or 
time but rather 
plant a tree
walk around barefoot 
in the grass 
lean close to 
flowers and breathe 
for those things 
frequently do change 
better or worse 
they do change 
because that’s what 
nature does best 
and not man

I think that 
one of the 
heaviest burdens to 
bear for myself 
is the acceptance 
that I don’t 
fit in anywhere 
I have been 
lugging around that
reality since I 
was a child 
and oh I 
am so tired 
of moving it
from one place 
to another from 
one group to 
another that now
at long last 
I have finally 
understood its purpose 
it’s not a 
reality upon which 
to drag but 
one upon which 
to sit and 
wonder and think 
and to write 
and be loved 

I know now what 
a piece of bread 
feels like once dropped 
into a toaster from 
a picture of a 
street in Portugal there’s 
barely enough room in
between buildings for a 
person to walk that’s 
the beauty of foreign 
cities their slender yet
sprawling footprints as though 
a giant with narrow 
feet walked around barefoot 
leaving behind impressions 
in the wet sand 
ahhh cities abroad so 
different than in America 

The rain came 
my windows weep
like my mother 
did when dad
died from top
to bottom one 
drop meets another 
then meets another 
and soon a
river forms flowing 
downstream finally catching 
on sill or
for her sweater
and now all 
I see is
my mother in 
my window and 
all I remember 
is what a
broken heart looks 
like it rains