Warmth emanates from

the singular chimney

Housed within the heart

Of a drafty mansion

It’s where the deer go

To lie upon rickety floorboard

As sparrows acquaint themselves

With the abandoned rocking chair

Preening their worries away

Serenity melded with serendipity

The course of the universe

Ivy stretching over bricks

Decomposition of matter

And the soul

Ichor of old gods

Pitter-patters solemnly

Gaia drinks her fill

—

Flowers before dusk

Curling from darkness,

How you shrink

So timidly inward

You fill yourself

With seas of fears

Though occupying

Minimal space

I would

Kiss your petals

If you

Loved me

Peace with the worms,

Consciousless things

How I’d like to join them

In holy matrimony

With the earth

As the skies weep

Reinvention

Feels like a sin

i t’ s backpedaling

Don’t I deserve

To live

Without

A

Hi-polymer

Eraser

?

The Haunted Ceramic Figures of My Childhood

My ceiling is crusted with stars

It brings with hesitation, old memories

Chipped ceramic figurines

Cherub lips, empty gazes

Some were glazed matte,

Others shone glossy

There was a plastic

Glow-in-the-dark unicorn as well

The past hums

A soft lullabied tune

It creeps up your spine

And into your heart

Like ice

The old, dusty window ledge

Where those old figurines sat,

Ate cobwebs and glared out

At passerbys

The paint would stick to

Each small pedestal

Baked under the sun—

They would grow hot summertime come

I would touch them as a child,

Sometimes make them kiss

My fingers collided with their skin roughly

They were gritty, like fine-toothed sandpaper

Cross and unwelcoming they were

Like they had little spiteful souls

That looked at the first floor lawn

In contempt

Perhaps I should have known

It was how all things went

Visible and forgotten

Left for the next apartment owners

f(x)

I would like Math to love me—

Show me the world succinct

Truths and certainties

Laid upon numbers and variables

Only the white of paper

And the black of pen

The value of tangibility

The charted minimums

And maximums

Knowing where

The function of life

Curves and bends

—And whether

Pain and suffering

Ends.

I gathered people like dewdrops

Collect upon a lonely leaf

They were made in the clouds

Of pollution and acid rains

I beckoned and waved—

The wind forced my hand

Yet upon my lonely branch

Ne’er a hopeful bird did land

Only dewdrops grew

Little parasitical things

They burned and ate

And I turned yellow with grief

Pocked with holes

In sickly sheen

Death beckons

And I hesitate

But the solid form

Appeared

So comforting

A being

A rubber wristband

Encircling a

Pale arm

Extended graciously

A plain white

Sterile shirt

Hung loosely

’round their form

And bed hair,

Bright eyes,

A smile

Innocently wise

I would lay

In their embrace

Nestled wordlessly

Drifting

Into peace

If Life had not

Eaten my soul