May Term 2002

37 Cents
     I speak to you in riddles 
     cause my words get in the way -Staind

you speak to me
in rhyme
that doesn't fit the
scheme i layed out
side by side
still i fall for
every riddle left
unanswered
when i try to
make sense of
this uncharted purpose
and i wonder
if i'm listening
or what i'm waiting for
when i find no reason
to stay
   until
tomorrow or today
i spend my days writing
you letters in my head
and my nights writing
the One who can deliver them
out of this quiet place
where some things are
   (never)
better left unsaid
between fantasy and fiction and
fact of the matter
is you can't read
what i can't write
so i'll see ya when i see ya
still the perfect rhyme of my
poetry and postcards
are still waiting for the
stamps He won't sell me
and the mailbox you aren't
ready to open.


I think that sometimes
my parents really do know what's best.
For everything else,
there's Mastercard.
I think reality is surrealism
after isn
turned downside up
inside my membrane
of memories long since
forgotten
until trip goes my
shutter and flashes of lightning
radiate my X-ray
vision of heaven.
I think someday I will get there,
up spiral staircases
to nowhere fast
or slowed still stopwatches
sounding my perfectly timed
arrival.
I think eternity is always just
around the corner
of my old neighborhood
street down to the playground
where swinging merry-go-rounds
of laughter lap upon my shores
stealing first through third
and all the way 
home 
again where the heart is 
heavy no more
or less inviting than a whole
open door way
to ever after.
And in my befores
I am fully convinced,
if I am still enough and wait,
I can see the grass grow.


Monochrome

It's not easy
to see my world in
black and white.
A fast developing
photograph
overexposed to a mere
moment in time
ticking one-hundred-
    and-two
silver ions breathing in
   and out and out
of control panel
levers and switches and
dials up your 
number as numbered
are my days
when I find no need to
call but no time to waste
away the day with
sleeping or with
out you in
all your technicolor
tenderness.


Mission

I just don't care about 
political science right now.
10 page papers on
newsprint issues
already written into
the bigger picture where
it's all trivial, 
really.
from nuclear weapons
to my very own 
internal explosions.
what relevance does 
globalization have to
my life?
it's not like I'll ever
leave the country.
unless, of course,
the phone rings.
and instead of that 
familiar voice smiling
through the wires,
a long awaited One speaks
driving directions to Africa,
peace to all my wars,
and till death do you part promises.
upon whence I will hang up the phone,
finish my government,
and pack my bags
full of t-shirts, Bibles,
poetry, and tap shoes.


Over the Edge
     found poem: Sarah McLachlan

I've crossed the last 
line from where I can't return
where every step I took in 
faith betrayed me
passing time passing through like 
liquid I am drunk 
in my desire
in between the calm inside me and 
the space where I can breathe
a breath between us could be 
miles
a glowing ember 
burning hot 
burning slow 
deep within I'm shaken 
by the violence of existing for only 
you
and all I feel is black 
and white and 
I'm wound up small 
and tight and I don't know 
who I am
with night as my companion 
and solitude my guide
could I spend forever 
here 
and not be 
satisfied?
I have the sense 
to recognize that 
I don't know how to let you go 
every moment marked with 
apparitions of your soul
I'm ever swiftly 
moving trying to escape 
this desire the yearning 
to be near you
but I fear I have nothing 
to give I have so much 
to lose here in this lonely place
tangled up in your embrace 
there's nothing I'd like better 
than to fall


1500 mph

directions 
to your house written 
on the floor of my car
e t c h e d into the grooves 
of my pedal un-
patiently lifted off
the mat as I'm 		stuck
in a …nopassingzone…
driving 25 miles an hour
while my speedometer wants to convert to
m	i	l	e	s	 a minute
and race right to the finish line first
breaking every law
and turning this very concrete
up side down in side you
and your
stop-and-go
traffic patterns that cause
me to transform my
lead foot into
inches apart in 
neutral
until a collision scratches 
off the paint writing 
directions to your heart.


Now That I Have Written Four Poems Which I Cannot
Under Any Circumstance Send and Say: This Is For You

Memories splash cold
breezes over me as I
lie in wonder
land stretched in all
directions
between point A and point B.
Music curtains the car
windows in my mind
focusing only one-way
streets twisting chords
around my heartstrings.
Unraveling one stitch
at a time ticking
through Bible verses
of our book
stored away with all the joy
full silent smiles
I can't forget
even when I try
to hide them behind
cards or phonecalls or
late nights lost in laughter
over nothing more than
the pages we keep 
writing one word
at a time.
Chapters of conversation 
saved between dancing snow flake flights
melting into blessings
that come hand in hand
with personified prayer,
tickled with tye dye
moments of worship
washed over the ink
of my poetry,
perfection in each day
made new by the mile.
Traveling at super speed
limits can't contain
me when I remember 
so many words spoken 
in unison and miss the 
sounds of our silliness.
So I slip up
and down your doorstep
by step
on this tight rope
tug of war to
peaceful
greetings of open door
ways to open arms
where I am met by
silent under standing
on the same solid
Rock.


running through the sprinkler
     and is this real? or am I dreaming? -dave matthews band

some things you just can't
-capture-
on film.
wrap the world 
in words and watercolor
sprayed with cheap perfume called
"summer rain".
only we can truly
F E E L
the drops drip	d
		o
		w
		n
cheeks as we cry
out for more
cleansing from heaven,
sliding off the tips of our
noses and sticking to our
eyelashes where we can
see
our friendship clearly.
reality rests
somewhere between the ripples
feet left right in the puddles,
and soaked into 
the denim creases
of creativity.
yet all our
art
is inadequate
to the reality
of creation.
but	someday
we will get to watch
     God
make the rain.


there are too many pens
in my Bible
as if I myself
write the stories of
2000 years in the making
history of so many
people to be remembered
so I underline verses of
hopelovepeacejoyeternity
promise
	of a new day
of a new life
if only I would put
down my pen
and let my Jesus
do the writing


can i?
     take a look around you and see what's within you. 
     is there room in your life, can i fall down beneath you? -pat mcgee

is there room
between your toes
for me
to step inside a
while?   i could be
your mirror
if you would listen
to me talking from
on the wall
you've built between
     us
and left me digging
deeper inside your
self so i can 
slide beneath these
bricks beneath this
glass beneath that
thing you always look
like you love
to do to me until
i wonder if you're even
looking at me
or at your
self or at your
feet and where the are
walking away from me
leaving me hanging
by the tips of
my toes.


Wrong Side Up

The sky sings of heaven 
tonight, white clouds d u s t e d with 
the shadows of nightfall
ing fast upon the world below 
my feet walking always 
up a down escalator.
Forever fighting 
fast lane traffic traveling 
wrongway on a oneway street toward 
right destination unknown 
left over
right over 
left in front of the
other foot forward
falling up but back
ward to the place I started
from. Still I sit and
wait for a step
          by 
            step to still
so I can slide up
the staircase to
heaven.


in my someday after every 
setting sun would shine upon the
cracks in the walk beside
my feet never growing tired of
dancing circles around the
tear drops
my eyes would never miss
an inch of the wonderland around
my heart would beat you to it so
i could hear a mile away where
my mind would meet me in the 
middle of the kitchen floor
dusted with footprints of
my loved ones and twos and threes and
forever on inside
my room where we would be filled
with joy of
my Jesus never falling silent
or feeling farther than
my own back yard where i
spend hours rolling down 
the hill staining 
my favorite jeans that i can never
part with no matter how many
holes they carry with me
the evidence of 
my moments


To Go
     for phil lee a 

whispers in the wind
call from every corner
this breeze has traveled
in between the moon beams
and ocean waves
the grass breathes
and sun shines down
through a clouded sky
shading His mysteries
that you have been sent 
to discover and uncover
the eyes of others
who whisper their own
searching for the light
peeking heavenly through
each pin prick in a
midnight sky that speaks
the same over you and me
even worlds apart
assuring us to be
silent
and hear their cries
for direction,
the whispers to guide
us to them,
and His answers to all the
mysteries
these brothers and sisters
never dreamed 
you could help them
understand...


in my margins

what would happen
if I let my crayons color
                          outside the lines?
like the ones I trace
up and down
the curves of your spine,
around the curls of your hair,
over the skin of your cheeks,
                        your neck,
                   your arms,
                        your hands,
              to the fingertips
that once traced the curves
                   of my face,
                        my back,
                   my waist line
              both in-side-and-out
of everything learned in
   kindergarten,
when everything was so 
   simple
and we didn't have to 
   think
about tomorrow     but today,
              you can call me
                   whatever you want.

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