Joy peered through the crimson panes of her blessed sanctuary, body outstretched across the silken petals of blossoming love. Each exhale escaped her lips a hum, an ode to the ecstasy of Being, breaking the silence that embraced her, faithful, like a lover. She rose and fell as an ocean, birthed again with every heartbeat. She bathed in peace, in light, in stillness, peering as she always did --.

Outside, the crimson tide gave way to rough sea, a tangled mass of sharp blue lines bending like steel in every direction. An indistinguishable prison. Trapped inside, the wild eyes of the one she knew as Sorrow. Wet with wanting, they watched her, as they always did, steady like serpents poised to strike in desperation. Heavy breaths raged like storm clouds, fog on the glass, transient blindness.

Joy did not avert her eyes, and neither did Sorrow. She knew without seeing. He was always there, as long as she was. His piercing eyes crying of the misery of Being. She raised her hand to the glass, fingers trickling condensation into dancing streams. Up and down in sporadic loops, hands wiped the surface clean - Joy's on one side and on the other, Sorrow's, moving in perfect synchronicity.

Palm to palm, locked in gaze, Joy and Sorrow sat in stillness. Joy smiled and somewhere behind the prison lines, she sensed that Sorrow did too. It was in that moment that she realized her unshakable truth - that the pane through which she peered was not a window but a mirror. Sorrow not an other, but a droplet in the same cup of wine, Joy not absolute, but Sorrow set free.  

No house, I'm home -
blood, flesh, bone.
Knock down the walls,
there's plenty of room.
Stay the night, stay forever; 
Everybody lingers, in
hair and nails on fingers,
exterior decorating.
Unlock eyes, ears,
valves of the heart.
Get comfortable, don't
mind the mess, always
under construction.
Home's a work in
progress.

DOOMED is a choice. Broken before we're buried, eyes on fire with anger, it's a choice. Blinded, silenced, dosed and left on the sidelines - choice. Cowering, life a night-lined alley, only fear says we're alive, we're making a choice. Powerless is a choice. They don't give us power, they don't take it away, we make a choice. Homeless, penniless, forgotten - you have a choice. Sitting in a classroom, daddy paid the tuition - you have a choice. Stuck on the train, back and forth to work again - you have a choice. Old man, death in the eyes, grandchildren whispering goodbye - you have a choice. Dark skin, light skin, skin covered in blood, thin skin, bruised skin, old and loose skin - you have a choice. It may feel like you don't, but every brick in the foundation of existence is choice. Between every breath is choice; underneath the fingernails, choice; mucus lining the eyes, wet with choice. Let their dark and dirty dungeon be your castle. Let the pain be life. Know that every day the sun shines, sheathed or not in storm clouds. Every day it shines its light. Right now, this time, is your time - make a choice. Be a flashlight. Sticky, oozing, gooey, evil casts shadows - they don't make us hide, it's a choice. Seven billion flashlights don't allow for darkness, flashlights don't hide. Even masked in thunder, even with the night on one side, every day the sun shines. Choose to be an ally. Shine just as bright. You will not be alone, and together we cannot be defeated. Doomed is a choice. I say, "Fuck darkness." I will shine like a light, every second of my blessed life. This is my choice. 

He sat there, reading a book
Just reading his book
Back to the open doorway
Story lines bathed in rays 
Of natural sunlight.
I can't see his face, 
I can never see his face, 
But if he'd only turn around
I know he'd see mine
Peering down from the balcony
Of my own life,
Dreaming up the color of his
Eyes, how they must be kind
And a little bit wise
Just like mine, 
Exactly like mine -
Lost in this land of visions
Reaching for reality
Grasping at possibilities 
That flash in the periphery 
Imagining, mind playing make believe
He's lost in his book
I'm lost in a daydream.

Decorate, form a border
Live outside the boundary
Unorthodox, innovative, avant garde
Marginal, maybe, now
Hair that frames the face,
      covers the eyes,
Sweep it back. 
Lose your balance hovering
      on the line. 
Re-bend the wires to make
      and shape your own life
Disrupt the
p
  a
    t
      t
        e
          r
​            n
Disconnect, let the battery die
Explode - acid everywhere
Find, redefine, limits
Question your own authority
Silence for days at a time
Lost in the universe of your mind
Find abundance in poverty
In faith that you are safe
Untied, not understood
We need not comply with context
Unbind from the spine and rewrite
Manifestation of pure potentiality
Threads left loose, twisted
Shake with the hips
To the deep beating 
Of truth in your heart.

I feel it all the 
Time slips through my
​Fingers strumming a broken
String tangled up in 
Knots bulging out of her
Back in the day when life was
Easy does it, sweetheart, just
Relax the curls by applying
Heat rises up in waves from the 
Pavement imprinted by tiny
Feet buried deep in the 
Sand bags holding back 
Water falling from the 
Sky-colored dresses on 
Bodies in a single-file
Line their pockets with
​Money isn't everything.

She pressed 'play,' and the world went around and around - it was a dancer; an astronaut in her inner space; a creature of the sea, tentacles outstretched for a strange embrace.

She moved her legs, and she jumped up and down, up and down - she was a surfer on the moon's face; skipping along the squares of a checkerboard, all gray; twirling up soppy, green strands of overcooked spaghetti.

She made paint, splattered color on the walls and the sky and the ground - nothing sat in boxes anymore; all the walls transformed to doors; she dove into tunnels where there used to be hardwood floors. 

She stretched her limbs out in a million new directions, tied them loop-de-loop, like twine - she shot herself like a bungee ball, watched her body unwind; fell to rainbows in the kitchen sink; swung down the drain on a jungle vine. 

She washed away, candy crusted solid on the horses nose - she fed the leprechauns lemon-flavored holly-pops; danced in the Christpatrick's Day alien parade; a universe of colors inversed, bleeding down the staircase of her mind.  

She pressed 'play,' and the rubber-boned queen erased the outlines.

I could be anywhere, this
reflection of me staring back
from the blacks of your eyes,
same gray sky, fuzzy against
the edges of your new life. 

Street sounds fading in the
background of that face -- 
eyes closed, sleeping on a mountainside
single bed, dripping sweat, middle of the night
twenty-hour bus ride, chair reclined.

We've been everywhere,
incidentally, 
accidentally, by chance:
that thing that we had, before
it slipped through our hands.

The way you held mine,
I remember the first time
on the dark blue streets of somewhere
with blurred lines --
we could be anywhere.

But we stand, incidentally,
accidentally, by chance  
on the street right here
staring at the fragments
of a phantom romance.