Words, what soulless

 Words, what useless things--

they don't fill your stomach

but they can turn it.

They don't keep you warm

but they can burn.

Words, what frail, formless,

naked, tortured things.

What apology has ever 

unbroken anything?

What truth has ever

untold a lie?

What massless, airless things-- 

words. 

Not a single one has ever

filled a void

but many have weighed down

the drowning.

Words, what soulless,

breathless things

to so define a man.

Ramparts

Your words have blown away

in life's gales. The house of self

that stood for decades

has been shaken.

But where words used to

bulwark the home where our hearts

sat together, we can build a new frame.

We don't need the words, I promise you.

Today, you watched silently,

as we blustered and bustled around you.

Were your thoughts and opinions trapped

under the rubble of the changes that have come?

I want you to know, I saw you. To keep you

from digging for those buried words,

I ran my hands down your back. I touched your hair. 

I stood beside you and leaned in. 

You leaned back. We ourselves can be the ramparts

built over the wreckage of your broken words.

We can still be each other's home.

Lean into me again. 

Lean into me until you rest 

with your dismantled words.

Lean Into Me

 Was it a moment that extinguished your spark

or is it day after day that the signal grows more interrupted?

I don't know. I don't know. But that switch flipped

or those cables breaking down, one way or another

it took your words, belabored your breath.

It isn't happening to me. I know that. I know that.

And yet it is--whatever stole your voice,

whatever choked your breath,

it thickens my throat, too. I lost your words, too.

And now I would give almost as much as you would

to have even three of your words.

Your voice is lost to us. To us, do you hear? 

Do you hear the voice I would give you, the words I offer?

I stood beside you today, longing for those halting words.

I would wait however long it took for you

to say what you need to say.

But I know your words are lost, so I leaned in.

I leaned into you and you leaned back. 

So much of you has shrunk in on itself

I needed that pressure. Please. Lean into me again.

Our time is short; don't say cruel things.

Our time is short; don't say cruel things.

Years without you wait in the wings.

Let's share small laughs, let bygones be.

I'll be strong for you if you let me.

But if you've lost so much of who

you were and are and what made you

that you need to cause me grief

I'll take it to give you relief.

If you need, I'll be your joke.

I'll swallow tears that make me choke.

I'll take your rage. My calm won't stir.

I'll try to see you as you were. 

Blackberry

Comfort is the blackberry
you gather when you grieve
as each thorny revelation

bleeds the heart upon your sleeve.

Comfort is a blackberry 

you gather in your pain, 

sweet a moment in your mouth

then bitter once again.

Comfort is a blackberry.

You gather it alone

in the midst of wandering loss

that rips you to the bone. 

Comfort is a blackberry

you squander and you waste

because your pain-churned stomach

cannot abide its taste.

when grief is long

 when grief is long
and begins unannounced
while you thought you still had time

and before your love is really gone
you find that you wish
heart-leaved vines would grow
roots in you to be
your mourning glory

showy and seen

 
when grief spans seasons

your cheeks become

sycamore leaves after rain

fine hairs dampened

overstretched, brittle, and melting

into the damp pillow 

of soft, earthy, 

decay

when grief is endless

as the bright shards of winter

you wish you could break

like frozen things do

or freezing does

break everything else

when grief is long

and planted as an inkling

growing into a fear

blossoming into

some thorned, poisonous flower

you find you tend it

unwilling but helpless

you help it grow

and grow

I know you. You don't want these words.

I thought I was writing this for you, but I know you--

you wouldn't want this. You wouldn't be touched

if you could hang around a little while and watch

me tuck a poem in your cold hand even knowing

you're not taking it with you anywhere.

I know you. You'd be offended to think 

that losing you broke anything in me--to think I felt

like I was losing you at all. If you were here, I'd tell you

how destroyed I am at your loss because you were always

the one that I told everything. And you would tell me

that nothing can destroy what God has built. 

If you were here, you'd be touched to see me pray. 

You'd tell me to seek God's face. It would matter to you

to see me strong and courageous. 

And I promise you, I'm trying to be what you would tell me to be

if you were here. So I guess I'm not writing to you

because I know you. You don't want these words.

I guess I'm writing this to tell myself what you would tell me

if you were here.