Going
I've been mugged by words. Held up against a wall and had sharp commas pressed against the thin skin of my neck. I've been tortured by pairs of colons tearing into my night eyes. Those syllables like urban gangs, circling me and taunting me, then swarming my frail self and beating my bones till I'm broken and forlorn. Those words teamed with crazy punctuation abhor me. Their wish to ruin me upon a streaked and bloodied page. I hurt from these written posts, but I heal in my own way. That's another story, a crazy comma has come my way.

Fallen
I am to the fallen these open doors
Glancing in this church, rising in steeple and prayer
I am that, as this too:
The entrance to a rounded temple,
a mosque in minaret call
A synagogue as guiding light
I am those colours that bend in stain glass window
That open belfry that lets in light and crisp, cold air
I am all those things, and the disbeliever, too
There is that importance of all this, this organized prayer
The awe of a God that We create
And there are those days I pray this disbelief will go away
But no matter, there is that rising steeple
that round temple
that singing mosque
that guiding light
I believe in all that, and revel in the beauty and closeness I see in open doors

Age
She's got eyes like boarded up windows
A heart closed off to the street
Her hands have fallen:
curled and wasting against her skin lain along her lonely dress
She's too young to rise from hurt, to lift up strong from despair
But as darkness gives way to light
Her life will be that youthfulness
Till a boy she loves boards up those eyes,
Then she'll wear that lonely dress,
her wasting skin growing rougher and more calloused with age

The Voice
I heard her voice, five minutes away
That cry for help, she wanted me to come to her aid
But she was too far, her voice was five minutes away
The wind was strong, stronger than me; it robbed me of that time
it robbed me of her, her words silenced, she fell quiet as a grave
In years since, I recall only once of that day, that distance
That injured voice dying for my aid

The Bet
Oh, if I gamble on tomorrow,
I'll bet on all the days I own
Around the table I sit
A smoky circle of steely men;
One lays down an Ace of Spades
A Queen of Hearts cries out his name
This time I feel a loss, losing the winner's hand
I missed out on tomorrow, that's all the days I own
But a Queen of Hearts married an Ace of Spades, and I went home

Eyes
I was walking near the One Lucky in a state of self-possession when I was pulled into an alley. A wild-eyed youth had pressed me against a brick wall.

"I'm scared inside my head!" he screamed. "The voices, the voices. I'm scared inside my head!"

There was that wildness in his eyes. Then came a sorry, lunatic squint and the slow easing of his two strong hands. I snuck out of the alley and heard the cry of the crazy boy scurrying against night: "I'm scared inside my head! The voices. The voices. I'm scared inside my head."

I too was scared inside my head. Afraid for that stormy youth overtaken by madness. A mother's son. A brother. A sister. A father's boy lost to the randomness of a mind dispossessed and on fire.

I stepped into the One Lucky and sat at the bar. A cynical face looked at me from a smoky mirror, but I saw no wildness, just my own worried eyes.

The Last Fight
It was 3am and in a back alley an old fighter boxed against shadows. He threw lefts and rights and spoke in small, crazy admonitions: "I'll get ya's Manny. I'll get ya' Manny Weinberg. That belt you got is mine!"

They knew the fighter at the One Lucky as a harmless old fool, a braggart whose tall tales were fueled by too much cheap booze. Some laughed at him. Others ridiculed and mocked him, teasing him into off balance turns of bent sadness and desperate anger. This bothered 'Beer Mugs' Moran who pretended to pay him no heed. But he never ended the cruelty, even though inside it hurt his heart. Instead the bartender let the man box off his booze in the back alley, throwing his half-made fists against men he saw as big as windmills.

It was the first night of winter. The old fighter felt as tough as a charging bull with giant clouds of steam rising through his flared nostrils. The steam mixed with the alley light, illuminating him in a passion play; as if God were a fight fan, and was blessing one last round shrouded in an old man's mortality.

As much as the fighter felt special at 3am, he forgot about winter's first ice. He danced and slipped sharply, his head cracking against a tin garbage can.

He hit the pavement hard. Out cold he was with both arms encircling his head and his two open palms laying against the icy ground. There was no more crazy talk. No more steam rising from bullish nostrils.

An awakened old dog walked from behind the garbage cans where he slept at night. He hobbled to the fallen fighter and pressed his warm nose against the cold human skin. The stray dog didn't lick the man's face. Nor did he whimper quietly out of sadness or fear. Instead he moved with his hurting hind legs and lay down protectively along the human's chest. He felt the last, quieting beats of a dying fighter's heart. The dog then licked his own lips gently and watched clouds of steam rise into God's waiting air.

People
Some people watch TV till their eyes hurt
Others watch dreams in darkness;their eyes hurting at first light
Others watch nothing; their eyes gone blind long ago

Radio
I can't remember
I can't imagine a future
I'm in the now, a Hero for the moment?
So scared I am for the past and the instant I'll soon forget
It's best, I think, to hold absently to the coming night

The Screen
I went to a matinee movie
A girl sat alone in the second row
She held her knees up to her heart;
There was a small, tired crying sound,
Perhaps it came from the screen with moving pictures?
I sat in the third row, far from the girl and wondered: tired and alone

The Speech
Don't believe what I say
Question these wandering lips
I'm a wayfarer of words, I travel on broken speech
I've cut wanting hearts on shards of desperation
Made them bleed deeply in soundless emotion
Oh don't believe these moving lips
I'll try to hold back, as much as you've been warned
But I got a serpent's tongue with a razor, poisoned tip
And for you these scarred, slithering lips run fast
Speak slowly in silent time
Be told, you with your gentle eyes
Be remembered, you with your sweet woman's lips
I'm a wayfarer of broken words
I'm a traveller of dying verse
Cut I am by shards of your wandering speech