Thoughts by the Beach

The teenager in me is listening to

songs that ask for freedom

on a morning after

Christmas by the beach, with a coffee

on the glass table and the burning sun

on my left leg, the sensation begging me

to notice the difference between the two sides--

the bright and the dark.

The twenty year old in me is listening to

songs of reaching, of regret

at 9am in a seaside town inhabited

by those retired and comfortable,

those who have perhaps given up their dreams.

The thirty year old thinks technology is incredible,

for allowing those of us in broad shorts

and those of us in thick winter jackets to be in love,

to be in touch, to see smiles

through frozen minus three degree weather.

Once, In Wonder

Reality has never felt more beautiful since I met you,

since I’ve touched you, since I’ve kissed you,

but the obligation of a poet

is to make facts fantastical,

and to never believe in the landscape

I try so hard to remember on paper,

to question the softness of the asphalt we laid on,

to find explanation for the hardness of your penis

through your khaki shorts,

to excuse the moisture on your chapped lips,

to notice the absurdity of street lights that shine way brighter

than any stars in the sky, dyeing white the darkness
of space above us.