We threw our glittering hopes into the sky,

Knowing that the hidden sun would catch them

To paint the clouds with vibrant rays.

We spread our darkest fears across the blue surround

Knowing that the mountains would keep them

To drape the ridges with mournful smoke.

Some removed masks that covered their faces.

Some donned masks to become who they were.

Everyone could be seen.

Soon we return to our different lands.

Most will live in some sort of shadow,

Careful of how to appear.

In our unguarded moments we look at the sky,

Yearning to glimpse a rainbow.

I held my darkness with tender care,

Warmed it in the cradle of my heart,

Gazed at it with kind regard.

What do you want of me?

Would anything I can do,

Anything I can ask of others,

Ease your suffering?

I do not ask you to leave,

Heap no blame upon you,

Force no unasked change.

You are the most faithful guest.

What will make you happy?

The sky has not yet lightened.

I grasp an hour before it passes,

Lay it down on the kitchen table,

And slice into the middle of its hurried time.

Inside I find a kernel,

A hardened instant that I place in my pocket.

Later in the rushing day, I hold it within my palm.

Breathing in the coolness of that secret pause

Breathing out the heated scurry of demand.

Thus reminded to be grateful, I open my hand.

The faint strike of a bowl resounds.

Somewhere in a darkened room,

A woman sits lost in sorrow.

She thinks of her mother and her mother’s mother,

Both long dead, buried in a distant land.

Their voices would rise and fall,

Weaving conversations that she still wore

Wrapped around her like a shawl.

They painted bones as they talked,

Bones that belonged to their mothers,

Painted them black like the night in which they fled

Painted them black like the rage they dared not show

Painted them black like the death of all they had loved.

On these bones they wrote

Wrote in the language of women hidden from men

Words that spoke the secrets of their lives

Named the children they had never held

Sang the songs their voices could not raise

Celebrated their beauty that was never revealed.

These memories warmed her, yet she wept.

She had no children, no lover, no friends.

Just herself alone in this desolate room.

Who would paint her bones?

From mother to mother to mother.

And so because of this, she cried.

Who would paint her bones? She had never learned these words of magic.

She was not a mother, would never be a mother.

Alone in a foreign country.

laughter is bitter

when you know the right questions

only after the fact

the trips made the operations performed

everything proclaimed a shining success

laughter is bitter

when returned at home

you struggle to find your way

life harder now than even before

laughter is bitter

let others go about their lives

they see what they want

this is nothing new

laughter is bitter

I’ve always known

and so I offer you honey

when I pour you a cup of tea

Words fall like stones

Catch them in your hand

Fingers bleed from flinty edges

Drop them to the ground

Walk away

The words hard still but changed

You marked in turn

Stupid mind, stupid heart.

I forget and forget again

That home does not exist.

A small yellow leaf drifts to the ground.

Rain patters on the roof.

I begin to bang my head

On hope’s hard concrete wall.

Is this it? This is it! Home now? Home!

Stop it, I say, stop it right now!

The wall, long dappled with red,

Has been stained by bloody foolish tears.

I’m tired, too tired to go through this again.

Rest for an hour, ignorant self.

I’m not staying here for long.

when you suppose you’ve found your most difficult task

be wary indeed

do not say aloud

“this is the hardest thing I’ve ever done”

deities have keen hearing and cruel wit

with an illustrious history of punishing hubris

if you must speak, say only

a murmured bit of thanks then

go about your onerous work

best not to say anything at all,

lest you find yourself transformed

a tree or cricket at best

forever having an eagle dine on your liver at worst