White. White. White.

The sky never ends
it goes on father than the sun
Stretching father than you'll ever see
With infinite snowflakes
Falling, falling, falling
nothing you can do, to stop, stop, stop it

Arms spread wide
Tongue catches the frozen particles
Eyes squeezed shut against the world

The world that is bigger than you'll
ever be, be, be
In that moment
you are small, small, small
Just a speck on the
grand spectrum of
life the universe and everything
everything, everything
You have your time slot in forever
do what you can
before you wash away, away, away
in the flood of white
White snow.

White sky.
White houses
sidewalks
grass
trees
A white world.
White.
White,
White.

What is Camp?

It's
waking up to chiming bells
and groans surrounding you
and a rising sun.

It's
singing so loud everyone is heard
trying to play a speed card game quietly
running around in a old ball gown and magicians hat
glitter in your hair
getting a mud facial in a creek
hugs
laughing in the rain
Chuckles Benedict

It's
the taste of
instant oatmeal
sweet potato biscuits
morning dew
open woods

It's
the sound of
slamming screen doors
screams of laughter
strums of guitar
clanking plates
purring cicadas
roaring campfires

It's
the feel of
wind on your face
hands holding yours
cold splash of the creek
dirt smooshed between toes
sun between leaves

It's
the love
of love

Suffocation

The cold keeps snatching at my ankles,

My flip flops clicky-clack

on the vacant pavement

I fight to catch my breath that whips itself away from me

The tears fall

slowly- my vision is left somewhere behind me-

crawling down my cheek

onto my neck and heaving chest, still without air

Silently, with no rhythm to this pain

it washes oven me in waves, receding before it really hits

Silently; for no one must know

Trapped,

a glass dome encloses me

A poisonous gas condensing into an impenetrable fog

The sun behind these clouds. It wants to break through;

I said the fog was

Impenetrable.

Hope

crushed by the slam of Pandora's box.

Opequon

That's how I remember it. In flashes of all my senses. The smell of a burning flames and smoke that continues to cling to your clothes till morning. The purr of cicadas and roar of night. The feel of a hand, of everyone's hand as we stand in a slowly tightening circle, eyeing the steaming food. The sight of attentive eyes; of eyes that care; eyes that will catch your fall. Taste the love of five workers. You can't take just one bite; you eat in heaps. I can feel the presence of joy, radiating from peoples smiles as steady as the sun. There's a warmth at this place called camp. A warmth you can't get anywhere else, no matter how sunny the day is. It's walking onto a stage where everyone's the star and there are no judges. It's floating down the river, trusting the water to carry you in the right direction. It's looking down from the top of a mountain you just conquered. It's free falling into love. That's how I remember it.

Oh, the Horror

Poetry is terrifying

it will expose you

The rawness of you emotion

a slap in the face

Many say it's too

cryptic,

long and boring

Maybe you can't read it 

if you don't have enough soul to 

see into someone elses

I know

I know,

more poetry.

I'm not apologizing.

Boo

Creak. Bang. Boo.
Shadows take their time creeping from my closet
with doors I thought I closed
From the night that lie in a hungry wait outside
my fogged up window
The usually reassuring moon
slices through the clouds
and knocks on the glass
But it only makes the darkness dance and jump
now on the white walls of my room

The wind howls
another monster
requesting a visit
Knocking the trees
where ever it please

Sunk low under
soft, comfort
Seeking warmth in the cold fear
Is the darkness of covered eyes
less Frightening
than that
of shadows
and children of the night

Eyes squeezed shut
covered by layers of soft warmth
and happy thoughts
may keep the horror at
bay
For now

A Nagging

I'm suppose to
be tired
I can feel it
tugging at my
head
A far off thought
Lost in the complex network
that is brain.

My body is
tired
Sagging, unmoving
falling into my mattress under my covers
But my mind
is
Wind awake
and spinning
around in rectangles
just like the stars
the ones that are
Always
Awake.

Not Running Away

The moment of freedom.
For a split second it's all
there is
Then the wind is
stretching the skin of my face
arms, legs, body
it sneaks it's way
under my
glasses, stinging
my eys

All I hear is the
pat-pat-pat
of my feet against the soft dirt
the backround sound
comes as a haze
a slurring blur
of twittering crickets,
humming birds and belching
toads
as they
sit on the dampest
leaves, staring into nothing
looking at everything
all at once

The taste in my mouth is of
sweat
and I resist the urge to
clomp my jaw together
to gnaw my tongue raw
To taste that sweet rusty
blood in my mouth

My legs
are pumping, straining, on fire,
hurting, but I
keep going
my arms are pumping
back and forth
creating rhythm
they end with small, tight fists
knuckles white, skin thin

And suddenly
I'm stopping
walking over the uneven path
Taking slow, painful breaths
as my heart
flys out of my
chest with every bump-
bump-bump
Once breathing and thinking
are able to
be done simultaniously
I do it again

I run
away
No,
Towards.

Cinderella Falls

I am upside down
In my own head
I close my eyes
feeling them
scan the letters
words
phrases that turn to
sentences
paragraphs
pages
chapters soon
books that create
shelves in
librarys
and back to letters
My fingers already
ready to turn
the soft, musty
yellowing paper
Before my eyes
are halfway down the page
before my thoughts a quarter

I am anxious
to see what
happens
Never wanting
it to end

I know it's late when
I take a
peek
at the stiff, red
numbers
Four numbers
It's tomorrow
and I imagine
Cinderella
each story different
as she
Tumbles down the stairs
as the clock
Strikes

You know the feeling?
When it's 1AM
and you can't sleep
When it's 11PM and you're still
scribbling in your red notebook
under the cover,
hidden
Just one more thought and
BAM it's down
The thing you made up running
through the woods
is on paper
Though it seemed better
in your head
In the saftety of it
softly hummed between
your lips.

A Hot Day

The moisture hange in
the air like a
blanket draped ever your
shoulders, covering you fave
muddling your non productive thoughts
only this you cannot throw off.

The hammok clings to my sweaty skin
Blue, red, green, black
strips woven together
creating a mysterious pattern
to that never seems to have began
nor that wants to end
One foot on top
one gently swaying
creating a rythm
on the cool, tile floor.

The ceiling is boring
orange,
cannot figure out the plain substance
in which it is
I look to the side
outside
The soft rolling mountains covered with trees
save one bare,
pale spot on top
loo like little pebbles covered with moss
Up close the true variety of trees is staggering.

The smell is unidentifiable,
it's plain but fresh
like forest and life and trees and fruit
rotting fruit and bugs and more life.

I hear the rushing of the forceful river
below
Some one has somewhere to go,
carrying, pushing
sticks and logs and bugs and fish and
dirt
Birds chatter
louder and louder
different pitches
combine in your punding head
as one
blinding sound.