forgiver

i see everything,
looks lingering on hips,
soft seperation of sticky coffee lips,
i see the extra beat per minute
i see the worn molars.

and in a look, a thought, a whisper
you're hung; taught rope brought out
but i can forgive you
if you want me to

i see everything,
green looks on jewelery
planted seeds of disease sprouting
i see the poison ivy vines.
i see the bitten nails.

and in a look, a thought, a whisper
you're hung; taught rope brought out
but i can fortive you
if you want me to

do you?

My Faces.

My Faces.

All I remember is the flash
like a camera that stole my smile away,
that and the rest of my face,
the last thing I saw or will see.

They fixed all the holes,
plugged them up with scars, now
I'm told I'm a skull wearing skin,
and when I'm taken in public
my family tells me I'm a terror;
some nightmare who's roaming the streets.
My daughter can't comprehend
why my lips have no replacement
or why my eye sockets show skin
stretched like canvas to prevent germs getting in.

My heart beats, but shamefully,
and aches with the pain I've caused
those so close to me.

Now they say they'll transplant
my face for another, says the doctor
averting his eyes, so I'm told,
From some stranger whose passing away.
Tomorrow if I wake up, will my face be a neighbor's?
Will my family see through my facade?
Will this smile be wry?
Will these lips finally find the expectant lips of my wife
or will this stranger mask turn her away?

Insomnia

Every night somewhere it's three in the morning,
and someone's not sleeping 'cause sleeping's boring,
and with twiddling thumbs they count as imaginary sheep leap
and wonder if it's worth it to try to fall back sleep or just get up.
How many sheep before enough is enough?
Plus they can't stop thinking about the bills.
Plus they can't stop thinking about the chills.
They can't stop thinking about how much
they're worried about tomorrow
and if they had to, where they could beg and borrow.

For a few seconds...

For the next few seconds
forget.
Remember when remembering
soaked through like sun through
venetian blinds and striped our carpet
with warm and cold, light and night,
and all of that
kept us rapt
and we forgot
to look ahead instead of back,
and we crashed,
so for the next few seconds,
forget.

On the Way Home from Drew and Bethany's Wedding

A long ride in a car.
Music pumping like blood, gasoline like adrenaline.
Raindrops not cleansing but spreading yellow
mud of pollen about the windshield.
The velocity on 64 seperates each drop into a distinct "tick"
but as the volume of rain increases,
the sound turns from "tick" to "Ssthack"
to a thick, mid-pitch "shhhshh."
Pollen puddles collide and disperse up the windshield,
to its corners and out into the wind
that seems to send the rain sideways past the speeding car.
Let's just keep this up.

Cornerstone

There is but one brick we build upon
There is but one house we're safe within
And the wind, and the wind
Cannot find its way in,
No, the wind cannot find its way in.
There is but one we will call I Am.
There is but one rock upon which we stand
There is but one reason for our love,
And there's but one armor we can trust.
And Satan, and Satan
Cannot find his way in
No, Satan cannot find his way in

Jesus Christ, cornerstone,
In your love, we find our home
Cornerstone, Jesus Christ
Your empty grave, it promises life.

Smile-Face Pictures

The pictures from those days hang crooked
on the wall before the stairs, all smiles,
all oblivious to the paychecks that didn't pay,
the night after night with heartburn and lying awake.
Their dusty frames and glass contain momentary joy
that sometimes stretched like a rubberband across days
or weeks, but sometimes snapped and slapped back,
cracking like a cup and spilling it like a sink.

And now it seems we don't take any more pictures
and I wonder if we still have momentary joys or
are we jaded like jewelery from China?
I don't know, but on the stairs, I remember.