I have seen the color from the mountains, 
Witnessed peaks bronze into shades of copper, 
The air crisp like dollar bills, 
Seen leaves scatter from the hills of Appalachia, 
Watched them float like hammocks, 
Flutter like tired wings - dutifully - 
Like a cat that knows its dying day, 
Obedient to the season like migrating birds. 
I have shuddered from the breeze 
Of still sunsets, 
Lost my mind in lava skies of soft magenta, and prayed 
Like the pious to each blazing star at night. 
I have nursed myself by fires, 
Desperately counting on that last twig for ignition, 
Seen visions in the flames - 
A wolf once sat by me for hours as we watched the logs swelter and recede 
Like fistfuls of sand- 
And still I cannot understand 
Loss, but I can accept it.
I have plucked guitars, mandolins, 
Banged on djembes, tambourines, 
Danced madly, high on my love for folk music, 
Celebrated the harvest to the tunes of Neil Young. 
     Yes, I have loved it all. 
But I have also seen the fall during strawberry mornings in our apartment, 
The way the light melts into pools, like a carpet of sunshine
As you scrape the jelly on the toast and the cats sleep by the window
And I have loved that most. 

LBCH

      The years had passed the way that they do, abrupt, yet imperceptible, a channel of memories binding the days between like guitar strings, tense and quick to vibrate with each touch. She had offered herself once more, trusting life, like a child holding the hand of a mother among the crowd. Loss turned dull, names and faces hazed with each morning coffee, the days behind dimming like afternoon sunlight, spectral and irrelevant. She, too, had become a fissure of memory, a name mentioned in passing, like the lyrics we forget from songs we once loved. The self renewed itself as naturally as seasons, the days rolled by like waves, each reaching the shore by the thrust of another. Again, life had become better; she had found peace, she knew, her mug resting on the windowsill, the morning breeze seducing the rising steam in a dance. Yet sometimes, like a distant tune, she could hear the plucking of another time, days that once burned like stones around the fire, and she would wonder what it was all for, what it means to know that there are people one will love forever, and never see again.

LBCH

June

The days are sunny as sunflowers,
Warm as our bedsheets during late mornings,
The sun sliced through curtain blinds, 
Your silhouette split by light slides, 
Skies slick as polished mirrors, 
Afternoons bright as a beer buzz
On a beach of glittering sand, like a field of diamonds,
And salt water - silver - sharp as metal.

The days are sunny as sunflowers,
And the squint in your eye is tighter than usual,
Slits so fine I see horizon lines across the ocean
When you smile.

The days are honey, syrupy thick,
Eggs runny,
Just the way you said you like them
That day we wrote poems over brunch,
The ground, blazing raw,
Where bare feet are pricked by the heat of a 
Sizzling skillet,
Like the day we burned the bacon before work. 

Stretched as roads, drunk on a daylight
That won't let go of the hours,
These days are long and funny,
The way we latch to you so easily, the sun and I, 
Your skin so quick to blister,
Makes me wonder how you adapt to me so well,
The cool of your shades shelter these veins that carry an island
With the ease of an Indian Summer,
And you remain like the days,
Flawlessly radiant and sunny as sunflowers.

-LBCH

Meditation

Listen 
to the rain
plummet constant as minutes,
dive steady as our breaths,
the pumps in our beats,
drops
dripping on skin
over faces white as cotton fields, 
and brown as sodden soil alike,
over scalps bald, soft as pillows, 
or hardened ripe with age. 

Listen
as it hammers like a tired woodpecker,
to the tack before the trickle,
the hush before the shower, 
this rain you've known for years, 
connected constellations, 
drawn melting hearts, 
traced watery stars on windows, 
steady as breaths. 

Listen 
to it pass,
and come again.

-LBCH

I am searching for you in this sunlight of honey, the soothing warmth and the fifty degrees of the virginal breeze, the rhythm of wires, like belts, in a backdrop of motion, abandoned tires and telephone poles, like a row of old crosses, the water rings, river halos, the golden quaver of the melting afternoon, wavered by today's benign wind, like curious fingers tracing skin, the dull print of the moon, visible still, or visible already. I am searching for you in the cloud's design, brush strokes of air adorning the sky, like angel breath, boundless spaces, the faces of strangers sitting on each seat, the lyrics of songs I play on repeat, I listen for your name in the call of the train approaching the station, like the song of sirens, each stop a new syllable, codes like bible symbols, the howl of the breaks grinding the tracks like anxiety attacks. I stop. I am searching for you, but don't know what to find. You are already mine. 

-LBCH

For my girl who likes to dream of a house by the sea

Listen to the breeze, 
The dry branches scraping our kitchen window, 
Coyly, like the cat scratching the leg of the couch, 
Or the sound of little racoon paws on the back porch.
It is particularly windy this afternoon, I meant to mention
With my hands dipped
Into soapy water, 
And you holding me from behind, 
Laying kisses on my nape,
(Those lips I'd know as mine if I were blind)
But the tide had just risen, 
The white foam splashed the rocky shore, 
And I could almost hear waves fizzle like champagne
As they slid back into the ocean, sucked like magnets into the deep
     So out of respect I let them speak. 

The house smells of sea salt, cinnamon, 
And cookies that I let burn slightly in the oven. 
Forgive me; 
You looked so peaceful going through your photographs, 
Crouched on the wooden floor, arranging prints like puzzle pieces, 
A dim spear of light piercing you softly, a sun shooting its last arrow 
On this cold and cloudy day, 
That I forgot time existed, 
And resisted to tell you it was a quarter past the hour. 

The cork just popped, and the can just cracked open, 
And we sit by the chimney watching logs turn into flames. 
The sparks became dancers in your irises, I noticed, 
Like in tribal ceremonies; 
Your look is concentrated, yet serene, 
And I can't get myself to intervene and ask what you're thinking, 
And if colors look brighter 
With eyes ablaze. 
I know that I will love you always, I meant to mention, 
But a melon moon just started growing in the sky, 
Still a shadowy trace, and the night started to seep, 
     So out of respect I let them speak. 
LBCH

Life trembled
Within her, like an interrupted
Volcano, 
A ruptured, ravenous beast, 
Erupted - Pleasure - 
Passion, 
Pressure pushing heat inside her - 
Love - like lava, boiling
Beat by beat
           Life within her 
           Trembled
With splendored madness,
Courage combusted
Like Color in spring, 
Her restless feet danced
Wild, her arms opened like flowers, 
Dignified, like distended flags, 
A New Woman welcoming 
An ancient sunrise
Composing the tempo of a
New time
            "I will not admit defeat"
             Dance and repeat
            "I will not admit defeat" 
LBCH

It's the routine
Of the day by day
The Q like a rocket,
An express machine
Surfaces from the dark
Like a submarine, 
An enormous whale, 
Surfing the afternoon, now bluer with winter, 
Gliding past buildings,
Their windows lit
Like bright eyes
That must have seen our faces, 
And a thousand expressions
With no surprise, 
Silent observers
Of the ancient cycle, 
Living our lives
Under train times
Transfers, delays
Subways with no commitments.
We look up from our phones
Reassured of a world outside the doors, 
A last breath
Before we get swallowed by the tunnel. 
LBCH