I Wouldn't Miss It

Yeah, I can imagine you’ve seen it all,
A sunrise on a postcard,
The golden hour on a feed.
But I was right here,
Just before light gets jarred,
When this world holds its breath
and sounds recede.

And I wouldn't miss it...

The feeling leads to moments
When a roller coaster
takes its highest stake,
That's the fear, the thrill, the promise,
Of seeing you as days break.

And I wouldn't miss it...

Lying on the beach with her,
looking up at the night sky,

the rusted chrome bumper
on our car above in the lot

seemed farther away
than the stars in Orion’s belt.

AIIeluia alleluia
Jesus Christ
Is risen today
Jesus Christ
Died on the cross
For our sins
Alleluia alleluia
We live in
God's world
We are lucky
To be alive every day
In God's world

This is my body.
It’s a mediocre, underfunded show,
It’s a vessel trying to impress,
That polishes itself so much just to reflect everything the world deems socially acceptable.
This liver isn’t sitting idle,
It has to down shot after shot just to give me the courage to live another day.
These lungs aren’t living rent-free,
They have to consume nicotine like oxygen,
They have to replace their entire chemical structure with a pile of tar and pollution.
This brain isn’t taking up space for nothing,

after writing what I (considered a modest married man)
who completed LXVII journeys around the nearest star
satisfactorily wrote a piddling poem compared to class
A wordsmiths whatever standards determine excellency
whether inherently gifted with the ability to codify idea
lodged within an inaccessible area of gray matter versus
practicing typing extemporaneous freestyle efforts kept
stashed away like some priceless heirloom accidentally
discovered by a random cybersurfer seeking a .wav file.

Nothing asks for me here.
Not the clock,
Nor the door,
Nor the day I’ve already lived.

It’s simple.

It’s how my breath steadies itself
And my bones settle in.

I come back to myself slowly.

I straighten my blanket
And open my notebook
To write something
Just like this.

A beating heart pounding against a golden plain
freshly mourning in morning dew .
Its widened traditional following of wistful wheat
resting with orderly ease
against the burning bastion of the buoyant sun .

Beating with the bleeding drums of this earth
awakens the forthcoming crooning
of the crystal eyed wind .
Its errant tune, torrid yet waning
whistles through the tightening entrails of dirt.

The sun climbs the Zagros heights
And wakes the Galilee,
Igniting fires in ancient nights
Across a bitter sea.
Two mothers mend a fraying hem,
Two fathers guard the door,
shadows cast from Jerusalem
Reach Tehran’s marble floor.

It's a war of whispered ghosts,
Of iron, sky, and stone,
Where prayers are sent to different hosts
From seeds that we have sown.
But when the steel begins to rain
And thunder shakes the wall,
The salt within a tear of pain
Tastes identical to all.