again and again it is almost

again and again it is almost

again and again it is wanting

again and again it is hope

again and again it is dancing as light as hammocks, deep as couches, hungry as groaning old pianos

your colors are not my colors your mouth not my mouth your language not mine we just sound the same look the same waltz the same stranger

the beat I missed is where? oh there in my oh, bones

I eat your cake you eat my rat poison and it is equally sweet

I drink your skin you drink my mojo and they are equally monstrous

I crave your knowledge you crave my cluelessness stranger stranger stranger

again and again old umbrellas lost

again and again blankets, swamps

again and again refuge, thunder, shouting in the desert

your decades are not my decades your dreamscape is not my pillowland your stories are ash to my flame roots to my wings whisper to my deaf deaf ear and there we were missing the go-round missing the locusts and honey missing the trumpet call how, how could we miss that when all the world is deafened?

again and again it is almost

again and again it is hope

again and again it is breath as ragged as unswept shards, singing as tuneless as love can seize, brain fever deep as wounded memory

again and again it is overheard stories, strangers are plural and speaking strange truths

again and again it is this life, that fierce maroon ache, those people, those people, those mountains of what? grabbing it with all the fists and shaking the what?

again and again it is no, yes, how, please, now, never, drink it, dance it, speak it, shout

born alive

given toes, words, milk, stories

millions of hours to navigate earth by earth

again and again it is sweetness in vinegar, life in these thorns, shouting through days

so long as we can

stranger