Untitiled

Writing and scribbling
hoarding my little words
a miser could not be greedier
with his gold.

Wild haired, wide eyed
crazy to the world
this is what keeps us safe
this is what keeps me sane.

When I Dream of My Son

I had dreams about my son

when he swam in my womb

i want to say contentedly

but no, he was full of energy

Then he was born

arriving at a later date

than he was due

but fast in his arrival

after weeks of making

his impending arrival known

my son was born

but not the one I had seen

It was many years

before he became

the son he had been

the one I had seen

He taught me chess

he was strict, I tried

he made me exercise

in Rehab, I cried

He writes short

tough love notes

"eat right, exercise

see a credentialed therapist"

you’re too young for this shit.

He let me play his drums

it made my anger at

his drumming father 

lessen just a little bit

I dream about my son

and every dream is

one less dream

of my father’s unseen hands

I dream about my son

and every dream is

one less dream
about his father

When I dream about my son

I wake up with a smile

that he exists, a man

and that I exist at all.

For Arun: January 2009

You had something
You did not recognize it
It was everything you needed
You did not care for it or nurture it
It died.
It was revived, struggling
It died many times
It was revived repeatedly
It lived on intubation and IV fluids
It is not living anymore
Merely surviving on life support

Written in 2008, Journeyed in 1989-2006

The bipolar disorder
finally diagnosed
is soused with all 3 prescriptions
succumbing to one of them
though no one can agree on
which pill - blue, pink, or white -
has done its magic.

Symptoms subside
to be followed swiftly
by anxiety disorder
treated, set aside, making way
for panic disorder
which is a bit more troublesome
but nothing the pharmas can't handle.

Thank God there's been
no obsessive compulsive disorder
or everyone has been too kind
to mention it to me.
The screaming and silences alternate
in the windowless room.
I just want to wake up.

She's catatonic.
Perhaps it's adult onset autism.
Perhaps it's early onset dementia.

Though I may not know the answers
I can finally say that I am free
and if the questions led me here
then I am who I was born to be.

From 2012

The loss of Loss

As each breath goes in and back
it's pace constant, not permanent.
so too is the pendulum
as it swings from end to end.
there is no light without the dark
up without the down, in without the out;
gain is loss, death is life
letting go of the holding on
brings blessed peace, making me strong.

On first reading Seo-Young J. Chu

My garden, browned and bereft

brought no life to its dying sight

no hummingbirds hummed

no bluejays nor sparrows 

nor woodpeckers cavorted

no bulbuls sang their songs

and I sat in the garden 

waiting for my end in

it’s dying light.

Numbed in body

awakened in mind

ran the movies of 

everything

I think I thought 

had happened. 

The grouse has come today

to take my grouse away

so I may know the day

when joy enters

to green my broken garden

and my shattered heart.