This Is the Part

This is the part where
things get harder not easier.
This is the part where
loneliness demarcates your sight.
This is the part where
the hours of each evening seem unending.
Where the quiet night unearths you.
Where you discover yourself
rough and dark
and crumbling.
This is the part where grief
corrodes your most cherished memories.
Where fear wails out in anger.
Where the ghosts of harming gather
and chant hypnotically.
This is the part where you
will struggle and choose differently.
Only awake and strong can you
change your path.

~

RNH

half there

i stood in the doorway

half there and half leaving

and you shone with the affection

that belongs to the spark of familiarity

and i waited for you to say it

and when you didn't, i hesitated

and as i drove home, i plucked one petal off
at a time.

~

RNH

tracks

there are train tracks

on the skin

from afar, a whistle
blows, heralding
the night darkens
the few leaves shiver.

~

RNH

crying

he paced by the screen door

while the music inside lifted

wore a fine groove into the wood

while their voices inside shifted

from mere strangers to acquaintances

laughter made and exchanged

glances and he clawed

at the locked door

between them,

crying, but she would not

let him in.

~

RNH 

dove

softened by the fluff of pillows

the plunge into your arms

so that this love could be a source 

of comfort and not

two limbs of harm. 

~

RNH

soldier

she waved a single white flag
from the bombed-out
barricades
as the smoke curled
around another
explosion, another
grenade,
and she cried out for peace as the hatred
rained around her and she ran
into the pocked field gathering
bullets.

~

RNH

audiophile

for a year, i walked around in circles with you,
for a year, i stayed on that track
and did not stray
and for a year, i watched as the scenery
didn't change, and the images slowly looped
and then the audio did, too,
and i could not feign the blinders
that i did not have to blame
the fear of being lost,
the belief that i
was not enough,
they were not true and it didn't
end up mattering in the end,
because that record only played
when i knowingly went around on it.

~

RNH

a glimpse

the empty house sat
with its windows looking out
and he watched from his chair
for the neighbor, for the mail lady
and the smile of the visitor that used to open
his doors, every day
a glimpse into a former life.

~

RNH

Rush

I held my breath
For the long slide down
And winced, in both joy and pain,
At the newness
And the cool wind rushed
My face with bright sounds
And it only took a moment, until I
Let go.

~

RNH

Will Not Have You

I will not have you either
Said the patience to the thorn,
For you dwell in the dagger of your own pain
And you revel in causing the sore.
I will not have you either
Said the passion to the stone,
For you hide in the shadow of your own cage
And you bury your fire in its hold,
And I will not have you either
Said the promise to the cliff,
For I have learned to value my own judgement
And no one will push me off of it.

~

RNH

To the Rescue

It was like carrying

An injured body through waist-high

Muddy waters

In the pouring rain,

Screaming rationale to the helicopters,

Except the person did not die, they just

Refused to live. 

~

RNH

Capsule

Growth, in all forms,
would be a matter of time
and place, just as the seeds
know
when to unfold
themselves.

~

RNH

Shorn Free

She took her axe to the tree

That had stood bearing

No fruit for far too long,

And she built herself a fine boat

And she sailed away. 

~

RNH

Sugar Hill

in this hill of sand, a diamond,
in this sugar pile running through my fingers, a thorn
worthwhile, and even the hourglass that
pummels me, it
melts, too,
under the laughter of licked tears.

~

RNH

watermark

pencil dropped and picked up

like the stutter in my heart's beat

like the stereo's pulse and bass

pleads, static

blacking out the windows until they
disappear,
their images lost in a thousand bridges
swerved off and their bottled notes acquiring 

this stain. 

~

RNH

edited roses

my scissors cut out shapes i do not

recognize, their slender 

teeth articulate, they know

what they want to say, while i

hypothesize, phrases curling

upon whispy edges, taffeta

crinkling, stabbed by letters.

all of this unfolds

as the silver cuts and cuts

and cuts. 

~

RNH

a once love

the specter of love / bleeds through my irises
divides the mind / with her lightning / red bolts
that fiction / on replay / flashes the same scene
the big screen / cerebral / where we
about to kiss / lean
and disintegrate.
we burst, into an expanding circle of flame, our gazes
trapped on opposite sides, unraveling.

~

RNH

carved to me

you were carved
to me
like a cut heart
on a tree
and our wounds betrayed
the softness and its shell.

~

RNH

for LMH

I will grow anywhere that I am

planted, like the dandelion suns, wild

and free. I will roll

like the resurrection tumbleweeds, 

thirsty for the right moment and ready

for the hope that blooms

with spring, if only I am patient. I am

as strong as the prickly cactus. I am

fluid as the honeysuckle's sweet scent. I, too,
can conquer steel.

My love is a fenceless love.

And wherever adventure halloos, from the stars
to the tree line, just look and you will

find me there. 

~

RNH

emBraced

When it rains,
Will you fold
In fury, be brushed to the gutter
And surrender
Wherever the current may flow, or
Will you bear
This downpour
And its weighted nourishment
Held by your faith
That you hold the sky.

~

RNH