I wash myself with water,
you find too hot to touch
But it soothes my aching muscles and
my tired soul so much
Relaxation is becoming me,
with eucalyptus in the air,
Soothing all my senses while I
lather it through my hair
Jelly bean body scrub in hand,
everything smells sweet
Exfoliating the day from my being, removing myself from defeat
Rubbing circles along my jaw to massage away exhaustion,
high pressured heat to free my shoulders of the burden they carry so often
Body oil to top it off,
strawberry my favorite choice
It's hard to hate yourself when you smell so good,
but it's easier to find my voice

I have many scars
But they all tell a story
They are my tattoos.

My love for him felt displaced by time.
Like a long summer nap and waking
to find the sun freshly out in the sky.

Only that it wasn't. It was the same sun
in the sky before I slept, and the same one when I awoke at 19.58 pm.

Nothing was new. Instead all was steadfast. Lacking in the fluidity and spontaneity that gave one the ability

to see into a man's soul through the twitching of his right eye.
It felt like a black wren's feather

caught in between two branches.
The proof that although I wanted to fly, I was held back by the familiarity of a place.


So I sit on this short hill in the twilight of my life and wonder what it would feel like to fly uninhibited in the morning sun.

Like a little girl's laughter in summer. Full of crescent moon tambourines and a head covered in a wreath of dried lavender.

What is the value of a life
Of a husband or a wife 
Of a daughter or a son.

Do these labels give value to one,
More so over the other?

Is a wife less valuable than a mother,
A father more valuable than a son?

Does value rise or fall
as one becomes another?

Surely every life can't be worth the same!
Can it?

 I wonder.
Is a peasants life,
of less value than a kings!

Or does Status, Creed, Race, or Color,
truly, not mean a **** thing?

It is true that I would place my
wife, my son, and my brothers
life over that of another.

But that value is given to them only by me.
No life is worth more
than any other in reality.

Yet until we can open
our hearts and minds to see.

The true value of life will never be!

It was the day you felt so awake,
Looking so weak—too tired to fake.
You spoke of dreams, but not with cheer,
You softly whispered, “I’m going, dear.”

Maybe you were shedding silent tears,
But it made my heart break, pierced by fears.
No final hug, no reason why,
Just aching silence in your eyes.

And then you disappeared…