I wait all year for the fall.

I have lessons to be learned from autumn;
You do not die gracefully
but you die with passion
and when you have clothed the streets
with your
fire-scented blush
we look up to see
the sky shattered by
the angry arms of empty trees.

Teach me, autumn!
and I will break every heart
that has ever loved me.

For honesty's sake (first draft)

I have given birth to a half-breed of utmost honesty and straight up lies.
For months, stumbling past Spanish street signs in my summer disguise,
I speak to the ghost who follows me, him with impassive eyes,
and snowboots always. Wearing a woolen cap and mittens to defy
my sunscreened skin and tries to convince me, despite bright, sunny skies
that he is not, but it is I who meets the other in unseasonable attire.

I helplessly watch the trees I adore turn to the brightness of fire
and their blood coloured ashes, like leaves, rush towards the roots by which they were first inspired
and conceived. As though praying, I press my ear to the concrete, so tired
and worn thin through the seasons so I may hear the root's longing and desire
to embrace those rose peddle and sun-coloured leaves, who once aspired
to kiss the yawning sky, and now, rejected, return to the cement ground to die.

I tell the ghost that the tree is searching for my heart in the soil, and cry
bitterly, knowing she will not find me, for my heart had long before died
in his hands. My heart; pierced by arrows like icicles which time had tried
effortlessly to melt, was given to my then-living love who had lied
in action, vow and word to protect it and hide it from the howling winds outside.
Ashamed, he offers the gift of my life back and I
refuse. What use have I of this heart, now only able to remember and mourn.
Instead of the steady pulse of love and blood my heart once sang through my now-torn
veins, she is capable only to do this: remember and mourn, remember and mourn.

I toss myself from the limbs of the empty trees, for a moment airborne,
now, I rush to the ground, falling upon a crown made of thorns.
I allow the wounds of that accessory twisted from mockery and scorn
to tear through me. I lay over the roots of trees and I adorn
them with the same colour as the autumn leaves that, from the very same tree, were shorn.
The winter threatens to bury me here, but I stay, for
Underneath the concrete, my new heart swells through the season, warm with forgiveness and reason
and by Spring, I know I will be reborn.

For home.

I've been feeling nostalgic, lately.

I love the cities where I live.

when I grew up, I live on an island

and I loved it.

In the summer everyone in town

would be on the boardwalk, the beach

eating shaved ice and fries.

My family and I would bring a bucket of

cold chicken and ice cream - sit on the sand

watching the sun drop

into the pacific

to light up the cities of

mermaids underneath.

But while I was growing up, all the other kids would complain

because:

we wouldn't get enough snow

we didn't have anywhere cool

we had nothing to do after 6pm

because everything was closed.

Now I am grown up (I think)

and i live on the mainland

all on my own, while my

family still happily eats ice cream

on the beach - they can even see the lights of my current city,

or so they say.

Anyway now I live in the big city,

and I still listen to people complain

because

it rains too much

there are too many poor people

there is no place to go after 3 am

I don't understand those kids from my hometown

because

one year it snowed 3 ft. and that was enough for me

(also, the city had one snowplow. Any more snow would be chaos.)

after 6pm I didn't need to be anywhere but home, with my family

and I could think of nothing better than

my father, my mother, my brother, my sister

on the beach, with a bucket of cold chicken

watching the light fade into

finer points of stars

and the glittering of the mainland, where

I will end up

in the rain

watching the island

disappear after 6 pm.