I thought of you, sister

aboard the late bus

made me sad to know

you’re all inside yourself

and nobody can understand you.

Well, I’ve been stranded on the curb, myself,

watching kind faces fade

every moon will have its dark phase

and I know I haven’t seen the end

of these lonely late-bus days.

Now the words that race through my mind

shriek for release and thirst

after a hard day’s fight.

From east to west, some words come

through highways, winds, birds, blue skies

they will never be spoken

till I find myself stranded, invisible

clawing, pounding

at the nothingness of my life

so many miscarried poems

connected by illegible ink smears and scribbles

I’m watching by the roadside

of my own unspoken words

passing by

how can I watch my mind disappear

in so many tangled, misunderstood, forgotten letters?

There comes a point when voices are all inside you

or voices are all outside you—

give your soul or keep it

but you’ll always circle back around

to see your reflections

shattering

the longer you look at yourself

till you fear that before you end

you’ll crack to pieces

and be viewed only in tiny shards,

sharp and accusing fragments.

In the shape of a girl’s face

the hollow, unspoken places

struck a match in you at birth

and the flame fades from your cold fingers

you fumble, sink to your knees

before God, who never whispers inside you

and you worship invisibility.

This is the center—

darkness without roots or seeds

screams, and the memory of screams

and slipping, falling, trying

but never crying.

There comes a point when all you’re

longing to speak into the air of the real world

turns inward, and the day is done—

you’re too exhausted to talk about yourself

now there’s only tattered tickets in your diaries

people’s understanding faces

like the late bus

passing by

too late to get yourself free.

Move forward, sister

and put on your beautiful disguise

soon it will be all of yourself

that you recognize.

You’ll be traveling in many more windows’ miles

Contained in your jar of watery smiles

in your clear and fragile jar

of watery smiles.