Eight Was

 The world stopped for you

at eight.  The amber of time

froze you there:

infinitely eight. 

But time proceeds

for the rest of us, 

and who you might have been

evolves with those who

yet have memories of you. 

Eight was too young

and always is,

even if the age of reasoning is 

here; the baby teeth and baby cheeks

are those of a bud

not the full flower of the 

gorgeous life to be. 

Eight was

the full sum of your years but not

the full sum of your life.

We are not immune to tragedy

but see it in its starkest relief

when we see it 

and you are eight.

And we are, for this moment at least,

so very old, and 

tired of this.

Built

 I am all

boundaries like a property map

and scaffolding of 

scar tissue

and nets of 

projected nerve--

an edifice, a public monument,

an institution of self.

My foundation is dug

deeper than I want to know,

fathoms in the earth,

My spire to be

is beyond the bounds of

atmosphere.

Yet here am I

a work in progress

sorting out the many ways

that I 

am built.

The Problems I Have

 The trouble with me,

the problems I have,

are made of flesh and bone and bad

ideas, and

exist wherever

bad ideas and flesh and bone are sold. 

Because I know right now

that flesh is tragic

and needs proliferate, 

and my sadness is for 

as much a thirsty human carapace

as for the genius 

child within.

But imagine a hundred cults without vision or 

a thousand militias without

a cause,

but some dumbass speaking could make them

so,

so,

so much a thing in motion. 

And I welcome my unexternalized 

sorrow 

for it has not

yet made of me a fascist. 

My problems are small against a fucked up world

is all. 

I resist hating others for my mortal condition.

And if I stress this point, 

could it be enough?

Impatient on a Monument

Tell me what you

elevate

commemorate

memorialize

and I will show you

your examples

your values

your character

for these monuments

are not mere

milestones

idly marking a path

with just

a number along the way:

a concrete literal fact--

but the time it took to

render the hairs on

a horse's ass

as lovingly as

you tend to your own face.