“Don’t wait” the first 
Invitation*, states.
Subject and verb meant
What I heard: it’s my turn.
These wasted times,
My healthy days numbered 
Counting crows in a line.
Life and death married 
And birthed you together 
So don’t wait for 
Tonight or for daylight  
When winds kick up a mess
Of better yesterdays.
Sour mash in a dirty glass 
Ice diluting the burning
Hoarse throats from thirst
So deserted, beyond quenching.
Straddling my legs up to the bar
And wild wet eyes find 
You outside of the frames 
pictures -you took them, too. 
Stored in musty boxes
In basements and attics  
All dressed up, obnoxious
When glasses obscured by
Bottle blondes divorced and lonely. 
Time in the mind only reminds 
Us of what no longer stabs at
Our hearts. Funny things:
Gene’s helixes and a pine’s cones
All the sacred plans for galaxies 
Spun Nautilus shells and 
The ringing bells in my ears. 
Yet some refuse any sound
Like the dying refuse food.

Outside nature awaits and what sings
Of life alone in the flutter.
Nudging the willow tree’s long locks
A hummingbird wings create unrest.
Crying tiny drops of firelight
Candles leave wax rings
Worn into wood, married by ownership
And warning our bodies
in the dusk’s lazy sun adrift the sea
Winking goodbye as it hides for the night.
At home we take the complaints of stuttering billy goats
Where clamorous hens kick
At the roosters who forgot a nest
Or two. What about me?

It’s the way we all feel 
Have they no idea 
our children fled the nest -
Leaving their rooms full  
Of their trophies 
While we wait to sleep  
In fitted sheets 
Dug in graveyards with 
Names like Star of David.
Smoothed over blue grass grown
Watching the dead proves
Equally as boring.
It doesn’t mean a thing
I mean that nothing was meant by it:
To say that at birth  
We become life and death, as one
Intertwined together. 
Growing taller, spinning 
Until we grow dizzy and 
Giggling in the know 
Of moment we will fall
Carefully goes the innocence 
Spiraling, radiating out
Of our mouths the 
breath of love itself.
Rejoiced in our screams and cries.

A call to our guilty conscience 
That wears heavy on our bones
Asking again to what ever we’ve 
Said no. Must we unpack and 
Put their guilt in the pantry 
Set the table with the China  
The sheets hang out in the 
Golden dusty fields 
Collecting the scent of 
Late sunlight in baskets 
After hanging up on the lines 
With the rest of the whites
Faded and drying we remain 
Dying in the sky tidally locked
Like the moon to the earth 
And never once asking 
For more than a simple goodbye 
“One day we will meet again”
Though I never have 
Known you in your own skin
Only under layered pelts
Like laundry hanging from your deserted bones. 

Dare we share the bond 
That darkness cannot control? 
Isn’t that a woman’s fate: 
to allow men to drink
Until they drain our souls?

*from Frank Ostaseski’s The Five Invitations, highly recommended on audio book as read by the Author. 
“Don’t wait,” is the first invitation. One cannot live their entire life or tell all those they love how they feel, or forgive even yourself of any pain; it’s never too late, however.