I want to make trouble.
I want to jar you awake.
Make you question your hands.
Ask what is true and what is not?
Why do I fidget and ignore my sadness?
Why do I not understand
the words the world gives me?
Or is it the other way around?
What are the things
I give words to?
Why are there so many?
Why do they come together
yet seem to fly apart?
And I’ll tell you I don’t know.
I’ll tell you that I love you,
and yet have no truth in me.
That all my questions resolve nothing.
Why do trees stand without voices?
Why do rocks hold their dreams
in such firmness?
Why does water assume all shapes,
and the night
hide what it passionately embraces?
Why does silver shine like ice
but never melt?
And why does ice cut so deep
yet disappear with tears?
What is so different about being human
and not a star?
Again, I don’t know.
The hardest surface is the truth,
the brightest light,
the greatest joy,
the most harrowing fear.
So if you seek it,
write a poem.
Be a troublemaker.
Break my heart
by showing how yours was broken.
And we’ll do an anthology
dedicated to being true.
Perhaps,
a book about being in love.