Everything with you was new to me
Every step I took with you was a first for me
I stumbled at times and had to find my footing
At one point I even stopped and fell to my knees

After a while I just gave up, knowing that you were ready to run
While I still hadn’t mastered walking

What you needed was someone to be in pace with you
And I knew I couldn’t be that for you before the race ended
I was intimidated by the speed and the way the course was shaped

So I tripped and fell, and for it, I had to watch you disappear
Because once you had reached a certain pace, there was no slowing down

Did you exit the track?
Or are you coming around again?
Maybe this time you can slow down just a bit so that I can learn to jog with you

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

I miss you

Your too tallness
And your british accent that sounded a bit more like barney the purple dinosaur
I like him, whoever he was you became
I like your glasses and that we both had them
I like. . .
I remember the first night when you called me beautiful
Twice

And you looked at me like I was unbelievable
And remember the second night
(right after the first night)
when we knew we would see each other but I wasn’t sure I would actually see you because I don’t trust
anyone
and I didn’t think you were going to be there
let alone call me
but you did
even before I got there
and it was so easy
it seemed so easy for you to just be who you were and feel how you felt without any stopping
and I wore something cute but not too cute and not too girly because after all I wasn’t dressing for you
I was dressing for me (and that guy I met last night, who, dang I hope I get to see him, but nah, he won’t call because he called me beautiful and he was cute and I lie the way he carried himself so he definitely won’t call)
When all this doubt brings me is truth from my words, and who wants that?
Who really wants to be a fortune teller?

I just want to have a good fortune
Yeah maybe my fortune will include a guy who’s a bit arrogant and thinks he’s in control of everything around him
But I’ll be the better for it because if I’m in his circle he will do anything for me
Because he’s in control
And I think I missed out on that

I had to start looking for holes
I had to start looking for stops
Because I knew things would have to stop
And I do wish I hadn’t stopped but it wasn’t a decision
It was a reaction

I don’t know if you can accept that

I reacted to the situation I was presented with
My brain will hopefully one day fall to the wayside and my heart will rule
(and then hopefully I can then resume action with my brain, because it is in rather good shape)
one day things that don’t make sense won’t matter

I don’t want it to make sense
I want to make nonsense with you
And I want to know that every free moment I have will be filled with you
Like it is now
And like I hope you know it is
Because I don’t want to have any shame either
I want to let you know
But my words are not my own
My words would lead you away
And I want you near

So I stay quiet
And wait to push the doors between us open a bit wider
I want you to enter this space again
And I want you to see me the same way you saw me that night

But I fear

I fear that your sight will be jaded by what you felt and what you think I didn’t feel
And those tears I cried that last night in the park were a bit commercial don’t you think?
But damnit they were real
And god knows why I cried that way that night
But you held me
And you didn’t get mad
And I don’t know how you felt about it

But I felt good and safe in your arms
And it was funny the way the white people started caring about the black girl with the nappy hair

But you wiped my tears
And for some reason that still didn’t register to me to hold on tighter

Somehow I still let you go
But I didn’t want you to go
I just didn’t want to be in limbo anymore

I felt that I didn’t deserve anymore time

Because I knew time was coming to a close
And I felt that I had to do something about it
Be involved in the ticking motion

I like drama
I admit that

But I really did feel something that was completely new and obviously misunderstood

My tears came down hard
And they wouldn’t stop
And remembering them right now is hard because I haven’t cried like that in a loooong time

Before you I have never cried ON someone
I have never let myself reach such a point of weakness in front of someone not myself

And I don’t know if that means anything to you
I don’t know if that registers to you
I did not tell you because we ended soon afterwards
I think
(only because I do not know)
that you left because you didn’t like the feeling
of bending backwards with no one there to spot you
if you fell

and I can understand that
there goes my brain again

you were so honest with me and i had already reached the stop light
and everything had shut down
and I don’t know why or how it happened
but I know the instrument and I will deactivate it
if again I have the chance to meet you for the first time

hurt
I don’t know if I hurt you
If you felt pain from the way I had to act for sanity
Is it worth it?
To be sane?
Is loneliness worth sanity?
I don’t know

You are not every sound I hear
You are not every wind that blows against me
You do not knock me off my feet
But you do force open the wellsprings in me and bring forth music of a kind
You make me full with everything that did and didn’t happen
The memories and the walks
And the words
And the pens on paper
And the nights that ended up lighter than dark

I don’t even have to close my eyes and I am with you

Maybe this is just what poetry is made of though
Maybe this is what feeling is and you were just a beginning
Maybe (this is my attempt to steel myself against the possibility that you may have found another lover or mate while you’ve been away—if you have taken a wife there where I am not, I will lead myself to believe that we were never meant to be and that all of my actions, logic-driven though they may have been, were correct and perfectly calculated to cause me the least amount of pain possible. I will call myself RIGHT, and I’ve heard that’s the problem with us young people these days, we always want to be right. I do want to be right, but I also want to be held)

Will you hold me again?
Will you want me again?
If you see me will you feel anything or have you taken on my symptoms and become well-brained too?

Shall I do all the feeling this time?
Can we both consent to reality?
No matter how heavy it is?
Can I look at you like I want you?

Can I even ask you before you arrive if you are engaged with another?
Is it my business?

I am barefoot with no shoes in sight and I want to drag my feet through the mud of your flesh
Making footprints that will stay forever

I want to stay forever lodged in you as part of you
If I cannot have this, I will selfishly and childishly release all memories (but they will go nowhere)
I will act as if I am strong
And there will be a bulb in my throat that cannot be ignored
So I will excuse myself to a restroom near me and I will shed tears
3, maybe 4
And I will breathe and I will bear the pain of the unswallowable
Because you are not mine
And if I release again it will not be in your arms and therefore will be useless and worthless and inconclusive

Every night following will be cold
Even in the summer
Heat will not be my gift
I will be empty and without

And of course after days and months of thinking of you
And flooding my eyes with water that does not cleanse but only stains
After this, I will rest

But will not forget you
And every so often, as a ritual dance, I will allow myself the pain of remembering you
And again the bulb will rise for me as it did the last time I encountered you

And this will be my life
The days that I live consumed by the absence of you

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

Catching thoughts on a Friday night
I must be alone
Cause all I’m doing is thinking of you
Maybe if I had a date I wouldn’t be locked down or shut up with words floating around in this head of mine

Maybe I’d be able to take words as themselves and not dress them up to be something famous and, when you think about it, unknown

You words are a treasure to me because they are so far and so few and so distant

I am stretching you wide

If my mind were a voodoo doll
Boy would you be in trouble
I’d have you with me always

Don’t worry about night time
I just want you near
You might feel me if you close your eyes at night
My body on top of yours
I straddle
I like it there on top
We are close
And I feel like you are something that can be owned by me fully
I lock my arms around you tight and I feel in control

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

Dieting on you is filling me up with words unspoken
Like I love you too
And
Please don’t stop looking into my eyes

I keep it all in because I kept it all in
With nowhere to go my words hope to be your brain food
Serving you gladly each night as you dream
Tempting you with memories of days lit by the sun’s grace
and me next to you
vertical and stretched beside

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

A little nostalgic

I walk up 9th avenue and am flooded with thoughts of you
Tears roll down as I walk up
56th street
sushi spot and you feeding me eggs from some other mother
squishy and pink
plus fried ice
and I am cold
wind blows against me

it is an empty Friday night
empty weekend with nothing to do
my mind fills with you
I binge on memories of us moving fast towards
My red light


And I wonder now
Why I stopped our collision
So desperate and inevitable
It was thought
Brain seizure
Then shut down

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

One day at work, i reasoned that it would be okay to print out the one poem you wrote to/for me and to cut it out in the shape of a heart and put it near my computer. that it would remind that you existed, even though i had no recent record of it, what with no responses to the emails i'd sent you. i also was in need of feeling loved--ever, or feeling something close to that so i cut it out and put it on th ewall near my screen, but soonafterwards i reasoned that the whole idea was silly, and that more than making me feel good, the poem would make me seem desperate and crazy and would haunt me with memories of something i couldn't have, potentially ever again.

but then the other day as i explained my present dating situation, i re-realized that you were the last person i seriously dated. and even more recently i've seen the product of how i felt for you--poems, a lot of them. i don't know if i lied to myself when i told myself i didn't love you. i don't know how i felt about you, but i know that you come to mind a lot and that i wish things had been different. i wish you hadn't been leaving, but rather, staying. so we could have become the friends i thought we always deserved to be.
i no longer have the records of our text messaged conversations, though they were special to me. my phone only has so much capacity.

and i guess you must only have so much of a capacity too, though i did hear an amazing jazz musician over the past couple weeks cover the song "never, my love"
this same concept, of there never being a limit or an end to love/emotion for another or a true love is spoken by two of my favorite actors (julia roberts and brad pitt) in the movie THE MEXICAN. so if it's true, that one's feelings for a true love never ever go away and nothing can ever wipe away the memories or make the musings of "what ifs" go away, then what happens in the meantime?

we didn't have the time to take things slow. i wonder if the reason people think slow is generally better is because if things go slow they are drawn out and lengthened and patience is inevitably either practiced or learned. and if someone can stand to be patient wth another person, they must be able to bear them? i don't get it, but i do wish we'd had more time to become whatever we were supposed to become. i hope our time hasn't passed and that there's still time to learn and grow and dance. . .because i don't think i was completely honest with myself when it came to you

i think my answers and attitude were encased in a time capsule and it was unearthed too soon--it needed more time to cement

do we still have time?

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

hi
i'm sorry it's so late
i always use the time dfference as my excuse but since i don't know what state you're in, i really don't think it holds water

i don't know why you just popped into my head, but you did
it was right after shaun (from boy meets world) said, "wanna go get ice cream or something"
right before that, someone said something about growing up and how it happens so fast--how and when? right now

i honestly think it's the jazz that draws me to you
i've been listening to kurt elling lately
he doesn't remind me of you
but music at all--good music--reminds me of you
i can imagine you thinking you introduced me to kurt elling in the first place
not arrogantly
but just because you led me in this way

one time i remember after us not having spoken in a long time, i called you and asked if you were still playing
your response was exactly as it should have been
flabberghasted--kind of like, what of life without music?

i only recently faced my reality with music
that i have no choice but to sing
and to do it with my whole broke and only half talented self
i don't know if i'd call myself a performer
because i don't think i am

but i'm touched by real music
music that has purpose and feeling behind it
and i have to somehow be a part of it

i want to make music with you

i've thought about calling you a lot lately
to say hi and to ask you if even though there may be lots of unresolveds between us, can we just do what we love with each other and have nothing to do with each other except making something meaningful?

tonight when i thought of you randomly, i imagined that when i tried to explain my calling you, you would say something like the time i called just because--still very closed and fearful of your power over me--and you said "i miss you too"
and it was that, and i guess it may still be that moment and others like it from before, that makes me know i wasn't really crazy and that there really was something between us
even if it never became what i wanted it to be

what it was you wanted, i don't know
whether you achieved what you wanted, i don't know

i don't think it's very important
i think if you wanted me to know, you would tell me
because you know where i am and how to reach me and how i feel about you, i think

i think you know how i feel about you

that i would dance through the mystery of any scary movie if i could find you there at the end
that your voice is my culling song
that to see you would stop me dead in my tracks and whatever direction i was headed in would be completely lost and meaningless from that point on
that i would follow you to wherever you're going if i knew where to start
that my love for you is so unconditional that it hasn't stopped breathing or opening and closing its eyes since i had the chance to meet you

i think you know that i did stop breathing when we stopped being
but i've since then exhaled
and everytime i get a brand new cd (god-forbid) i feel you
and sometimes i want to cry just to remember how good it felt to feel
that sometimes to remember you, i listen to anything your ears have touched

and sometimes i don't even do it on purpose
but the music follows me and i don't have a choice but to follow . . .

and that's how i know i have to sing
and i HAVE to make music
and maybe one day i'll see you again
and maybe we'll both be making good music
and we'll try again
to make music together

but really, i just wanted to say hi
but since i pray now instead of dialing, i had to at least write you a selection from my mindsoul
thank God and you for putting it there and for putting me wherever i went just now so i could find the time and place to write it out

thank you

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence

there is something within you
there is something in everything that is
unbelievable beauty
flowing from deep inside
don't be shocked or surprised if i
lift your disguise
realize
that i can see it in all things all
but especially you


there is something we carry
like a rhythm that tells us who we are
it's the rhythm of living
hear it we'll come to see who we can really be for time
erases time
it's sublime
and i can hear it in all things all
but especially you

the time is upon us
to lose our indifference
for time isn't holding us anywhere
i declare
life is
savoir faire

we know windows of your inner star
and see things as they are
and infinity of light
like a torch in the night
in the sun and the moon and the stars
are living within you
they are shining in everything that is

here's what i see in your eyes right now
ten thousand lives over many years like leaves on the vine of this morning's glory
the determination of years coming to fruition
in the ever present now of your life
unfolding now in the flowering of days
the constellation of stars in the sky are like a fugue of life in velvet hands
the melody never ends
echoing again and again
nearer still sounds the melody leading through darkened rooms
playing like the sun on the water
like it's reflecting in your downcast eyes
when will you come to see you like i do
and know you like i do
and hear you like i do
and love you like i do

there is something within you
there is something ineverything that is
unbelievable beauty
there is something within you
there is something in everyhing that is
unbelievable beauty
there is something within you
there is something in everything that is

unbelievable beauty
flowing from deep inside
don't be shocked or surprised if i
lift your disguise
realize
that i can see it in all things all
but especially you


--Kurt Elling's "the beauty of all things"

reach for me
through the darkness of night
stretch out and reach for me
let your pain deliver you out

close your eyes and just reach
and i will be standing
there
reaching for you

i know this duet feels like a dream
cause love in this life ain't always what it seems
but just reach for me darlng
and i will be true

close your eyes and reach
i'll be standing right there reaching for you, too

don't think too hard
and don't hesitate
please don't rest until our fingers meet

just reach for me baby
reach reach for me baby
don't retreat

reach

over sidewalks and city streets
through scenic walks with weary feet
under blue gray skies clouds stretch for miles
i have stretched this far just to see your smile

so c'mon and reach
reach for me
close your eyes and reach
and i'll be there
reaching for you

let light be the first thing i see
when i open my eyes, let light
be the cure and remedy

waste me
like the food left on your thanksgiving plate
that your eyes were too big for
shove me to the side
sharp multi pronged object forcing me
off site

send me away
back into myself
cocoon
spreading wings not
back curved
fetal position
harmed but unwilling to admit pain

ignore me
like my eyes closed when you said girlfriend
like the lie: if you can't see them, they can't see you
like the silence that comes only for crazy new yorkers
who have closed their eyes and
shut their ears to the filth
and craze that surrounds

but love me still
with unanswered phone calls
deaf ears
untransmitted feelings
long kisses
and warm hands

through incongruity
and confusion
take me in deep
so i know i always have someplace to be
even if i know i can never stay

and i know i can never tell

Copyright © 2005 by Arin Lawrence

Tonight i looked up and saw the moon
she was beaming down at me and i saw her fully exposed
burnin' a hole deep into me
straight to my core

she cleared a space in the sky all around her so there was no chance of misunderstanding:
she is the ruler of the sky
the madame and the mistress
and from her light comes life

love affair with deep blue sky
is she mother of all creation?
or father?
sky breaks open at her arrival
clouds burst with fear and temptation

and still she takes form as she will
cresent
high tide
half then full

powerful and unrelenting, but
demure and coquettish
she sits high on her throne
overlooking all that she owns

my world is hers
and hers is my world
______________________________


okay, so that was just an exercise--don't ask for what
And this (below) is my beginning attempt at trying to rhyme and be coherent at the same time ( i wanna write a song, but i have to prepare...though this IS not, nor is it intended to be or become a song)
this is just an experiment...

monday night/
white light
blue skies /melancholy sighs
tears fell inside of me/
from wells i couldn't see
i had weeks ago let go of his memory/
but he came back to haunt me

"Let us always remember the laughter spent together.Opportunity comes but once seized stays forever.Victories both public and private start with vulnerability.Every chance i have I will embrace you"
--j williams

ME: you remember that night we were on the phone and you asked me what kind of music i listened to?
(Hypothetical) YOU: no
ME: well i don't remember what i was listening to at the time, but it was probably my playlist that started with Bonnie Raitt's I can't make you love me, which always reminds me of the guy who kind of broke my heart
(Hypothetical) YOU: okay
ME: well anyway, that night you said something about how it seems like i like to make myself miserable sometimes, with the things i engage in and the music i listen to, and it's true--i admitted it then, that sometimes i like to make sure i'm feeling what i'm feeling as fully as possible, so just keep going and going into whatever direction it is that i'm headed
(silence)
ME: I've been thinking about you a lot lately--and i just found this thing you wrote on the last day i ever saw you and it's pushing me further away from you but closer to you at the same time
and it hurts, but it feels good, like i'm proving to myself that i really can feel something
(Hypothetical) YOU: That's what you were crying about that night in the park.
ME: Yeah
(Hypothetical) YOU: It was really late and you had to work the next day. Why were you crying so hard?
ME: Because I wanted to be able to feel the way I felt i should for you, but i couldn't make myself...but i thought my not being able to love you, even with your leaving, meant that i was crazy and that even if something amazing came my way i would miss out on it
(Hypothetical) YOU: Hmmm
ME: Yeah--I mean there is some truth in it. Otherwise I would probably really be talking to you now, instead of trying to pretend I know what you would say in this instance...

Forgive me if this has already been seen...I don't feel like looking back today, though it's obviously inevitable, what with this chain around my neck

A former lover found his way into my mind last night and since then i've been melancholy
i don't know if this piece I'm about to post was originally about him--i have a flightly heart, though I am realizing more and more that most of what I feel is lies...which could (and may) be troubling at some point, but i'll get to that when it comes back around

one thing i do know is I don't want to want what i don't want anymore
if you feel me just stretch your heart out this way--i'll feel you

anyway, these are my words
I hope whoever they were/are directed to can feel the feeling



I wrote you a poem last night as I lay unwanting in a lover's empty arms
It was about how much I love your smile
And how I wished his arms were yours
The ones that do the talking when your mouth doesn't quite catch the meaning And it was about how we don't have time to talk about little things like sex or stuff like that
But when we talk it's always about SOMETHING
Like words or color
Or the way I pronunciate a certain musician's name
And I wonder sometimes if you think I'm putting up a sign on front street just for your beaming purposes
What you may not have yet gathered
Is
I don't have the time enough to waste it
These nighttime escapades are simply me escaping the days of my life when I really do come home to
No one there
And no messages
No one cares
To check up on me
Jesus, friends, family
Sometimes it's all we got
But I'm hopin' and wishin'
Very soon to be prayin'
That I'll one day add to my anthem that ghostface tune
All that I got is you
And I'm so thankful I made it through

UNFINISHABLE/ "GOLDEN SILENCE"

I wish I could save all the words you say to me
You give to me a smile every time we talk

I hear new york in dee cee
And I see your smile
Always stuck on your face
Always smiling at me

I wish I could be where you are
And I wonder what that would be like
I wonder what me in your arms would feel like
Daily standing close to you
Hearing new york still in dee cee but coming into Chicago standing still
And close to you

I wish I could know how these “things” are going to work themselves out
How life is going to happen tomorrow and the next day

I wish I could see what your nocturnal eyes look like beyond those frames of seeing
Into the world
You see the world in a wise way
You know the world more than me
And I feel like I need to open a few more books before I say something stupid to you, king

I usually don’t like to be referred to as queen by a kingly man as yourself
It seems to suggest a certain arrogance or state of mind that I don’t know I possess
“Queen” fallen from lips as yours would be a compliment, yes
but still, I feel uncomfortable with such honor
perhaps I wish to sell myself short of the glory you emit

your light so bright
it shines around me
and a circle of warmth is added to my blessings
your voice always peaceful and calm among the already celebrated of my own glories

I am thinking of what else to say to such a stately one as you

How do I say enough words without saying too many?
Perhaps the answer is in a golden silence starting…now

Copyright © 2006 by Arin Lawrence