It came to my attention
one day
so late.
Over Irish Coffee -
heavy cream, whiskey,
sugar cubes, and company.
The name I have,
The name I'll keep,  
may end with me.

These talks of kings and queens,
Lineage releasing despair
for a child to walk with a sword, to speak
spreading seas, birds and bees.
So it was written.
Our only deed.

Yet days wandered to years
as time disregarded love
and rambunctiousness wrestled and wronged
the avenues we could have called home.
Because why grow up as my stubble grows thick?

Memories remain,
callouses harden from the same, the same,
and I can't remember
a day, a November,
that I wasn't alone
wrapped in ecstasy of you.
Our permanence -
etched lines of physical signs -
only stenciled.
And bruises always fade. 

If ever the rust of perception
will clear,
the beating heart in this study
will bear
not just a name, or a poem on names,
but a reason to give in.

And the grin of a doting father
will replace the temporary harbors
dancing like pieces of a cookie cracked
whose fortune read exactly as dreamt.

And I sip and think of kings and queens.

There's a tree outside
whose bark's tough hide
has seen winter whither lesser trees,
summers parch lesser beings,
and the spoiled crabgrass scream,
but the tree has outlived these misgivings
to bear the brunt and toil,
see both beautiful and soiled,
and relay these lessons, these morals
to give its branches more
than Spring's shining store.

And here it stands
in the wide expanse
with its branching reaching far
to be just like the tree.
And if the tree could know
the effect of its hold, 
of the nutrients sowed,
its long embrace and let go
for the branches to thrive solo
shaking off the misery and cold
and exploding with beautiful leaves of its own.
Well, let's hope the tree has always known. 

And the branches' leaves will shed
from the burgundy to red
and whisper until the ground
that it learned a thing or two.
Age will cultivate
as rainfall alleviates
the circle of leaf, life, limb, and fate.
For the branches will grow
singing to and fro
to the tree whistling in the wind. 

There's a tree outside
whose bark's tough hide
mirror the roots that run so deep.
There's a tree outside
of heart and life
whose trunk will never cease to be.
And this tree outside - 
despite the shifts in time
and different street name signs -
will forever be ours to keep. 
And forever ours to see. 

The pillars upon this earth we’ve built
solidify and modify to hold our weighty ways.
And the tears we sweat,
drip by drip,
fuel the ocean’s sway.
And those songs we sing
blow the time in sync
cascading through our memories,
building these pillars
brick by brick.

The pillars grow larger, straighter
and those cracks still show,
but we’d never paint them over,
those badges of honor
remind the true tests we’ve known.

And soon we’ll be standing on top
labeling stars,
laughing at the little people
inconsequentials conquered thus far.
And I’ll always stand
weightless with my mind at ease
knowing you were the reason,
the base and the mortar,
that’ll leave my dying days
days in peace.

And you’ll always be there
standing right next to me.
You’ll be standing next to me,
You’ll be standing next to me.
You’ll be standing next to me...