Jonah

I don't remember you being this tall
I don't remember you knowing so much
I don't remember you understanding this world
Sometimes I wish you didn't

I remember you being this brave
I remember you making me laugh this much
I remember you being this full of love
Sometimes all I do is remember

Sometimes I can't believe you're real
Sometimes I don't know what I did so right
Sometimes I look at you
And all the words I've spent my life accumulating fail me

It was a night like this that I held you
And you and I were floating alone in a sea of stars
It was a night like this I made my promise
And you just slept


I don't remember you being this tall
I don't remember you running so far
But I remember my heart bursting one night
It's never stopped once since then

Kaia

Ninja Turtle with an air guitar
Incredible Hulk in a matchbox car
Singing Rude waving sword in the air
Grinning eyes behind a curtain of hair

Lion heart, impossible face
Monkey dinosaur flying into space
Bounce off ceilings, crash through walls
Throw yourself at life, human cannonball

Blazing love
Soaring voice
Don't ever stop

The End of the World

Tonight I drove to the end of the world

Where a dying sun gave way

To hell-ghost fog

And phantom trees stood in judgment on us

As the breath of dragons closed upon our town

And this ashtray apocalypse hangs silent in the sky

Layla

In stars and satellites it's written

Carved on desert rocks and sung

By hidden voices at breaking dawn

That I've known you forever

And I only just caught up

Layla Bear-Eyes, noon-day smile

Cloudstruck dreamer with arms upstretched

Twirling dancer on silky seas

Jump to me now and promise

You won't grow

Stay a while your hand in mine, Layla Bear-Eyes

Diamond heart in moon-kissed face

Your life my neverending song

If I Were Marvin Gaye

If I were Marvin Gaye

And you were Diana Ross

I'd take you in my arms

And kiss you in that sort of awkward, unpleasant way that people kiss sometimes, you know like where your teeth bang against each other?

We'd run along a street, hand in hand

Singing love songs to each other

And also possibly songs only marginally connected to the subject, like What's Going On, which although featuring a slight love-related theme, is more about a universal concept of fraternal love than the romantic and sexual feelings which I would wish to express to you, although it's an excellent song, really.

We would climb the highest mountain

A big, icy mountain

Where Lex Luthor lives

In a castle

I would use my magical Marvin Gaye-Ray to penetrate his lair

And you would stab him with your mystical Diana Ross machete

And we'd celebrate with an adequately cooked chicken.

If I were Marvin Gaye

And you were Diana Ross,

I'd spend all day serenading you with my smooth vocal stylings, and you would clap and laugh and drift away and occasionally ask whether that one was actually Otis Redding.

And I'd tell you to shut up and slap you because honestly I have a severe alcohol problem that I just won't get help for.

Which explains this whole poem.

Final Hugs

Grab the kids for final hugs

The little drugs

You found

In a bigger town

In a hygienic hotel

Last time you stayed

Was the last time you prayed

And the sound

Wasn't loud

But that time

Isn't this time

And that town wasn't this town

And the number you called

Rang out 

The moment you caught sight

In the middle of the night

Of the little drugs

But remember

The final hugs.