INTRODUCING... ... a man named Blake, called Carpenter, three weeks into his first long-haul OTR gig. [april 2014. new york, ny.] -- Nobody is noticing the way that grace is coursing through the floor to meet the corners of this university hallway. My life is simpler now. I do my best to care for the neglected parts, see their sturdy craft, study their humble arts. I hear the singing in the hinge of a heavy door. It’s a melody trying to straighten its notes on the way out. Didn’t know if I’d make it in time. Didn’t know if I’d make it at all. Didn’t know if you’d care, if I should dig up the quarters for a call. But it feels good, leaning up against this blank sheet of wall. It’s one-fourth of a frame within which a dream shared by great strangers took shape, found form, grew legs & wings. Made fables and gave good work to the storytellers like us, yeah. Find me downtown, where I am one among a hundred amateur historians - each expecting nothing less than twenty miracles in a space that time & sound made sacred. Well, the one that I hope for? I keep secret. (wish you were here even now, if you can believe it.) As I cross the corridor, head for the next display, I get this little prayer in my step and let it rise into my face. Offer it up for the other wanderers passing through this place, and it says: “Fill your lungs to the brim. Fill 'em all with the dust & the particles of this. Trust they’ll mix with your matter, that you’ll carry the tiny parts with you your whole life, and remind yourself of this when memory alone is not enough.” Pedaled seven miles or so out of town, headed for the farm. Spent every spoke-spin thinking of that afternoon I passed at the Clarence J. Brown Reservoir, and all the hours I could never get back, taken by that bright water. In days imprudent & sanguine, I gave you the coordinates stitched onto a bird’s wing, the hour in universal time (and made a joke about galaxies synchronizing watches)... how I swore back then I expected nothing! But there was no way to hide my misguided disappointment when you didn’t show, and I drove straight off the road. I kicked my head. I broke my heart. I lost my way, my mind, & my busted rental car in ol’ Ohio, ol’ Ohio, and I let the humid August air fill my eyes to the brim. Fill ‘em up to the waterline with shadows of a day grown dim. Over my hope, a setting sun. Over everything I’ve ever given up, that I’ll recover from my whole life. I’ll remind myself of this when the will to keep away ain’t strong enough. May I be strong enough! (even if i wish you were here. can you believe it? even still.) Well, I’ll bury the hatchet when I bury the last of her letters in Watkinsville. And what Susan said is true enough: “I was born in the Big Ugly, but I’m gonna die in love.”

INTRODUCING... ... me to this river in Georgia. [october 2014. athens, ga.] -- Sitting & sketching overlapping visions on the rocks, on the banks of the Oconee. In these spare hours, Dudley Park waits to welcome me. When found, I’m amazed to be wanting for nothing, finally. All those noisy distractions, the hurt & regret, are dismissed, relieved of their duty. I watch them fall into the water alongside all those autumn leaves, and I wave goodbye to that life as they drift out of sight, downstream. The only things aflame here are the river dressed in mirrored suns & the crowns of shelter trees now that I am burned through. Now that I am free. Pardoned from my past, i am made ash, scattering on the breeze. So scatter me on the breeze.

INTRODUCING... ... light to these shadows. [may 2015. brooklyn, ny.] -- [for disorders:] Protect the vessel. Steer the ship. Don’t subjugate yourself. Don’t settle for being a figurehead when in the cut of your cloth, there’s a captain. Protect the vessel. Get healthy. You can’t dedicate yourself to progress & positive change if you don’t have a body. [for traumas:] Count each color in groups of three until you see the rainbow around you. That’s all the proof you need that you are here, in this moment, right now. You’re okay. We’re okay. Take note of your breathing. Take it day by day. Feel your feet at rest upon the ground. Preserve yourself. Despite your every fault, your darkest parts are still washed out by your good, never doubt it. [for sins:] In this moment, even if just for now, let yourself be blameless. Accept the gift of it. Don’t feel ashamed. Don’t ever be afraid to ask for grace. Let this unfold. Exhale. [you had been holding your breath. what for?] Shake your head. Forgive your heart - it will forsake you, but what’s born of love will never break you. Don’t deny this when you find it, no, repeat it... In this moment, you are absolved & blameless, so let yourself let this go. When it all unfolds, sweetness follows. [for penance:] Remember to look up, and rest your back against mine. We’ll take turns with the sword & the shield as we need to. I am now and you are now and now is all there is or will ever be. Shake the compulsion toward compunction if you lie down to remind yourself of the constancy of ground. I’ll turn the lights on. We’ll travel swiftly & safely. Let us navigate the universe. There’s solace in recalling that there’s so much more to every moment than any one of us.

INTRODUCING... ... night to morning. [august 2015. seaside park, nj.] -- In the space between the dreaming & the waking, I felt myself at rest upon the grass or on my parents' roof, looking up at all the stars you can see when you're surrounded by so much nothing...