The Empty Orchard.

Poems

Covet.

You, angled in lamplight, bone and sinew

sketched in soft relief, almost not there.

I want what you are without meaning to;

a shoulder blade like a wingtip under skin,

spine curving like the keel of a ship

built strong to weather storms I’d never dare.

It’s hunger, yes, but more—

a kind of ache for something I’ll never keep,

never hold without it slipping, shifting,

fingers reaching for the line of a jaw,

the hollow between collarbones

where shadows gather and part

like a door left ajar,

letting light fall in slices,

just enough to see you

without ever touching what’s yours.

---

The Candle Count.

Each year it’s quieter, a little closer to dusk—

no balloons, no bright cards in the post.

Only the sound of a candle flickering out,

one for every year that’s passed

like a slow retreat, gentle as breath.

The skin tells stories, lines scored deep,

each one a memory folded and pressed.

It’s not the years I feel but the space they leave,

a room growing hollow, filled with soft light

and the echo of laughter from some other time.

And yet—there’s sweetness to it, a warmth,

like tea cooling just right in the mug,

or the last sip, the best sip, knowing it’s close.

Another year circling, winding around the sun—

more than a number, a gift, a glow.

---

The Empty Orchard.

It’s winter again. Cold sharpens the branches,

strips the trees bare—apple trees, twisted,

reaching for something that never arrives.

He is here, walking the rows,

each footfall pressing silence deeper.

He talks to no one,

or to himself—no voice answers.

The orchard shudders, a breath withheld,

and the ground is hard as stone beneath him.

He calls this power, as if the earth

bends to his will alone.

And maybe it does—each time he passes,

a shadow settles, birds scatter to the edge.

But still, when he’s gone, the trees stay rooted,

branches empty, bending under his weight,

waiting for a season that might never come.

---

The Rabbit’s Shadow.

In the quiet suburb, beneath the hum

of streetlights and the whir of cicadas,

a boy sees time folding in on itself,

a night peeling back like skin, raw and pulsing.

Donnie walks the dark edge, the black mirror,

where no one else dares look.

He wears the burden of those who see it all—

the loops, the frayed lines, the hollow-eyed mask

that stares him down in the dead hours.

Frank, with his sharp-toothed grin,

guides him deeper into the heart of things

we’re never meant to know.

Time, they say, is just a trick of light,

a path through the woods that twists and twists,

and yet here he is, caught in its maze,

looking for an ending he can’t remember,

his hands empty, his future unraveling

like a thread pulled loose in the dark.