I wish we'd grown up on the same advice

Wish we'd played in the hallway together.

Teethed on impossibility,

That summered hue of self-control.

I know you don't need me right now

And this feeling will jump again

Like the filament between our backs

when we move in different directions; 

jump like skeins of light sparkling across the

skin of the Hudson. I want to feel

like I felt I did after the strong cups of Ethiopian coffee

I'd drink with my roommate on the balcony most mornings,

talking about the day to come. Love myself like I love

you - when I need you.

A flight long ago

I am an American airport loiterer,

Starbucks sipper, turning my head

Like a hen at intercom announcements,

Waiting for the names of things in my life,

Wishing absentmindedly for screaming children of my own

So I could get to the front of every line.

In my seat now I feel replete inside, an empty slide

of this good day gone. The conversations we could be having lay still,

our knees locked like barbies,

The seats lean back as if to baptize us

In this bruised plum sky.

On Scarcity

Scarcity mentality is seeing the glass half empty and then defending your position vehemently.

It’s when you only buy the cheapest things at the store, even if you know they’ll break soon and you’ll have to buy them again.

It’s becoming attached to people and outcomes because you can’t fathom a world where there’s more than what’s currently in front of you.

It’s characterized mostly by the inability to dream, to consider a life where you’re working with the people you’ve always dreamed of working with, doing amazing work that makes a difference, investing in deep, rich relationships with folks that matter to you.

It’s when you eat everything on your plate as a rule because you can’t stomach throwing things away.

It’s a feeling that you’re not enough, that your work isn’t good enough, that you’re not worthy of spending time with those people you admire and want to be more like.

Scarcity mentality is a melancholy, a sadness, even, that you slide yourself into, and one that takes weeks, months, sometimes years to climb your way out of.

It’s the short-cut that keeps on taking. Ravenously so.

Scarcity mentality is a fear.

A fear with which you keep yourself small.