A Sense of Propriety

The magic triangle in the bottom left corner,
Structurally sound as it stands,
It grants you entrance to an escape.
Intoxicated peace,
Cards, cups and pockets
Electricity without sockets.
Los Angeles is an ocean of soft fire
And I lightly pinch the spark
That dances on this one wire.
A single tingle ascends my arm
A little more startle,
A little less harm,
A little less charm,
That now dangles from your phone.
Smoke dances on the drapes
Names are thrown,
Some stick like tape.
Others slip like ice
And swirl back like the deepest eyes
Dressed up or buttoned down,
This is a joyous, boisterous sound.

The Components of Us

And this phrase overused
Fades into a spacious blue,
Sky-cracking harmonies
Outdated words fall harmlessly,
Bouncing off strings with a dinky little ring.
Oh God, I'm singing so loud with a smile on my face!
Filled with warm shaking, things I can't replace.
The direct object has been subjected to this:
It's time to close this chapter, kid.

Transition-Free

It's funny how things are always different once you get there,
Different in how you felt or,
Different in what you expected.
You ask yourself, "Who's protected?"
But some things must go
Unpreventable,
Unpredictable,
Unprecedented.
A sudden jump into sullen waters,
A wooden thought knocked
Before fading into fodder.
Good luck, you masochistic hopeless romantic,
It's time to do the maths and the sciences,
Don't panic!

Saigon Guido Cash

The smoke of cigars sets on your tux.
The sucks and blows in an elegant drag
Form the tag line for "class" and we are enough.
We are the trust in the bonds that we make
We are too much with wine glasses that break,
Raspy voices, hasty choices,
We're all out of tune,
And we won't be leaving too soon.
Swooned for like a sex fiend
Swaying, sipping like a sailor,
Savor this fraternal love,
A gentleman's true gentleman's club.

Twilight

A sign perched against the dawn-graced window:
Dead end, fall asleep...this is all pretend.
Bend the wire, press repeat with pistons on fire.
My body is weak from holding my own
You've stood stubborn ground
Meanwhile, I have grown.
Forgotten like shots, forgiven if not,
Kindly, no room for many other thoughts.

One Wish

There is always truth in accidents made.
Have a great night, I hope that you're safe.

Muses of Horror: This Temporary Life

The effort is always worth the binder,
The assurance that I'll always find her:

The silent workings of before
The colored mountains and the shore
The summer parties pooled in cars
The fires, blankets and the stars
The movie on the TV screen
The warmth under a shedding sheet
The freshness finally coming out
The sighs and smiles and eager shouts
The magnet of my every word
The Brand New night kept undisturbed
The running over, mine was better
The scent that's left on scarf and sweater
The proper noun for your escape
The stains I left despite a plate
The car that pushed for hands to hold
The alcohol and matching rose
The fallen petals mixed in with tears
The very depth of darkest fears
The bandage over heavy wounds
The living backwards before June
The catapult that brought it back
The righteousness and sneak attack
The settlement of déjà vu
The brittle riddle, me and you
The snowflakes falling in the dark
The truth enthralling, drawing, stark
The rope that's given hidden slack
The unknown guest who taunts me back
The reiteration, louder this time
The new moon whispers in my eyes
The burning yearn sufficed, now stable
The picture perfect on my table
The broken leg that tried to hide
The falling break on other side
The carpenters: two, the credit of one
The blinding in the brightest sun
The sudden tug of shoddy rug
The certainty of metal slugs
The cold that branches from the spot
The hypocrisy of lessons taught
The intentions more than actions made
The latest nights waiting for age
The displacement of pace and trust
The best that's just not good enough.

The purple side,
The catfish pie,
And all the hazards of love,
All that I fear to mention here,
And all of the above.

After Sleep, Before The Sun

I let my door shut with no guts to go lock it
With the best comfort found in the lint of my pockets,
A self-preserved warmth that is worn bitter sweet.
Come on, baby boy, just go back to sleep...

Subtle Unrest

The quake of what was misunderstood,
Aftershook in the nooks in which it settled
With the permanent carvings of sharp metal
On soft fragrant wood.
These clocks go round,
The story's retold.
And crashes with the dishes
And splashes ice cold.

Inhale quick and pause stiff,
Eyes wide ajar.
Names, dates and places turn into scar tissue.
They are issued unorderly on our porcelain story
In faint and dark cracks in its beauty and glory
That is not coming back.
They drowned in clay oceans;
Unevenly stacked.

I'm burnt on the beacon that guides our ship
While watching your name by a tiny blip.
Your Morse is coarse and of course you know.
You failed your own course to lecture in show.
Never a care to walk on your tips
And I'm carefully aware of our public quips.

So okay, to my dismay, with a quick moving on.
Excitement in your eyes,
Pride in your stride,
Unsettled by the meddling
In the back of your mind.
And rather, you are flattered
And your swagger, still strong.
There are cards I could play,
But I let you go on.

Instead,
I built a house
Called Home,
But felt,
In only me,
In my mind's nest,
Though lonely,
At very best.
I'm falling,
I'm falling!
But doing my best.

in (love)

We do not need a god to fear, because we will destroy ourselves in the end, and the biggest mistake that we will ever make is having fallen in love again.

Fitting Fire, Fitting Rain

Wherever you are, the world is still real.
Lips, hands, intentions are not set apart
And I can still feel a double-edged sword
Cut right through my heels.
Intentions are sharp and snap tensions in nerve,
I cannot run and you don't deserve
The peace, that you took as I fell on my knees.
Intentions invented with no blame on me.
I am not to blame,
Except for the fakest smile I've ever made.
You'd be crazy to think I'm alright,
And by woe,
You should know from a last summer's night.
Everything hurts,
And your epic redemption
Just made all things worse.
I can't find the rationale this time around.
Where are my angels?
Stuck on the ground,
Playing pretend,
While I'm watching great things come to an end.

Counting Crows In The Early Morning

One tear goes to an unaltered life,
But mix me three heavy ones this time.
This is the first time I've used this right.
I couldn't tell you what my mind has concocted
Screaming "M.A.D." with every gun cocked.
Keeping,
Keeping everything locked
But leaving everything sheltered and stocked.
Puddles aren't deep, but still you're surprised,
You're aware of the color in only your eyes.
Guilt and Pride,
What a concept to ever get right...
And I still don't know how I'll fall asleep tonight.

8:58

It was throwing my morals against the wall
I cannot resist the call of pride,
Of seeing how quickly you can hide
A monster.
Keep it inside,
Keep it in time,
Keep it or weep as you get pushed aside.
But frankly, it ain't me,
I'm no one thirty-five,
But a full pound in one night
In two seconds under nine.

The Center of the Universe

A low moon scraped against haunting trees
With dead finger tips grasping.
Our eyes were gasping for light
As we walked through the cemetery at night,
Searching for a ghost with no grave,
Wondering if ourselves could be saved.
But there is only sound as a result
Of self-afflicted blindness
And knees on the ground.
We are driving now,
Blurred light from the dash
And the ash-colored pavement
Press against my retinas.
The bent antenna puts static in the songs,
And I can still feel their bodies,
Limply hanging on.

New Face

Man triumphs in synthetic,
Prophetic in shallow eyes
Who want permanent disguises
So we don't know whose lie is whose.
And different faces
Are preceded by traces
Of medical marker and polished shoes.
You can borrow the sorrow I lend
When self-portraits past
Replace mirrored glass
And expressed emotion is only pretend,
Because you lost yours for a couple cents.
They are gods, but only in a human sense,
Molding plastic,
Holding souls,
Then letting go,
She's getting old.

Sleepless

Sometimes I think that I'm dreaming in reverse
And I'm trying to pull myself out of the dirt.
Asking the grass for the skin on my bones
Shaking the worms out to find a new home.
Hollow eyes wide open,
Hoping to find who tore my soul and body apart.
But a sudden itch behind my ear,
Reveals a memory I held so dearly,
Clearly one of the few intact.
In fact, it's you who had my heart.
Wrapped in gold foil,
A promise's encasing
And I suddenly lost my need for chasing.
With my bones all disjointed,
I slipped back in lawn sheets,
My heart left unstartled,
No longer mine to keep.
Its pace in my chest would surely make it melt
Like your sweetness, a chocolate
With richness unbound.
The sound safely harboring your rhythmed responses,
A radio frequency with only your song.
Because sometimes it seems like you're only listening
But I'm content, in the end
You are what I've been missing.

Rainy Day Hair

I'm breaking the rules a little bit
Because who knows if these pumps will ever quit
Crossing these fault lines,
Dumping their sop lines,
That you loved to hate
And I loved to create
This picture pitched by a pitcher of smiles
Keeping connections across thousands of miles,
Over mountains and streams
And both of our screens.
I hope you don't mind if we stay for a while,
Cozy while we doze off in our separate beds
With our separate hearts in our separate heads
Stringing together through fingers and thumbs
Patiently waiting for time to just come...

Relay: 1

Possibility is a collection
Of one-address stamps
And planting great trees
With only one branch.
Growing rings upon rings
Of ink blotches,
Hot chocolate,
And notes for three rings.
Playing courier-catch,
Consistently matched,
With what our minds hatch
And what our hearts sing.
Stability is eager with nothing to write
But with potential,
Credentials for hope in my eyes.
It's mixed in with sleep,
Beauty once it's in sight,
And hands full of prayers
For peace through the night.

A New Winter Coat

In quiet nights it whispers on,
Trying to find just where it belongs.
Tapping on windows,
Tangled in hair,
Or laughing, just happy
With floating in air.
Caressing the wind
With unique ice stitches.
It softly sits on my shoulder
Giving me kisses,
But making me colder.
Though once I've found a shelter in light,
It softly melts and says goodnight.
Your entire life becomes where you go
When you are fresh snow of a new winter coat.

Minutes Before It Matters

I've checked my sheets
For what I've done wrong
Retracing sleep paces,
One step by one.
There's no dirt in my step,
No blood on my hands,
So who dare puts
Broken glass in my sand?
A coloring book to the colorblind
Will always be in black and white.
I'm dreaming on dominoes,
Consecutive nights,
Trying to tuck these covers in tight.

Stepping Into Puddles

Your words could have been
The cup in my hands
Quick, without the chase
The worst kind of robber.
Disguised ever so well,
But with no demands to tell.
The wind has a voice
And you are its breath,
To go and to come
And become nothing less.

Imagining Everyday

Rinse, repeat,
My body is clean.
A smile of glee is slapped on my face,
Hard enough to wake up
And pick up the pace...
I pick up the vase,
A sea of crystals on the ground
I let out a lazy, mortal sound.
We're always running towards the horizon,
You bet, set to get whatever our eye's on.
Breaking through the tape
Your mind's video plays everyday,
A new ground is paved.
Your senses are saved for now.
You can open your eyes
When you've shown me how you've changed,
When thought is then bought and put into play.

The Direction of Perfection

It started with an idea,
Pushed by the inertia
Of a utopia lived vicariously.
A future for something greater than me,
But all-inclusive as well
Building a ladder to climb out of this hell.
The mind's glistening haze
Gets richer and fatter,
A fair trade.
A day ablaze in a lightning daze,
Routine as seen on future's face:
Infinite steps.
It's the journey that makes it
And takes me to rest.

Because Consciousness Is Not Permanent

A prefix overused
For twisting stubborn knobs
That twist back or not at all,
If never used
Or pursued in falling.
Calling out the colors
That painted my emotions
Red and green for stopping motions,
Painting pictures incomplete
Reminding of the obsolete.
Complete the circle one more time
The conscious choice was never mine,
Surface up when best dressed down
The sound of striking, venom strong.
And with my poisoned mental lungs
I'll say I miss it all.
I said I miss it all.

The Gravity, Regardless...

Will I grow gray
Spending my days
Knocking on their door,
Screaming things they know
Rain or snow
Rain or snow,
Coming fast towards a red light,
As blind as justice
As blind as this trust is
To break my own benediction
And work with what I've got,
As closeness gives us friction
And makes these waters hot?

Needing Symmetry To Leave

We're scaring the darkness out of the night,
Out with our light,
The fire in our hearts
When we burn this pure oxygen
So we won't get us lost again.
Hello, cutesy smile,
Salutations, sunshine!
You're looking alright...
Congratulations on life.

Stepping Backwards, Then Turning to Face the Night.

I've done this too many times before.
A setting sun's lashes put eyes to the floor.
Her gravity pulls me away
From a door I've once taken
That pushes to stay shut.
"Come back!" said the crests,
Crashing white with the fright
Of accepting the flight that I'll inevitably take.
My thumbs are the breakers
On which her tears can break,
As the waning waves comb her hair made of sand
After I reread chapters, a pen in my hand.

Linked!

There's fog on the rear window,
Only frosted light shines through.
This is our truth.
This is our youth buckling,
We are the sucklings of maturity
Squeezing the purity out of
The prick on a finger.
We sucked the poison
Right out of the stinger
And I thank God that
You woke up this morning.
So in this fit of emotion,
We make the good and bad commotion,
And the notion is that
We'll both land on our backs,
I look in your eyes and find an explosion.

Mother is going to take care of you...

My day doesn't exist without you,
According to you.
Child, I'm too old to play.
Your head spins
With the world you've made around it,
Like how you hurl yourself
Carelessly from the swings.
Oh, the thoughts that go on
When you don't hear a thing.
So I'm putting razorblades
At the bottom of the slide
To cut to the chase.
There are things I can't hide
That you can't seem to find.

Tentative Roof

Here we are again,
I, attentive, quiet,
Enjoying the riot of a sword fight between
Stainless steel and porcelain.
Your mouth sparkles with flint
As the pockets in your eyes
Get cluttered with lint.
Meanwhile, a cloud hisses
As it fills in the air,
Challenged by the charge
Of the static in your hair.
A beauty retained when we are alone,
But gone with a wick licking over the stove.

Trudy Without A Sense of Direction

You should be the last
To tell me how I should hold glass.
Are there just a pair of black gloves in the front seat?
I know you've been good at following directions,
But somehow, it's so hard
For you to read these signs.
You have the light,
But I don't want the stage.
Just remember who was turning the page
In the dark, with a flashlight
A something you held tight.
When it first hits your eyes
It gives a dull sting.
You follow,
I swallow,
Remembering things...

Right Eye Twitch

I fought them and lost.
I don't know who you think I am,
Because I'm no fucking superman.

When Creaky Doors Fade To Tacky Walls

After--far too--much deliberation,
Liberation?
Yes.
Some sort of willful resignation
(What a concept-shunned conception)
But I'll keep it brief,
As if you were worth more...
I hope you've found your attention
Whore!

The Most Meaningful Dullness

First you starve out the riches
Then try out the gifts,
Notice how they shift in their seats.
Show this to every single past me
With a smirk on your face,
Because every retraced line
Can always erase,
Like reading these palms upside down
And making the name an improper noun.

Agoraphobia

For all I'm concerned,
We are crowded by ghosts.
We host them and boast
Of the prettiest roses
That we march down the streets,
A fragrant infantry,
Armed with pedals and thorns
That drive in the foreign-born.
They party before parting,
Making trash while getting trashed.
And then it all passes
Before I have mine to say
That traffic and roadblocks are
Not making my day.
...Turn before it closes!
Thanks, Tournament of Roses...

A Decade So Rich That It Spoiled

As if he would ever change
As if he'd be in range
To pick up the signal
That signified his defiance.
Unaware of his share
Of flaunting noncompliance.
He never learned how to ask
For he always received,
A decade betrayed
From some jealousy seeds.

Roslyn In My Ears

Anticipated stream, a gleam from
The brightest I've ever seen a deep crystal blue
After washing away every single untruth.
A moonlight boomerang,
It's coming back again.
It's loving back again,
Losing the crisis
Of sitting quietly in a chair,
Seeing this sight
Breathing this light
Drinking this air, so thick
Of something that has always been here.
She is softly swaying back and forth
Humming the strum that makes me think,
This will work.

This Time Around

I feel the pressure beneath my lids
Street lights by a booth give
Soft lights,
Soft seats
Softer smile.
I have truly found something.
But I should be a lawyer,
Adult time at 5am
With a cold glass of water
And everything is okay.
Patterned sips
For every quip,
Cleaning up where I had slipped,
But some of me fell straight to hell
To justify what I do so well.

The Mines In My Backyard Are Mine

With the greenest grass on top
We can stop the most obvious appearances.
But are they low enough for clearance?
I fear that they'll fall to the floor
In fits of laughter,
Though I insist
That after all of this blows over
Like the wisps of hair
That I try to comb over,
They'll just be older kids.
They're all just that today
And no matter how hard they try,
We could never let them out to play.

Gently Rock the Cradle

Long stares take you one more up
The flight gives its light
When you can finally trust
Yourself.
But right now,
You're bounded to hell,
Given buckets of water
Of youth from a well...
But I never asked, if you couldn't tell.
Because I can tell for you
These lines, designed by you
Before you recycled,
Recentered,
Relocked,
Everything is rewound,
The winding sound stops.
Something here isn't mine,
But I take it all the same,
Filling holes with the goals
I haven't yet defined.

Precious Precocious

You're scaring yourself with
Hypothetical monsters.
They scheme in your closest
And dress you up with
Every fashionable frightening.
Your Sunday's best is your funeral
And you die with the weight
Of all that you wear.
It's hard to keep your hands
So tightly clasped together
When you've become this self-aware.

49 Minutes Later...

We made our greatest wishes
In our secret, silent ways
Some vague for some complacency
When faced with space to say,
I'm abused from excess truth
But I would do it anyway,
So we wait a little longer
Until the soft lights fade away.

I Would've Sent You Flowers

You have to be out here for something
Everyone is out here for someone
Let our red ribbons go undone
Let it slip so smoothly
So soothingly
Against your hair
Against your skin.
It feels cool and refreshing.
But it's still the same,
Faces stay fixed
Once fit in a frame. Guilty of what
You didn't want to be blamed for.
The jury's quietly hung because I'm sure
Your name is the magic
And holiday fear
Cheer
...It might as well.
Your translucent shell was made for lucid dreams,
But it's Christmas Eve
And still I wish we didn't leave.

Self-Surgery

Push it out
Pull it out,
It never does seem quite right.
The almost ghost is there
Floating in and out of light.
Falling backwards,
Reaching forwards
Teaching more words to myself
Because the bandages won't stick
To the moisture of my mouth.
I was grasping for things to sing about.
But my speech is not rich
To purchase a vowel,
So I wipe up my water
With stained paper towels.

With My Back to the Basics

Everyone has their own drama
And retraces lines
In near-perfect steps.
Check under the table,
Gum and something won again,
So I just avoid the question.
Nothing is broken,
Just needing correction
But with running water
Running hot in my head,
I think I've been led
To damning connections.
You're dropping rocks in my river
Of the always-forgiver,
And these eyes are turning jaundice
From the strain on my mind's liver.

Route End 66

A quaint little frame to claim
Stretching its arms out into the sea
Being nudged by the waves perpetually.
Eventually, your eyes adjust
To the sighing sea water
And accented rust.
This memory is robust:
The loudest colors
The brightest sounds
The darkest depths
The highest clouds.
We make mischievous laughter,
Foreboding joyous corruption
A sole light exploding in slow motion.

The Middle

There are graces in the spaces
Where quiet is kept.
The pace that we left has changed,
The laces are pretty again
Because it all ties together in the end.
Unspoken amends lend a helping hand
When confronting this line
On the same side we stand
The safe side we ran
With coinciding breaths,
A sigh of relief
That now greets me with rest.

Stain

Leave your courtesy on my cheek
All of your problems seem meek for once
A sheep for once,
Guided by the sight over your walls
When you feel safe for once
And at once let them fall.
Sip on city light seas
Find a separate ease
As clocks float away in a light breeze.
And we can finally breathe
With the softly fading ticks.
There's a powerful hit
And there's glass on our lips.
Theses are highs rediscovered,
Moments for which
I would not trade another.
Said like anything short of lovers,
"Put your arm around me, motherfucker!"

Broken Loops Unspoken Through

My innocence was put in
Associate deposits.
But it would've been better kept
Somewhere under my mattress.
And even though I left with nothing
I came back with more than I had.
Do you still wander
Even when echoes don't call
Let alone respond?
There was always something off
That I could never get to
So please, just let me know
When I should come and get you.

You (pl.)...Those Other Others

Sitting sound with serpents,
Let's talk about those things
That hiss
Something I was never a part of
Apart from this.
I don't know us
I don't know this
Singing and swinging
Into arms,
Up in arms
Not quite the defensive,
Just trying to stay
Away from the fence.
There's a lot of dust
That comes with
Coming to the ground
Nothing's coming up
So now I'm sitting down.

Bitterness (and Commercials)

I've been awoken from a coma
A prison of the brilliant prism
That is my mind,
Serving twenty-five years
Of what seemed like a life,
But was only an eighth.
This is some sort of
Fantasy of choice,
But fake-smile voices
Advertise songs
I know better than they do.
Claiming them to a life
They don't even pertain to.
Robbing uniqueness,
33,000 feet in the sky,
But we never dream of the cost.
Hours gained and then lost,
Then gained and lost.
Sometimes you just have to trust
Because there's nothing else under you
But air.
And somehow you're not falling
Even if no one is there.

Worn-Out SoCal Slip-Ons

I remember running into the sea
With the other half of me.
Someone has been watching me,
Caring for the wounds they inflict
When everything gets violent.
When trauma from the dramatic event,
Pragmatic intentions so I won’t remember
Drinking coffee from a mug
(Or tea from a thermos),
That meeting in Montauk
Because I just
Don’t want to drive anyone anymore.
Gasping for air,
Grasping for hair,
I got it but I don’t get it
In perspective to a former self.
I guess I understand what you meant,
Because I think about it every moment.

Fade Out

I went for warmth and froze in burns.
Cigarette holes in my memory
As the cancer is sucked right from the source.
Walls of wax can't stand in the heat of real life,
The series of bad decisions
And inopportune timing
With bullet precision.
This life doesn't run on morality.
Deserving is subservient to the human capacity.
It has no tenacity in the oiled rigging
Of chance,
Fate,
The greatest lie
Is that everything would be alright.
Hold that against every reason why
Everything once dying is dead.
Dead weight on my encasing,
The pressure in my head.
Hold that against wishing the best,
A silent panic,
Insufficient breaths.
This path is paved with leech,
Here is the momentous breach.
For my own lessons, I surely teach:
Stability is lost, too far out of reach.

Airplane Friends pt. 2

And what we are left with
Are songs that made themselves,
As the notes that feel like ghosts
When I pick them from the shelves.

Before Infinite, Indefinite Paths

In a shortness of breath,
I let this one out
In the wispiest whispers
So they might float about.
Ever so calmly,
Through the stars we are hurled.
But cheek muscles tug,
And these fingers uncurl...

Airplane Friends

Laughter travels down the gateway,
I couldn't find a safer way home.
But there's a shaky ascension
With the intentions I've flown.
Watch the wishes you whisper to the sky
To which they lose speed and feed themselves,
Idling high.
They congest into traffic,
And the static in the radio box.
And your best thought up inventions
Become your worst intentions crossed.
Too many terminals will terminate them all.
So put your knees on the tarmac
And light them home with your heart
You'd be skittish not to finish
What you wanted from the start.
It is my most worshiped sin
To which I could never give in,
Leaping out in vain
Just to make the quickest friends.
Because planes were not made to reach for the stars,
So we build silk friends from the liars that we are.

Slipping out the Back

God sprinkled triggers all over this world
The sweetness he feeds us
And makes us unfurl.
Here in this basement
Are spotlights and twirls
Living a dream for most boys and girls.
It was surely a suave and selfish display
Of the thing that will do me in one of these days.

A later me found irony in a storage room
Bundling up for the blustery cold.
Concrete,
Discreet,
So that know one would know,
Bearing that jacket like a brand
Standing out because I know I can't stand
Hands turning over,
Over and over.

We will never get too old for this
Adding more verbs to a list in pen:
To hint,
To bend,
To make pretend
It's much mightier than the sword
When it can't cut permanent, precessing words,
Redressing words, it still means the same thing.
It sings the same ring,
The incessant, incandescent and ominous swing.

This night will end and I'll close my eyes
With a gift still wrapped while the other let me lie,
It let me slip out the back into the cold, dying night
Making everything older without tasting of wine.
I'm out of lines,
Out of time,
Out of sight
Out of mind.
It's the same end,
With a pen that just
Writes,
Writes,
Writes...

Fruits and Fermentation

Cease-fire,
Cease-fire!
The neurons are quiet
But the riot rages on.
The sky is pages long
Of watercolors drowning a vast sea,
All eyes are on me
And I can still breathe,
This is ignorance and bliss,
This is temporary free.

A Compass in the Fog

Little beads knock at the window,
They're all just trying to hold on.
They slip and stain
Into the tiniest veins
That run down the glass,
This heartbeat is strong.
So long,
They run down the cracks on the walls
Spilling every secret,
Dropping every call.

Rain mixes with phrases
And together they fall
And together is fate,
When they turn to the weight
On the shoulders of your coat.
Crooked lampposts
Leave ghosts burned into my eyes
From every day replayed,
Just shifted to the side.

Father, I have sinned.
My tongue speaks of lies to mute cries from within.
There's a devil inside that my mind has born
That singes mind's bridges
But nonetheless, keeps me warm.
I just want to stay warm,
I just want to stay warm.

I'm waiting for waiting with a purpose intact.
I'm trading umbrellas for places on maps.
If I wanted my peace,
I would've cut and dug in.
But I just want to stay warm,
Despite this storm setting in.

I Dream of FCC

It's four in the morning and I'm heading home,
Bobbing my head to the melodic drone...
I peel back the ceiling: banana split skies,
Fissioned by the the vision
Of natures valiant try.
I retraced the dreams
Left in turbines and steam
As planes slowly drifted and wandered towards home.
People fall out, leaving bodies still intact
Runways strung with light, so their lightness is led back.
But regardless, those harnessed in those seats
Are different by the landing's screech.
Some have eyes that forget how to meet,
While others are blurs in the passenger seat.

Shape-Shifter State-Drifter

You're changing the gears and hum to their grind,
You're asleep at the wheel and can't stay in the lines.
Crash your car in a ditch because you had the time
Put a stitch in your heart when there's no room in mine.
Turn around, here's your silent-sound siren
There is no use getting loud
When you're high off the ground,
Lost somewhere in effervescent clouds
Of what you thought made you proud.
They just hiss and I miss
What innocence I let you keep.
It leaks and speaks of something wrong,
You're hurdling on and your traction is gone
And you're driving with your blinders
And you won't ever find us now.
You are the fire that fuels your own hell
You are a ghost that haunts this cold shell.

Comfort In Displacement

Short-lived dreams fall from northeastern skies,
Perfect in crystal state,
But the disintegrate before their secrets can be told.
Our hearts are too warm to ever beat through that cold,
Standing on the porch like it was a decade ago,
Ice on the steps,
Lawn covered in snow.
I'm blanketed in a fresh white sheet
And tucked into discrete corners of maps.
I'd nap with eyes wide open,
I've once dreamed of this day.
Speechless in the creases
With the pieces to play every breath with a reason
Every heartbeat in treason
When the lights burn on an empty stage
And I wait for the hand that will turn a new page.

Splice and Loop

Clever lines wind up in someone else's mouth
And I admire them greatly.
A higher state innately,
But that's just reading between the lines.
Like the one that snagged and pulled me back
Like the one that snagged and pulled me back
Like the one that snagged and pulled me back
To my bed every night.
My frame of mind is just a still
Of a work print wound of bed hair and lint
And borrowed stories for the night,
Just so it doesn't get too quiet.
And this perfection was painted in cinematic display,
But the sun got bored and instead called it a day.

A Flower In Waiting

Blossom, you do sit so quietly
I've been a riot ever since you bowed out politely.
Your lightness is quite like this dizzy feeling
As my head floats up and hits the ceiling
And Stucco falls down like snow.
If any made a sound, I well would have known,
But you were neatly tucked in a sheet of time.
You are fermented grapes that I've left to wait
In hopes of returning the sweetest of wines.

Cooled Air and Shattered Glass

I'm breathing azure crystal shards
Scarring knotted vessels broken
For the proudest colored heart,
I'm dreaming now with eyes wide open.

For Jenna, A Moment Ago

I'm defined by a line that dances with ease,
The rolls like the waves the lap at my knees
And I'm brave when this knave
Makes the greatest of leaps.
The laughs in the trees are carried in the wind,
Stiff birds in the sky seem to fly paper thin,
Carrying me to my dreams,
Burying the fairytale in the clouds and the steam.
There's a gleam to the engines
With their sugary pistons,
Though needing depleting warm water and kisses.
The hottest core was once a heart,
The blueprint was stolen
And the bones, picked apart.
Even skeletons are treasures
Not measured by greed,
But by maker,
The baker of everything sweet.

To Rebuild An Empire

A frontier doubled back
Due to the attraction of a frantic heart,
Panting from the banter that sets him apart.
Every source is tapped out
On every course he mapped out
So he looks three feet about the ground,
He looks to greet the calcium light,
The crescendo of hello's and arms squeezed tight.
The foundation is vast and every corner is hugged.
Show me a different kind of sun,
Remind me of a safer love.

Touching the Ground in Newark

This state is in a state of identity crisis.
I'm dreaming of death,
A kiss from the wife of Osiris.
She is the familiar light at 6 a.m. in Jersey
When everyone's still in a hurry to leave.

Just talk it over with yourself
Over some terminal food
Dying from preservatives,
Preserving what was,
What won't
What would be
Traveling alone in this part of the fields
I feel the sun has had enough.
Enough with the light,
Its petals will wither
Its roots will run dry
Much quicker than I meant it to be.

Leave it all there as carved notes in a tree.
Let it take in the meaning
And fall out with the leaves.
Now that all has been cleared,
I can see New York from here...
This is the closest to Montauk that I'll ever be.

Mix Tapes Mixed Me Up

The deed is done
And along goes the quiet one.
In this world,
The unsettled must rest.
In this girl,
Swallowed in her heart
Was the best of me.
The rest of me was left to pass
These steps were paced and retraced
I'm taking it all back.

The memory is what I keep
The memory, I won't let leave
The memory is everything
I thought it used to be.
We never learned to need.
We never learned to speak.
You were right,
It was all a dream,
But I've got my witnesses.

Now I can't know what your business is
Dressed in suits of spider web spun,
The green-lit fog is moribund,
I am the Gatsby and you are the sun.

Damn Parallels

You learn to cherish the short bursts of light...
They lay down softly on your skin
In the thinnest coat of innocence.
My ambivalence is my guilt,
Quilted to keep me warm with maturity.
Past the point of being absurd,
Past the point of keeping your word,
I've learned everything this way.
It's the normalcy you love to hate
Where the brightest colors fade away.

Only Familiar

This is embrace is something
I can't wrap my mind around,
The distance seems bigger
After being far away,
After nothing much to say
The charge is stretched and dissipates,
Things don't hold and float away.
This is the static of progression,
An interference called regression.
We're all just visiting,
We're all growing up,
Shooting for the moon
Happening too soon.

Simpler Times

Contentment bent in every direction
I inspect the color of this light.
It's arc is short and rather contrite
But trying to stay true to its colors.
I look to my brother...
With a tiny face that holds so much light
I hope earns a burnless flight,
And my blood, keeps churning through the night.
In this repeat of festive lights,
We have to learn how to turn out alright.

Golden City Synthetic

How I love the unpolished shine,
The burnt out promises
Have always had my name on them.
It takes five hundred days to understand
Then five hundred more before you can stand it.
Flexing at the thought,
I braced for what I brought on myself.
These shelves could only hold so much
And I was held up by the rush
Of whatever was under my feet,
Digging itself out of the ground.
It was a consolation prize,
And an incessant ringing sound.
Bells of warning,
Bells of warming my chest
With the rest of best wishes
Adorned on silver dishes.
It was out on the table,
And cleared.
It made room for the absent,
Or otherwise weird.
Inevitable,
Inedible,
I forced it down.
Into circles,
Circles,
Dizzy-drowned
In the sweetest sugar mixed with lead.
From a dream in which I was already dead,
I finally woke up today...
Those dreams were great,
But far away.

Mercury Down The Aisle

A flash and I'm a part of a stranger's memories.
A smudge whose light diffuses
By the thin protective film.
But it would never protect you from the heart's kiln.
I'm buckling down for known losses,
Soon to be lost in translational.
The destination is home,
But it was gone before I could leave.

G

The floor is the only thing left to hold you up.
So you slam back to earth, but it won't slow down.
Hot tears fall to your ears
To drown out the awful grinding sound
When things just aren't working out
And I don't have the tools to fix this.
But we're given pain that comes in pills
And God slips the bill under our doors
Because we're always waiting.
And we're always saving ourselves for the insatiable.
There is no benefit to the doubts that I have
So I lay it on the table to be judged.
This is the hope that we've all learned to love.

Life Is Your Favorite Movie

Everything is a science here,
The truth in the silence
The guidance of fear,
It wrung out my pillow after long restless nights
And cooled off my head to dampen the light.
Source-4 days, we'll toast
For what I'm thankful the most
It won't be the mirrors,
It won't be the ghosts.
I just balance those acts, using both of my hands,
And pay love respect with a sarcastic grand.

Willful Corruption

We connected our paths over laughs and wax paper,
I traded my freedom because I liked the sheets.
The seats in the foyer are warm and safe.
It is never letting the colored light escape,
It is two clasping hands,
It is brotherly grace...

Depths

The world spins so madly,
I feel that I am already dead.
There's a lightness in my head
And everything that was said
Is muffled with a ring,
A stinging high pitch
That will be thrown in the ditch
With all my dirty dishes,
Put them into the ground.
This body is an anchor,
It drags the soul,
Down.

Pulling the Envelope

A child's instrument plays
And we make paper cranes
Before God decides he has lied
And crumbles our paper names.
The sender never sends,
And taps a foot for a message home,
The other: sender-returned,
So that this body sleeps alone.

Names

We sing our drinks
We sing our past
Grasped in binding,
Blinding
Ethereal light,
And the echoed wood and clocks
Make the city safe at night.
Troubled youth choose
To shed their own kind of light
That resonates in the hearts
Of lovers of the same,
Lovers that need someone to tame
Every field of our flowers
With a place and a name
And a purpose:
It nurses our souls for a day.
I have a daisy,
And its petals float away...

Restoration

It is a default face
For a default place, a pocket in time,
Tucked in my jacket
Hugged between lines.
This one has many breaks and turns,
But its meaning is direct
And its the effect of intentions
That invent a detectable glow
Giving light for its trace.
The L.E.D. palindrome has for now lost its place,
I'm already coming home
And the greatest things haven't changed.

Envy, Lust, Intentions and Trust

Behind closed eyes,
They're comfortable just out of sight
Where the right-of-way is far from right.
Lines are judged by the distance stepped,
The distance closed,
The closure met.
They bet their warmth
Not high,
Nor low,
They know no logic in the flow.
Unreasonable,
Undaunted,
Rush.
The lushness of a fatal crush.
Behind closed eyes,
The muchness clutches, cold as ice.
Behind closed eyes,
The darker things are realized.

Undiscovered Heights, Rediscovered Lights

Beautiful sin.
Chaparral,
City,
Brushing against your skin.
Everything breathes,
Car engines and leaves
Branches and streets are the arteries of an entangled life.
Polygamous glamor,
The ocean and skies and earth are one here.
Brown and blue, I hold you dear
As I sweep the dust from sweet dreams that are rusting.
I'm trusting that lushness in lost youth may soon run,
Those legs haven't stretched since I've last seen the sun.

Reconsidered

Frankness makes the canvas bare,
With trace hints of an off-shade blue.
A palette of justice with a balanced renewed.
Stay true to yourself,
If you knew what these shelves had to hold.
Paints for a straight path to hell made of gold,
Or a bed with a cross when you're withered and old.
I was told this kind of war is not fought,
It is not won with weapons
It's not one to be bought.
You stand at the barracks
Holding echoing hounds
As sickness takes foe,
And they fall to the ground.

Revisited

The same lights
Mean something different every time
And you've finally found the chords
To tie it all together.
Turn to the right
One to blame for the weather.
You get out of the car because it smells like rain
And you need to know what it feels like again.

In the Company of Thieves

I'm overstepping into holes
Trying to find a hand to hold.
I'm directing traffic,
It's getting old.
The whispering trees.
The moon is gold.
But then rustling leaves explode
In a burst of words
I should've known.
You fire empty shells, but I don't respond.
It's dead,
But still you fire on.
You point this gun in every direction
And your selfishness is my resignation.

Ironic Bombs

A little slip of paper light
Will slip under your sheets tonight
When you've tucked the beast in,
Nice and tight,
And absolved your skin in treacherous night.
I could've had it any other way
It could've happened any day.
But now it can
And now it will.
A missile in the loading bay,
Big Mike for the kids today.

Important Points

The soldier lines up by the trenches, nothing in his eyes.
His secrets are unkept, so that it's quiet when he dies.
And when this broken body finds its way into the ground,
I know I won't regret that I had turned my car around.
I know I won't forget how she had put my body down.

Punching Bags and Ticking Bombs With A Pressure-Sensitive Detonation Override: Life Is A Pretty Thing, Ain't It?

Selfish
Translucent
Transducer,
Elusive abuser of long-lost advantage.
How can you manage to go on?
The winds are howling,
On and on,
And sing to you a warning song.
The storm is returning your call,
The storm is coming in strong.
Because these chains have been undone
And I begin to run...
I'm waking,
Eyes towards a setting sun.

2,492

It was a citywide search for the insane
The streets are untamed
And we are the same.
Striving with a drive for the intangible
Grabbing for points that we make.
We are here to stay!
There is every way to get this right
Even when we get it wrong,
We've always got some off-key song to sing
That brings us back to why we are here.
It isn't of blood, but we do get near
And it's been clear
How much we are willing to give up
For no kitchen works,
For working so long,
For twenty-three strong
Yeah, that's what's up!

Touching Base

Weaves,
Weaves,
Through the stripped down trees
That grasp for the expansiveness
Of freedom.
My sanity has been redeemed,
By familiar things
Mixed with new stings
That poison us together.
I'd never say never to the antidote,
But could never find the anecdote
To rival new remnants
That replicate what I'm shown,
When local is getting closer,
But the ghosts are staying home.

The Softest Bells

This scene seems all too familiar.
A series of indirect paths,
Magnetized and hypnotizing,
While realizing these eyes
Are only looking back.
The slightest glance stolen
Steals my heart for a moment.
Bring me back,
Bring me back.
I am seasoned with the words he has spoken,
Folding the maps of bridges broken down.
I built them,
Hoping that something wouldn't drown.
I'll be the anchor,
Put me in the ground.
I'll hold your dreams
And put creases in my hands
Because this is what life demands
From a man who has felt this once,
The birth,
The journey,
Of falling in love.

To Baker And Back

I brought it on myself,
Letting the sober dust
Accumulate on my shelves.
My lifeboat was sunk
And I went down...
Down the stairs
To feel the ground on bare feet.
Everyone is waiting outside to meet me
And I pray these feet would bring me back
Quick, like a lick of lightning,
I dash out the door,
Nothing fearing, nothing frightening.
Just one step at a time,
Hoping authorities' paths won't cross with mine.
I know we crossed the line,
I know I didn't want the time
To say hello to the person
Waiting behind those doors.
This is what you see and a little bit more
Feeling a rush that bites down to the core,
An adrenaline rush that gives me the heat
To run through the cold in my first naked streak.

Deadlines

I'd put the clock on a tourniquet,
But it would tick all the same.
I'm not the one to blame for this.
I'm all worn out,
Out-blamed and pissed.
Spoiled milk spills on the page.
It will never taste better
Just bitter with rage,
Tired rage.
Helpless swings at a ghost
You're out of line, soldier.
Get back to your post.
I'd want to believe
That the days get brighter
But the light comes in sleep
And the nights meet you too early
So your breath of relief
Comes out with the sun,
And they day's just begun
Just when you're giving up.

Coming Home

I hear your voice
A sentence complete,
Now meet me at the lion's gate.
The skies will roar,
But your shrill happiness
Will keep me safe on the ground.
Now it's the sound of your blood,
My blood,
Genesis with her arms open wide,
Embracing to suture
Rips in time when she cried.
An angel's howl,
Like the darkest delight,
Packaged so neatly in a puddle of light
Spilled onto wood grain and night.
She sings judgment comes early
But I'm glad that it's so,
Light spills on old chapters
Where the ink comes to flow...

Peace of Mind Is Peace In Mind

When your friends start dying,
Hold the others in your heart...
We're too young for this to start.
Keep your feet on the ground.
Though your soul might be helium
I swear that this feeling of
Lightness
Is the tunnel that carries
That awful silent sound.
We know you're meant for it,
But not quite yet.
These hospital sheets are your safest bet,
As we bet fate with our hands clasped together,
Holding our hopes like butterflies.
Our whispers are kisses that fall on your head,
Hoping to give it rest.
You are a balloon that is tied to this state
But gently you're pulling yourself to the stars...
Oh please, not just yet,
Don't make this the start
Of when atoms stop tugging,
And just simply fall apart.

Having Pretty Friends

I'm listening to jazz while God
Washes his paint brushes in the sky
And the sun slides down like yolk.
These moments are scrambled, relived in a flash:
Stumbling through the darkness
Over concrete and grass,
Finding the light just to put it away.
Because we've found our words
Pinned to the wall with nothing to say,
Playing Marco Polo with our lips.
I know those who would kill for this,
So I hold your hand,
But look away.

Selfish Clouds Scrape Their Bellies On Hollow Metal Triumph

Stop with these stabs
These sloppy, drunken jabs.
You can't always have you want,
So shut up and act like you're really moving on.

Bob Dylan Was A Drunk Girl

Mismatched furniture

Art-draped walls,

Hollow-tuned like corded guitars

With no chords at all.

It's alright though,

Keep the brother quiet.

All I want is the low-fi riot

Of a beautiful, alternate life

Where all the blurry pieces

Just seem to fit right.

So I can sleep at night

Unpuzzled

Nuzzled between

What's real and what seems.

Where the cutting room floor

Holds the unexposed things.

Tagging Back Soon (Freedom)

Here I am,
Pushing the limits
With envelops and gimmicks.
Flattop-cropped with the guillotine,
Checking my teeth in the widower's gleam.
You left me here and your clock's lean
Has thrown the pace off.
And in your selfishly-paced walk,
You forget locks left behind.
Grow up, kid.
You already have
And surely I am glad.
And I've kept these teeth,
Prosthetic and clean,
But you just seem not to get it.
Yet I've spoken too much
And the blade catches my tongue.
Flaming pink, it falls to the ground.
Back down,
Boy,
You must back down...

Thankful for Strangers

A held breath is relieved
And the pressure released.
This air escapes lungs,
So heavy and free.
Remembering the first part,
Wearing a threaded heart,
I prided the worn out edges,
The holes and the stains
That would set me apart
After you picked me apart.

But fluorescent lights have always lit my face,
And this improper heart
Has found its improper place
Propped up in a vacant hole in my chest,
Etched out from the hollow crystals
That always seemed to get the best of us.

And the best of me is what you'll get.
And we'll see where we place careful steps.
A dance we know we never had,
A chance to find out where we are.
The farthest distance in my head
To meet when we get in my car
And reach for the stars,
Traffic lights in our eyes,
Driving down these boulevards.
Familiar streets and your familiar sweet scent,
Fermenting the dreams that I'd forever invent.

Speed Writing .149

Raindrops falling in the dead of night
Reconcile,
Reconcile,
Thunderous heartbeat, ominous might
No end in sight,
No end in sight.
They're falling for you.

Steel-bent anger, tumbling fright
Of endless time,
Of endless time,
City street beacons giving their light
Into my eyes,
Into my eyes.
I see the real you.

Clouds burst to crystals in the sky.
The truth comes,
The truth comes in your eyes.
Wash away my sins,
Give me your breath
Let me within
The calm,
The calm,
The calm,
The calm...

Where Our Chistmas Lights Hang

It was textbook.
It was the best book I had ever written.
The truth came back,
Not so driven.
My hope grows in carbon
And my vices, they burn.
I have made my mistakes,
Yes, I've made my mistakes.
And as I age,
I've learned nothing,
And my body still aches.

Serpent Dreams

As I ascend this tower,
I hold up these walls in some religious pose,
Embracing lost faces in posthumous ghosts.
Moon's reign
New stains devil red,
Taking frankness to head,
And like molasses to heart.
It lingers in each beat,
Stuck there sugar sweet.
I'm the alchemist
Comparing copper to tin,
Reflections,
Reflections,
Glazed sugary thin.
The write-ups are messy
And dressed just enough,
Like the storyboard's finish
When you've woken me up.

Contrast

Robbing a heart for the sake of pursuit,
It's something worth getting used to.
It's something like getting used too,
Maximized efficiency,
Sooted signals from the chimney
When all you'd do is blow smoke,
Bad attitude from the cigarettes
That you wished you smoked.
I choked on the moments
I'd always try to take in,
And spin at your thought
To make you my world again.
I've got all the words,
But I'm holding the letters.
Green, yellow, red,
Where's your scent on my sweater?

The Real Go-Getter

Fair game is played under this roof,
I'm bringing the prey,
I'm making the rules.
Such games as these
Are merely played on myself
And the shelves are all crooked
From your foundation shook.
Resigned to a rook
Designed for the look,
We burned your forests
We poisoned your wells,
Neat and legible,
Logged in a book.
I looked on,
Away from the formidable weather
And prayed for my prey,
Left for real go-getters.

There Are No Earthquakes In Cambridge

My great burdens rest on the crests of my eyes.
They dangle from nylon,
On needles they're tied.
Always getting, never by,
But nonetheless, I'm getting by,
I'm motionless on my worst sides.
Sleep is a matter of sealing a suture.
We get lost in the dream
With dreams lost in the future.
And direction and karma will push me around,
But I've found my importance,
I've found stable ground.

The Stagger

There is always a hand
To save yours from the cold,
Where the waiving of matters
Has for once found it's node;
Where I pilot this quiet
And two skies explode
Warming with fleece
In a starlight abode.
Drunk on your presence
I lie on my back...
An evening achieved,
A couple steps back.

Your Little Green Light

I sat on the deck
Writing Peter his check:
Two lines and signed
This life was once mine,
I'd been given my time
Now I'd pay my respects.
But in short breaths of stream
A dream signaled through
That brought steps off the railing
And brought me back to you.
Two lines I had signed
Had signaled an end
But gave radio's whisper
Words as soft as the dead
The white noise of choice
Held your voice in your heart
And shook with vibrations
That set me apart.
Hearts half-handed,
Melted ice in your eyes,
Your Northern Star glistens,
Montauk still has its light.

Lemon Eyes

A tagline left to slip away,
This gesture measures disarray.
It meant to be so much more,
I meant to be so much more
Than lions' pride without the pack,
The strongest posture with no back,
A lack of time to wish I'd called
As frantic clocks spin off the walls.
I found this tagline over my bed
Crossed over my heart,
I'm over my head.
My bed is lost in sleepless hours,
And everything has all gone sour.

Advantage

Machines never die
But are simply rewired,
And your colors are changing
Bringing death to the choir.
Sing me to sleep with no words at all.
Serrated at angles,
It echoes,
It calls
And comes quicker.
My issue is scar tissue
That just keeps getting thicker,
And I am relieved.
You've given me something
That I can believe.
Whether ghosts at the door
Or your key on the floor,
I'm kicking you out,
It's time that you leave.

Full Night

Pushing the clock,
No, pulling it back
It's moving fast,
But we're moving faster.
These plans are made of alabaster,
And the plaster chips from seconds' drips
Onto my coat, weighing me down.
All the while, the shepherd herds sheep
That he weaves through the town,
Making fleece of the buses and the underground.

White, three sides, and radish leaf
Make soothing balms that bring relief.
Take off your jacket,
Pick up a drink,
Give yourself some time to think.
And link the arms of lives entwined
Take a picture, pause in time.

Semi-formal
Semi-firsts,
Semi-good
But semi-worse,
Semi-let-me-quench-your-thirst
With laughter and the flashbulb bursts.

Reverence to Genesis

Hello everyone,
Hello to myself
Since I follow this more
Than anyone else...

This garden is a temple,
Its harvest is a prayer
That leaves my lips and drips
Down the slits and nooks of time.
This prayer is hope,
This prayer is mine.
Growing and dying
By seasons' decree,
I'm digging down deeper
And spilling out seeds.

They grow into thoughts
That sit on my shelves,
They occasionally clutter
And bring me up hell...
I do it for the glory
I do it for the pain
I do it for the stains
I can never wash out;
Nicks on my pride,
Pricks in my side,
Heart on my sleeve,
I'd never believe how much I have changed.

I've wandered these Fields for exactly a year;
This heart is still beating
These lungs are still breathing
My love is still dear
And I'm glad that I'm here.

Peace-It

The morning comes to say goodnight,
Delirious and out of sight,
A title for my state of mind.
Every week incessant repeat,
A gathered battery,
Beat to the beat
Until we beat before defeat
Before I sleep...

Encore, we eat at 3 o'clock,
A.M. pizza,
Cardboard box.
Papers strewn and turned to sea
Of things we wish would be complete
I'd be complete with this week's end
But a problem set stands to contend.
Paper thin, but set to win.

Begin, back where this all began:
Sun comes up with shining plans,
But I'm not ready,
Oh no, not yet,
I've got my name down on this bed
And I'm entitled to this rest...

Able Is Cain

Some things we bring are packaged vain
Like how we work with labor plain.
A beauty mark is still a stain
As roses' thorn pricks still bring pain,
As freely running, ankles sprain,
As you are to me, able is Cain.

Cobblestone Reflections

For the sake of good graces,
These hands have been open
Memorizing faces with touch,
Loosening the clutch of acquaintance.
Patience,
The faintest glow.
If I ever did know a candle's light,
It blushed her cheeks on colder nights.
Too bad we don't live in a brave new world.
Instant gratification is hard to find
And trust is the ultimate product of time.
Ticking tocks, the marksman is locked
But all the while in hesitation,
Selfish in absence or in consideration.

Awaken!

Here's a wish I'm going to make
On the stars that almost never make it.
This night is special
And it is all clear to me now,
Tracing the steps of monuments,
Taking breaths,
The moments when I'm filled
And the constellations billed
A pretty pocket letter
Blown in words that ride on feathers:
Pretty golden row of lights
Guide forgotten dreams tonight.

D-Entry

We're just some kids making history
And I couldn't be more proud
That this is me,
This is us!
What's the fuss five floors up?
It's the windows and doors
Shaking in 4-4 time
As the boys and girls awkwardly grind...

I almost forgot where I was,
But I'll never forget what went on.
I am the champion of pong,
Because Beirut is the capital of Lebanon.
And heaven on earth is what this is.
Can't go to sleep since my room's full of kids,
So fall asleep, wake up,
Now you're sitting in the lounge...
I swear that this wasn't as bad as it sounds.

We're the best of west campus,
From Next House to Bexeley,
I am Batman! Come hither, and do make it sexy.

8:45 to Providence

Lighted perfection.

It's in the direction of home

That shone in on this scene.

Everything is perfect,

Edits are clean...

This is what they mean to me.

I hope this is what it's meant to be.

What's meant for me more south?

I sit the duration

And shut my mouth.

Bulbs pass by,

My eyelids slouch,

Perched on slippery eyes.

This certain something calms my life,

This certain something makes me alright.

Neon Halo

Walk the gauntlet,

I can't believe I got this far.

But I keep my cool

Because I know very well

Who I am.

Ambiance with a thud,

We bump into each other

In the synthetic weather

Of suspended heat.

Suspended,

We drop into air.

Back to the artificial

We are proficient in this kitchen,

Cooking up a storm, born of pride,

Plastic cup sinking.

You blink and then it's gone

This is my youth and it's still going strong.

Wake Me

Waterfalls,
Some holy color from my head.
This semi-arid simulation
Stimulates such an occurrence.
A perpetual wink
Until faced by the sink,
Discolored.
Hammers in my throat
Hammers in my throat,
A coat would have sufficed.
Lather would have been nice.
But temporal authority pushes me back,
And yet these sinews still feel no slack.

Little Man

The significant things
Your significance brings:
Your delicate streams
And your bubbly singing.
I'm clinging hard to the mental picture.
Saturated colors make it richer,
I put creases in the corners
Like the good book put to use.
Organs and cymbals,
Glory spills through the clouds
And this signal gets through,
I am talking to you.

When I come back,
Will verbal holes be filled
Despite your stubborn will?
Despite my stubborn will
To hold hands
Back?
When I come back,
Will the tape be rewound?
I don't care about the sound.
I just need those faces
I just need to retrace them.
Like the the one who gave,
And the one who took,
Or the one who named
Today in this book.
Oh, I'd come back just to repress play...
Oh, I'm counting down these waterhosed days.

Warmer Things

I wait on tides for directions etched out.
The Atlantic breathes colder
Since we're all getting older.
Her heartbeat slows down
As tired horses with blinders
And hopes built like sand castles.

Sleep is a bitter medicine
And far from a vaccine.
So my mind remains quarantined
With no one checked in.
I can't forget where you've been.
Neutralized aspirations about where you'll go,
I'm just missing the things that once defined home.

Retrospection Brings Imperfections

Of becoming
Of loving
Of strumming
Of calling
Of waiting
Of hating this very direction,
Feeling guilty with a kiss
At the end of the page.

Taste the inky comfort
And see how long it lasts:
Grapefruit flavored accuracy,
Picked precociously,
Obnoxiously unstemmed
And condemned to damnation
Of permanent past,
Until words dissolve in citrus
And cannot say what this is.
And wouldn't dare to tell,
But wince and of course misses
A subject-meaning kind of hell.

Repetition comes in three's
And gets it on its knees...
Just sleep when it pleases,
Because some things never change.
Audibles are fixed to dates,
Dreams will always overtake
And make baggage of past.
Leprous unmeaning, but needing,
Bleeding out impurities
To see that there's no purity.
Dare to mention stability?
This story is a window;
Dry rain packaged in keys,
By which each square is dressed.
This sickness treatment's more or less
Of pictures, words, and to confess,
But painter without patroness
Is more or less directionless.

Reconciliation

Close your eyes,
Free falling.
Found in a newspaper
With a catchy hook and a spelling error,
You left your graces in the hands of a guilty man.
This mirror has perspective
And you laid in my bed with your lips turning blue.
These words were a song that never came true.
Some smiles are shared with no one else
They bounce off perfect walls
And fall behind shelves.
You open your eyes
For honesty's sake,
And let out a breath for the mess you have made.

Best In Show

Five o'clock rock to the mind
Because they're never on time,
We're never on time.
A single-filed line tracing heart palpitations
Took each counted step as a new hesitation,
Another reservation to stumble on air
Running thick with the pressure of everyone there.

But our swagger is a dagger
That would fall on our hearts
If we fell apart.
But we had the part,
And we had the heart.
Where do I start?

Together, we struggled.
Together, we fought.
We gave what we had
To take what we got:
PBE making presence, and up, screaming loud
... I can't remember when I've been more proud.

Being On The Other End

Showing the ropes,
Building up hopes
For a fitting future forming.
We're storming the front,
Becoming veterans fast
Becoming veterans of past
With a pinch of condescension.
We need our names,
We need our attention,
We're praying their staying
Will be our inventions.
But regardless of outcome,
I'll continue as then,
Providing my knowledge in dividends.

Record Lows

This had started off
With something bitter to say
About the cold getting hold
Of the words, mine to say
And how tunneling winds
Could begin a bad day,
But I found your name around my neck.
In the patterned fabric and little specks
Of little fuzz that would buzz and drop dead
And find final rest on the nest of my head.
It hung like a noose for the mute
In the angles most acute,
But for now it keeps me warm,
Hoping you will follow suit.

Listening To Daughters

This morning is cloudy
The sheets are undone
This heart pours out sugar
Through buttons undone.

Dark is the night,
The wind glides on ice.
My bed has become a foreign place
Where I sit suspended
In pretended kept space,
Tracing lights in colored streams
That gleam out from these floating dreams.

And what it seems is what I've seen
And what I've seen is how it ends.
Cities burn for habits unlearned
That churn until perturbed again.
The nerve again for coastal norm
That came in left in sudden storms
That gave me weather far from home
I'd rather not must spend alone.

Casual Reassurance

Blood sits quietly
And waits its turn.
Churning, this heart
But subtly yearns
For the fading burns
Of Epsom salts.

I had cut my open palm
On the broken glass
Of preserving balms,
Conserving the calm
In the calling of storms
Where hurricanes dictate the norm.

Some things will always go forlorn,
An unaired wound will remain torn,
So we breathe.
So we keep our heads above the water
And hope that mine will not get hotter.

Timeless

May this prove responsive
Though my beat peaks in Boston.
The L.E.D. screen screams in bleeps,
"I am lost!"
But arterial maps always lead me back home.
And lyrics snaps tell me I'm not alone,
I am here.
Somewhere near the edge
Of the glass,
Of the past,
Its prison is warped in the prisms of tears.

I peer in and seer skin
From the sharpness of it all:
A distinct recollection,
I drink from my reflection.
It is thick with the sickness of a love mid-
Sentence,
Sentenced to the senseless sense of solidarity.
But she visits,
Voluntarily.
And her kisses,
Always there with me.

We make rounds to the sounds
Of a tune of never ending,
The prisoned past passes
Through the white light-prism bending.
So I'm still chasing rainbows
And I'm still where the rain goes,
Always and forever,
She took the best weather.

This rainstorm's a brainstorm
Most days of the year,
So forgive the rhythm-patter
You seasonally hear.
And sometimes you need,
So you can relearn,
The sturdiest bridges can never be burned.
Thanks for compassion,
And thanks for concern,
Consider this finished:
A message returned.

The Lock-In

Slavery split up nice,
But production's put on ice.
Where are the beers?
This is nowhere near focus.
Attention's at its lowest,
We're the slowest from the start.
But this glue will cool
As we tool it all night,
Putting together
To never pull apart.
Radiate a mass of land
With the wobbly fist
Of a can-clutched hand,
Which broke the fall
Onto the floor on which you slept
And then on which you eventually wet.
On which the other threw a shout,
The flow reversed,
And spilled about.
This is viral and embarrassing,
The way brotherhood is meant to be.

Mixed Drinks and an Ominous Swing

This is me raised to the third degree:
The music, the book, the bitter and sweet.
Remember the beginning?
My memory is thinner of a sinner without sinning.
Together we were spinning,
But grinning every time,
Because it was all ours.
And every time I recycle this theme
I’ll always remember you singing with me.

Principles of Exclusion

I see hospital lights.
I see them through tired eyes.
And I've tried to decipher
A life more estranged
By the rivers and mountains
And miraculous range.
Its not hard to see
Something you've worked for
In danger,
When they start growing older
And looking like strangers.

Wall

I etch hours into the bower
That is this youthful mind,
Taking too much youthful time
Well spent hell-bent on being it all.
Pushing forty out of none,
There's work
There's play
There's sleep,
Choose one.
The moment I had left
I promised for the best.
But when it came to hit,
There's nothing in me left.

Dusty

Tickers are scissors
Reflections on my neck
I can't keep myself in check
If I don't respect the clock.
Pillow shock from the withdrawal
I'm all in and talking talk.
Walking walk right off the edge,
Pull the sheets back on my bed.
I'm tired,
But I'm trying to shake the sleepies
All out of my head.

Heavies Then Lights

And we start it where we all left off,
Where we all trailed off into the next day.
But I found its secrets!
They're puckered in the kisses
That miss the mark.
Parabolic hypnotics,
They took the hydraulics out of this day.
Lids cover my eyes,
I'm under the gun,
Running from cross-hairs,
It's been a long one.

Severance

Oh, it's such an impossible task
When echoes are meadows,
I lay in the grass.
I took for granted the planted moments
That passed ever so quickly...

I scramble the pebbles along the bank.
Pointing an arrow towards where the sun sank,
A perfect ending.
A perfect bending of light,
The curved around the earth
And birthed joy in my life.
You were a toy for my eyes
That held you like a doll,
Your buttons,
Your stitches,
What a beautiful call.

And all it took were some seeds in the ground
That rooted and raised
That blossomed each day,
That whispered in wind, a soothsayer sound.

Hung Up

This was the greatest story ever told.
And I'm waiting for it to get old,
Old,
Older,
Gone...
But there's no one else who knows this song.
So it sticks with me.
It pricks me in the sides saying,
"I'll never let you hide me."
This is something that couldn't stay home
Insatiable and never filled.
I'm carting Jesse up a hill
And if I ever had the will,
I would never want to sleep alone.
I don't ever want to sleep alone.

Cram

I still hear your voice
Tucked between vibrations of familiar songs.
A familiar wrong
Was that I never had it right,
But we made it through alright...
We made it through those nights
Dipping shadows into light,
Sipping romance from your eyes.
Siren eyes.
Fatally magnetic and I'm pathetic once I get it,
But I had it all along:
I'm feeling lower,
You're getting bored and
Pushing forward,
Moving on...

Memory

I might forget this,
I might regret this,
But yeah...

Summon You

A crooked carriage reels you in,
The horseman lost his head again.
I wander plains of worn out graves
Moaning for forgotten names.
A table set with dirty sheets
Wines picked from the dying trees.
I took the cue and made a toast,
A summer hue in sudden ghosts.

Tooling

Delightful distractions
Attract these eyes to temporal demise.
Your life is refractions,
A fraction of what I had been in your eyes.
We quietly go on with our lives,
Definitive renditions of a factor of lies,
Exponents,
Necessary components to a long-sought stability.
If I had the ability to choose,
It would always be mine,
But everything's perfect and it's all out of time.

Magnetic Eyes

Circuitry and alkaline,
Something's here that isn't mine.
A stolen spark from the '84 DeLorean
No, this something isn't mine anymore.
But this core is reacting,
Forever more
Forever storing,
More consistent with more precision,
Magnets do not make decisions.

Innit

I maximize neatness
In this incompleteness
That's gone completely out of hand,
Like the pin that falls
With every grain of sand,
Demanding a moment taken.
Input without a turnaround.
The hourglass will keep its ground.
Every second has its sound.
And every minute,
I am in it.

Silent Night

Backdrop of tiny boxes of light,
Reflective skies warm your back tonight.
Here is my comfort,
Here is some other thing I plucked from your eyes,
Gracious and spacious,
A delicate light.
Stay warm and sleep tight,
I'll make sure you're alright.
It's been a silent night
Now that you've closed your eyes.

Under the Garage

There's a fluctuation
In dedication to my mind,
But I've taken my time
And I've waited in line
For this state of mine.

This is where games
Become the gravity of now,
Pulling us in,
Giving us in
To something never intended.

I pretended many things.
And I'm sucking out the poison in my skin.
There is a magnitude of disgrace
Holding the walls to this placebo effect.

Noses erect, we hunt.
A stunt never doubled,
We're going through the trouble
Of a concrete bubble
Where instincts are vicious
And judgment will miss us.

The Woods and Nauset Vastness

Rain patters on my jacket.
My face glows in the fire
Growing slowly.
I retire my back
And drops illuminate
Seconds before impact,
And then there's a feeling intact
From fulfilling attacks on me.
I turn back to the fire
And repeat.

But then I leave.
The ocean breeze calls me
With its squalls howling in,
As darkness grows and falls
Over me.
I can't see anything,
But the crests of waves,
Yet I brave the front.

And I am small,
I am so small.
We mean absolutely nothing
When we stand on the divide
Of the vastness of nothing...
I can open my eyes.

Replacing Names with Similar Faces

There's never enough
But I'm making mine
Like a needle that fits into grooves,
I am fine.

Brain Pressure

Brainstorming with my head in the clouds,
Oh yes this is how,
Yes this is just how it flows.
Like the slow churning
Cool burning
Of an ominous breeze,
Right outside my window.

Why do we invite hurt,
Becoming blood brothers
With poisonous words?
Because they are words.
Humans hoard and then get bored,
So then they hoard again.
And we swear off our bias
And we wear out our names
Worth no more than the check
And the ink of the pen.

We build up our fake deaths
And then we all make bets
And then we make regrets,
But now I have digressed...

Chapter II

Bracing for the bite
Of razor sharp or chewy gum.
Hours shower quick
As I stand under the gun.
Here it comes,
Here it comes!
Four years have come to this.
Tomorrow I find out
Just how hard it really is...

Happy Where I Am

Always right in
Never left out
Always spicy
Never bland.
Fitting smoothly in the grooves,
A soothing now I am.

Distance-Importance

Recurrences disturb,
Occurring at the waking moment
Lingering slowly that
Vinegar spoils the levity of life.
Dyspepsia is mixing with a drink never had,
Unidentifiable in the sugar dreams and sand.
Desaturation exaggerates a truly unbalanced state
So that somber politicians tie flags on their faces,
Gagged and bound like true gentlemen.
Lied-out, they stay silent
Debating the dead,
The memories unsettled
Ghosting somewhere in my head.

Wood Horse War

Fight for me,
A ghost to be
In one week's time.
What's your name?
You forgot mine.
We're there before the line,
You're stepping over mine.
It's been a while since I've been me
It's been a while since anything...
Just tell me what's it that you seek
Stealing presents from the Greek?

Binding

Always a day behind
I haven't got the time to find
My peace of mind
The pace of mine is far too fast
Letting not the good times pass by.
You and I,
Yes, we all see
These people will be there for me.
Because families are familiar
And friends are made of memories.

Coffee Cake

Serendipity
And coincidence.
I've coined it ever since
It jingled in my pocket,
Shining in the timing
So tight that I could lock it,
Deadbolt and key,
He is answering me.
He wipes time off our clothes
From when we are young,
Finding a closeness,
River and sun.

Another Quiet "Goodnight"

Push one out on the house of cards
On which I stand,
Shaking my fists with shaky demands.
Inhale for every sentence,
Exhale for every pause,
Open your hands
And clench your jaw.

There is a dullness that knocks at your head,
Inertial and certain as your chance is dead,
For now.
Wishing best for months self-served,
Enamel cracks as you turn your backs
One had paused,
The other stopped,
Thoughts as fast as hummingbirds.

It's time to share,
Though unwillingly so
And unwillingly slow.
Hold your life against a plot
And you think you know
A bittersweet is what you'd meet
But this rewrite I demand.
I'm speaking as the jealous man
To all the people I don't know.
But now you know...
And I'd hope so.

Undelivered

An onslaught of zeros
Reminds me that there is
No hero
To this story,
Because there is no story.
I reach into these pockets
To find a proper allegory,
A category drowned
In the glory of victorious,
Inglorious,
Erroneous,
Matrimony
Of lonely neuron
Chasing neuron
With something pure on
Vast azure.
Turning blue,
I stay true...
So I reach into these sockets
To find something that's shocking to me.
I jostle the urge of disabled nerve,
Yet all cannot have,
And none I deserve.

Snowflakes in the Dark

Mute,
Unmute,
Pop the lights out,
Talk and find out
That there's stout resolution
After accepting the inclusion
Of silent things.
My retinas don't sting.
Many hours, not a thing.
Listen for the sightful
In the quiet and dark.
Glisten in the night folds,
Undeserved and stark.

Building Bridges In Ditches

The suspension swing sings
Over seas of aspirations,
Tempest-tossed and lost to
Hopes and expectations.
Echoes bellow deep
In a moaning metal sound,
We're building broken bridges
Just to stay on level ground.

Where are you?

The morning brings laughs,
The night lets them pass
With the clouds the bring rain
And stain the sidewalk a darker shade.
Light dances in the splashes
By which they scattered apart
And then became our stars.
And then became our hearts
Drifting somewhere in the air,
Solemn sky...

I just want someone that I can tell,
"Goodnight."

Unfinished Self

I rub the contour of my face,
Look into the mirror
And nothing's replaced.
So I look away,
So it didn't fade away,
Seven days on its way
Crooked lines had been retraced,
It didn't fade away.
There is always a reason
You don't want to stay,
But we say we miss it anyways.

The lines bind this train to the track,
Derailed, yet prevailing to stay intact.
Time is the length between theory and fact,
But metal on metal just whimpers and drags.
Outbound,
No sound,
A lack of responses,
Confounding this town for something I've lost.

The gasoline burned before it met eastern sun.
And delusions to truth rivaled
Three,
To,
One.

Holding A Gun To Your Therapist

I fell 2,000 miles to a chair and a chaise
And a message replayed.
No one is home except for the drone of phase,
An advantage advancing in retrograde,
Stomping our feet in a ladder parade
Unevenly broken to evenly break.
You're asking a healer to kill.
You're asking to take like it was your will.
But you won't.
It wouldn't be home and you couldn't,
You missed it.
Physician-assisted
With a gun in your hand,
You demand a prescription
Because you know you can't.

Prob-

The sun is up again.
Again.
A gain of none,
A yawn to morning sun.
I live in the night before
In some sort of magic,
Fantragic, fifth floor.
Solar panels flex in the light.
I crack my back and rub my eyes.
Machines never sleep,
Machines never die...
But sometimes it seems like we try.

Trees

Putting X's through messes
That compress into paper.
Irreplaceable,
Untraceable,
Insatiable as long as I walk these bridges
Sowing the ditches and sewing these stitches.
Whether grasping anew
Or holding to keep,
These branches reach high,
And these roots burrow deep.

Cutting Angles

Water falls for waterfalls
The pressure of the wave still calls
And everything falls still.
A voice emerges from the deep,
The fragrance of a dream received.
The audible caress of a plausible truth:
Boston is a ring and deserves a gem like you.

Chapters

I will never know
What I missed in vertigo.
Ascension to heaven,
I was taken away too far
To wipe the tears from your face.
I stretch out these arms
And brush my fingers through space,
Empty space.

I never want to know
Your words turned white
In winter snow.
The months to come
Will fade in flavor
Like the gum you used to chew.
You thought you knew
But were insecure,
But we know the thing
Of which we were sure:
Attraction.

The reaction is shock.
There is no longer touch
There is only talk...
Oh it's been so long
Since I've talked about love.
I had never felt so right...
The plane's direction is wrong.

Clear Waterfalls

You are reading this,
Wondering what secret crypts I'll reveal.
But every seal has been broken
And the warranty for hope has been soaked up
By a rising sun, nudging my eyes open
Because I am done,
And our thoughts go further than the syllabus runs.

Hours of stillness,
With nothing but the soft vibration
Of soft voices
Speaking soft choices
That wrap around our skin.
It's a refreshing calm from within
Like when these lungs can't hold anymore
Of this fickle air.
And I didn't care of the noxious gases,
Accustomed to the breathlessness
Of a moment that passes,
Over and over,
And then it is over.

Together we spin
Through open doors to the bizarre
Left ajar like tempting sin.
It dropped us into the purest waters
And we saw how deep we could put ourselves in,
But through the seaweed and crystals
You were always above...
Maybe you'll find it when you've fallen in love.

Sing With Me

Soundtracks emerge before the sun even sets
Behind Christmas tree mountains in the sea.
Our voices pour out like the concrete rivers
Flowing into the sea,
Flowing into the breeze,
Flowing into you and me.

The silhouette of numbers fade in
From the dark side of the moon.
The evening comes too soon
And an "X" goes through
April, May, June,
July,
And now I lie on the tracks
Held down by thumbtacks,
Held down by the numb fact
That the calendar won't back down.
The digits fly across the sky
And in the sea,
There they will drown.

They are always on time,
When I'm late on the dime
But we have to make due.
A sorrowed flight spreads wings of truth,
Adhesive peels off from my shoes.

Expectations vs. Reality

And I'll remember when
The last summer sun is setting,
Just how it came to this.
A transmission lost in translation,
A definition of home.
The water's getting colder
And the sunset sinks alone.

Typically Late

This world is small, this girl is all it takes to get people talking. Now I'm walking in the grooves, a centering spiral uncovering truth. The record plays on. The decor stays on the theme of class. like drinking wine from colored glass...of the Solo cup variety. Every name is familiar. All the fame is a glimmer into something that will be left so soon. But would've been great. We are typically late with our movie-script conclusions, but it serves some justice to our media delusions. So here's a toast to cheap wine's sting and a conscious stream of "normal" things.

Wooden Saint of the Sea

In the darkness of night,
A familiar wheel is your beacon of light.
Spinning,
Spinning.
You grin at the hypnotizing spin
And you want to stay home.
And in the drone of late night
You turn to the other side.
Your organized life seen by organized eyes
Sees no divide between ocean and sky.

Holy Trap

Pretty, pretty, soft and witty,
These chairs are stiff
Like the poor man's coffin
After the poor man coughed out his last
Breath.
Breadth of this situation juxtaposed
By naivety with a smile and salutation.
A lead heart led me apart from reality
And pulled me to the ground
To hear the sound of surreality.
I feel vibrations,
Sensational and violent.
But these eyes remain silent,
Quietly crucified to the generic carpeting
Dreading what this mind is harboring...
Fiery ships guided by a lighthouse blinded.
Mariners strung up by anchors of distrust,
Dangling and waiting for the moment I combust.

Double-Faksies Lied

Compulsive
Impulsive
Decisions.
A fission at the center of the mind
Has thoughts crammed against your skull.
There's a hole in the hull
And time falls in buckets
Onto paper.
It bleeds through.
There is too much truth for a single sense,
The rest, lost in translation.
You hesitate on what it meant.
You had hung on the swings
As sleep hung on your lids,
And you slid into home so that you were alone
With a social exhaustion before leaving for Boston.

I believe (Speak to me)

The hair on your skin turns gold
As you drive into the sun,
There are dust bunnies in your head
From the same old thoughts
That fought until death
As you laid in your bed.
You turn on the windshield wiper
And the sunlight comes in brighter,
Midas brushes the softness of your cheek.

When imminent change is absolute,
The elements of life seem to follow suit,
A humble gesture from spirits unknown,
Embraces from faces I'll always call home.
These are the traces of a life well-lived
When a sieve bleeds out impurities of heart
And leaves familiar unique,
The stable I seek,
An answer unquestioned, but known from the start.

Single Digits

A private city sits perched on smoky air,
We stare as the ash clings to clothes and to hair.
I'd dare to close my eyes,
But I don't want to fade away.
I don't have the heart to say--

These festive lights make no disguise
So I bottle these things that I've been shown:
Innocence,
Sweetness in sugary flow,
Things like these I'll never know.
I'll just smile at which I can't relate
And sip into a darker state.

So I take a few steps back,
Admire your laugh in my panic attack,
Finding a soft way down the slope
A dull light replacing the essence of hope
That maybe I'll find what always escapes
With a trail of photos and audio tapes.

Amber

Direct light gray,
Indirect golden.
This life works in angles
In shadows and degrees,
Never poured in your eyes
But in everything you see.
Remembering a father's anguish
Recalling a mother's pain
Recounting a brother's laughter,
All at once, and all the same.

I pack solitary warmth in a suitcase.
I pack my youth into a binder.
I pack my calendar with time
Because I don't know what I'll find
Once I've left the real thing behind.

And in a three-hour gain,
I'll feel a great loss.
Because somewhere in the worthless gloss,
Los Angeles is a paradise lost
Where jaundice spheres forecast the day
And all your dreams can come and play...

The Right Side of the Bed

Once you get over the drone
Of the music that will always be home,
You hit a silence.
You see it in the dust
Reflecting beams of light
When you're spending time alone
When you're spending time to write
When you're spending time alright.
I'm alright.
I've been all right lying on this bed,
Making a lopsided grating
From celebrating tradition.

But now I'm mourning rendition
As forced as it may be,
For the raincoats and frost
And the seasonal leaves.
The trees will stand naked,
Only bare at best,
As I will be too
After everything's left.

I am poison.

Tell the girls and boys
There's dark leeching
In the screeching
Of the overtones in his voice.
These are the choices we make,
The greatest takings of chance.

When a train of thought stops
At the length of the page
Of a number detracting
On the calendar's page,
Like the wheels of a plane
That takes me away,
A sentence stops short
Of a meaning to say
That the Fields of Elysium
are my equilibrium,
A fable,
Unstable,
Where nothing is certain,
And I hold that burden.

It has not been enough
But it all is too much
And my only crutch is my frame,
Polished out imperfections
But still flawed all the same.

So I've crossed all my T's
And dotted my I's
As I sign my name off
To the greatest of lies.
A builder of morals
Independent of sin...
See the signals?
Hear the bells?
That's the train coming in.

Jalapeños & Beer

There is so much with me
There is so much to come
There is so much in the muchness
Of not being done.
An unfinished masterpiece
Is merely trash on the table
And the OCD inquires the insatiable.
Forever foreboding
Forever controlling,
Forever sensational.

Red Zone

My shortened breaths
Have only brought words for myself.
They are selfish heaves
In a coward's panic,
Sucking up dust under a sheet up in the attic.
Baby boy, you're giving too much blood
And the wood floor drinks your body's wine.
There's not enough pressure
Not enough money
Not enough time,
Not enough time.

12:34

This is an ode to every moment
Spent bent three-hundred and sixty degrees
Dividing the psyche into millions of pieces.
This is to five in the morning
Ending where everyone else began
Held back by the nothing
That no one would understand.
This is putting that ugly face on
When you hear the hardest song,
But mama said my face would stick
If I held it for too long...

So the seasons are calling for a change,
And though the trees are sweating
I am betting that their words are missiles
That will always be in range.

Magic

Retrospective catch phrases
Catch days in dreamcatchers,
Wet from the sweat
Of cloudy days in late November,
Brown leaves and wet trees.
Run through them screaming hard,
Laughing loud with your hands on your knees.
Wasn't it innocent?
A singled strand frayed at the end,
But brought together by fretting hands.
The same which cradle cardboard unique
Strategically placed and portraying me weak
As he always has.
Unintended, yet well deserved,
Like the multiple meanings in a single word:
Magic.

Bodies/Entities/Me

Words escape me as birds escape me,
Doves out of bullet wounds
That let out lovely swoons
As my lungs hiss and fall asleep.
Still light runs through blood vessels
And wrestles itself free on my irises
With the colors of Osiris...
The colors of a memory fleeting fast,
The blurry film reel feeling warm on my chest.

Where is...

Tired nights make you lonely
And you're tired of lonely nights,
Wired up to a pleasing screen
Bringing restlessness in a stream of digits.
And you fidget as the numbers get smaller.
A ring,
A fate,
A phone,
A caller.
The loved are so far,
The fear is brought near,
And all the pretty pictures have slowly disappeared.

As Perfect As Death

Sunlight through a dirty windshield,
Bluer skies where buildings once were.
Something about the past,
Something about the last thing I said
Before it left me fast.
All the while,
I'm standing still,
Looking for something
Never lost nor found,
But longing and belonging
With feet firm on the ground.

Interim

Still light,
Night life,
Sleep is something that pushes from the east.
Where normalcy meets in the cradle of the beast,
Somewhere off the western ghost
With longitude, latitude, nautical ghosts.
Numbers are smeared on the clock
Like a cheap windshield wiper
On poorly fitted glass.
It streaks as it passes
And creaks in every
Tic,
Toc,
Tic,
Toc,
A pause.
A lock,
But daylight is breaking through the blinds
...My eyes are now opening to my mind.

Dining with Lions

Judgment came in hospitality,
And I clicked affirmations against my morality.
Because here is a good shot
And I heard in God's earshot
I'd be damned to not take it
If I ever wished to make it.
It was a circus on a turbulent sea.
Hand-wrapped plastic meat,
Lions and me,
Balanced on hard beds
With soft memories
Of some angel sitting next to me.
But as divided chains had pushed and pulled,
I stood my ground and then was full.

New Light

Today was a day for transactions
So I converted my units into something
A little more compatible.
Divisions of four in a 4-door sedan
Headed into the mountains
Of bedrock and sand.
And what silly sung harmonies
Some hardly heard voices sang
That buzzed in the basins
And hugged on the hills.
Choppy English,
Baby laughter,
While a seasoned voice went higher,
Faster,
Like the wheels that rolled
And took us far away
Humming our hearts to heave
Something to say.
And that we did.

Unstable Equilibrium

Halfhearted happenings
Happen half the time.
So this candy tastes plain.
Every bar tastes the same
And the feeling's mundane.
And Monday through Sunday
I'm hoping that someday
These taste buds will bud
And not hide from the words
That I hold on my tongue.
But the future draws blanks from a clock with no face
And I am treading on time in the fluid of space.