said the blind man to the carpenter, you'll have no sleep tonight (or: i'm fucking dead)

charred trees against the sky
stuck in my headlights like another person
(or so i thought,
but look, i'm all alone again,
and no amount of god)

god is pounding his way through my eardrums
borne on the music of young men
(he's a clever one, he knows my weaknesses)
but you can't make yourself believe.
i wish i could tell my son that one day.

red black open graves as the crow flies all alone

you can drown yourself
you can drown yourself in sex,
seize it, take it from their willing hands,
you can commit a thousand murders,
rip the blood from fragile and gasping veins,
you can pull bottles dry
of misguided antiseptics,
but no amount of sex and blood and vodka
all over your silken body
no amount of god
all inside you
can erase the fact:
you are the human stain.
you will never stop hating yourself.

why am i so disjointed
why am i so scared all the time
why am i suddenly so scared all the time

christmas night, 9:45 p.m. show

the way,
and the alley way,
every brick,
slab of concrete, or limestone,
marble, dying snowflakes,
birds and the dogs that eat them,
benches, rusted pipes,
all of it, the inner city, my inner city,
not a maze but a way,

but she is all angles and anger and she does not whisper
oh no i need that softness those curves those
voices simmer like summer and pour
sweetness into my ears not the

roars, machines, foghorns,
seething fumes, the smoke, bodies,
rotting feathers, or corpses, mud flats,
sewers, shadows and trash cans,
whores out for drugs, druggies out for whores,
revolvers or knives, steeped in blood,
and smelling like sex, reeking of it,
in white-powdered noses, and
every day it snows, but

the women who pull me don't drag me let me in let me be
a man who breathes really breathes for once
a man a real man who dies and is afraid
and who will drown someday

but i can't have that.
inside me i find it,
the way,
the alley way,
and the rooftops, and the balconies,
and the cast-iron gates —

my city screams.
i feel her.
god.
i feel her.

dear jamie woods (visions of 5th grade)

we always made fun of you for your imaginary dirtbike.
you weren't very smart but
you were a total jackass
and i hated you a whole lot.

yeah, i bet you can do all those cool tricks.
why don't you bring in a picture of your dirtbike? hmm?
you never actually brought one in.
we laughed at you for a while.

you were a bully,
all "look i'm so badass," but you got so angry.
you swallowed quarters to impress girls.
i remember all that.

you had a girlfriend in fifth grade.
when the health teacher asked if anyone knew what sex was
(we were in fourth grade) you raised your hand.
i was jealous because i didn't know what that meant.

i remember this: only once did i see you struggling.
you were staring at a math problem (an easy one)
but you couldn't figure it out. you ran a hand through your hair
and your voice — your voice was quiet.

because you had problems in your brain.
and now i think, if you knew what sex was when you were nine,
and you snickered about it, then what was your life like?
for some reason i seem to remember you crying once.

i wonder why you were so angry.
i wonder why you knew about sex when you were nine.
where were your parents?
why didn't they help you, jamie woods?

i'm sorry.
i'm so sorry.

the underdog and summer heat

all i am
is chemicals and waiting.

my hands are ghosts.
they have bloody pasts
and they could scare you to death
just by wanting.

my spirit is not yet alive.
so my body will curl it up
incubate it
until the day my eyes see a world
where it is worth it.
worth living.

my mind treads water,
clinging desperately to that memory
of the last time it was still awake,
still breathing.

december feels like summer (or: waste of breath)

not helping my mother even when she doesn't ask me
makes me feel guilty.
i sat on a chair and read a book that i've already read,
fell in love with a boy whom i already loved,
made a wish for a brother that i've already given up on.

i hope no one ever sends me a shoebox full of explanations,
even if it tells me that it's not my fault. i don't want
to end up shivering inside a rocket ship that is
forever grounded, drawn to earth by
children and backstabbers,

even if i can see the stars through the top.
where is that canvas mat?
where are those ropes?
i don't need gloves. well, i need them.
but i don't want them.

curly hair,
flannel cuffs,
halfway ice crashes wetly to the ground,
and every day i learn something
i never wanted to know before.

i hope today will not become one
of my thirteen reasons why.

tony romo vs. the giants defense

i could see it
where the pain lanced up his spine
and he thought
"these quarterback pads are —"
but then he tried to get up
and he stopped thinking.

he was lying on the ground
when he saw a pair of cleats
(red or white, it didn't matter)
and he needed someone right then,
who would take him by his shoulders
and drag him from where he lay

wincing at his fingertips
and his profession
and he shook it off when he got up.
i saw that.
but later on
(the cameras didn't show us this immediately)

there were several people wondering
if he was okay and he (unaware of the cameras)
reared his head back, in a magnificent grimace,
because all those other guys are
depending on him to hold them together,
but he is stuck all twisted up

and it came back to haunt him,
later on,
when he was dragged down,
beaten down, thrown down,
in a field of blue,
watching every single thing in the world

slip from his fingers
and fall beneath their bodies,
and he was so slow getting up.
(he needed someone again
whose wrist he could grasp tight)
and he was so slow getting up.

he won the game.
the announcer said something about a contusion.
he is twenty-eight years old.
ten years from now, when he thinks back
on the systematic and thorough destruction of his body,
he will wonder if it was worth it.

impossible

frantic, hit-by-a-car
gun-in-my-mouth
snapped-fingers
wide eyes and no words to be found,
nerves surging through my skin
in yellow strings or webs, lightning,
shivering as if the fever
was already dismantling,
systematically dismantling every defense
that i'm throwing up against it,
confused and desperate and drowning
in that tidal wave of
everything i can't change

half the time i want to kill
and half the time i want to die.

"jesus christ i'm alone again so what did you do those three days you were dead cause this problem's gonna last more than the weekend."

in the past couple of days
these two anvils,
shovels, maybe, lead pipes, wrenches,
have been beating me about the head
and shoulders

i was trying to keep my balance
and then along they came —
i was trying to have friends
and then along they came —
how does that happen?

i've been counting the weeks.
have you?
yeah well.
i guess not.

i spent the morning listening,
watching
the young people of yesterday
begging us not to repeat their failures.
the inherent problem is:
they didn't realize that they had failed
and logic follows that neither will we.
it was sad, really.
the way he pulled regret out of thin air
and settled it on his shoulders.

one day i will be like that.
regret will drift down and condense in my hands
but i will have no shoulders upon which to settle it;
they will have been worn away
by those two anvils,
shovels, maybe, lead pipes, wrenches —

no, they are not any of those things.
the power of words.
the power of words.
i never believed it until now.

the hollow boy (lovingly ripped off from t.s. eliot)

I.
i told you already what i am made of.
the wind whistled through my mouth,
and you, disappointed, listened,
to the scraping of sand against fabric;
you were hoping for words
but i do not have them.

i am the trench long after the war is over.

i tried to make you believe i was worth it,
i was scary, i was special,
i was worth the few seconds, the few chemicals
it would take to lodge me
make me stick in your memory.
but you weren't fooled.
sand gets stuck in your shoes
and fabric wears away with time.

II.
chorus of angels.
let me hear thee
the voices and the sunlight
the truth and the meaning
which i cannot be.

sand will be scattered.
fabric will be tattered.
but they will not die.
i will be battered
but i refuse to die.

III.
in the crater i see the face of a king,
broken in two,
and a beggar climbs over the corner of his lips,
his nose, his left eye,
to whisper in his ear:
"give me the starlight.
i shall never want again."

i wish he was not mad.
because i find myself praying, one day,
that the stars will bend to him,
and i want no part in the mind of this man,
broken in two.

IV.
the heart is gone but the broken bones,
jagged trees, chasms,
great mountains,
cracked under the effort of
bearing our weight for so long.

we know there is nothing left.
we hold each other's hands.
there are no hands in a place like this.

there are only slipped knuckles,
bruised bones,
sliced marrow.

i do not want to see again
because if i do see again
i fear my body will be gone
and it will be only me
when death dreams
that is where i will be.

V.
our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

a hundred times.
a thousand times.
it must have been,
i have said those words
and i have never believed them.
i have tried so many times
to talk to god,
and nothing,
i swear,
i would not lie to you,
about a fear so terrible,
because i have heard the bells
with their deep, solemn knells
and i have begged for reprieve
and he has never, never, never
reached down his hand
to grasp the clapper
and the knells have echoed
through the hollow of my body
and the knells have driven me
far, far away to places i do not know,
and i cannot get back because
the clapper, it swings like a pendulum
and one day they will find,
covered with sand and a fabric shroud,
bleeding with knells that sound so loud,
the body of a boy
broken in two

this is the way my dreams end
this is the way my dreams end
this is the way my dreams end
not with a sigh but a scream.

i am going to write something short (1968 DNC convention, or: richard daley is a moron)

riot police, riot police.
you came all this way just for me?
oh don't even pretend to frown
when you stomp me into the ground.

the time is now! the time is now!
look at all these kids for you to beat down!
lift my face from the curb and look at me.
i'll smile at you with my broken teeth.

friendly fire (or: my life is fucked)

sniping from the hills,
bullets like words
words like daggers
enter in her ears;

they are in the same regiment
supporting the same cause
but there is conflict
amongst the ranks;

so i fly down my helicopter
and i tell them to
"break it up"
but the sniping continues

and i want to stop it
but i'm afraid of getting hit
so i just sit
in my helicopter and say nothing

later on she laughs too loud
and his voice is too low
and he asks too many questions
and she says she needs to;

but all i could think was
sitting invisible on the stairs
listening to sniper fire
and wondering

how the hell we're
supposed to get out of this mess.
they tell me the cause is just.
but i don't believe that.

so many years
so many lives
so much money
wasted on one spectacular failure.

when people look at me
i will wear my pin and wave my flag
and pretend i am supporting the cause.
but really
in my mind i am condemning her.

this is war

i don't know what to do with myself.
obligations, duties,
so far away and feckless;
half of me feels born again
but the other half
slowly
sinks

i went looking for adventure but
my lai in the morning
was far too difficult;
i do not have the courage
to stop them
(i cannot fly a helicopter or command a platoon
or stand between the horsemen and the refugees;
and even if i did, i would just die of cancer
forty years later like a normal kid.)

it's okay.
it's too late for me already.
go use your helicopters and chemotherapy
on someone who's brave enough to want them.

one day i might be a doctor or a teacher or a fireman
or something.
first i'll go to college and then grad school and then
i'll get a nice safe career
wife but no kids
a pet cat who lays on my stomach when i'm sick.

can you tell me how to get there?
apparently i can find the way by finding the will but
my will is smarter than i am it
saw how fucked this situation is and it
ran away laughing.

i'm young
i am so young
it's been a hundred years since i knew what i wanted

tracy, california

seventeen years.
i can't even imagine,
literally, cannot begin —
don't even tell me
it's part of the mystery
because those bruises —
i would say they
speak pretty plainly.

your silence scares me.
seventeen years.
they tricked you into thinking
that this was normal —
when did it go too far?
was it when they chained your ankle to the car?
or when they covered you with ashes
in an attempt to hide your bruises
from your own eyes

(maybe it was a careful balance:
we can do to him whatever we want
until he stops obeying
and starts running.)

i wish you'd known.
i wish you'd known to call the police
before you turned thirteen.
i wish you'd known to stay at home
because these people don't want you
to be alone.

and i wish i'd known.
when i saw you taking out
the trash that one day
your pale, drawn face
(you were emaciated and empty-eyed)
and i should have thought.
i should have known.

seventeen years.

every one of them was hell.

that is the burden (inspired by eliot, yeats, superman, the green lantern, markus zusak, dustin, john k sampson, and the doctor)

i am the one who stumbled
i am the one who called out the warning
it was my voice rising
on the mad wind that rushed past
and threw you into the crater

i am the heron and the frog
i am between the impulse and the action
between the stimulus and the emotion
i am nero and his fiddle
i am the firstborn child

i am the withering jew
hidden away in a basement
walking on tightropes
i am the one who kills the king
in every dream i have

i am the sweet silver bells
i am the oldest song
i am the fear and the joy
i am the center and the centrifuge
the savior and the damned

i am the last one
i am the judgment
i am the weight and the glory
and when my home burned
in the fires of pompeii

i was left
standing on a hillside
watching everything i know
buried
under mountains of ash

this is my giving it goes out to everyone

i am thankful for
plaid
reasons
sweet things
softness
cats
pianos
songwriters
thorns
virtue.

and also
(this might sound a bit strange,)
fevers
circles under eyes
cemeteries
opening wounds
night driving
being alone.

but i promise i am most thankful for
you.

cast off

i've been thinking about it for a long time.
i was always too afraid before
(and everyone,
no one believed i could)
well i'll show them.

i'll do it. i'll take the plunge.
i'll make that leap,
and soar, with the sun on my back
and the wind rushing past me.
i'll show them

that nothing's impossible.
i was a timid kid with glasses
that are too big and shirts that
don't fit but now i will be known.
i will mean something.

i can feel the bravery
swelling up in my chest.
i'm smiling big now.
i'm doing it. i'm doing it
and no one can stop me. so i leap.

above me
the golden gate bridge recedes
into the sky.

ode to my favorite techie (the somewhat less sucky version)

you know, we're not so different, you and i,
you with your friend, and me back here with mine,
though in your eyes, i see a cloudless sky,
and in your eyebrows, that metallic shine;

but i see, too, the smile you throw at him,
the kind of smile that makes him lean on you;
you look as happy as you've ever been,
but i can see that this is nothing new —

that you two are the greatest kind of friends,
the kind who love to keep each other safe,
who've been together back since god knows when
and always know exactly what to say;

i turn and lean my head on my friend's back.
i hope that someday, we can be like that.

no power (awe struck)

you, crying girl,
with fragile wrists and eyes turned the color of roses,

folded to the table,
crooked like a tree in winter,

you work so hard
and look so proud and burn so bright

and you've withstood blizzards and hurricanes,
not bending and not breaking,

but when the earthquake comes
it rips up your roots and leaves you strewn and gasping.

always reminded that you must grow up.
always afraid of the fall — the taller you get

how the safety of the earth
keeps getting further and further away.

dear blake,

a cabin in the mountains,
way up, further north,
far beyond all the phone lines
and the passing cars amongst the pines;

the snow falls like summer,
the one you saw last fall,
disillusioned with the world
and all those jaw-breaker girls;

your guilt-ridden crows'-feet
betray your cigarette smile,
and you're beautiful and sad,
but you're all that i have,

and i'm not even sure i have that much,
so listen close or you'll miss it:
i know that you will overcome someday.
you call in sick but you won't stay that way.

haste the day

night, thick as canvas,
cold as an absolute —
it will never abandon you to
wild lightning and burning bushes,

it will rid these flares, each an SOS,
from the invisible tree-branch webs
that creep, spindle-like, over windows,
and its breath will cover everything
like the deepest and blackest of fogs;

and you, shivering dreamer,
will feel it weighing down on your chest;
and when you open your mouth,
it will rush in like water,
taking with it a thousand ghosts,
each one ten times more ancient than the last.

i am bone-deep exhausted (i will leave this somewhere far from home)

i remembered. your words are like
a crash cart — they jolt my tired heart back into
motion barely sufficient to keep me running;

i always wonder why i go to bed so late,
but i can never find an answer to
this comprehensive exhaustion;

and i feel bad, when i hear you sing songs about me, allegedly,
because that exhaustion draws me
straight home (my magnetic north)

and i just end up telling someone else
that i have to leave, and in my desperation
i forget about your songs

and all i remember is night driving,
an ocean of music and two yellow lines
for miles and miles and miles
and miles
and miles

i didn't take it

all i see these days is whitewashed walls
dirty sheets and bottles on the floor

i'm falling apart from the inside out
you can see the chasms all over my face

my friend sleeps in the room next to me
we talk but he never seems to notice my slow dying

my words are muffled and i can't move
but he laughs and laughs and laughs

sometimes i have to turn on the tv
just to drown him out before he leaves

someone else has a room in the attic
i don't know him so well

the things he says
they hurt me

make me reach for those bottles on the floor
because that's the only way

when my words are so muffled that
even i can't hear them

when i'm paralyzed with the weight
and the effort of movement

then i stop caring and
i can finally sleep

there are pills on the ground
are they mine

they must be
no one else lives here

no prior knowledge

(the assignment was to write a poem about a painting. i picked this one by manolo millares. it's not strictly a painting; he stuck torn burlap to it and did some other stuff. it's titled "sarcophagus of philip II".)

you liked the way
that white chalk outline looked
the day you died
(smiled and pointed) so
they put one around
your coffin

you would shiver
every morning underneath
your flannel quilt
(young boy's toes curled up) so
they put a quilt around
your coffin

but things were angry, you see,
and that chalk line (it was smeared)
(i hope you won't mind)
and they ripped away your quilt
slashed it to tatters wrapped around
your coffin

and things were violent, you see,
so their knives (big and black)
(they threw them in with you)
and they chewed up their tobacco
spit it (thin and black) all over
your coffin

in your afterlife you are
a martyr so i will give
your coffin

a new name
and it will be fit for a king
(a boy king)

dear philip,
lying in your ugly,
battered,
filthy
defiled

sarcophagus

ode to my favorite techie

you know, we're not so different, you and i,
you with your friend, and me back here with mine;
and maybe if i wasn't quite so shy
(if i would find some strength and grow a spine)

i'd tap you on the shoulder and say, "hey,
i come here pretty often and i've seen
you sitting right here every single day
and watching all these awesome shows for free —"

and then i'd swallow down my stupid fears,
"so do you need some help with sound and lights?"
but you would probably look at me weird —
i need to know if it would be all right;

so if i meet you one day and i say,
"i like your style," would that be okay?

set it ablaze

"YOU ARE THE GASOLINE I AM THE FIRE
BELIEVE ME, I'M NOT GONNA SAVE YOU
YOU'LL FOREVER BE BURNED ALIVE"

oh yeah? oh yeah?
that's what they want?
i can give it to them
ripping it
from my throat handing it
throwing it
ramming it down their chests
i can feel it echoing off the in
sides of my legs i feel it i
SCREAM SCREAM SCREAM SCREAM SCREAM
it goes on and ON and
ON AND ON AND ON AND ON AND ON

oh did i break my
light box look at those shards the
shattered glass, throw that at
them too ram that down
their throats
they like that, you know that
violence, i can see them slam
dancing the circle pit, god i miss the circle pit,
i want to be down there lashing out i want
SLAM SLAM SLAM SLAM SLAM
i want to punch their f
lights out send them home happy

give me that mic oh give it to me
oh give it to me now oh
GIVE IT GIVE IT GIVE IT GIVE IT GIVE IT
let me wrap it around my throat yeah
let me i will choke my words i will
CHOKE CHOKE CHOKE CHOKE CHOKE
they will stutter out ripping like
i sound like a rabid in the background
the break beats the
BREAK BREAK BREAK BREAK BREAK
they are breaking it
they are TEARING IT ALL DOWN

i can see them back there banging
their heads i can see them they want
they want me so bad they want me to
giants in the ocean
yeah, let's give them that those guitars
down down up down those chords
those chords i can feel them echoing
off the soles of my feet they shake me they
bring me to my
knees i
FALL FALL FALL FALL FALL
and those words
come ripping
out of my throat

don't even tell me
don't tell me this is it
this isn't it

this

is

everything

strike

(the assignment was to write a poem about your observations of a stranger, and to use a different poetic voice than the one you normally use. so i rhymed. ew.)

there is an old woman sitting on a chair,
inconspicuously in the way,
sitting very quietly there;

it is plain she does not want to stay
in the way her mouth wrestles with her frown;
i can see her patience beginning to fray;

i look up, so she looks down,
and asks me if she is in the way;
i turn my eyes back toward the ground

because i can see her patience beginning to fray
and i do not know what i should say
to this old woman who is in the way.

overfuckingworked

tomorrow
if you see my eyes sunken
into the back of my head
or scratched out with a pencil
into two bleeding x's

know that i did not sleep
and i wish angels lived with me
but they are much too smart
they would be disgusted
by the wreck who opened the door for them

broken english

(the assignment was to write a poem about a parent.)

once there was a little girl who climbed
the mango tree in her backyard
(she was only five years old;
her sister was eleven)

but then the winds changed,
a promise of freedom with
a risk much too high to accept,
and she was rushed off

further south
(she was thousands of miles away when
she heard about mr. oswald's terrible feat)
and she moved around,

way up north, south again, then north once more
to pursue what she loved —
the way things looked
the beautiful way things could look

and she learned to speak in yet another language
and to draw designs that would make people smile
and she went to the big city to be an american
and she worked at a corporation, where she met this man

i don't know where she started believing in god
or in andy warhol or ralph nader
or in the clash or the ramones
or in health food and her children

but when i hear her speak on the phone,
bits of english dotted along the stream of french,
then i think, what if
i had been cuban like her
after all?

for some reason

you, young virtuoso,
here you are, far from home,
attracted by a simple promise;

you smile as if you don't know how
and speak as if you're used to singing,
but your face is only kindness.

a coat that's too dark for your features
and a scarf that's too light for your coat
and i just want to keep you singing;

so i secure your name in my memory
(stephen w terribile)
and i'll put it down in writing.

nerves and muscle (anthony)

(the assignment was to write a poem including the line, "there are days we live as if death were nowhere in the background".)

no one likes us much,
this group of kids,
young, ostracized,
and what are we supposed to do with that?

if no one else will
then we will
carry each other on our backs.

eventually you stop
trying to make people look at you,
but once you start looking at yourself,
you find all the bad things everyone else has put there;
we all have those things cluttered up
inside us,
constricting our breath
giving us heart attacks
(not our bodies — the other half)

and it hurts to feel that way

so we do our utmost
to stop feeling

there are days we live
as if death were nowhere in the background,
yet furtively,
ashamedly,
we glance over our shoulders
to affirm his quiet breathing
before we open the car doors,

and we drive,
when our speed is ninety and
the visibility is zero,
and we're pushing so hard
as if striving to take flight,

and even when it landed us in the hospital,
we never told each other,
"i peeked"

riding on the metro (sonnet IV)

i haven't smiled this much since god knows when.

oh dearest, how i love to see you break.

i want to snap your fingers one by one 

and swoon at every anguished cry you make.

i almost feel sorry for your veins.

they're turning into dust before your eyes.

oh, if i could, i'd force-feed you your pain,

but oh, how sweetly i'd kiss you goodbye.

you've gone through every single drug you own.

since august, all you think about is death.

but august was a full three months ago.

i've waited long enough for your last breath.

i've hidden all the answers that you seek.

now your forever's only one more week.

seb (image + imagination)

you saw the best minds of your generation
destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical,
and bearing witness to such a tragedy
has traced dark, demure circles around your eyes

you look down and pretend
that those circles are supposed to be there

i hope that one day your ring finger
lives up to its name
and you find someone to give all your words to
who has in his heart the same sunset that colors your hair

but if that never happens, i want to take your hand
cover up your ring finger and give you all of my hope

maybe someday you'll stand on the edge of a cliff
and the wind will howl around you,
blow the dark circles away from your eyes and
let there be light

and you will look out over the ocean
and all of your guilt will be washed away

it's over.

new dawn, new day,
everything like that;
but i like the crowds,
jumping up and down,
and even though
we've ten weeks to go,
there is a light at the end of this tunnel.

and i guess he was right:
yes we could.

today is november 4th

"There has never been a better time to be artistically angry and full of love, if one can walk that uneasy line"

-blake schwarzenbach

i like that quote.

cross your fingers and hope.

song of myself II (the infinitely suckier sequel)

(the assignment was to write a 4-stanza poem describing yourself.
what the hell.
i tried to keep this one light on the teenage angst.)

someday i would like to save a life.
i would like to stitch up a wound,
take a bullet,
grab someone's hand on the golden gate bridge,
write something meaningful —
if it's not too much to ask.
my role is boy 1.
he's always smiling.
forgive me if i drop character every now and then.

i am a child of punk rock.
i want to be there,
sweaty bodies, all my friends, pressing in —
punched in the jaw by rosy-cheeked housewives,
kicked in the gut by brand-new shopping malls,
we are all so eager to carry each other on our backs.
one by one we take the mic and say,
"this is what i believe."
this is what i believe:

i believe that people are good.
i believe that music saves lives.
i believe in questioning authority,
universal healthcare,
giant particle accelerators,
and young adult fiction.
but most importantly:
i believe.
it's just that sometimes
i meet someone who doesn't believe in me.

at times like this
(this evening, the role of the victim will be played by riley richards)
i go home and watch pinocchio.
pinocchio is my favorite movie because
the ending always makes me feel a little better about my chances.
(do you think it's strange:
last year i wrote a song of myself,
but now i have nothing to say.)

you're a jaw breaker (compchorea song)

look at my hands, they're shaking like a sound wave.
my lungs are collapsing like a dying sun.
i have such strange dreams every time i wake.
to sleep off last night will take me a month.

i'm treading water and there's no sign of land.
the wind and the waves sound like some sad song.
when the ship went down, you let go of my hand.
but the water's cold. i won't have to fight for long.

there's a black hole in my room and it's pulling me in
to where everything i do feels paper-thin,
to where each new sunrise is the same old dawn.
now i'm slipping further every day you're gone.

it's christmas time and my apartment is bare.
a slow-dying tree would only bring me down.
i left my friends someplace but i don't know where.
i promise you i'm fine without you around,

but i'm really just a slow-dying tree
covered in tinsel and ornaments.
that smile i give to everyone i meet
hasn't been true since god knows when.

i see carolers all around
but i can't hear a sound
everywhere i go, strings of christmas lights,
but they're not shinin' on me tonight.

there's a black hole in my room and it's pulling me in
to where everything i do feels paper-thin,
to where each new sunrise is the same old dawn.
now i'm slipping further every day you're gone.

30 minute infomercial

you can keep
the hope
that we've laughed at time and time again

you can keep
those chords
you can keep
those smiles

we said "heartbreak," and we said it again,
but really
you won't be able to stop the halves of your heart
from coming together;
each is the other's keeper
and they will not
they will not
let you fall.

there is no "now" and "then."
there is only you.

james dean and me

(the assignment was to write a poem about a personal experience with a historical figure.)

I was mopping up

one day after we'd kicked out

all the raging alcoholics with their heads

on the bar;

and then I heard someone,

some young guy, solitary, making speeches

to an empty room,

his face twisted up in circles,

his voice attacking his mouth like a mad dog —

"You're tearing me apart!"

I felt obligated to apologize.

I said hey, why don't you let me pour you a gin and tonic,

and I said hey, what's your name

and he said, "Call me Jim,"

and I asked him, hey, are you okay?

We went up to the roof and looked at the sky for a while,

and no planetarium could ever

look like that, not all raw and proud like the night sky —

and I think I fell asleep,

because when I woke up he was telling me that

the universe had ended

and I sat bolt upright,

nearly knocking over his

(newly refilled)

gin and tonic.

He said "Watch yourself," and grinned;

"The life you save might be mine!"

His words dissolved together like watercolors.

I could smell the alcohol that had dripped onto his red jacket,

like a poppy field (or an oil spill);

I asked him if maybe

he'd had a bit too much to drink

and he told me:

"We alcoholics

are the last true hopeless romantics."

I could see the shape of his ribcage beneath his sliced-up shirt.

His breathing was a slow, tormented

rise and fall.

Then he looked down and smiled and said,

"I need the gin because sometimes I don't know

what I'm doing here but when I have a glass in my hand,

I stop caring about that."

The look he gave me made me think that

if I'd touched him he would have

cracked apart right there on the roof.

We went back downstairs,

threw snowballs at passing cars,

spray-painted the side of the bar with sappy slogans

(he told me "one day these will all come true, I know it")

and we laughed for years and years

until he said he had to go

I asked him, let me read for Mr. Mineo,
and I'll be your Plato if you'll be my Jim,
and half the things I want to say
won't be in the script,

and he said,
"I've run out of time. I'm too little and it's too late."

I will tell you that when he got into his car to drive away

I had a bad feeling.

buddha

(the assignment this time was to write a villanelle. which is pretty difficult. wiki it.)
(i should probably note that this poem is about the death of the buddha, whose name was siddhartha gautama; he died from eating some rancid pork that was offered to him.)
(i should also note that i do not remember how this goes, so it may suck.)

they give you their love and their rancid meat.
they come for your words like a thief in the night.
dearest siddhartha, oh do not eat.

you finally found that universal peace.
they grab at your robes, the red and the white.
they give you their love and their rancid meat.

you are their harbor in stormy seas.
they bring their gifts to your guiding light.
dearest siddhartha, oh do not eat.

they swallow down every word you preach.
"give, do not want!" "befriend, do not fight!"
they give you their love and their rancid meat.

oh gautama, rise up and flee!
leave their offerings! take your flight!
dearest siddhartha, oh do not eat!

you are everything that they want to be.
they are proud of their hands but they covet your sight.
they give you their love and their rancid meat.
dearest siddhartha, oh do not eat.

ode to a sheet

At the end of the day
I'm all
ankles
and arms
and I don't really
see you
(the woolen comforter,
you've been overtaken,
the dark plaid that seeps
like a wine stain over
your pale face;)
but I made this bed
and I can rip
it up
and over
to find
you.

I never know the answer
for why I stay up this late
and you, unshaken,
never ask the question.

Sometimes in the night
when all my ankles and arms
get
twisted up
in your tangles,
you hold me down
hold me safe
so those devils at my heels
can't
drag me away,
not until I'm awake.

You and my
fingertips,
a bruise on my shin,
my eyelashes
and my lips
are enough
to know I'm
still beneath
the sheets,
still breathing,
still asleep.

ode to a knife

(note: i'll be posting my writing as readers homework here. the assignment this time was to write two odes to ordinary objects in the style of pablo neruda.)

O knife,
I have been warned about
you —
your innocence,
inadvertent
your accidents —
What lovely shine!
What perfect edge!
What immortal hand or eye
could really,
truly,
use you?

Sometimes when I'm
tired,
or I've been torn down,
fallen to the bottom of the ground,
you can catch me
on a knife's edge;
I am captured by the way
you slide,
smooth like a smile like
a silver tongue;
every second I am swayed
and I want to take,
wrap my hand around the
self-assured black of your handle
and see what you can do.

But I catch
my reflection (wide-eyed)
in your silver face,
o knife,
you tempt us with power
and rein us in with
reminders.

Dear blade.
Ruled by physics
(ruthless in killing),
I will leave you stuck,
magnetized,
I will leave you to hands
not so young and stupid
as mine.

alkaline trio, hamlet, metropolis, murse, spoleto (or: settle down)

a flare of fasting
last time we talked,
i really want it but
i still blanched at the thought

and when i said,
"our kids will be —"
i stopped pretty
suddenly
for obvious reasons.

all i want.
all i want is to reach in there,
maybe down my throat,
maybe plunge my hand straight through
my sternum
like i saw in a certain photograph
(except that was a child,
and it was the grim reaper pulling out all
of his insides and leaving a flap of a shell.)

reach in there,
and grab my heart

(hold that in one hand)
reach into my brain,
pluck out a body

stick the heart in the body
and i'm good to go!

i used to think of music but now all i hear is
this could be love,
(LOVE FOR FIRE)
and men with fatally gorgeous names
and fingers on a long-necked bass

i used to think of soliloquies but now all i see is
his sleazy, anorexic body, oozing sex,
oh hamlet, spit out those words,
sear that poor girl's brain;
let those guards force you to the ground

from this time forth,
my thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth

ralph nader

"turned on"
apt for a punk rocker;
the guy was forty-five minutes late
so i was reading
about a punk rocker;

my mother,
gleaming,
forty years of hero worship which my dad
called a "cult of personality,"
and that sent me into echoes of
YES WE CAN

applause louder than apologies,
preceding the slow, methodic dismantling of
hope
and change
and i wondered how

my mother
was doing.

overcast, warmish and really windy had me grinning like a moron
but after torrents,
yes, torrents,
railing against the collapse of my fragile faith,
and i was thinking of how he was held up
by pillars made of credit cards and brand-new drugs,
(it was a dark and stormy night)
i said "this weather is stupid"

but then i couldn't see where i was going
(mr. obama, where are we going?)
and my umbrella
doing its best to cheer me up
flipped inside out like eight times and
i said "this umbrella is stupid"

and then i almost walked into the pond
and i started grinning like a moron.

"if you let me have my way i swear i'll tear you apart"

if i could collect all the lies you spit
like snake venom from your lips

if i could take that black hole in your throat
that makes your guilt go down so slow

if i could peel those scars from your legs
make smooth skin from the red

if i could inhale all the smoke in your mouth
when you exhale it carefully, wincingly out

then i would.

i would swallow it all down.

and then one day,
when you finally snapped,

i would give it all back

ten thirteen

all gone to my head.
images. stage lights.
this is the voice you wish you had.
take me with you,
ecstasy,
give me that tab on my tongue
i need it like i need a cancer in my lungs

gorgeous looking so
tortured up and twisted,
pretending to be cute,
but later on,
[when you're all alone again]
when you're [you'll be] naming constellations with a noose
it's only because you wanted to be missed

i almost feel sorry for what i did

the way you put your hand on my mouth,
and i'll stop struggling when you've smiled long enough,
and all those things you whisper in my ear
and all those stories you beg to hear
my dear,
it took everything i had,
but i liked it the hazier you became

sure. i'll hold you.
i'll tell you a story
and i'll tell you a promise
and i'll say "i would die too, with you"
and i would let you eat up
every empty word i said

but i had a good night.

raw and rushed.
stripped, sabled,
vicious, the victory
welling up in the depths of me

basically i'm sitting on the couch and cheering.

because revenge is a cliché
(dear hamlet, if only i could put you somewhere
that deserved your fragile, thrilling self)
but revenge + mahone will never not be awesome.

i had a bad morning.

pin me down like a butterfly.
crack open my chest.
there's a fine layer of compassion there,
thin and soft like a spiderweb;
you could yank it out easily
discard it
in the scraps by your feet;

i will not promise
that i won't fight back

to keep you from seeing past
those spiderwebs
beyond the pink and red;

hope would not sing for me
so i took it gently by the wrist
gutted it,
splattered it all over my own voice,

i sing with a hope on my voice that doesn't
feel
quite
right

but maybe to you it sounds like church bells

i am the canary
that you take into the coal mine

when i stop singing
you will drop my cage
deep underground

and run toward the light

"we prey as wolves among the sheep and slit the necks of soldiers while they sleep"

dearest son,
your mother and i
we are the ones,
the ones
who feel this love for fire,

who applaud when they run planes into towers,
god, that power,

we laughed when they shot the president
back in '63,
oswald, the mafia, and me,
and when jackie climbed over
the back of the car to grab the pieces of his brain,
god, we howled,
all that blood on her dress,
jackie darling, that's gonna leave a stain,

we vote pro-life
so that when those young girls want abortions,
they'll have to stab up their insides,
there's no more doctors, dearest daughters,
so will it be coat hangers or knives?

and we go to all those parades,
say we hate the jews and the blacks and the gays,
but really, we just like to see them all fucked over
we like to see them writhe
and all those straight christian whites
with no education
saying "thank god for damnation!"

and dearest son,
we're gonna pin it all on you,
take the blame
(it comes with the family name)
and in a decade or two
when everyone hates you
we'll be laughing at you too
because you're a decent man, dear son,
but you won't be able to take it.
no.
not those years and years and years and years
of shame.

boy with stars

sitting in the back row with
a video camera in his hand

singing out those songs with
a hope in his voice


watching the stage with
stars in his eyes


when he gets home he will watch his video
and someday he will give it to others so they can watch it
and he will give them stars
for their eyes too

young man, pick up your guitar.
we'll need your trusty chords for this war.
make sure you play those songs wherever you go.
'cause all these new bands are sleepin'
but some kids here said they wanna dance.

kick start

there is no white line

one day i will look up and notice the power
and
the glory

eastbound i can't see but for
spots of light where did you go after i
promised to drive you home but then
left you sitting on the curb with
a rip in your shirt and a half-empty bottle of bear

in those two seconds when
i'm wondering that

it would only take two seconds for me to
jerk the wheel toward the other lane
i hope they hit the side of my car
so that i am pulled toward
the other driver
who will see the dreams on my face

shards of glass on the curb

where you left your anger

and your ripped t-shirt



tomorrow is another day

push pin black holes

stable stable this is not real
the pretense of love i show her is so wrong
breakdown breakdown how would you feel
if i said i haven't told you the truth in so long?

liar liar i am the one who
feels so guilty every time i see her
empty empty i already told you
this is nothing and i am its keeper.

re: new yorker, page 128 ("the way" by albert goldbarth)

the endless blue, where you can't
tell where the sky ends and the ocean
begins, where the middleman is missing
and it's just wind and water just
wind and water for thousands and
thousands of miles;

and he was right, it's silly to name it
"the sky"
because this is what it is:
it is
the piece of everything — absolutely everything,
the entire universe, everything that exists right now —
that you see
through the trees in your backyard

where the middleman goes missing
the earth drops away and there are
years and years of light separating us
from the sun and from all the milky ways
that no one sees

i'll

never grasp it

(do the stars conspire
to kill us all with loneliness?)



i will reach up my hands and they will be
silhouettes against the sky

metamorphosis

headlights
a dark night

blood spattered
he burned
so bright

"five months"
"should have
said something"
it's a slap in the face
you can hear the sound of
that trust falling out and it
stings

daylight
(can you see clearly now? i'll
show you again, look:)

"in me"
"you don't know"
did you ever think about it that way?
i bet you didn't and now
there's a guilt surging up your spine like the bones
surging up his spine and it
stings

are kerosene and a lighter ever the right thing to do?
but look at them, isn't that exactly what you wanted
to see

and when he used to say "not alone"
it meant something and his brother
would feel like he wasn't alone
but now it sounds thin enough
to be torn in half by the breath of a child

headlights
a dark night
it's been a long couple of days.
and it still stings
they're trying to open up their wounds
expose them to the air to let
them heal but by the time this thing is over
each of them is
hurting
a little more
than they were before.

second son of joseph

grassy knoll next to a brick red [facade]
[full of] books, stacks of books -and [but]
[no glassy shine] -bubbles, could you still see if
the sun were a little bit closer?

if you reach
then maybe you can touch it

doubled down double dare
give it a try, a wink, a gold tooth
winking [in the texas sun]
the sun is [much] too warm today

if you see clearly
then maybe you can touch it

someone looked up and saw you but
it's too late. "well, it's all over now"
you said, when the ocean blue came [in]
pulled you offstage out of the sun

if your hand is steady
then maybe you can touch it

grassy knoll next to brick red [facade]
things look normal today, you know, except
a white x
in the middle of the road where

NOVEMBER 22ND, 1963

a crack
the crowd gasps
and brains spill all over
jackie's lap

if your sight is true
then maybe

(who were the ones who told you that?)

metropolis

i snapped (literally) and pretty pretty, it was aflame,
the whole goddamn building,
i told you i'm not good with precision,
and god, it howled

flames like me
they lick at my hands with their wet, hot little tongues
they run up and jump up on my legs and chest
and lick my face with their wet, bright little eyes

and they howl
not at the moon
they howl at the whole goddamn world

i like the warmth, and cold will kill me one day
(i promise you that, motherfucker the whole goddamn
building is ablaze — don't you dare tell me it's my fault.
i'm the one who's dying
in the inferno
the inferno likes me, it burns like a fever,
and when it sees me, it explodes)

i can't see the floor it's
two feet in front of my face, the heat and the blindness
smoke, sweat pouring off my back, all together now:
you're one serious fuckup, damien! now god PLEASE
GET ME OUT OF HERE.

it's so cold that i can see the mist
of my breath
in front of my face

it looks like cigarette smoke

for obvious reasons

good evening.
i'm damien.
i'm the fire man
(not the fireman)

and one day i'll stop dreaming.

(thank god for cloudy nights. the sunset is enough to break me
into a million desperate little pieces.)

castiel is not angela

when wings unfurl in shadows
and there's longing in all that you see
when your only hope is hit the ground
while necks are snapped one two three

when you're doing so well with looking so strong
but you just end up broken instead
then you know it's time to go straight back home
before your brother winds up dead.

there were eighty-seven advil in the bottle now there's thirty left. i ate forty-seven so what happened to the other ten? -tmbg

when we were awake.

when we were still sleeping.

the pain that you take.

the life you're still keeping.

they sing you that song.

they tell you, "lie down."

you've slept for so long.

but you can't just die now —

the bottle is clear.

your lies are so clouded.

the answer's right here.

don't tell me you've found it.

your breath comes so slow.

i will make you do this.

i won't let you go.

not til you've fought through this.

not fair

the shining source. the deadly dark.
the scarlet wound. the purple mark.
the evil lives beneath the ground.
listen for that wailing sound.

a song i never thought i'd hear.
the flashing sirens look so near.
but when they get here, hide away.
they're here to hurt and they're here to stay.

so i'll lie across the yellow lines.
this mess we're in is wholly mine.
i'll greet the policemen in their golden crowns.
i'll let the policemen beat me down.

alleluia, enigk 4:11

i spent all my life living outside, 

frozen in between a name,

the sun beating down with its final words,

the light on my back, the heat of the blaze,

i spent all last year floating along,

wondering where that current ran,

the one that pushed you to another home,

the heart that pulled you to another man,

i spent all my weekends dying in fashion,

living off lipstick, feeding on attention,

the choking down and the daily seizures,

waiting for the final ignition,

i spent my last days burning slowly,

casting my salted wishes aside,

i will not run down these circles again;

i will follow the will of the rising tide.

hum vee sobriety

a mushroom cloud by the side of the road
if you ever light up, i'll be there
i would stop you but
i'm missing a limb

no hands to reach out and take
the fire from your lips

buried belonging to the sand
the medicine man, that vital organ
he is running down the well
but the well's run dry

war across the sea
see the land mines in me

quantum physics inside a place
where there is no place for them
confused and searching
we must find that one time when we all had a soul

you are the casualty
and i am your phantom limb

settle for shells

halfway open so you can hear half my words.
the red runs away like a devil in flight.
escape from the wound and stop your slow dying.
close your eyes if it gets too bright.

left behind, brought down, and right from the start.
under the weather and over the hill.
the smell of smoke gives away all your secrets.
if you won't believe me, then surely i will.

wait for the pistol or start up the shooting.
you're so impatient to hear that sound.
the race isn't over, so just shut up and run.
you may be losing, but i've been found.

my favorite plum

sapped of all warmth.

dyed through with black.

the waves that you're riding

and the sails you lack.

your will is the leaf,

your heart is the limb.

the trembling.  the bending.

so fragile.  so slim.

you smile at the sun

but wilt in the heat.

your skin is so bitter,
your flesh, so sweet.

sigur rosss

a rowboat,
a sea of lily pads and a sun the size of a silver dollar;

all the colors upside-down,
a night-black pond and a golden flower atop a disc of orange;

the plucked flower,
held in my shaking hands;

i wanted to offer it;
but you were looking away,
into the shining night sky —

or rather the water's surface,
dotted with slivers of brightness,
the sunset's way of laying a comforting hand on my shoulder;


i saw

you




and you
were looking away

eight hours of

pulling off the top of the container,
the smell of raspberry tea rising
as i tilt it forward;

a distraction and a porch light,
the stars in shades of orange,
a violin in the background (or is it cicadas?);

husbands or boyfriends?
forgetting to think about that
and thinking about you instead;

scared and knowing i shouldn't be,
surprised and still trying to get my head around it,
switching a useless black for a warm blue;

raspberry tea
dripping down my wrist
and onto the floor.

ode to cloves, take two (i'm hoping for some redemption)

you heard me say the word "bitter"
when i was talking to you
but it wasn't about you

even though everything should be about you
because the new dawn blazing out from your city
stuns me every single morning

sometimes i just slow down because
i don't want to hear words anymore
and i feel bad because i lie

i lie and say i love you, goodbye
when i really mean i love you, please stay,
please help me out a little bit here

which is selfish, i realize,
but i can't help it that i've gone back to my old ways
and the word "collapse" is the angel dancing on the head of a pin

take me back to where i was
before i learned the word "bitter"
so that you would never hear me say it

sometimes i slow down but sometimes
i make a swift descent, like going straight down the middle
of a spiral staircase

i could reach out and grab an iron step
to stop my fall

but the concrete of the floor below me
looks so warm

that i remember you (hopesfall hopes fall)

aligned north, pulled by the mountains,
unable to sway ourselves from the satellites;
things are crashing down around us;
our cameras are trained on the falling towers.

in a hundred years, we'll be buried under the mountains,
piles of ash compressing our bones into useless rubies;
but the surface of the earth will be littered with
pictures of the rotting world in its final days.

you don't have to come with me.
i have a satellite dish to guide me home —
i will not be that man who exits;
but you are weightless, pulled down by possibility.

please don't bend down to the steel in the ground.
across the bay, taillights wait for a voice to free them.
if you are weaker than i believe,
then i believe the earth will swallow you.

angry emo poem

a little while ago, i couldn't tell when i had a headache
but now my head is falling into quarters
(cracked through vertically,
sliced open horizontally;)

i thought i was going to go to sleep,
but i need to stay up so i can
KILL
this PAIN
on time —

four hours between the smaller ones
six hours between the bigger ones
(it used to be eight, but i got tired of waiting)
(i go early sometimes if it starts making me curl up)

and when they rip the stitches out from behind my teeth,
and my brain comes cascading down through the sockets
and spills out my mouth
maybe i'll write another shitty poem like this one

and you can be disgusted with it
and leave me here




angry angry emo emo emo

worse for wear

it's been a long time since i've been around.
i sleep in a hotel room for the sake of not living.
i need that feeling of being kicked out.
i need that feeling of sleeping alone.

the typewriter in front of me is on its knees.
my tired mind gives it a supplicant voice:
"will you please start seeing things on their sides?
will you please look through them instead of away?"

i looked through the drawer
(and saw a razorblade)
i looked through the ceiling lamp
(could it take my weight?)

half-finished cigarettes mashed between the keys
crumpled inspiration in a heap on the floor
at the top of the page, a few words: "sometimes, i just want to"
and then rows and rows and rows and rows and rows
of x's

rise against the sails

"all because of you, i haven't slept in so long,
and when i do i dream of drowning in the ocean,
longing for the shore, where i can lay my head down.
i'll follow your voice. all you have to do is
shout it out."

i'm walking the thin line between "slipping away"
and "too far gone" (to be saved)

the waves on all sides
and the rhythm of the bruises that cover me

i won't deny it; we lost control
i don't know if the screeching was real or just in my head

or if lightning split the mast
or just my exhausted lungs

if i can smell the blood, then i'm sure they can too
sweetest salvation, take me home.

le coucher de soleil

if someone told you,
"there's no such thing as safety,"
would you believe them?
i think i did for a while.

but the sun in slow descent
gave me a place to put all my fears and doubts.

that glowing star sank into the earth.
that shifting shimmer slid away across the water.

i gave the sunset my eyes,
but the sun wasn't the one racing through my mind.

dear you,
i believe in safety.

forty-eight psalms (this one isn't really true)

some days i look up and say,
"god, you're not the sharpest tack,
but it's all right; i know you're great.
i know that someday you'll come back."

and this one could have been the last time,
so help me find my memory.
help me find the reason and rhyme.
help me find out what this could be.

if i show you chance, will you show me truth?
you're losing the race, but i'm still at the start.
let me put my insecurity in you.
i'm living twice as fast with half a heart.

i pushed away the fear inside.
silhouettes against the sky.

accident prone on a sunny day

hey, how's your
summer going?
this is when you really know.

a tic mark on the wall for
every broken arm and leg.
in the summer, i'm accident-prone.

i stared at hope, trying to
secure it in my mind,
but i've only got half of it down.

because there are other words
scrolling by, evicting my thoughts:
"it's brighter with you around."

i've been waiting two years
for my day to arrive,
i think it's still waiting in the wings.

and i nearly did some good,
but now i'm just all scratched up.
someday i'll tell you everything.

track eleven

a slow drum beat. a major chord.
my heartbeat echoes the bass line.
i'm not running down in circles anymore.
i'm happy. i really am.

i say:
"this night was a blessing."
the song says:
"sometimes. sometimes."

i wish there were more times like these.

the hammocks

three suns on the surface of the river.
flowers in the summer breeze.
skies the color of oceans.
two weeks spent hoping to hear your voice again.

i can't take my eyes off of you.
i can't take my eyes off of you.

eye alaska wrote a song called "i knew you'd never fly"

half of you is soaring. i can hear it.
but your other half is an anchor.
your sails are made of paper. they're tearing apart.
look up. sunlight is waiting for you to greet it.

you live on complete calm.
steady and sleeping. fearless and blind.
the origami tigers on your wall can only look so alive.
look up. darkness is waiting for you to find it.

all the sad, sorry words in the world can't give you redemption.
if you set yourself on fire, would you even notice?
burn bright. stay with me.
feel your heart beating. feel the fever that stirs you to sing.

i'm flying. you're dreaming.
please, help me out.

july 4th

i am talking about things i don't like
and i am acting like someone i am not
it's strange and sort of scary

i see my cousin and her "friend" by the volleyball net
she leans on him
i wish you were here to lean on me

there are chocolate-covered strawberries on a blue-checked plate
i know you like them
"do you want one?" i do not ask

watching fireworks, i am intensely conscious of
the empty space next to me
(there is actually a paper plate there)
it brings me down

i watch the spinners and the fireflies
i wonder which one you would like best

it's windy and i'm cold
if i were blocking the wind for you, i wouldn't mind
as it is, i mind

"are you all right?" my mother asks
"i miss her" i do not say
my voice reminds me that i am alone

i wish you were here
i think you'd like it
i know i'd love it

black pools of insomnia under his eyes

cigarettes don't seem like such a bad idea
crawl toward me. i want to see you do it.
are there scars on your palms and knees?
do we at least have that in common?

i'm not too strange for this.
i just close my eyes a lot. i just give myself headaches a lot.
the skin is stretched too tight across my temples.
my headaches. they scream. they thrash.

i usually don't believe in god.
pretty girls with cigarettes don't inspire much hope.
but after i collapse, i'll be able to keep crawling.
because i believe.

there's a song in my head. it only showed up when you showed up.
it can't be about you until i know why it's about you.

"see you in the shallows"

the rift in the hull spoke of sunken treasures,
when it screamed its dementia to me;
a seaborne storm is no way to measure
the breadth of any man's bravery;
since no mortal man can stand and face
the terror of the ocean's foaming wall,
each mortal man must take his place
on deck and wait for the wave to fall.

when the seething red dawn was over at last,
i stood on a cliff and looked down to the sea;
the angry tide was falling fast —
it showed me my crew, staring up at me.
i thought i saw blood, but i couldn't be sure;
i was distracted by the peaceful faces of my crew.
there could be no blood, the water's far too pure.
i leaped down to join them, in the clear, shining blue.

seven million

each time i glimpsed myself in a mirror,
i saw only grey, uniform and running.
so i went back to black boxes and pale eyes
and sunny days and some raving intellect.
it was all right, for a while.
but everything's all right
only for a while.

i tried to say, "good memories."
but it came out as "i'm missing something."
my tongue is slashed to bits with sugar crystals
that leave me strung out and sliding downhill.
etch the good memories behind my eyes
so that i'll know where to find them,
because otherwise i'll never remember that they happened at all.

when i looked for solace in a story,
i found only roses that ripped me apart,
which is a rarefied kind of stupidity, i know,
but i couldn't deny my compassion's shattered confidence.
sometimes i wish that everything didn't remind me
of the very best things i keep inside myself
and use to slowly burn me up into an empty, loving shell.

so i decided to stop being stupid
and made the damn call already.

deconstructed

life isn't shit as long as i can stand up. as long as i can write, i'll know i'm still thinking. as long as i can sing, i'll know i'm still breathing. don't wait to talk to me. i swear i'll share this bottle if you tell me what you believe. i don't get paid a lot. i get high a lot. sometimes my friends wait up for me. sometimes they know it's best to go on without me. i'm getting old. i disagree. protests are fun, sad little things. if you want to haul your voice into the air, don't be surprised when it flies upward untethered. have you ever lost control? i have. it made my head crash into a million places. i love it. i wish it never happened. i know i told you i'd share this bottle, but i hope you won't mind if it's gone by the time you get here. i don't want a light. i want a fire. can you look into me and see if you can find it? i know i left it there somewhere. i can feel it in my stomach and my jaw and my inner ear. can you reach it? it's pretty far down. you know, i don't even have a van. is that sad? i'm not sad. only my face is sad. i promise. no, i'm not drunk. shit. get out of my goddamn face. i've been smashing bottles blind for a while here. where are my car keys? oh right. no van. no fucking car either. i'm not angry. i'm just a little sad. i promise.

my own psalm (thank you, blake)

o angel wings, o pistol bore.
don't raise me up. please ask for more.
i found six things that made you cry.
i love the things that made you lie.

o weeping song, o falling sound.
it's always black with you around.
beware the man. beware the beast.
for they're the ones who love you least.

o fifty years, o crashing wall.
it's been so long. were you here at all?
i saw you when you came to town.
it's always bright with you around.

o waiting phone, o sinking glass.
how long is it since i saw you last?
these cathedral walls can only frown.
it's always good with you around.

i miss you so, but you don't know.
i guess i'll wait for you to come home.

sonnet III

i liked last night, for all its heavy storms,
while i held you like my own lucky charm;
i did my very best keep you warm,
though freezing rain collected in our arms;

and there are days i don't know what to say,
so i just waver, struck dumb by your smile;
but when it's midnight, we forget those days,
and we just stand there, silent for a while;

the silhouettes of trees were bright and clear,
while you were shaking in the cloudy chill;
i thought, "these angry nights give us such fear."
and wished you'd be content to just stand still;

because there was lightning flashing in the sky,
but i saw fireflies flashing in your eyes.

the four horsemen

the evil lives in the ground;
those who stand in the shadow of the mountain are doomed;

bridges scream; walls cry;
rain thunders down like the severed hearts of firstborn sons;

voices erupt from the ocean;
Time and Space and Death are uttered to the forbidden air;

this heat boils human bodies;
their flesh is pulled apart and used as harpstrings;

in my dreams,
glory goes forth from the hand of god.

immersed in the magic city

when he spoke to me, he said, "water washes away red hearts"

brand new and neverending, isn't it the same thing?

i haven't been selfish for a while, so:



forget it.
i'm not going to ask you.
because i won't be satisfied with the answer.

i still can't stop listening to jawbreaker

the way you don't back down is lovely
and the way you laugh at me is great.
i like hearing it so much that, well,
not all these screw-ups are mistakes.

the way your hands twist when you're worried
is sad, true, but it looks so nice;
there are times when i just let you worry and frown.
you're my secret. you're my vice.

the way your heart beats in my chest
and i feel you breathing in and out,
it's keeping me. it's killing me.
i'm yelling it out before it breaks me down,
breaks me now:

I
WANT
YOU.

oh niiine

i want to blow up the whole world out of joy
i want to drive my car off a bridge because i know it'll fly
i want to run around like a tyrannosaurus rex
i want to dance in circles until i fall down half-dead

so come on.
let's take the time to throw our friends into ponds
and fall down and roll around and laugh our way through
and let's wait to take a nap for a couple more days now.

talk radio

when people hate my kind
but i'm too far away

when people are going to descend
but i'm too far away

when people need my help
but i'm too far away

i'm supposed to be the one
who's bad to the bone
but their dirty voices cut through me
and through my bones
and sometimes it's tough to handle.

so i toss down my responsibility
and let some long-haired no-brained kid pick it up
and sometimes i feel okay with that
and sometimes i don't.

a lame poem i wrote after the french exam

if you don't wait up,
that's okay.
i'll just sit on the skyline
and greet the day.
these city lights look just like
candles in the breeze
compared to the sun and
the way you smile at me.

thirteen broken mirrors
and black cats are fine
because this morning, i'm yours,
and this morning, you're mine.
so if you want to go and grab
a cup of coffee, my dear,
don't worry about it.
i'll be right here.

live from abbey road

i wish he'd been dreaming with a broken heart
instead of lamenting sir newton
and the way he sinks to earth all the time

i wish he'd talked about how the drugs don't work
instead of staying in his mold
and being a million different people every other day

i wish she'd asked herself why she didn't come
instead of running around fairgrounds
and staying by the carousels just for the ups and downs

i wish i'd asked for a love and a kiss
instead of thinking about a young boy
who isn't there yet

someday, i will find the real world (inside this one)
while its outer shell falls apart
and it will be bigger and brighter
and only good things will happen there

shirt (more blake)

you are a glider
(don't need no one to fly)
you are an astronaut
(make me believe in the sky)
you are a box of matches
(tell me what i see)
you are a bouquet
(bring the sun's beauty to me)

you know,
none of that's right

because you are a metaphor for something
something good and beautiful and free

but i don't know what it is,
darling, i just can't figure you out.

angela montenegro

when bones look like butterflies
and lungs lack commitment
when skin falls into a fearless sleep
and finds no sorrow in it

when angels fly you through the louvre
and smile as you paint the sky
then i know that we can make it there
we'll make it, you and i.

wire in the doves (goodbye)

there was a man who told you to
reset things by releasing
a flock of doves;
and they would fling down mass graves
and you would think you were doing something right
and you would feel like you were finally worth some grace

because no one else much liked your mind
when they peeled away the outside,
crumpled it up, and put it in their pockets;
they left you on the floor
but i don't want you on my floor
i want you dancing on the roof

but you danced off the edge of it.

buried

i woke up in the backseat of a car
the earth stifled us on all sides
(yes, you were there too)
and i couldn't remember anything for
the fog in my brain that some strange demon
had breathed just for fun;
but you called down the lightning
and heaven hauled us out of there, so
thank you.

but then

i woke up in the backseat of a car
this time, the air was free and plenty
and you were telling me how the honesty spilled
from my fingers and the backs of my eyes.
we drove toward a sea-green sky split with
crawling black branches that caged me in,
but let you drive;
you opened the door so i would tumble out
and you told me, "goodbye, this isn't your fault,"
but where'd you go?

i stopped waking up
and lay there on the dirt road
thinking about explosions that would destroy this place.

addendum to the schwarzenbach-inspired rant

i'll give my veins sugar amphetamines
and my tortured liver these pills;
but i think maybe the alcohol's the reason
i can't stop lying so much, so still.
i used to be able to handle every drug i knew,
but cocktails were never meant to include you.

blake schwarzenbach is another one of my heroes

i'm smoking something and i
don't know what the hell it is;
i'm seeing things that [send] are
sending me into six kinds of fits;
boys on their knees at the feet of priests
and my son making a call from jail to me.

where did you run to late last night after
we started to ignore the electronic snow?
i wanted to follow you so i could find you;
next time when you leave, just please, walk slow.
the night was black, but my eyes were starred;
i'm trying to give you up, but it's just so hard.

when my brother asked me what i wanted for christmas,
i told him a bottle of johnnie walker would be nice.
throw me into space so i can miss all my friends.
throw me in the backseat and read me my rights.
there's no higher place or broader scale here;
just an empty man surrounded by empty cans of beer.

i feel exhausted

it's about the journey.
and the journey was bad enough.
what lies at the end, that's supposed to be
the final reward,
right?

but that was no reward.
that was a cruel joke.
i had the best minds in the world on my side,
but long-term damage and lack of rest take their toll,
and the worst part is:

it's not even anyone's fault.

all i have is keeping her cold.
all i have is never feeling her warmth again.

it was about young people

the yellow hair fallen over his face,
the green that obscured the mourning;
the blue that washed all castles away,
the white that signaled warning;

the golden path that led her there,
the red that called them to rise;
the black that nearly pulled them astray,
and last, the whites of their eyes.

a band called burning airlines

they pointed us toward falling stars,
and told us that's how we're supposed to steer;
they locked us in our rooms with police at our doors
and told us THERE'S NOTHING TO FEAR.

but now my child is dying,
and faith has never seemed so impure;
they told me to stop searching,
but i swear to god, THERE IS A CURE.

all the martyrs i once idolized
turned to sinners as soon as i looked away;
this aviary's nice, but the wires are still there;
the police grin and tell me THEY'RE HERE TO STAY.

it's chilly

surrounded by her
and the rushing of air;
the sounds try to touch us,
but the stillness is there.

i took my brain back, sorry i didn't ask first

i swear to god i'll have your eyes,
i'll seize them by force, if that's what it takes,
i want to ask them about the way they lie,
and how i could make such a horrible mistake.

i swear to god i'll tie you down,
and take them both out by hand;
and after they've watched us madly drown,
i'll see you below in the promised land.

riley's hands lying on the snare

if i was weary,
and my back bent off to a side,
and, like metal, refused to bend back —

if i was weary,
and my arms were sore and my hands blistered
from supporting those who cannot support themselves —

if i was weary,
and my eyes were red and welling
with seas that reflected the evils i was forced to witness —

would you still give me a smile?

i know you would.
i would find you in an old house,
on the bank of a lake,
and you would sing me a song and play the guitar
and i would sit and close my eyes and sway.

only in dreams

i want to be made of red and gold
i want to fly and not fall down
i want to be reborn in a circle of green eyes
i want to kill the demons that would eat the innocent children

i want the city to light up with the hope of millions
i want an angel to be born from my strength
i want this place to be made-up,
and that other one to be real.

andy

kids shouldn't have vitamin D deficiencies
or epilepsy medicine prescriptions
or dead mothers

kids should have safety
and soft knit caps
and lots and lots of love.

on a wire

with no home

I've been living alone for fifty years,
and I'll stay here for fifty more,

but you're not all alone, my dear,
you have friends beneath the floor.

no one dies at the end

but really, even if i didn't want them
to get together, she was pretty enough
to make it okay, and the way her arms moved
and her wrists let her hands lie
was nice.

and really, the bad wolf is gone
(hit by a car, don't you know)
and the tigershark trailed smoke over him
(he called out its name, but it couldn't
it couldn't save him.)

now really, isn't it time
that we let the mayor marry a crazy woman
and let the boy rip up our stumbling zombies
and let a swinging, still young man lead us
(to a new life system)
and let the drugs do the talking?

murder by death is a band who wrote this cool lyric

you know, you drink a lot.
and your job pays minimum wage.
and you get in fights over the smallest things.
and you know you'll never settle down.

but hey,
if a guy ever knocks you out cold,
i'll smash a bottle over his head,
and if your boss ever screws you over,
i'll slash his tires for you,
and if a girl ever uses you and throws you away,
i'll spill red wine on her dress by "accident."

because
"i know there's better brothers,
but you're the only one that's mine."

soy sauce

most days,
everyone speaks, and
sometimes listening is no pleasure;

but one day,
for the cause of love,
the only sound was laughter.

you won't know. (which is a Brand New title as well)

I heard your voice calling across that space,
proud of something that wasn't yours,
yearning for approval because
you think that you are not enough.

And yes, I'll look down on you for it,
because if you are not enough,
then what do you have? who do you have?
If you say you're not enough, then
it becomes true, you fool, you brainless en-soi.

(I understand that this is harsh,
but I've been hoping for a while
and I was in a good mood
and now that's all smashed to bits.)

i wonder what "eye candy" is in welsh

hey, now, don't you go away.
we've still got plenty of time to play.
put away your fears, the spring is here,
and this time, i swear it's here to stay.

the morning star's coming over the hill.
nine in the morning and it's rising still.
once again we found love buried underground.
ask me to hold your hand and i swear i will.

everyone dies at the end

i took a liking to her on paper
i read a long while
i wanted to hold her hand and wait
outside her window

some other guy got her, of course
on paper
some other guy gave her more words
some other guy knew she was a beauty

but everyone dies at the end
and the guy, he was okay, i guess
but the girl, i miss her.
and i never even met her but i miss her lots.

(and)
(i even miss the one i met)

my own mix

i felt like an insect
my intestines cascading up a glass pane

i felt like a dry leaf
my body cracking along the edges, flying

i felt like a drumbeat
my heart thick and deep and cool

i felt like a rivet
my face forever locked in a metal casket

i felt like collapsing
and breathing down and holding tight

things that aren't true

skip, skip go the ladies

slip, slip goes the boy

snip, snip go his scissors

but he never reaches their pearls

air! (a quatrain for each song)

i know they gave us lies
and still are keeping the truth
but i'll do my best to fly
and scream from the rooftops with you.

i wish we were more aware
of the awful things we've barely seen.
i want to reach out and care.
i want your daughter to live through her teens.

i don't need speech to talk
or control of my muscles to move.
i won't take you for a walk
but i'll fly you across the moon.

how can i live without my child?
how can i live with this pain?
i should have known your spirit was wild,
but you're lost to the sea anyway.

i will nudge you from the nest
and see you black against the sky.
all i want is to take my rest.
all i want is for you to fly.

i'll pick you up when you suffer.
i'll take you and ferry you above.
and though i have been your mother,
i'll do it without your love.

'cause things, they never work out right

I want to fall in a pirouette.
I want to hold a lock of hair.
I want you.
I feel it like a heart attack.

o madeleine

i'll tell you the truth:
there's a certain point after which
you stop dreaming,
and satin linings in rose and scarlet
are the only things that visit you
in your
(turmoil, thinking, waiting)
sleep;

and those sirens who bade you good night
have grown old and sunk to their watery graves,
and the wind has stopped whistling,
and the rain has stopped rapping,
and all you have left
is your
(unrest, breathing, curling)
silence;

and you will not see anything
and you will not hear anything
and you will not rest
but you will stay.

salt in every reason why

gasoline and letter openers
fire that fits on my skin
when I opened up, I
didn't mean to swallow down
all of hell.

cliffs and smashed feathers
staring contests with glazed-over eyes
when I told you I was dead, I
didn't expect you to take it
so well.

there's a fire in the school

a stampede filtering over
the hill
and they think they're not crushing me,
but look at my sunken chest
and my splintered limbs —
what will I do about that?

the flames licking at
the school
and they're not really there,
but look at my terrified eyes
and the smoke choking my breaths —
what can I do about that?

the hailstorm pounding against
the skylight
and it doesn't break through,
but look at the wrath of god striking at me
and the shards of glass parting my wet hair —

what am I supposed to do about that?

this child

i thought maybe it was my fault
when you got hit by that big SUV
i thought maybe i didn't love you enough
because love keeps our friends alive

i thought maybe i made a mistake
and skipped a prayer for the sake of sleep
i thought maybe i messed this up
because love is enough to keep our friends alive
right?

the following is utterly ripped off from "sic transit gloria... glory fades"

control control control control
control control control control

I was sitting there in the bar, having
so much fun;
I was sliding my hands along the counter
let's rewind a bit —

I was yelling in a place no one could hear,
"DIE YOUNG AND SAVE YOURSELF!"
and then suddenly
everyone else was yelling it too;

I was making them all shatter into pieces,
the glasses I mean,
because the people are mine, and
they were already broken anyway.

I was enjoying it, I was smiling
it was smiling twisted
but then I screamed it again at the wall,
but then I ran my hand down my body, and so did they;

I was making her show herself to me;
her eyes had nothing in them — I'd taken it away —
so I just asked her to show me her shoulder
no, that's a lie; I made her do it

He was waving and he was
making me wave back at him and I
had lost it because I had lost what was
inside of me; I was empty

He was making me wave back at him
He was making me wave back at him
I couldn't stop myself from waving back at him
He was making me do it

i lost control

I am in shock. !!!

I knew there was something strange about you
and it wasn't a red herring this time;

some things gave you away:
your red ribbons; your tidy home;
your tidy mind (but really you just
hid everything in the closets, didn't you?).

And you didn't recoil at Mr. Doe,
or beg to say that you lied,
or weep at the prospect of your true self
being exposed to the ignorant;

you just you always just
smiled.

après stop-loss

Our bodies are full up with blood,
so much that our skins can barely contain it;
and when we explode,
Pollock himself would applaud the result.

existentialism plus!

I believe in personal demons,
in digging up graves for fun,
in doing rain dances when a hurricane comes
until the grass is torn up beneath our feet.

All the trees in this mighty forest
depend on their roots to draw breath;
Men have no roots to keep us standing;
What are we doing? Where are we going?

Man is condemned to be free
and fly on wings of wax,
fearing the sun, the fog, and gusts of wind
that might trap him in the trees;

Don't put yourself up on a pedestal, boy,
You've done nothing good;
Everything was luck, it was all accidental,
We'll topple you down, boy, down, down, down!

I'll leap into the hellhounds' den
and let their red ripping jaws take me,
Because I'm no better than them, you see;
We're all condemned. We're all condemned.

Now our finale, boys and girls,
I'm going to step into a pit of fire;
Why don't you come forward and join me here?
It's only a matter of time.

And when (oh yes, when) you walk in here,
don't expect your right-handed glory;
your body is smoke and your spirit is ash,
billowing up into your sisters' throats.

There's no God up in that sky, you see,
but there's a devil beneath our feet.

There's no God up in that empty sky,
but there's a devil inside our minds.

mr. booth

there's a light,
in the skylight, past the sloughing of
the rain;

there's a light,
flashing over the brook, at the wide
window that bears witness to —

there's a light,
it flickers a thousand times a second,
or so, but my eyes understand;

there's a light,
in that boy's eyes, when he secures
himself in that man's arms —

but there's also a light
in the man's eyes, because
with that boy, he, too, is secure.

"get laid"

Those words are hideous,
Mr. Rike, you were right,
we've taken something sacred and
made it a game;

There are two halves to everyone,
and the body changes inevitably, but
the spirit is not as mutable,
and that's what counts — I hope —

because if it doesn't, then
only half of you will ever be satisfied;
"soul mates." Brave words
for a narcissistic generation.

Do us all a favor.
Treat her like a goddess.
She's kind enough to give you a chance;
please, be kind enough to really prove your worth.

small heart

an evergreen park;
searching, under the pine shadows
you will not drown here
because look around you:

you are not alone.
these growing angels are reaching
you don't need to take their hands,
because they are already holding yours.

take a breath.
it's so easy, isn't it?
so easy. don't savor it,
there will be many more like this.

wonder at the clouds you can't see,
at the treetops that cover you
like a new sky,
they protect you like a precious child,

an embrace that feels like the world
has conspired to love you and put
all its efforts into keeping you safe
and wonderful and so, so alive.

don't worry, young one.
they're above you. they're around you.
so listen:
you're not alone.

burning insides (this is one more sonnet)

The bible-burning rite leaves me inside,
With pages flying out the windowsill;
There's no place for this golden cross to hide,
So I'll ascend atop the burning hill.

As I draw close, I feel my insides freeze
Against the sour flame of burning books;
The soldiers seem to smile with such great ease;
Pretending is much harder than it looks.

I feel that some small part of me is dead:
I'm folding nothing into pleated squares
While demons crawl and sleep inside my head;
The ship is going down, still spouting flares.

They're burning God beneath a screaming sky.
I fall to ashes as the embers fly.

i'm sorry, colin, but

I don't like when people say
"we'll both go down together!"
and hats are thrown in the air, and
reviews full of praise are published,
and everyone says it's so great because
it's just so goddamn romantic!

well,
it makes me think of you and i
flinging ourselves off a veranda
and our bodies,
suffering slaves to our emotions,
bursting apart on the rocks below,
and our bones drift out onto the open ocean.

A rush of blood to the fingertips;
if we can feel each other
then we'll be close enough
and we won't have to become ghosts
to defy the laws of physics
and exist within each other.

i ran out

no more
numbers
no more grids
no more
nothing

i want my goddamn medal
i cried for your fallen
i stood for your pledges
i grew angry at your wars

i'm an angry latino
and i've never even been there
to cuba

i'm lying to get ahead
identify? i don't ify.
i just make lame plays on words

while i'm waiting for my medal

so give me my goddamn medal



please

it's fucking midnight and a half

sudoku that is
six by six;
"so strange i remember you" with church organ
set in
stone inside the temples behind my eyes; a
sound that
strays so far from the burning original;
stop and rest, he
says, from the back of my brain, you don't even
see anymore, and these
spiraling shapes are getting away from you.

six.
by six.

a couple of good quotes, and dustin, i love you lots.

"come all you weary."
gather 'round me
and i'll tell you some stories
that will give you courage to go on.

"we are bridges to someone's broken heart."
let's open ourselves up to each other.
let's grasp hands and pull each other to our feet.
we will lean on each other, and if you will teach me,
we can sing good songs to the wide, wanting road.

after sowing season, yeah!

I will not hold your hand!
I will not stroke your hair!
Don't look at me! Don't look at me!
I do not love you!

Twelve years, my darling, twelve years!
I've never seen the light of day!
This black cage is all your fault, my dear!
So break these black bars all away!

The heat weeps through my white-streaked skin!
Look at my arms, darling, look at my face!
This darkness goes for miles down further in!
I'll never see the end of me, of you, of this place!

There's a monster sitting across the stage
Who growls out his iron rule!
Your betrayal draws him to this cage,
And my screaming is his fuel!

So leave me dumb and blind, my dear,
Leave me below this earth!
I will sing and burn and drown in fear,
And await my second birth.