October Phoems in re: Girls, Anxiety, Autumn.

This fragile little leaf,

eyes like sad almonds,

she floats in flowers

and breathes gentle secrets

that ring of the tragedy of truth.

She scarcely looks further than the ground,

but when she dances and sings forgetting pain

she is often the only thing to punctuate my day

with a semblance of a smile,

with furrows finally carved north

with the volatility of joy.

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Here we go falling

insane little autumn rodents

muscles bulging and hungry teeth

restless hands and frightened eyes

jumping from limb to limb hand to mouth.

Winter will be long long

longer than we can stand

so here we go now while we

can still remember our names.

Just don't worry

when I build a nest of your hair

and seal myself in with lead

until the lashes of Easter

massage my eyes

and stir my spine.

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Relapse (with Ian)

What a day!

like a little skipping stone

we end it sidewalking

and talking from our assholes

in bright clouds of the wine

and love deep in our guts.

I am going to bed hungry

and yet am already bursting

with the thought of tomorrow morning

being spooned like butter

and golden cigarette butts

upon two no more well-deserving goats.

Sleep long, sleep well,

tomorrow we take Hell.

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The day unraveled in its nervous string,

webs of blonde anxiety spun through trees

and exploring my throat,

the last bittersweet guesses of my questions

whispering wind to your sails.

Sitting immobile my heart threatens to explode

like a blossom of sawblades to sever these shining ropes,

we will crash to earth like birds forgetting to fly

and meet eye to eye with broken ribs

and the wheezing justice of my anxious love.

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Nothing's good enough for you,

nothing is real enough,

is honest in its permanence,

least of not I.

But I Am and can do no else,

and I am Real and can be no else,

and have Faith enough for nations

in my honest contempt for the ephemeral.

I am good enough for I,

that I am good enough for me.

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Desert nights I'm glued to the surface of the lonely fucking moon. Knowing you and I are sleeping alone, no matter who breathes by our side, stealing air from our parted lips. It seems too easy, we two wrapped in pages and doom, and some nights, these lonely fucking nights I'm terrified at how little sense it all makes, at the injustice carving chasms through the mettle of a heart. I've surrendered to my eyes a sadness that will shape me beyond the veil of death, and until then I will walk breathe sleep with a patient vengeance.

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Staring at Kandinsky (Morphine)

Staring at Kandinsky,

wondering where the water goes,

wearing a disguise of my own skin.

Last night shudders rubber through my veins

like a thousand needles of sex,

thirty hours of dreaming

I'm made of air and laughter.

Morning all great erections aimed at no one,

day all eyelids and drag,

afternoon all coffee and stuttering,

night all pain wrapped in moth wings.

The walk home is as all walks home,

indifferent to the sky's indifference,

praying for exciting stab wounds

and an end to your boring bullshit.

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I am reminded of you in moonlight and pyrite,

worthless shines but honest stone.

My saviors will always lose.

My saints have always eaten the dragon.

Better to keep you with rubber bands

and photographs of burns.

I remember your skeleton hands

hiking across pillows and meat

to steal the crown from my temple,

not a second thought to the smile you've glazed

across my hopeful sleeping face.

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Autumn is bleeding,

listen to dripping colors

and the sound of smokey wind

wrap itself around melancholic afternoons,

this bittersweet purgatory

an excuse to bind ourselves

in veined leaves

and assume a nature

not dissimilar

to the ground

we tread.

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Count your blessings in the wound

hidden behind your snake mirror

that we judge you only for who you could be with us

and not for what you actually are without.

Lord give me strength to find no schism between your two

and finally be rid of this gross malfeasance.

The Letter Opener

Somewhere in Iowa, I drank a lot of cough syrup and wrote this.

He stands unsteady, his eyes in his hands

the letter-opener still protruding

from his massacred left socket

"I'll cut my fingers off next" he mutters

"and then go to work on my tongue with gardening shears

and on my ears with chopsticks to the hilt."

I don't reason with him,

I've been too far gone myself

and I know that reason is dead

in the swollen, bleeding heart.

His screams are unnerving

as any who choose to scream alone

behind closed doors

and I can hear him even with the

key in the ignition, even idling in the street.

There was no telling him

no matter what he chopped off

what he butchered from his body

or scraped with scouring pads and lye,

her letters will glow neon in his universal night

her skin will wrap him haunting still

and O God how she will roll yet on his tongue

and sing poison bells through his skull.

The trenches of memory are dug deep

and filled with bodies.

September

A True Story

A melancholy Sunday, and yet you glow with the same lightning of years past and their verdant desperate grinding of soft kisses, nothing more, and how the tenderest ornament was placed atop the highest broken limb.

I dreamt of you, what with brown eyes searing a late summer's night of longing leaving, and awakening I found my bedclothes twisted into a limp shape of your fragile body clutched in my arms and us quivering in every night being the last night the last kiss the last knowing glance tracing your tattoos with my fingertips. Those summer nights I would have died. I may die yet.

You taught me love beyond reason and I've drug that cross ever since. I will wait on your doorstep trodden and I will sob this rock to mud, and I will never surrender your luster in my memory to these cold demons of rationale. Wait for me at the doorway to oblivion. You'll recognize my scars and I won't forget your little yellow dress.

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I have no room in my heart save for the desperate,

as the idiots go caterwauling safely to darkness

I am left alone in purity's embrace

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Boys Strumming War

I will not die for some stamped cause

let their children's boots tremble

not me, not mine

I can scarcely win this war of living

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Is it wrong to be so jealous of the ground you walk upon,

of the moon that watches you sleep?

I'll spend my days staring at setting suns,

waiting for the cloak of blindness

to make a religion of memory

and a faith of forgotten faces

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Another Drink

It occurs I don't need another drink,

I don't need to walk on unsure knees

or fall asleep already sleeping,

to pour another glass of rum

in a houseful of friends already retired,

not one more ring of dizziness

to cloud my vision of night and cat,

and I will go to bed as unfamiliar as I am

and rest bashful sober and quiet.

A poet's work is never done,

which is why I'm a line cook instead.

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I spent today a grinning skull,

lost in the awful wonder of the world

losing all sight of the gunpowder lessons

hammered through my heart,

losing all sight of who I had Been, who I need to Be,

just sick with amusement at broken bones,

a shrinking banner of pride

limply waving in air never so chilly and heavy

with the smell of bedrooms and hair.

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I've found this beast bloating beyond my comprehension,

rearing up like jagged mountains that eat sky and drink daylight,

crawling on its belly through my gut,

pulling at my hair until my eyes roll back into my head

and I stare into nothing, nothing at all,

just the jaws of the End and the ripple of my sinking heart.

We are willingly drowning in a lake of roses.

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I'm creepy, man

diving into navels

finding none so deep as my own,

dancing dead little circles around lovers,

snorting state lines for kicks

and heartbeats pushing sweaters above waistlines,

just creepy and asleep

cross-legged

mouth sagging

bile

fade to wide-eyed concession

that this night was not mine to win.

Springfield Poems, 08/18/11-08/28/11

In no particular order.

I want

to taste your teeth,

drink your eyes,

drown in your lungs,

dance in your skin,

breathe your hair like smoke,

kneel upon your back like an altar,

wear your feet like a mask,

wear your hands like a noose.

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Mill of avarice be damned,

I am not unwanted!

Ground to a pulp,

doth not blessings yet be cursed from compost heaps!

River rolling, my swollen ears float Me

to downstream chests of mud and silver!

The apes cannot fathom why you'd love this man,

where I why I am still still, shining coin in pale hand!

How sick every day to find love,

how torn every day to live!

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Alcohol

O sweet tranquilizer, cross-eyed womb,

excuse to hate and be hated,

to do and be done,

kaleidoscoping vomit to forget the day,

staggering pathetic morning still alive,

blessed blood transubstantiate,

words spilled from skinned knees

like ignored arrow through brains.

How the sentence would smart if my gun were sober,

what wake my actions would leave in the pavement

if my hand unwavering swung that axe

with a clear mind

and frightening eyes.

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I'm slobbering drunk and hungry

chewing on sunrise

my own two feet my own two feet

drooling truth while you swim in lies.

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Shit, how could I forget blonde punk rocker;

we used to neck in purgatory.

"Ah, fuck it" he sighs satisfied,

faces away from everyone

and drinks his drink too fast.

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I'm building a hearth,

palace between my ears and behind my eyes,

heavy wooden doors and a moat of blood.

It is my jungle, my lighthouse

my nuclear submarine in a black sea of quiet glass.

You are not welcome,

you will not shatter my tranquility.

You have proven to be anything but a friend.

I refuse to be anything but alone.

I hope to live my life as a thorn in your ankle

and you think of me every time you fall.

I hope to live my life as a bone in your throat

and you think of me every time you choke.

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Chainsmokingpushupaholic

I stink with living

and am a pond brimming

with the frogs of discontent.

Let me show you my arms,

wrap you in lazy scars.

My eyes train towards the heaven of smoke

your beacon is lost in the fog of bleeding.

I have plenty of dry bones

with which to stoke dry fire

and your hair is made of straw.

I am the avatar of kerosene,

dripping disappointing oaths

to a cold curving pink god

one-night-love, this town dead in flame.

I will not stop smoking.

I will turn into a tree

and your spine will lean into mine

and roots will fuck the mud.

Who am I

who is this motherfucker

knowing too much,

saw him to lumber

treated so that his eyes are stain

and his hips fragile be balsa.

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Complete solemnity,

paper pulled from golem's ear

is a mixtape track list,

thusly are my feet glued to habits and sighs,

my face is turned and shorn and blossoming

in summer's final death throes as if to affirm

I cannot last forver!

I will flame unto you while I can still muster humble strength.

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Doing the Twist in my bedroom,

just me and Nina,

5:23 am,

makes me want to drink more beer.

I'm missing the point

and don't care.

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Bricks are red and bed is magic

Trade them for a life less tragic

Poems 08/04/11-08/17/11

Bomb Dream #16

Napoleon pinned down by sword thru his guts,
they had no problem aiming the Bomb right at his heart
and blowing the city into a new seaboard
a harbor of boiling blood
and me splashing away in a fervor of survive! survive!
Jesus O Lord save me
as burning ocean laps my ankles with flame
and I wade thru water thick with fat and atoms
past dead dogs and cars transmuted to coal and iron
floating atop Munich's ash river
and under the glare of a European dusk
God willing I nor anybody will ever see.

What do all the movies mean?
I ask my sure-footed shore, my grunge god.
Nothing at all
as he calmly smokes his cigarette
and waits for me to wake.

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Country Boy

Where is she who loves legs swinging over farm gates
eyes trained to the cowshit
the crunch of drought-bleached gravel under boots
the sweet-sour sweat soaking chest
under St. Christopher hanging desperately around my neck
like a noose of the interstates I've known and loved
and fill me with a lonesome dread
so that here I am, walking meditation
remembering when this tree was a tree
and not a lightning-torn stump
just egg rolling back to cedar nest
just drying fish flapping like dead man's clapping hand
towards creek towards spring basins.
This I offer.
Take me for what I am.

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Of Those I Miss

Of those I miss
I miss their faults as much as their perfection,
their lies as much as their love,
for we have shaped shaped shaped each other
beyond any semblance of ephemerality.

And now we wander
with feet planted opposite shores
among the ruined foundations of bridges burned,
and I can't remember their faces
but I love them just the same.

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Twisting A's out of twigs,
kissing all the wrong backs,
worried about my parents.

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There will come a day
when I'm judged not for my inability to cope with small talk
with people looking down their noses
Me swelling up like a tick
like a balloon like a ballast of love
a raft on tides of shame.

Fuck no, that day is tonight
and here I am,
sober as birth and as deadly serious.
Electric fence,
a live wire stare with towhead and mean fingers.
Rebuild my crumpled body with bricks and cable.
This heart will never know the difference.
I need love and raw meat
I need love and dead leaves
and we all float slow and screaming
to rot in Heaven.


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Ante

I've been rolling my eyes like dice,
going all in on the small blind first hand,
playing people like chess.
There are no winners,
the game will end the same.
Ha!
Except I will live til the end!
Swear allegiance equally to passion, whimsy, and folly!
No regrets, by God!
I've loved!

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Mildred

Sitting quietly in country static,
a radio tuned to night bugs
and the occasional snuffle from a tired hound dawg,
I can hear the draw on my cigarette.
Watch mosquitoes land on me,
fly away without molest,
I am unprovoking and without resistance
to those who suck and bite
so they neither suck nor bite.
Nothing to do with how I taste now.
More to do with how I choose to sit;
silent still sad content.
A bird couldn't alight from my shaking knee,
My ribs would spread like legs
no, like a curtain
and the bullet would pass through
and I walk unharmed.
Maybe a little lighter, I've lost some weight.
Maybe a little more humble, I've lost some pride.

I've lost nothing.
The goddamn son will rise in the morning
and there I go.

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a constellation of cigarette burns
with a burning cherry satellite
while I'm a space station
still spinning mute

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You're beautiful as frost,
I'm stunned as Valium,
thinking floating eating memory,
pure as
pure as snow
pure as hate,
clearer than swollen hearts
is the fading plea,
the choice to about-face in this gunfight
draw and fire.

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New Orleans

I don't consider myself an extrovert in any way.
it's a scam.
Today I got my first lapdance
I loved her, smelled her on my hands
the rest of the day.
met people at the metal show.
got punched in the gut at the metal show.
I don't know.
I guess they're alright
these people
these people
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Thunderstorm broke the night
like a fever
5 am
hangover.

A Marked Change in Behavior

Sometimes you gotta lose to win
I have no home
but here feels good.
In my dreams
My friends are dropping like flies
and here I always thought myself humane
a vicious carnivore
but usually a scavenger
a lye facial
lying facedown
and lying.
No, goddammit, I ain't no brute
no caveman
no muddy fool with clumsy tongue
no bleeding heart carried on broken legs.
A cannibal, maybe
though I'm not sure
if eating your own fingers counts.
And besides, I'm happy,
Alhamdulillah,
Pretty sure I'm happy.
Sometimes you gotta lose
to win.

"Road Prayer"

There are some nights, I've said it before, when there is nothing like a perfect murderous drive, I've said before, like a hot knife through the buttery underbelly of state highways, our angular little hood the head of a snake swallowing its two-lane tail, blinking at spirits hallucinatory and convincing, like making love straddling a backbone and swinging wide through the curves until she gasps and I nearly see the Glory of the Almighty in the infinite shadows cast by floodlit flagpoles, though the flags themselves drip with brains and wet gunpowder.

Only a night ago, everything was wet with stars, and closing my eyes I could see a lunar landscape of glowing coral and spiraling marble columns encrusted with hard candy and brooches, and I could kick off of these columns with a child's feet and fall giddily and unscathed through the storms of fear, and I was only filthy barefeet dancing with cicadas.

It makes me sad we will never know each other, but life is a funny wheel. I'll still have your letters and someday I will read them without a bitter pang, still will I someday regret to have washed your hair from my pillowcases. The wheel spins, we move on as swiftly as the world turns beneath us. There is no room for futility in these spokes, only a playing card to make the whole rotten thing feel a little more like a motorcycle. Insha'Allah, may we all find blessed comfort on maddening winds, knowing that same air pushes the sweat from all of our brows, knowing I will never know you so long as I refuse to know myself.

Screeching hymns of the open road, the lonely howl of semis and the tranquility of smoke and good tunes, the Holy inertia and exhausted eyes in league to make this road twist and pulse and lunge under my feet even when I'm standing perfectly still.

Amen.