How I Remember Yesterday

My friend comes over.
We take my car.
$5 to enter.
Walk and warm-up.
He meets us there.
Move on.
Film me.
He won't sleep with her again.
Bloody cuticle.
Have a bite.
My hands look great.
Film my friend until he sends.
I definitely got it; that lady's wrong.
Go deeper.
Survey the South Pacific: too deep, too grainy.
Gaston the crack and fail.
Show them up with muscle memory.
What does she see in him.
No, I don't love her.
Deeper.
Simple shit, conglomerate.
Getting cold in the wind tunnel.
Come back.
Finally he leaves.
Then we do.
I got Bootleg.
My friend got Sternum.
And he got nothing.

I sleep next to her

I sleep next to her
when I can
in a small bed
inches from the floor.

neither of us sleep much-,
not a sex joke-
I think too much awake;
she too much asleep.

never regret it;
my back's fine

I sleep less
play more
life's great
awake
where
nothing
hurts her

When I See Your Simple Smile

When I see your simple smile, 

etched on my wrist

warm

in red ink

staving the blood

like a gauze

against my circulation,

I smile simply.

This tragic fantasy I have,

poisoned through my

eyes & ears,

is retold by you;

water vipers

lay in the inner waves

and aren't so easily caught

by simpletons.

But I shalln't worry

and continue looking for

things to disprove,

so I let go before

I thrash and 

strike her accidentally;

anyway, 

despite my intentions,

it's far in the past.

Square of Myself

Smudged mirror
hiding my assets
who is this monster...
not I.
I am beautifully
flawed
an iron belt through sandstone
smeared lipstick on my cheek.
I am what
I love
and the destructive
perfectionist
controlling
that makes me
question
whether you love me and
I was just thinking about you
and questioned why
I had so many questions.

Pre-med Self-Defense

Knock on the door

he comes out

he goes back in

grabs a knife

a big one

I catch it

turn around

press

don’t stab

him

over and over

I’ve been waiting

for this

for years

so

I get away

in my car

blending into

every other car.

It

might be in my head

but

I’ve got to get

him

before he gets

me

and

I will

someday. 

Clown

I’m a clown,

happy to the touch,

destroyed within my

repainted face. 

Dragging you to misery,

I’m unworthy of your

attention,

a goddamn leper,

keeping distance.

Seceded from those

who love

but are never around;

we all have

our shit that’s better,

you fucking liar.

I’m a clown,

smiling for you. 

Colourful

I'm a shit,
I can't deny.
Lie, maybe
but it's in
my defense because
I don't know what to
do when they get
pissed at me and
insist that I show
the motherfuckers respect
that they don't deserve,
all those other asswipes
that are on
their knees
for validation.

My imagination's colourful
and racist,
not that I choose my views
independently.
I thought a thought
because you made me,
and the action was all me.

I can't believe
I used to want to
kill myself
over this shit.

When I Go Outside

When I go outside,

the first notable thing

is the smell:

the dirt and sand mesh nicely.

The second thing

is my shoes,

lusting for traction

as I traipse through the hundred-acre woods.

The third thing

is the lack of control

no matter how I dress

or prepare myself.

The fourth thing

is my feet

rubber on the billion flecks of sand

nature fused together.

The fifth thing

is the ever-present fear

things could seriously fall apart

and that’d be it.

The sixth thing

is how my mind drifts

with no place to be

without trying.

And the final thing-

standing above my peers

and even myself

on a good day.  

Same Bus

Almost everyone is interesting

if they let you in,

whether they think

you’re taking a different bus,

or you don’t matter.

I’d rather know you

than myself.

I’d rather remove my head,

wander blindly through the wild

than know that it’s all heading

to the worthless end

no matter what I do.

Maybe tomorrow

will be better.

Maybe tomorrow,

I’ll forget about today

and still learn from my mistakes

while forgiving my friends

for theirs.

The One I Love

I think of the face

that I would wake to a million

times and never tire from.

What a doll,

what an essential babe

who should ever grace my

thoughts with hers of me,

who could never understand

the longing I feel

when I haven’t even left.

Were I to compare you to a

thing, ‘twould be a hearth:

for the firepit keeps me warm

when I am around,

gives me longing when I am

out in the wilderness,

and rejects me from coming inside

when the blaze is blaring.

But this hearth is the center

of my home, of my comfort

and delight, and I would do anything

to fortify the circlets of carved rock.

Undoubtedly, my simile does not function

because this is a woman,

not some thing to improve

to fit my expectations.

I refuse to mention

the struggles of this seeming damsel,

only that her strength outweighs mine,

pound for pound.

Yet, she clings to me with

unbelievable kindness,

such that I may spend the rest

of my life trying

to describe, to those who

only take meaning because

I don’t need to explain.

Beautiful black mirror,

you are the darkness I embrace

the most fondly, the reflection of
what I love
and desire
in myself.

Not of this World (Revised from Nihilist's Life)

This bastard brought into the world

searches for

or avoids          

others like it.

Stuck inside,

living like this.

I once felt

something with

a bottle and flame,

moving from green to white.

I would stop, but

the feeling is my friend.

Emptiness surrounds us.

A zillion miniscule somethings:

the reaction

is from collision

of those little somethings,

making nothing.

But at the end,

what's left,

nothing, really.

Nothing to remind them

of all the wasted time.

Not a thing.

Cathexis

Our cathexis is gorgeous
and not in imitation,
healthy, strong, and
burning like sticky pine-bark;
the aroma is with me always.

She holds the other half of my desire
by her fingertips pinched
and would not relinquish
such a longing
if I could help it.

Peering past the pupils
into an ocean of tears
that I could drown in,
submerged in the unspeakable,
untranslated passion.

Every time I hold you,
my fingers fill your ribs,
like only mine could;
when you hold me,
I could die in your arms.

And the best times I've had
were when you and I
walked alone, hand in hand,
where we shouldn't,
flirting with the dead.

Cars and Pedestrians

Balmy mid-morning
with the sun peeking,
the urban selection shows itself
to party-goers returning home
after a regretful
or prosperous,
memorable night.

He had had
too much,
and when his foot
left the sidewalk,
the poor man's soul
left the poor soul.

Out of all the times
I muttered,
"Someone better have died,"
this was the first reasonable obstruction.

The police were on my bumper,
and a woman,
probably the one that killed you
waited,
and covered you with a blanket.

Your family will think
"It's our fault,"
for turning you away
because you didn't have
shit to contribute.

You should have
looked both ways.

Fine, How Are You?

Far from glad
and not at all unhappy,
drift sensually along
through the darkness
until we are both nothing
in the void of perilous
misunderstanding, like a
ghost without a sheet or
casket with no grave.

Unknowing of
what we can't know
complements the lustful nature
of young lovers who
don't realize
what the other wants
nor themselves.

Thinking is like red wine:
good in small dibbles,
poison past the cusp,
injected venom into
every evaluation,
greedy,
ugly, and
suffocating.

And on most days,
we can cope with our flaws,
but on my worst days,
I could kill someone,
and that
should be obvious by now.

Going Somewhere

I listen to a pontiff
just as I do anyone else,
though we disagree
but I'm open to how
others think and
feel, especially
if they overlook me:
21 years old,
a child that can
serve as an adult
but depends on his father
and wants to get away
but lost the map to
wherever he was driving to
and now relies on
a compass and memory,
afraid of being dumb and
getting lost because he
second-guessed himself;
it happens every time
I am indecisive and
self-reliant.

On the trips I
find myself lost,
I go
and keep going
because it doesn't
matter where I end up
since it'll be somewhere.

My Imaginary Mom

Can't tell if you 

were there or never were

all the times I bumped my head 

or lost my friends or

got yelled at, but

you helped every time.

For if not for your smile,

or the things I heard of you,

I'd be in the gutter,

perhaps literally, but

I'm glad I can't know.

It's hypothetical, whether

you would have stopped

me from recovering, and

it's useless to wonder...

pressure on a thing

imaginary literally

makes my stomach turn.

Can't feel for someone 

you don't know

but have to

'cause everyone's got one

and I don't, and

I'm proving I

don't need her 

to function.

Saturday Afternoon Drive in October

Man lying in the street,

with a blanket over

his shame,

laid between two cars

on the melting asphalt.

No one knew you before,

and even now,

they pretend to not,

giving you a mask

to hide their guilt.

I’ve never known a dead man.

Overthinking

My favorite part of
waking up next to you
is the smell that stays,
as if you meant to say
that today would be lovely.

Maybe you wanted me to think
about it again and again and
didn't have time to write.

I could spend the weekend
and the night,
and plan on tonight, but
still
I don't want to wait.

Some days are perfect
just like others are tedious
and the rest maddening.

The clouds soak skin-deep
like a natural cleansing
that illudes;
the darkness I embrace
like a friend.

It's too easy
to do well,
companionship.

But you're worth each failure,
each lesson,
every chance for intimacy
that goes awry
in your head.

It's hard for me,
learning,
and hurts just right.

Been at It for Years

Pray before the altar of fear,
despised and forgotten
at the Sun's rising.

We are limited by
placated withdrawal and
self-righteous decrees,

placed perfectionism with
self-fulfilling,
self-reliant sustainability.

All of this has been my experience,
traveling days at a time
to idealism.

I have been at it for years,
and honestly,
I'm not very good at it.

Could be my friends,
the people I listen to
and gain perception from,

or it might be God,
but let's not go there,
at least not in this poem.

Ask me what I want,
so I can be creative,
inventing my purpose,

and sometimes convincing myself,
that it was always about

the girl,
the friends,
the publishing,
when it was always about
me.

Thought to Page

Empty melodies sputter stupidly
to mind, and the drive
is still present
to create something that will
last because we all know
we're headed to an end
called nowhere and
nothing, but we try to stand
out by impressing the
macrocosm we are
wasting away in so that
the inner anguish doesn't
make its way to the
ugly, honest surface of
humanity we try to
deny.

Hey, dollface,
I can't be everything to
you, and I know you know
this because you're human,
too, and no matter how
beautiful you are
nor how I place
you above and before me
which really makes
me want you so much
more since you're not
some thought-dissolving
bitch like the rest
who don't understand me
anyway and act
like I'm nothing since
they can't be out of control
nor headed in the wrong
direction.

But I'm probably just
telling myself this.

It's All the Same

I might be crazy,
which either hints at
my humility or my
egomania at always being
the best by giving
them a slim chance at
proving me wrong because
we all deserve a chance
to fight for our pride
and not get killed for
it from the inside, the
malicious inside where
the streets are unknown,
the sidewalks are uneven and
cracked and where the fucking
cat shit in the sandbox
again because we all love
them so much to
entitlement and have
them think that Ra
created them first and
who can blame them
when they are
treated to expect a
reaction by me, or
by us, I can't remember,
which was never glorious but
fabulous enough for its
sunken pillows to stay warm
on my cold bed where
she used to want to come
home to after a long day
of people bitching at the
same old same old same old
stupid shit
that no one gives a fuck
about but listens to anyway.

It's all the same.

My Least Favorite Thought

She sleeps in beauty:
I have a bitter attraction that feels without
and will not respond to my advances,
even when I satisfy her;
I expect acceptance
whenever I want it.

The truth is that she is
asleep, and I will join her eventually.
Most of the time, I am
awake, conscious,
neglecting nothing that passes before me,
no plant, animal, thought or expression.

Why is it that we are so
afraid of being alone, as though
our lives were not ours
and we are judged and
supplied with the teensy bit of
satisfaction we deserve.

See what life
brings, not what sleep can avoid
out of the pitiful day.  When
we finish, we start
again on whatever project we
forgot about.

Peace is what we seek, but
we don't know what it looks like,
confusing it with ennui-
boredom of the gods-
and continuously moving to a place
we may or may not desire.

And when, at the end of the day,
you find that you are no
nearer to where you wanted than before,
know that it is your own doing.

Take a rest;
don't go to sleep.

Elephant Man

In their room,
isolated for display,
I am paraded about.

I wish I could lay asleep
and listen to the boiler's hum.

Grateful for fortune
"for who needs it more than me."
They are not all black and white
through my terministic lens.

Why do I live at all,
why do I love at all...
perhaps my curse will haunt others,
or they will get over themselves
after the novelty.

I am dressed like a child
and treated like an animal.

"Romeo," more like Cyrano,
my love keeps me going:
love for art,
love seldom shown,
love that raps upon my bones.

Sophistication at a cost.

You are not good
nor bad,
Mr. Treves.
So kind, to meet you.

Waiting for Her, Forgetting Me

Despicable me,
you were right to ignore
and move on.

To be with you
or in your place
if not inside.

Longing is
unrelenting and ever-present and
won't fade.

Will not and cannot
forget
until you have.

Will not, cannot
force you
nor make me wait.

Yet here I am,
waiting
like a fixed housecat.

Is it too late to say...
If it's there, no.
I'm foolish
and you saw that.

I tried, tried,
but didn't try enough.
This will be the next last time.

Saturnalia

Saturnalia, worship of nature,
forbidden, gravely misunderstood.
Waiting for your maker's nod,
I stand forever in your magic wood.

Pleasing tracts of land,
gorgeous, again like the wild.
I brush against it;
the breeze is not mild.

Whether in the deepest dark,
or reflected in noon's light,
penetrating quintessence
always makes me bright.

And if you are afraid,
and you start to run,
don't worry, Chloris:
we're just having fun.

Verisimilitude

When I should pass,
if it should be too soon,
remember that it was always
for you, this life, this story,
this road to nowhere.
You could miss me,
if that helps,
but I was never there.
I thank you, though,
for my ignorance.
The world was prettier then,
and I was blinder.
And, honestly, it was nice to believe
in a Thing that loved
even me, even when
I tried to make It not.
God, if I could change,
I couldn't decide.
One of us wandered,
and I found the Truth,
that bitch.
I wish she would just
shut up.

No More Room

Hard ground, desecrated
by the fiendish imperials
we fought to control
but then became.
A charlatan would be proud,
proud of your ingenuity,
proud of your self-service,
proud of the broken hands.
Defy the definition
of what is happy:
money's what I need
because there's too many people,
no more room.
I'd build a house
and grow my food
myself
like they say we should, but
there's no more room.