When in doubt
I plumb the depths,
Past whatever present sent,
In the dark,
A resounding yes.

Familiar walls,
Not even seen,
With every step of routine.
Blue eyes, now grey,
Gazing somewhere, not today.

Hollow people, hollow things,
Can almost see the space between,
Where sunny rays toss flaxen hair
And choices seem to lead somewhere.

But routine is easy,
Routine is safe.
It is only when she tries to leave
That she feels her chains.

Intimacy is a hell of drug;
When I see you peripherally,
My thoughts are done.

The way light hits you
Just makes me nervous,
Bouncing ‘bout in my retinas,
Mixin’ with spirits.

Which, you might say,
Are oppressing my brain,
But I’ll misattribute you
All night and day.

Takin’ that serotonin,
Puttin’ it in your name,
As you run your fingers
Down my face.

Because, these impulses
Are shootin’ through me,
Driving my prefrontal insane.

I try to regulate feelings
That have no name.

I want you tactily, in-fact-ly
I want your intimacy,
‘Cause if you’re into me,
I want that dopamine.

On oxytocin, I’m choking,
These emotions, are roping,
Like I just overdosed
And am dangling,
Floating.

So if you’re itching,
I’ll fill your prescription.

Caught in the raptures of thought,
Breast swelling with speech,
Every breath like a mountain,
Held heavily.

An avalanche of moments,
Time rushing down,
Eyes hover suspended,
As images push out.

All holding the world at bay,
Ideas take its place,
Across tables and carpets,
They fill the space.

Turning thoughts in my head,
I focus on my lips,
Biting them coyly,
As after some kiss.

I stood ankle deep upon the shore,
Speaking verses evermore.
Verses strong and right and true,
I spoke them proudly at the blue.

The tide came swift
For my well-sunk feet,
So I curled my tongue and toes,
And spoke my verses louder still,
Against the mighty tow.

Waves hit me high
And sunk my chest,
But further still I thrust my breast,
Sucked in deep and help my breath,
As water washed around my neck.

Then lashed I, water with word,
An argument, which was superb,
That Neptune himself would have been convinced,
Had water not my lungs entrenched.

The world does not trade in words;
Only fools argue with the sea,
But if you would like to try,
Come and drown with me.

Oh to be brought low by greater expectation!
To take flight on fanciful notions
And fall tangled in experience;
To lie and struggle 'against the strings,
Making cuts and pulling hearts,
To know that what must be done,
But wish that none
 Will taste it's bitterness.

Someone had lit the horizon on fire.
Out on the ocean it glowed,
Holding back the heavy ghost of the sky.
With weak orange, it bounced under the clouds
Cutting a swath, like lava beneath an icy glacier.
The ferocity that struck through the gloom
And fired my imagination:
Of waves that danced in sun,
Of vast distances and the world that stretched to fill them.
The sun had reached me
Beneath the shade,
And I'd reached back.

There is joy
 In weighted chest and heavy breathes.
And something wholly different about the world,
Seems to seep,
 In through weakly gazing eyes.

The world is slow with gloom;
Trees make lazy shakes
And cars roll silently,
Their sounds far off from here.

There is painted depth in every piece
A world taken in repose,
Each detail can be felt,
Not with senses, but with soul.

When sadness strikes your senses,
Makes them numb and cold,
Let the world slip in gently,
Have beauty take its toll.

I want always to be talking to you,
To feel connected in some way.
But when I think of you,
I hardly know what to say,
Because the thought of touching you
Pushes everything else away.

Only gods could have built this city.
The tall buildings do not make you small;
They were built with the spirits of men
And they build a fire within mine.

I feel as if I can shout as high as they,
My words can carry their weight.
I am empowered,
My breath is fire.

The spirit of mankind is in this city,
And it will only grow:
It will fill every soul who only looks to the sky
And sees himself standing there.

In this city is a fire,
That will burn the world.

Little babe,
Small and curious,
The world stares back at you.
Fresh and new,
You are the beginning of something beautiful.

You have years:
You will love,
Taste despair and eventually find it sweet.
There will be things that delight you today,
Only to bore you tomorrow.
But you will press on.

You will find new levels of beauty in life:
You will wonder why and find your answers,
You will discover why the sun rises,
why men die.
You will come to know good,
And happiness,
And sadness.
You will taste feel run fight dream
Find yourself wasting hours... years,
But you will be alive,
And you will press on.

The clouds shifting over me,
Carried as ships on a chilling breeze,
And holding a blinding anticipation
Over my taut brow,
Then bathing me in holy light,
My jacket shifting from shoulder to chair,
Again and again

There is new excitement in each change:
The pleasure of lambent rays,
Then the rush, like cool sheets,
And the tight envelopment of soft cotton.
Each time with new awareness

Suddenly I have muscles, stretching fibers,
Then a cheek, brushed with stubble,
And a chest, filling with air.
Until, again, I have no body at all,
Only the words in my head.

Squeeze me like a piece of fruit,
Sliced for breakfast,
Ruby red with smooth skin.
Plucked fresh like an apple,
Peal me ripe, down to the core.
My hands wrapt round your navel,
Rubbed raw we ferment.

He swallowed the truth,
But never spoke the lie/
Never closed the door;
In the silence of his mind,
He drew lines in the sand.

But the line in the sand
Was washed away in the storm;
And he walked into the desert,
Where the truth was known.

I'll throw my heart into the sea,
Into where I cannot see.
Not knowing whether it will sink,
Beyond the depths of abyss,
Or float the currents
As a castaway.
Perhaps it will wash up on a beach,
Or be caught
And gutted.

No heart understands the sea,
But every heart must brave it.

My mind should be on better things.
Folding laundry, feeling as if
I were still watching
Clothes spin.

That dryer can hold anything,
Memories, paranoia, hope,
But it can never dry my clothes.
They’re still wet.

I want to put them on,
Feel their warmth.

Things aren’t like they used to be,
My clothes are damp,
While I fold them
I’m left to my memories.

A smooth breeze brushes my face
And stiffens my hands.
Light burns the underside of bridges,
While a lost train cries out,
Screeching in lonely desperation.

Joggers grate a sandy sidewalk
And clouds wait low in the distance;
Their coral hues almost blending
     with the thick horizon.
Planes crawl, carried in the glacier of the sky.
All frozen into the portrait of today.

Do you know what it's like,
Do you sit,
Just as I do,
In coffee shops and apartments,
Thinking of the smile
That could be?

I think that you don't.
I think that you sit there waiting,
Waiting for my thoughts to overcome me,
To gather behind my eyes
And weigh heavy on my mouth.

I could give in,
I could momentarily surface
In your sea of concerns,
But then you'd let me sink away,
And I'd sink back into you.

Your words will never have
the same weight as mine,
Nor your touch,
Nor your smile
And I want not to care for you
as I do,
But I do.
I love you.

Breaths of Liquid O2,
Too thick to speak,
Where you drown
And feel fully alive.

Heat and burn like a reactor.
Expression radiates and pools
(So Freudian),
Then you Submerge,
Choke Gurgle Spew
Run in desperate aspiration,
Always faster
Or lie still,
Drink antiseptic,
And try to cut it out.

Hot fever,
Wash me in you,
Steam rising from bodies
Cures like a lightening rod,
Pull me into you,
Ground me.

We quake and thunder.
Explosive storms twist space
And save gravity,
Let time tick, and affection unwind me.

She is the antecedent to my happiness,
The center of my universe,
My sun.
When she lights my days,
The world is dressed in warmth
And even nights may hold her glow,
Reflected in tender memory
of promise and affection.

But this is a dark night.
I sit in bright illumination
And I know it dark
By the lack of beauty in bland colors
Not even a billion billion ball of burning light
Can make the world radiant.