I gave you serpentine kisses in the morrow,

wore two faces when I confessed my love

but we lay together in the dotage of the day

and you are the only person I can think of.

you were the reason I didn't **** myself

this doesn't mean you have to love me

what it means is, I will always love you

I hate the way you hold cigarettes
and how you never drunk text me
at 3am. I want to be the person you
think of when a sloppy drunkard
is kissing you at a bar. His breath
rank with stale stogies, light beer,
and cheap whiskey. He uses way too
much tongue and swears his ****
won’t fit in a ******. He couldn’t
spell ******* and even if he uses
his fingers, it’s not enough to make you
***. I hate bad lovers and that’s all
I imagine you with. Dudes who say
“wanna play just the tip?” and other
lame *** **** because nobody ever
told them “ladies first” and you have
to stimulate the ****.

I feel like a black hole
when I sit at the bar.
Like there is no amount of liquor
that could fill this bottomless well
and people keep falling in.

I can hear them cry sometimes
finger nails clawing at stone
until the tips are rubbed raw.
Ghosts wailing in the dark
a throbbing in my chest,
Poe's Tell-Tale Heart.

I spoke to one once
at a queer hour in the morn
she said "It's beautiful down here"
even as her body was being torn
into billions of subatomic particles.

"It's beautiful" she cried
"I've seen the end of time
I've seen galaxies form
I've seen star's collapse
and again be reborn
I've seen life emerge
and I've seen it destroyed
I've seen it all with my eyes
and all the bad you've done,
all the guilt you carry
it isn't helping anyone
it's ok- it's ok-- it's ok---
to let yourself be happy"

I so badly desired
to have faith in her words
but I've never been one
to believe in ghosts.

A shoebox of letters
hand written on yellow looseleaf
pages upon pages of promises
written in red ink,
a coffin in need of a burial
a reminder of a life
and a love denied.

February 14th, 1989
penned within my first year
the name at the top is not mine
but she writes to him
the way you will write to me
only two decades later.

I shiver as I read each draft;
to realize our failed romance
was but an echo of the past.

I’m so afraid to tell her I love her
so I only do it when I’m drunk,
or we’re drunk together
and still the words nervously tremble
they shake like orange leaves in autumn
and the wind doesn’t carry them
they just fall, quietly and unnoticed
becoming just a nuisance
to later be packed
into black plastic bags
and thrown to the curb.

I think about her naked sometimes
I probably think about it
because I doubt she would give me the satisfaction
of touching her in the heat of passion
so it’s just easier for me to imagine
walking in on her in the bath, drinking a glass of red
maybe cabernet sauvignon, who knows, who cares?
a light steam rising off the foamy suds
they cover only what I want to see
even in my fantasies I like to be teased
she is calm
as though she left the door unlocked intentionally
waiting like a painting in a gallery for me to clumsily stumble in
and find her beautifully sprawled in a Victorian tub with copper clawfeet
painted wet-on-wet like a portrait by John Singer Sargent
her milky blue and marble eyes soften my will like whiskey
and I find myself kneeling beside the bath
my hand gently trembles as it glide against satin velvet skin

I drip the way condensation does
down ice cold beer in a TV commercial
when she looks at me.
I'm soaking up cardboard coasters,
sweating labels off bottles
until she wraps her hands around me again,
kissing me with those flower petal like lips,
drinking me all in.

I know I'm not what she needs
but right now I'm what she wants.
Not to stroke my own ego
but I am a good time,
I'll get you to undo that top button
even make you laugh
and maybe, just maybe
I'll even get you to dance
but no matter what I promise
or what I deliver,
I know at the end of the day
when the fun is done
and the headaches fade,
I am poison.
And when she's had too much of me
I'll make her sick.
***** spit in bathroom sinks
because she's too beautiful
to have her head in the toilet.

I'm the answer to feeling sad,
I'm the easy late night phone call
that never goes unanswered
but I am not the man
she marries, no not at all
because as sweet as I taste
or as gently as she may kiss my face
I am going to disappoint her.
The way I have disappointed
all the others before her.

An absent father's failure with an inhaler in hand

Insecurity seething from his skin

Manifesting it's self as bulbous red abrasions on his forehead

A heavy breathing child who's eyes were often aimed low

His expectations for life even lower

A little over weight but not enough to concern his pediatrician

He cut gym class a lot because of the showers

Now fourteen he had seen a few ******

He knew he didn't match up

It was better that no one knew he thought

He went on living like this

A pale shadow hovering in the halls

A faceless nobody in the background of someone else's group photo

A ghost who was only noticed by those who tortured him

Bullies like sharks can smell blood in the water

And he was chum

I still vividly see the feeding frenzy

I still remember the day we were told he took his own life

NO shrieks, NO cries, NOT even a whimper was heard

Almost a concerted sigh of boredom

That night there was a party

Not to celebrate his death

But an apathetic gesture of his nonexistence

I attended as was socially expected of me

Even wore a smile

But my mind wrestled with his suicide

I thought of how much I hated him

I hated the smell of his weakness

I hated the 'poor me' attitude

I hated him for taking his own life

Leaving me to feel guilty

That I had done nothing to help him

As if I was responsible in some way

...

I see her there
soaking in the bath
the water as warm as her flesh
she floats, suspended in emptiness
melting slowly as she gazes

I see her there
wine in hand, unfulfilled
by her intoxication
bored by reality, just jaded
by the whole affair of breathing

I see her there
thoughts of drowning
in a ceaseless sea
of forgettable people
with forgettable faces

I see her there
but she does not see me
I am the red stain on her teeth
the warm water inviting her to sleep
I am death, and oh so quietly
do I creep.

Streaks

from worn out wipers

dented cans, plastic wrappers

the glow of a cigarette ****

lying comfortably 
in the ashtray

white knuckles tight

on a weathered wheel

empty roads

cold and black

eyes tired but open

like trucker stops

or roadside diners

with the neons

still on

I keep driving

teetering between

my existence

and a sweet dream

I’d slip into that slumber

if not for the passengers

still fast asleep
in my back seat

So I keep driving

as quiet 
and as lonely

as it may be

I keep driving

because 
somebody

is putting
 their trust
 in me

Nimble fingers feed
plastic buttons
through fabric slits
then zip up zippers
and tie ties.
Raised brow,
steel eyes,
cannot help
but wonder why
I am incapable
of loving just one
woman at a time.

Coffee stained napkins
with naked truths
written all over in red ink.

Nothing worth publishing,
not even something
you’ll let friends see.

This is that real ****
that only you can read.

The mean things you say to yourself
when you’re not acting cool
in front of others.

The fantasies you dare not speak
in front of your mother
or even your closet lovers.

This is that real ****
that only you can read.

The stuff you deny in mixed company
even though you hate to lie.
That **** you want people to find.

But you won’t ever show them
because you think you’re ****** up;
so you lock it up inside that chest.

This is that real ****
that only you can read.

These are the kinds of words
that get torn up and thrown out
before you leave the café.

This is that real ****
that only you can read.

We no longer speak
but I conversate with you.
I transverse through
every syllable I ever spoke,
every gesture,
every lie,
every joke,
and every poem
I ever wrote.

We no longer speak
but I've been talking to you;
in dark rooms at strange hours
unable to sleep;
sometimes on clear nights
under a menacing moon
allowing its bright light
to wash me in its purity.

We no longer speak
and it’s time I stopped,
stopped reliving every mistake
stopped thinking,
stopped wondering,
and stopped loving you
because the gravity
that once drew us together
now pushes us apart
and with each rotation
I the moon go further
and further from the earth’s heart.

Hands hug a ceramic mug
warm like the touch of a lover.

Lips pressed firmly to the rim
met with a tender caffeine kiss

Folklorico serenades the street
from an open third floor window
a rhythmically refreshing sound
compared to the silence
the calming silence
of south 2nd street
in Brooklyn
hardly escaping the shadow
of the metropolitan center
this little pocket has escaped
the hustle and bustle
that traditionally defines New York
the chatter from the stoop
three gentlemen discussing
'stop and frisk' and 'being processed'
the corner store as old
as the neglected blue mailbox
that now serves as a canvas
for local taggers
new eateries and humming bars
full of new immigrants
out of staters, artists
from places not so welcoming
to their brand of queer
here on this quiet street
I watched the new grow
among the old
this place was a garden

of concrete, culture
and dreams

strange faces
in a crowded bar
6 PM
business attire
some are young
still full of passion
some are ready
to retire

chatter hums
about things
that may just matter
to them
but to me
it's nonsense

like a passing train
steel wheels clattering
against well traveled rails
strange faces
forward, empty stares
moving so quickly
they blur into nothing
and dissipate from memory

no sooner
do crossing gates rise
and we drive
as if nothing
has happened

The sun dripped with liquid gold
from the heavens above
to the earth below
coral, violet and red
hung over my head
revealing to my afternoon eyes
the very soul of the fatherly sky
and I heard the sea speak
oh so salty and sweet

She whispered to me
goodnight in a gentle breeze
against the fading of the light
sinking beneath the horizon line
turning form a wild fire burning
into cool and ancient black
slick with shimmering stars
like freckles upon a giant's back

I, just another grain of sand
among the many on this beach
felt on the scale of existence
that mine carried little significance
no more than an ellipses in a speech
so what would it matter
if the rising waters
were to wash me out to sea
or if I remained
and the world ignored me
What would it matter?

Why was it not enough
that I was here
and I was alive?

We joke sometimes
about falling in love,
we talk in deep detail
about our romance;
the kind of house we want,
the name of the family dog,
would we rather have boys or girls,
and we argue over who will stay home
to raise the kids, I always let you win.

We joke sometimes
about growing old together;
we talk about thinning hair,
wrinkling skin, tired eyes
and energized grand kids.
We promise to one another
that we will stay in love,
still hold hands, hug each other tightly
and kiss both daily and nightly

We joke sometimes
about a life we could be living
and I just want you to know
that I am not always kidding.

hands clasped
maybe bound
began to gasp
its summer now

light rays
warm water
lazy days
with new lovers

scent of pollen
tepid skin
kisses blossom
swoon within

fall breeze
broken hearts
shifting weather
fall apart

Blur the parts that make you feel
please forget that you and I
once had something real.

Blur the parts that make you cry
I say forget it all, burn it all,
I don't care and I don't mind.

For when the final ashes
have been carried like spirits
adrift amid the empty wind,

for when our hearts
cease to weep
and our busy minds
may finally sleep
then and only then
will I close my eyes
and admit to myself
that every single one
of these words
is a lie.

They can tell you all about their dreams
they can sing'em from every street corner
online, offline, on any **** line they want
but I have always had a theory
one good one about us song birds
were busy slinging dreams like cheap dope
because were afraid to live
afraid to take that first step into the unknown
so ******* scared of our own dreams
we talk about'em night and day
mostly at night, avoiding sleep
like lunatics ranting
but instead of hospitals
they got us tied down in bars
forget lithium, they got *****
boooooze I say
and enough drunk ******* to listen
to every petty fear you got
they even let you parade it around
wear it on your lips like a cheap suit
some even start to believe you too
we find ourselves singing from bar stools
like they were mountain tops
every one of us, every last one us
a ******* dreamer
trapped in a real world

I awake to my tired hands holding your body tightly against mine. The smell of you is something I will never forget, pleasantly refreshing almost like a hot shower. It's funny now to think that this moment is the last, the last time I will ever touch you affectionately. The last time I will gaze upon you with an infinite stare so deep that it still shakes me like the first shiver of winter; catching me off guard because I thought summer would never end. I can feel your heart beating against mine and I want to cry, what a terrible feeling to know this was fading and the reasons were all mine to hold. You drift back from your dream and into the daze of the living, you realize where you are and you ask me to drive you home. I get dressed and you do the same. Though we wore little, there was no passionate *** the night before. Just two bodies side by side seeking shelter from the storm that brewed inside of us. This is the end, we can both feel it but neither of us has the tongue to speak it.
I turn the key in the ignition and we idle for a short time in silence, now strangers again living different lives. This driveway in my beat-up Mazda on an early Sunday morning, this place is my purgatory. I make a stop at the gas station,  the E-light is on again. I ask you if you need a water or a coffee. You disdainfully say no. You hate me again, you have remembered I am a cheater, worse a liar and no matter how many times I apologize those truths remain evident. On my walk from the car I imagined you hopping in the driver's seat and driving off; if only the tank wasn't empty. I buy you water anyway because though you have declined it, I know that you need it, I always knew what you needed and it wasn't me or at least that's how I felt. I hope those feelings give you a little clairvoyance into my behavior. I never thought I was better than you if anything I thought you made me more. I pay the gas station attendant for pumping the gas, I hand you the bottled water and I drive you home.
My car pulls into the dirt driveway; I keep it running even though I want to turn it off, just shut up that loud lousy engine for a couple of minutes and tell you how much I hate myself for being such a miserable *****. Instead there is an awkward goodbye, do we kiss, do we hug, do we shake hands; I don't ******* know. You open the car door as to leave; possibly forever and you stop. You turn to me and ask a simple question. "Why didn't you do this when we were dating?" you hold up that plastic bottle now half empty "This is all I ever wanted!" I knew what you meant and it had nothing to do with water. I stutter for a moment and all my ego allows me to whimper is "I did". Wrong answer. I watched you walk up to the front-door and then I drove home; where I wept, quietly so my roommates wouldn't hear me because I was ashamed, not of crying but of who I was. Looking back I am glad that night wasn't about *** because it was always your innocence that melted me to my core. It was your smile, a cheerfulness that often left me confused. The world was a terrible place and yet you smiled when you looked at me. You were so beautiful and I so ugly, and because of that feeling I did ugly things. Today; I can say I forgive you. I forgive you for never forgiving me; leaving me behind was probably the best thing you ever taught me.

With love, always,
Jonathan R. Potts

There is a machine
it's hands driven by no singular man
nor collective of men but by the subconscious desires of whole societies,
possibly by all mankind.
It's will; perhaps passed on in our blood
but I suspect a more devious actor at play.
The augmented reality of language ****** upon us in our youth
with such tyrannical force it makes the rule of King Leopold
hardly a murmur in the heart of darkness.
It's reason as noble as it is useful. It aims to connect;
to help share the eloquent, heavenly images
that reside behind our eyes in our most sincere and naked moments.
Noble indeed are the intentions of language but they deceive,
make it hard for our pupils to see what needs to be seen
thus we live as Thoreau has said 'lives of quiet desperation'
blind to what our hearts cry for in the black of our deepest silence.
We deny them in the name of acceptance and comfort
for the fear of failure wear upon us like a heavy robe.
These words they echo such violent doubt
and in days past I had triumphed this lingering hesitation
with holy regard as if it embodied me with some super power.
What lunacy, what madness I endured;
twisted about by the contradictive nature of logos.
No more shall I wear this weight upon me,
cast off the coercive syntax and again like a child;
I think in images.
I may still write, even speak in fictitious representations
but I shall live my friends,
live to see these fiery reflections of light manifested into reality.
Live so that I am not remembered in words
but in the hearts of other men...

I need more sleep
but I need more you
how can I choose
when both are as real
as they are true,
if I must sleep
then I shall dream,
dream of you

I am not the man you marry.
Not at all!

I've never had a good job
I've never owned a nice car
and I don’t buy dinner.

Your mother will hate the way I dress
your father won’t trust me
and your girlfriends won’t ever be impressed
that you got me because

I am not the man you marry.
Not at all!

I drink too much
I smoke too many cigarettes
and I like to get high sometimes.

You’re right to think I’m crazy
you’re wrong to think I’ll ever stop being so
and if you ever thought you could change me
than you’re two cans short of a six pack because

I am not the man you marry.
Not at all!

I’ll make you nervous
I’ll make you uncertain about your beliefs
and I won’t ever apologize for being me.

You'll cry
you'll hurt
and you’ll try
to make it work because

I am the man you love
but I am not the man you marry.

There is an elephant in my head and a big one is he
he stamps his feet trampling my dreams into nothing but debris.
There is an elephant in my head, he is too strong you see
he leaves me no peace, no sleep, stomping on everything I can be.
There is an elephant in my head and I want to set him free
because deep down inside I know undoubtedly that elephant is me.

Yonderly forth does my mind travel
toward space unscathed by human eye,
vacantly naked my reflection unravels
distant are these thoughts of mine.
Untethered cognition free of man’s laws
his morals, his mission and even his flaws.
Thus I must burrow ever so deep
to find a single rigor of truth
I dig where other men sleep.

Awake,
Awake,
Oh wasted hearts
the first rule of living
is knowing: things fall apart.
What now is truth shall surely flee
as does the river's water escape to sea.
Clench not tightly to your current beliefs
they may not follow,
they cannot follow
where we intend to be.

Love is for the poor,
and money for the rich
but wisdom is reserved
for those who caught the itch
of curiosity for the fact that they exist.


Those sparse few who dare
to put their faith into people
but expect not to see the eyes of god
inside of another man’s cathedral.
Knowing well that these lies and laws
could never guide us past the flaws
of good and evil.


Only believe in the dreamer
who refuses the role of a follower
and shuns the idea of a leader.
Be not deceived by status or acclaim
because it only makes you a disciple
of a product and a name.


Hold in high regard the tired hikers
born to the depths of the deepest valleys
and yet they rise before the light of dawn
like a striker to set ablaze the malaise
of these pedestrian days
that mock our souls
with monotonous toil.


This life is but an eternal recurrence
therefore every morn we are born anew
and that potential is a shot at transference
into something more eminent than you.
Become the bridge my friend
because there is no future
in being an end.

So I say to thee, sing of me to future lovers.
Do not hold words behind teeth in fear of grief.
For they must be freed if life is to breathe seeds.
Whom sow and sprout forth,
in this garden true love grow north
toward bluer skies from open wounds,
dark thoughts and even darker moods.
Passion swoon like most fevers do
soon to pass as wellness looms.

This is not forever.

I know this to be true, sing of me to future lovers.
No matter how off beat or out of tune
Sing the way most old lovers do
full of hate, regret and true dismay.
Make mockery of my poetry
the heart felt things I'd say.
Call me a liar, a ******* and a no good cheat
but remember with each word you speak
remember; to remember it was always me.

I stand at the convenience store counter
with a smile but conflicted inside
I know I don't need them
yet, there they are.

A rainbow of apathetic death
a mosaic of bad breath
and even worse excuses
waiting to be packed
put into my chest pocket
and held close to my heart.

It makes me sick, hard to breathe
and yet here I am all ready to leave
with twenty more sticks of disease,
the same ones that gave my father
C-O-P-D.

But still I buy.

I swipe that card with little regard
to the fact that I'm reliving history
a son just as dumb as his father before him
scoring the same dope
wearing the same rope
around his collar.

I've thrown whole packs out car windows
sworn them off cause the habit,
the money lost and especially the cough
was getting to be a problem.

I've renounced this addiction
with the conviction of a holy man
yet still I stand smokes in hand
puffing away; swearing this to be my last
every time I can't help but laugh a little
cause I know I'm full of ****.
(Don't we all)

But still I buy.

We were misfits
the neglected *******
of a backwards world
that rejected us
not because we were sick
demented or dangerous
but because we didn't prescribe
to a preconceived notion
of what a functioning citizen was.

Not rotten enough to spoil
behind the bars of a prison
just competent enough
to work menial jobs
and drown our sorrows
at the corner pub.

We swallowed this hard truth
the same way we drank our shots
with no chaser
and at times it burnt
maybe even made us tear up
but we never let it beat us
(too strong for that)

We were beautiful
resilient beasts
that could carry the weight
of the world upon our shoulders
and it was heavy
but we would tell ourselves
"doesn't every world need an atlas?"
so we went on holding up the sky
when no one asked it of us.

I see you framed within the pane
of a stained glass window,
the warmth of dawn
crashing through its technicolor glaze
with the fervor of an untamed wave
of burning rays that peer into my soul
with kaleidoscope eyes

Rarely had my vision been focused in the past
and maybe for this reason the passage of time
felt as if it was little more than a forgotten dream.
I often found my eyes on an icy reflection
of a naked man standing before a fogged mirror,
fresh with the haze of a hot shower.
I would gaze upon him and he back into me,
pondering to myself "who are you stranger?"
I could only assume he thought the same of me.
I would wonder when he walked away
from that tooth paste stained portrait
if he ventured into the world with that familiar vigor,
that naive sensibility to battle
the demons,
the contradictors
and the liars.
If he too would laugh at these same fallacies in himself
with a certain kind of madness that could only touch
the ears of the few free men among us.
Those tragic spirits who dared to dance,
to transcend ancient genetics and modern culture
in hopes of touching a god they had long forsaken.
We may have given it a different name
but we were no better then the theologians before us,
we clung to our most primal desire.
It weighed upon us with such force
that hunger,
thirst
or even lust
felt like a pestering annoyance in the shadow of its glory.
Our appetite for connection far surpassed our need
to facilitate our biological deficiencies
and in those moments of understanding we reveled in the irony
of being minds trapped in fleshy bodies.
A smile crept across my face and one grew upon him.
I knew this man who stand before me,
unafraid,
bare in body
with a dastardly grin.
He was my oldest friend,
the ghost who spoke to me
in my most vulnerable moments
when no others did.
He cried for me when I could not,
would not cry for myself.
He had always been there
for me and for the first time
when I turned away from his reflection
I felt him follow too.

We had not spoke or wrote
for many long days
turning to even longer weeks
which grew into the longest months
until I could no longer weep
and again I found peace
in my once restless sleep.

But you came a calling
and a texting me
just when my hands
finally started feeling clean
spinning them words like
"I miss you"
"I just wanted to see"
wicked turn a phrases
pierce ears like crooked hooks
they could turn a man's thoughts
like the pages of an ancient book.

Your fingers gliding gently
over now so hazy memories
we meet again amidst a fog
but your eyes, your eyes
they do not remember me
they see a man foul in form
ugly, twisted flesh, weak and pathetic
ripping his own heart from his chest

This is not me you see (no not at all)
but a protrusion of your own ill-regard
you slithered on your belly like a serpent
begging to be tread upon
so I moved like certain kinds of dances
around tribal fires
determined not to slip but inevitably I did
how dare you hiss "Liar" at me.

I'm just a man
working on being a better one
I don't expect you to understand
cause I never said I could fly
so why the **** did you think
I was superman.