Tonight, I dare to hope.
I dare to hope that you will work.

I was afraid,
I afraid that you would just disappear
like all of the other men.

Is it too soon, my dear?
Is it too soon to hope?

Well, it might be,
but there is a little hope,
a little hope that you will stay,
a little hope that what you say is true.

I will try not to hope to much.

I keep pushing it down.

But I think I'll take the risk;
I think I'll take that chance,
and hope just a little.

What is this state that I'm in?
It seems as though it is an
in-between.
I am stuck in transition,
yet I am too afraid to move.

I am surrounded by a veil that disguises
reality.
I do not want to move from this unknown land.
I am in unfamiliar territory,
but I feel safe.
That, in itself, confuses me.

I look back;
I want to stay here.
I look forward;
I want to stay here.

The past fills me with
sorrow.
The future fills me with
fear.
Which I would prefer,
I have not a clue.

I would prefer to stay here in this
ephemeral
security;
in this false comfort;
in this illusion.

I would prefer to continue
deceiving myself
and altering actuality.
I would like to live in a constant state
of deception and transience.

Aren't we all anyways?

I'd like to live a long summer just looking into your eyes.
They tell me things that your words don't
They tell me things that your actions won't
They whisper about midnight and the way the moon looks
They scream about every time you've suffered for me
And it hurts
But they reassure me that you took those bullets by your own choice
Your eyes look me up and down in a way that feels like they are kissing every inch of me
They smile and laugh at my jokes
They comfort me in my sadness
They tell me goodnight with the deepest regrets

Your eyes tell me the words you won't say
They do the things you're too afraid to
They are brave while you hide behind them
Yes, I'd love to spend a summer looking in your eyes
They are honest, and you lie

Voices, there are voices, voices that I hear,
singing, sighing, multiplying, whispering in my ear.
Sometimes they are soft and sweet and sometimes they are mean,
I only wish I could wake up from this fear envoaking dream.
Voices, there are voices, many voices that I hear.
I wish, oh how I wish, these voices would disappear.
They chill me to the bone, in fact, to my very core,
but the only thing they ask for is "More blood, MORE!"
They scream and cry and rave at me until they get their way,
but I'm afraid that my many, many voices are hear to stay.
I wish, oh how I wish, that other people could see,
the many, many voices that are haunting me.

who killed himself
but nobody will tell me how,
and I'm too afraid to ask
because what if it wasn't an accident
and what if,
one day,
I know another boy.

Three seventy-five. At my current muscle weight, that’s the amount of force, in pounds, with which my fist smashes into my opponent’s face. Flesh molds against my knuckles, vessels rupture under the impact; I am that unstoppable object, that destruction you can only watch. I am that confused, hurt, angry child. I channel it through my arms, conduct it through my knuckles, watch it spark and jump from fist to cheekbone. This is the therapy I so wantonly crave, so needed. The only place I can vent the full wrath of my frustration upon the world; or…at least, a single member of it….

Jump back three days.

     Why can’t I see you more? I text her. Because I don’t want a relationship. She says. I don’t need a relationship. I just want to see more of you. I tell her. I’m afraid I’ll invest too much. She says. I don’t understand. Is that a bad thing? Seven years of friendship, two of off-on dates and rendezvous. How could you get more invested? What else can you spill after your hearts in a pool at my feet?
I drank a lot that night.

Jump back four days.

     I’m coming out that way. What are you doing tonight? I always initiate…everything. Always the first question, the first proposal, the first, the first, the first. Am I that threatening? Going out with friends. Homework and going out is all this woman seems to do. Maybe one less night with friends, one more with me wouldn’t hurt? Cool. Celebrating a birthday with friends, we’ll be out and about. Maybe we should meet up? If I’m here, she’s got no reason to refuse me…right? I thought distance was our only problem. Maybe it isn’t. I don’t know. I don’t want you to see me stupid drunk. What a stupid excuse. I actually want to see you stupid drunk. I will at some point if we keep things up.

     Long story short, a guy she sometimes fucks is going to be wherever it is they’re going, and she doesn’t want to have two guys she’s seeing in the same vicinity. What does that make me? I’m getting frustrated with all this confusion and sideways talking. My group incidentally ends up at the same place they are. I don’t even talk to her face-to-face. I’m such a sporting guy. She goes home...alone, to my relief. I get stupid drunk with friends. But never forget to message her back and act like everything’s cool.

Jump ahead a week.

     More conversations to clear up why I fill only one void in her life lead to more confusion. I’m frothing with it. It’ll be in my mouth soon. Wait…I taste it already.

     “Let’s drink and pick fights,” I say to a couple buds. Two hours out, we’re sloshed and trading licks in a back alley. The guy that had taunted and jostled me in the bar follows us out and picks a fight. Says I’m too drunk. Not worth it. I hide a smile, raise my arms, “Let’s see.”

     Shirts are off. Left hook to my ribs, I pivot an elbow, deflect with forearm. This leaves his side open. I duck his wild right-hand and drive a straight hit into his open spleen. He hits the alley wall. “Still want to take a drunk?” I taunt from my knee. He comes back, still sure of himself. I’ll show you what confidence does to us, my friend. He puts up a boxer’s guard and comes back, more cautious. Friends and enemies cheer and joan around me. I don’t hear a thing. There are thoughts. Dark, confused, smashed together, waiting to be dealt with. I focus on all of it. I focus on his face. I listen to the conversations that leave me more hurt and alone than they should. I lean into a false waltz stance, he doesn’t notice the feet. I notice his. He’s more drunk, on less, than I. Every time you breathe, I hope you think of me. The mass in my mind flows through my arms and legs. I charge and he punches straight where my head should go. I dodge right, grab his wrist, snap in and pull out, stringing him in an invisible flaying bed; my left elbow crosses his solar plexus, throwing him to the ground. Knees pin his arms. The hate, and anger, and confusion, and helplessness dissolve between fist and flesh, arc across the pain in my heart and the bruises and blood flowing freely from a fool....

Never entice a man with a need to portray his problems upon a heedless world.

     His friend steps in and plants a well-thought-out fist against my jaw. The one on the ground is down for the count. My friends don’t step in. They know me. I roll off him before his friend’s hit can follow through. Now I have physical pain to channel, too. I grin and my assailant isn’t comforted. This is the release I need. This is my way out. This is what will help. Fuck you, world. Fuck you girl. Damn all of you for your games and your feelings and your mysteries. To hell with why you think you need to hide your heart. Wear it on your goddamn sleeves. Fuck your dishonesty and your insincerity. Fuck your exes. May you all drowned in your lies and guilt and shame. Damn you for assuming I’d ever judge any of you, for not taking my love at face-value, for thinking I had anywhere near the ulterior motives you all harbored. My left hand grabs his left elbow, simultaneously blocking a right jab and flipping his arm out of the way for the full force of my right arm into his ribs. A cacophony of bone and flesh giving way to my wrath meets my ears. He yelps. Never yelp when you’re trying to be strong for a friend. Keep your damned lips closed, asshole. He recovers only slightly before my right meets his face. My arc is perfect: the momentum of muscle as it curves the natural twist of a muscled arm, the darkness of my life gathering on knuckle-tips like obsidian gems glinting in the dirty hallway between worlds of vice and vindication, the cording muscle releasing the pent-up rage of a thousand lives gathered in one body.

     Connection shatters worlds. The horror of life bleeds across his broken window to the world. The reflection of my jeweled nirvana wink across his eyes. See the world I live in, failed rescuer. See the hopeless honor I hold in my bosom. Sleep with the knowledge that even when you try, someone will always be there to flash the dark, jaded realities across your eyes…and bring you to my level.

     The other friends won’t budge ‘till I’ve stepped past. They part like the Red Sea for me. My ark is empty until I interact with the world tomorrow.

Brief peace is better than none.

-###-

Humans are pack animals and you can witness it on the highway
Too afraid to break from expected behavior such as driving the speed limit
Or turning on your lights in bad weather
The lone shepard in the middle of the highway
Driving his run down '67 Cadillac with every window open
So as to let every breeze he passes caress his wild hair until the sun's orange rays finally peek over the hills
And spills into the rear view

Sputtering down the highway at a pace
That only he is comfortable going
Hitting every pot hole, every bump in the road
Acknowledging every piece of trash that litters the roadside wondering
Why no one else can break from tradition
And merely enjoy the open road

She said, "You make me feel like I'm in the wrong skin."

And as he sat there in contemplation of this newest revelation

She told him about Thursday
And how he'd kissed her that way
And how it made her feel whole
As if they were one being meant to be
Joined at the mouth,
But had snapped apart and were together
Again

She told him about the way her heart
Raced with anxiety
And her fingers shook every day
But when he kissed her everything went numb
And her brain thought slowly
And the world kept turning
And she wasn't afraid it would stop anymore

Finally, she told him about the skin
She told him that being away from him
Made her snap back to reality
But she had finally tasted happiness
And her old reality felt all wrong
She felt all wrong without him

She asked him if he loved her
She couldn't bear to leave him

He didn't hear a word

"But your skin is so beautiful."

And he leaned in and kissed her.

I am the places I've been
the things i've done
the thoughts I've thought
the mistakes I've made
I am discovering new places
doing new things
thinking new thoughts
and making new mistakes
I am becoming who I was meant to be
and that's what I'm afraid of