FIRST DAY

1.
Who wanted me
to go to Chicago
on January 6th?
I did!

The night before,
20 below zero
Fahrenheit
with the wind chill;
as the blizzard of 99
lay in mountains
of blackening snow.

I packed two coats,
two suits,
three sweaters,
multiple sets of long johns
and heavy white socks
for a two-day stay.

I left from Newark.
**** the denseness,
it confounds!

The 2nd City to whom?
2nd ain’t bad.
It’s pretty good.
If you consider
Peking and Prague,
Tokyo and Togo,
Manchester and Moscow,
Port Au Prince and Paris,
Athens and Amsterdam,
Buenos Aries and Johannesburg;
that’s pretty good.

What’s going on here today?
It’s friggin frozen.
To the bone!

But Chi Town is still cool.
Buddy Guy’s is open.
Bartenders mixing drinks,
cabbies jamming on their breaks,
honey dew waitresses serving sugar,
buildings swerving,
fire tongued preachers are preaching
and the farmers are measuring the moon.

The lake,
unlike Ontario
is in the midst of freezing.
Bones of ice
threaten to gel
into a solid mass
over the expanse
of the Michigan Lake.
If this keeps up,
you can walk
clear to Toronto
on a silver carpet.

Along the shore
the ice is permanent.
It’s the first big frost
of winter
after a long
Indian Summer.

Thank God
I caught a cab.
Outside I hear
The Hawk
nippin hard.
It’ll get your ear,
finger or toe.
Bite you on the nose too
if you ain’t careful.

Thank God,
I’m not walking
the Wabash tonight;
but if you do cover up,
wear layers.

Chicago,
could this be
Sandburg’s City?

I’m overwhelmed
and this is my tenth time here.

It’s almost better,
sometimes it is better,
a lot of times it is better
and denser then New York.

Ask any Bull’s fan.
I’m a Knickerbocker.
Yes Nueva York,
a city that has placed last
in the standings
for many years.
Except the last two.
Yanks are # 1!

But Chicago
is a dynasty,
as big as
Sammy Sosa’s heart,
rich and wide
as Michael Jordan’s grin.

Middle of a country,
center of a continent,
smack dab in the mean
of a hemisphere,
vortex to a world,
Chicago!

Kansas City,
Nashville,
St. Louis,
Detroit,
Cleveland,
Pittsburgh,
Denver,
New Orleans,
Dallas,
Cairo,
Singapore,
Auckland,
Baghdad,
Mexico City
and Montreal
salute her.



2.
Cities,
A collection of vanities?
Engineered complex utilitarianism?
The need for community a social necessity?
Ego one with the mass?
Civilization’s latest *******?
Chicago is more then that.

Jefferson’s yeoman farmer
is long gone
but this capitol
of the Great Plains
is still democratic.

The citizen’s of this city
would vote daily,
if they could.

Chicago,
Sandburg’s Chicago,
Could it be?

The namesake river
segments the city,
canals of commerce,
all perpendicular,
is rife throughout,
still guiding barges
to the Mississippi
and St. Laurence.

Now also
tourist attractions
for a cafe society.

Chicago is really jazzy,
swanky clubs,
big steaks,
juices and drinks.

You get the best
coffee from Seattle
and the finest teas
from China.

Great restaurants
serve liquid jazz
al la carte.

Jazz Jazz Jazz
All they serve is Jazz
Rock me steady
Keep the beat
Keep it flowin
Feel the heat!

Jazz Jazz Jazz
All they is, is Jazz
Fast cars will take ya
To the show
Round bout midnight
Where’d the time go?

Flows into the Mississippi,
the mother of America’s rivers,
an empires aorta.

Great Lakes wonder of water.
Niagara Falls
still her heart gushes forth.

Buffalo connected to this holy heart.
Finger Lakes and Adirondacks
are part of this watershed,
all the way down to the
Delaware and Chesapeake.

Sandburg’s Chicago?
Oh my my,
the wonder of him.
Who captured the imagination
of the wonders of rivers.

Down stream other holy cities
from the Mississippi delta
all mapped by him.

Its mouth our Dixie Trumpet
guarded by righteous Cajun brethren.

Midwest?
Midwest from where?
It’s north of Caracas and Los Angeles,
east of Fairbanks,
west of Dublin
and south of not much.

Him,
who spoke of honest men
and loving women.
Working men and mothers
bearing citizens to build a nation.
The New World’s
precocious adolescent
caught in a stream
of endless and exciting change,
much pain and sacrifice,
dedication and loss,
pride and tribulations.

From him we know
all the people’s faces.
All their stories are told.
Never defeating the
idea of Chicago.

Sandburg had the courage to say
what was in the heart of the people, who:

Defeated the Indians,
Mapped the terrain,
Aided slavers,
Fought a terrible civil war,
Hoisted the barges,
Grew the food,
Whacked the wheat,
Sang the songs,
Fought many wars of conquest,
Cleared the land,
Erected the bridges,
Trapped the game,
Netted the fish,
Mined the coal,
Forged the steel,
Laid the tracks,
Fired the tenders,
Cut the stone,
Mixed the mortar,
Plumbed the line,
And laid the bricks
Of this nation of cities!

Pardon the Marlboro Man shtick.
It’s a poor expostulation of
crass commercial symbolism.

Like I said, I’m a
Devil Fan from Jersey
and Madison Avenue
has done its work on me.

It’s a strange alchemy
that changes
a proud Nation of Blackhawks
into a merchandising bonanza
of hometown hockey shirts,
making the native seem alien,
and the interloper at home chillin out,
warming his feet atop a block of ice,
guzzling Old Style
with clicker in hand.

Give him his beer
and other diversions.
If he bowls with his buddy’s
on Tuesday night
I hope he bowls
a perfect game.

He’s earned it.
He works hard.
Hard work and faith
built this city.

And it’s not just the faith
that fills the cities
thousand churches,
temples and
mosques on the Sabbath.

3.
There is faith in everything in Chicago!

An alcoholic broker named Bill
lives the Twelve Steps
to banish fear and loathing
for one more day.
Bill believes in sobriety.

A tug captain named Moe
waits for the spring thaw
so he can get the barges up to Duluth.
Moe believes in the seasons.

A farmer named Tom
hopes he has reaped the last
of many bitter harvests.
Tom believes in a new start.

A homeless man named Earl
wills himself a cot and a hot
at the local shelter.
Earl believes in deliverance.

A Pullman porter
named George
works overtime
to get his first born
through medical school.
George believes in opportunity.

A folk singer named Woody
sings about his
countrymen inheritance
and implores them to take it.
Woody believes in people.

A Wobbly named Joe
organizes fellow steelworkers
to fight for a workers paradise
here on earth.
Joe believes in ideals.

A bookkeeper named Edith
is certain she’ll see the Cubs
win the World Series
in her lifetime.
Edith believes in miracles.

An electrician named ****
saves money
to bring his family over from Gdansk.
**** believes in America.

A banker named Leah
knows Ditka will return
and lead the Bears
to another Super Bowl.
Leah believes in nostalgia.

A cantor named Samuel
prays for another 20 years
so he can properly train
his Temple’s replacement.

Samuel believes in tradition.
A high school girl named Sally
refuses to get an abortion.
She knows she carries
something special within her.
Sally believes in life.

A city worker named Mazie
ceaselessly prays
for her incarcerated son
doing 10 years at Cook.
Mazie believes in redemption.

A jazzer named Bix
helps to invent a new art form
out of the mist.
Bix believes in creativity.

An architect named Frank
restores the Rookery.
Frank believes in space.

A soldier named Ike
fights wars for democracy.
Ike believes in peace.

A Rabbi named Jesse
sermonizes on Moses.
Jesse believes in liberation.

Somewhere in Chicago
a kid still believes in Shoeless Joe.
The kid believes in
the integrity of the game.

An Imam named Louis
is busy building a nation
within a nation.
Louis believes in
self-determination.

A teacher named Heidi
gives all she has to her students.
She has great expectations for them all.
Heidi believes in the future.

4.
Does Chicago have a future?

This city,
full of cowboys
and wildcatters
is predicated
on a future!

Bang, bang
Shoot em up
Stake the claim
It’s your terrain
Drill the hole
Strike it rich
Top it off
You’re the boss
Take a chance
Watch it wane
Try again
Heavenly gains

Chicago
city of futures
is a Holy Mecca
to all day traders.

Their skin is gray,
hair disheveled,
loud ties and
funny coats,
thumb through
slips of paper
held by nail
chewed hands.
Selling promises
with no derivative value
for out of the money calls
and in the money puts.
Strike is not a labor action
in this city of unionists,
but a speculators mark,
a capitalist wish,
a hedgers bet,
a public debt
and a farmers
fair return.

Indexes for everything.
Quantitative models
that could burst a kazoo.

You know the measure
of everything in Chicago.
But is it truly objective?
Have mathematics banished
subjective intentions,
routing it in fair practice
of market efficiencies,
a kind of scientific absolution?

I heard that there
is a dispute brewing
over the amount of snowfall
that fell on the 1st.

The mayor’s office,
using the official city ruler
measured 22”
of snow on the ground.

The National Weather Service
says it cannot detect more
then 17” of snow.

The mayor thinks
he’ll catch less heat
for the trains that don’t run
the buses that don’t arrive
and the schools that stand empty
with the addition of 5”.

The analysts say
it’s all about capturing liquidity.

Liquidity,
can you place a great lake
into an eyedropper?

Its 20 below
and all liquid things
are solid masses
or a gooey viscosity at best.

Water is frozen everywhere.
But Chi town is still liquid,
flowing faster
then the digital blips
flashing on the walls
of the CBOT.

Dreams
are never frozen in Chicago.
The exchanges trade
without missing a beat.

Trading wet dreams,
the crystallized vapor
of an IPO
pledging a billion points
of Internet access
or raiding the public treasuries
of a central bank’s
huge stores of gold
with currency swaps.

Using the tools
of butterfly spreads
and candlesticks
to achieve the goal.

Short the Russell
or buy the Dow,
go long the
CAC and DAX.
Are you trading in euro’s?
You better be
or soon will.
I know
you’re Chicago,
you’ll trade anything.
WEBS,
Spiders,
and Leaps
are traded here,
along with sweet crude,
North Sea Brent,
plywood and T-Bill futures;
and most importantly
the commodities,
the loam
that formed this city
of broad shoulders.

What about our wheat?
Still whacking and
breadbasket to the world.

Oil,
an important fossil fuel
denominated in
good ole greenbacks.

Porkbellies,
not just hogwash
on the Wabash,
but bacon, eggs
and flapjacks
are on the menu
of every diner in Jersey
as the “All American.”

Cotton,
our contribution
to the Golden Triangle,
once the global currency
used to enrich a
gentlemen class
of cultured
southern slavers,
now Tommy Hilfiger’s
preferred fabric.

I think he sends it
to Bangkok where
child slaves
spin it into
gold lame'.

Sorghum,
I think its hardy.

Soybeans,
the new age substitute
for hamburger
goes great with tofu lasagna.

Corn,
ADM creates ethanol,
they want us to drive cleaner cars.

Cattle,
once driven into this city’s
bloodhouses for slaughter,
now ground into
a billion Big Macs
every year.

When does a seed
become a commodity?
When does a commodity
become a future?
When does a future expire?

You can find the answers
to these questions in Chicago
and find a fortune in a hole in the floor.

Look down into the pits.
Hear the screams of anguish
and profitable delights.

Frenzied men
swarming like a mass
of epileptic ants
atop the worlds largest sugar cube
auger the worlds free markets.

The scene is
more chaotic then
100 Haymarket Square Riots
multiplied by 100
1968 Democratic Conventions.

Amidst inverted anthills,
they scurry forth and to
in distinguished
black and red coats.

Fighting each other
as counterparties
to a life and death transaction.

This is an efficient market
that crosses the globe.

Oil from the Sultan of Brunei,
Yen from the land of Hitachi,
Long Bonds from the Fed,
nickel from Quebec,
platinum and palladium
from Siberia,
FTSE’s from London
and crewel cane from Havana
circle these pits.

Tijuana,
Shanghai
and Istanbul's
best traders
are only half as good
as the average trader in Chicago.

Chicago,
this hog butcher to the world,
specializes in packaging and distribution.

Men in blood soaked smocks,
still count the heads
entering the gates of the city.

Their handiwork
is sent out on barges
and rail lines as frozen packages
of futures
waiting for delivery
to an anonymous counterparty
half a world away.

This nation’s hub
has grown into the
premier purveyor
to the world;
along all the rivers,
highways,
railways
and estuaries
it’s tentacles reach.

5.
Sandburg’s Chicago,
is a city of the world’s people.

Many striver rows compose
its many neighborhoods.

Nordic stoicism,
Eastern European orthodoxy
and Afro-American
calypso vibrations
are three of many cords
strumming the strings
of Chicago.

Sandburg’s Chicago,
if you wrote forever
you would only scratch its surface.

People wait for trains
to enter the city from O’Hare.
Frozen tears
lock their eyes
onto distant skyscrapers,
solid chunks
of snot blocks their nose
and green icicles of slime
crust mustaches.
They fight to breathe.

Sandburg’s Chicago
is The Land of Lincoln,
Savior of the Union,
protector of the Republic.
Sent armies
of sons and daughters,
barges, boxcars,
gunboats, foodstuffs,
cannon and shot
to raze the south
and stamp out succession.

Old Abe’s biography
are still unknown volumes to me.
I must see and read the great words.
You can never learn enough;
but I’ve been to Washington
and seen the man’s memorial.
The Free World’s 8th wonder,
guarded by General Grant,
who still keeps an eye on Richmond
and a hand on his sword.

Through this American winter
Abe ponders.
The vista he surveys is dire and tragic.

Our sitting President
impeached
for lying about a *******.

Party partisans
in the senate are sworn and seated.
Our Chief Justice,
adorned with golden bars
will adjudicate the proceedings.
It is the perfect counterpoint
to an ageless Abe thinking
with malice toward none
and charity towards all,
will heal the wounds
of the nation.

Abe our granite angel,
Chicago goes on,
The Union is strong!


SECOND DAY

1.
Out my window
the sun has risen.

According to
the local forecast
its minus 9
going up to
6 today.

The lake,
a golden pillow of clouds
is frozen in time.

I marvel
at the ancients ones
resourcefulness
and how
they mastered
these extreme elements.

Past, present and future
has no meaning
in the Citadel
of the Prairie today.

I set my watch
to Central Standard Time.

Stepping into
the hotel lobby
the concierge
with oil smooth hair,
perfect tie
and English lilt
impeccably asks,
“Do you know where you are going Sir?
Can I give you a map?”

He hands me one of Chicago.
I see he recently had his nails done.
He paints a green line
along Whacker Drive and says,
“turn on Jackson, LaSalle, Wabash or Madison
and you’ll get to where you want to go.”
A walk of 14 or 15 blocks from Streeterville-
(I start at The Chicago White House.
They call it that because Hillary Rodham
stays here when she’s in town.
Its’ also alleged that Stedman
eats his breakfast here
but Opra
has never been seen
on the premises.
I wonder how I gained entry
into this place of elite’s?)
-down into the center of The Loop.

Stepping out of the hotel,
The Doorman
sporting the epaulets of a colonel
on his corporate winter coat
and furry Cossack hat
swaddling his round black face
accosts me.

The skin of his face
is flaking from
the subzero windburn.

He asks me
with a gapped toothy grin,
“Can I get you a cab?”
“No I think I’ll walk,” I answer.
“Good woolen hat,
thick gloves you should be alright.”
He winks and lets me pass.

I step outside.
The Windy City
flings stabbing cold spears
flying on wings of 30-mph gusts.
My outside hardens.
I can feel the freeze
deepen
into my internalness.
I can’t be sure
but inside
my heart still feels warm.
For how long
I cannot say.

I commence
my walk
among the spires
of this great city,
the vertical leaps
that anchor the great lake,
holding its place
against the historic
frigid assault.

The buildings’ sway,
modulating to the blows
of natures wicked blasts.

It’s a hard imposition
on a city and its people.

The gloves,
skullcap,
long underwear,
sweater,
jacket
and overcoat
not enough
to keep the cold
from penetrating
the person.

Like discerning
the layers of this city,
even many layers,
still not enough
to understand
the depth of meaning
of the heart
of this heartland city.

Sandburg knew the city well.
Set amidst groves of suburbs
that extend outward in every direction.
Concentric circles
surround the city.
After the burbs come farms,
Great Plains, and mountains.
Appalachians and Rockies
are but mere molehills
in the city’s back yard.
It’s terra firma
stops only at the sea.
Pt. Barrow to the Horn,
many capes extended.

On the periphery
its appendages,
its extremities,
its outward extremes.
All connected by the idea,
blown by the incessant wind
of this great nation.
The Windy City’s message
is sent to the world’s four corners.
It is a message of power.
English the worlds
common language
is spoken here,
along with Ebonics,
Espanol,
Mandarin,
Czech,
Russian,
Korean,
Arabic,
Hindi­,
German,
French,
electronics,
steel,
cars,
cartoons,
rap,
sports­,
movies,
capital,
wheat
and more.

Always more.
Much much more
in Chicago.

2.
Sandburg
spoke all the dialects.

He heard them all,
he understood
with great precision
to the finest tolerances
of a lathe workers micrometer.

Sandburg understood
what it meant to laugh
and be happy.

He understood
the working mans day,
the learned treatises
of university chairs,
the endless tomes
of the city’s
great libraries,
the lost languages
of the ancient ones,
the secret codes
of abstract art,
the impact of architecture,
the street dialects and idioms
of everymans expression of life.

All fighting for life,
trying to build a life,
a new life
in this modern world.

Walking across
the Michigan Avenue Bridge
I see the Wrigley Building
is neatly carved,
catty cornered on the plaza.

I wonder if Old Man Wrigley
watched his barges
loaded with spearmint
and double-mint
move out onto the lake
from one of those Gothic windows
perched high above the street.

Would he open a window
and shout to the men below
to quit slaking and work harder
or would he
between the snapping sound
he made with his mouth
full of his chewing gum
offer them tickets
to a ballgame at Wrigley Field
that afternoon?

Would the men below
be able to understand
the man communing
from such a great height?

I listen to a man
and woman conversing.
They are one step behind me
as we meander along Wacker Drive.

"You are in Chicago now.”
The man states with profundity.
“If I let you go
you will soon find your level
in this city.
Do you know what I mean?”

No I don’t.
I think to myself.
What level are you I wonder?
Are you perched atop
the transmission spire
of the Hancock Tower?

I wouldn’t think so
or your ears would melt
from the windburn.

I’m thinking.
Is she a kept woman?
She is majestically clothed
in fur hat and coat.
In animal pelts
not trapped like her,
but slaughtered
from farms
I’m sure.

What level
is he speaking of?

Many levels
are evident in this city;
many layers of cobbled stone,
Pennsylvania iron,
Hoosier Granite
and vertical drops.

I wonder
if I detect
condensation
in his voice?

What is
his intention?
Is it a warning
of a broken affair?
A pending pink slip?
Advise to an addict
refusing to adhere
to a recovery regimen?

What is his level anyway?
Is he so high and mighty,
Higher and mightier
then this great city
which we are all a part of,
which we all helped to build,
which we all need
in order to keep this nation
the thriving democratic
empire it is?

This seditious talk!

3.
The Loop’s El
still courses through
the main thoroughfares of the city.

People are transported
above the din of the street,
looking down
on the common pedestrians
like me.

Super CEO’s
populating the upper floors
of Romanesque,
Greek Revivalist,
New Bauhaus,
Art Deco
and Post Nouveau
Neo-Modern
Avant-Garde towers
are too far up
to see me
shivering on the street.

The cars, busses,
trains and trucks
are all covered
with the film
of rock salt.

Salt covers
my bootless feet
and smudges
my cloths as well.

The salt,
the primal element
of the earth
covers everything
in Chicago.

It is the true level
of this city.

The layer
beneath
all layers,
on which
everything
rests,
is built,
grows,
thrives
then dies.
To be
returned again
to the lower
layers
where it can
take root
again
and grow
out onto
the great plains.

Splashing
the nation,
anointing
its people
with its
blessing.

A blessing,
Chicago?

All rivers
come here.

All things
found its way here
through the canals
and back bays
of the world’s
greatest lakes.

All roads,
rails and
air routes
begin and
end here.

Mrs. O’Leary’s cow
got a *** rap.
It did not start the fire,
we did.

We lit the torch
that flamed
the city to cinders.
From a pile of ash
Chicago rose again.

Forever Chicago!
Forever the lamp
that burns bright
on a Great Lake’s
western shore!

Chicago
the beacon
sends the
message to the world
with its windy blasts,
on chugging barges,
clapping trains,
flying tandems,
T1 circuits
and roaring jets.

Sandburg knew
a Chicago
I will never know.

He knew
the rhythm of life
the people walked to.
The tools they used,
the dreams they dreamed
the songs they sang,
the things they built,
the things they loved,
the pains that hurt,
the motives that grew,
the actions that destroyed
the prayers they prayed,
the food they ate
their moments of death.

Sandburg knew
the layers of the city
to the depths
and windy heights
I cannot fathom.

The Blues
came to this city,
on the wing
of a chirping bird,
on the taps
of a rickety train,
on the blast
of an angry sax
rushing on the wind,
on the Westend blitz
of Pop's brash coronet,
on the tink of
a twinkling piano
on a paddle-wheel boat
and on the strings
of a lonely man’s guitar.

Walk into the clubs,
tenements,
row houses,
speakeasies
and you’ll hear the Blues
whispered like
a quiet prayer.

Tidewater Blues
from Virginia,
Delta Blues
from the lower
Mississippi,
Boogie Woogie
from Appalachia,
Texas Blues
from some Lone Star,
Big Band Blues
from Kansas City,
Blues from
Beal Street,
Jelly Roll’s Blues
from the Latin Quarter.

Hell even Chicago
got its own brand
of Blues.

Its all here.
It ended up here
and was sent away
on the winds of westerly blows
to the ear of an eager world
on strong jet streams
of simple melodies
and hard truths.

A broad
shouldered woman,
a single mother stands
on the street
with three crying babes.
Their cloths
are covered
in salt.
She pleads
for a break,
praying
for a new start.
Poor and
under-clothed
against the torrent
of frigid weather
she begs for help.
Her blond hair
and ****** features
suggests her
Scandinavian heritage.
I wonder if
she is related to Sandburg
as I walk past
her on the street.
Her feet
are bleeding
through her
canvass sneakers.
Her babes mouths
are zipped shut
with frozen drivel
and mucous.

The Blues live
on in Chicago.

The Blues
will forever live in her.
As I turn the corner
to walk the Miracle Mile
I see her engulfed
in a funnel cloud of salt,
snow and bits
of white paper,
swirling around her
and her children
in an angry
unforgiving
maelstrom.

The family
begins to
dissolve
like a snail
sprinkled with salt;
and a mother
and her children
just disappear
into the pavement
at the corner
of Dearborn,
in Chicago.

Music:

Robert Johnson
Sweet Home Chicago


jbm
Chicago
1/7/99

Little blips of you in the mornings

delicious sights and opulent tastes

night time wet and sleepy all day

summers swimming in pa pa lake

little blips of you so so exhausted

resting slightly upon my shoulder

waking in the rage of sunset fires

little blips in my mind's photography

of magnesium flash bulb memories

when you were here alive with me...


Copyright  2010

black as night
chiseled stone
spirits ramble
orphans roam

lover's eyes
masquerade
9 to 5
come out and play

drop of blood
alabaster
frozen heart
encased in plaster

open mouth
parted lips
shared breaths
sway and dip

swish and flick
atmosphere
moody blips
no need to fear

stormy skies
vivaciousness
gentle touch
tenacious kiss

cotton candy
flushed and wild
sapphire eyes
mother's child

wide grin
break apart
fleshy dawn
beating heart

Blip. Blip. Blip
In the black of my room a red light pulses langorously on my phone
Steady green and blue lights and a rapid orange define the router across the room
Red digital numbers stand in the place of the clock
At precisely 6:00 am my alarm goes off(a deranged rooster entrapped in my phone)
A flick of a finger dismisses the crowing and the day has begun
After dressing and any other trivial task, I  am headed downstairs
A chik of the toaster
One beepbeepbeep of the microwave
More digital numbers, this time green, indicate that my bus comes shortly and I dash off
The headlights of the bus announce its presence half a block before it halts and the doors jerkily slide open
I text Graham from five feet away, because I don't yet know enough sign language
On the bus the driver may make an announcement, various lights and a few wires around her seat
School starts with a bell and the mindless herd shuffles in
The hallways bustle with the noise of teenagers chatting noisily, ipods playing, cells buzzing, beeping, texting
Homeroom and every period after is marked by a bell before and after until the last bell, freeing us from our institution of education
Now everyone is really alive and the clammer of sounds is three times as loud as the morning.
On the bus all but the most obnoxious are silent, closed off in their little world of a cellphone, ipod, or mp3
The kids file on and off the bus, only waking from their technology induced zombification to rapidly vocalize with their friends
Once I get home microwave humms as food is reheated or quickly cooked
The rice cooker is prepped and light flips on when plugged into the wall
Coffee maker may be set, and if my dad is home, his workspace is humming and light-pulsing as well
Brother and sisters argue over which tv show to watch or first computer turn while I'm wrapped up in my world of texting homework and poetry
Mom arrives from school and dinner is made
Stove humming loud and food stirfryed
Dinner no blips beeps or pulses matter, just the clinking of silverware and conversation
Afterwards, faucet runs dishes clattering while I wash
Imersion resumes and videos, games, and homework take over until bed
Teeth are brushed, pajamas donned, and members of this family mess around in bedroom before slowly transitioning to bed, and then sleep
So ends another day for me in the 21st century

A multitude of Cerebral Blips
Brought to closure by a
High Priority

*Bloop.

Yeah
well I sat in the barbers chair while you walked up and down the crowded aisles in a half deserted Tesco store
I wondered why
what was it for?
The freezer stood alone at home
freezing cold as was its wont but it was stacked with want me nothing more at all
for it was full up to its freezing chin
with something brought from albuquerque
and two fifths of London Gin.

The barber gave a weirdly grin and gave me one of number two
I should have fekin known that's what the little *** would do
but you just wandered round and did you see that skinhead passing by the deli' counter?
that was me
I waved atop my fresh shaved head
but I was dead meat on the cooked meat and it shook me wide awake
I need to take a breather
might even leave her
she would not care
she's got Tesco's in her brain and not to mention in her hair with apple summer fresh smell,how much dumber can one get
well if I stick about just watch this space
look out for the smiling vacant face
that will be me
taking her
to do her hair
just like mine.

My darling boy,
The real one. The real thing and all.
A figment of my imagination but in my (tiny) self I hold.
You.

There is much awe in my city, my dear, but you are the skyscraper. Much joy in my world, but you are the bubbles, clumsily blown by a three year old.  Much wonder in my life, but you are my eyes when fireworks are set off. There is much music, but you sing a different song, of other lives lived, of sisterhood, of soul mates, of brothers, of lovers. Once again, we are.

It had been so long and on your descent, your landing, your smooth slip through Heathrow’s arrival gates (the home of my memory hidden in its ink)
I felt myself climb
Back into you
In the strongest, yet weakest way
Possible
Now you must rest. Go home to your mother and sleep til you wake.

Those days later
I watched you step out of that car
And as if in swift teamwork, my body was broken and healed at once.
I watched you cascade, so graciously, towards the bell ringers.
The people, your people
Your girls – full of anger, heavy wombs and hurricane.
I whispered, under my breath, ‘thank you, I love you’ and became
Me
You arrived and left without a ******* your arm – because, the truth is, you could never have anyone on your arm
Not even
You

My olive tree
The fruits of my loves labour never lost
A middle aged woman’s warm self among metallic scratches and blips.
A photograph – taken just before
Half of your face
Filling the whole page.

I will write to you
For you
As yours
Daily
And at the end of each I will
Whisper, under my breath, ‘thank you, I love you’

Thank you
I love you
Scorpio x

My heads pounding
My necks twisted amuck
think I'mma stop giving a ****
Light up a blunt and do what I want -
woah wait -
ain't that the **** that got me
here in the first place?
Worst case I nervously pace
the halls for a day - two or a weekend
Blasting the weeknd
Entire enviroment reeking
shrieking -
Nah -
I'm better than that.
Can't latch onto the past.
That's the trash that got
us there at the start - instead
I prepare it in art
And share from the heart, with you.
And you.
And you and you and you.
Because why not?
It helps forget about that pinebox looming-
Thinking outside the winebox lucid -
I mean Windex, clean em out
And a win decks, stacks paper chips
You can't say this isn't some matrix blips
I am not losing ****
I am manuevering this beautiful thing
up past this ******* Nuva Ring
Cause that's life - you can get beat
or keep it on a leash - jeez
that's sexist. I don't know
where this became an accepted
comparison, its embarrassing
comparing them - to K9's
But we hear it through the grapevine
Turns of phrase we make fine.

Aural sounds of delectation
funk-fuel in fervent distillation
undertones of jazz-swing in migration
electronic clicks and blips for relaxation
ambience is my one true occupation.

The resonance of sound in rotation
the initiation itself a radiation
morphological alternation in isolation
as the hubbub of voices echo respiration
breath in, breath out, in elevation.

No underlying obligation, only inspiration
and celebration of collaboration
revel in the pleasures of sensation
like the first discovery of amplification
and in its appreciation and stimulation
embrace variation in all its illumination.

Seek out new music from recommendation
the gravitation towards transformation
the re-education and regeneration
this musical manifestation of civilisation
saturated in complex contemplation
adoration in meditation
the simplest form of gratification
the creative urge for diversification
and technological intensity
of electronic experimentation.

somethings wrong
somethings off
the nights are short
the days are long
bleeding together
it's too raw, being together
it wasn't always awful

but what kind of basis is that for relations?
brutally escaping in even the most catered of places
chasing - those exit signs i guess
bad at following directions i guess -
so much time passed at my expense
with my ex, spent
so much energy on a situation run down
just closure after a foreclosure - back then we both
double-down on what seemed a fortune but where's the fun now?
little did i know we'd both been better off had i chose to ignore you
but of course  explore new
territory, and now it's terrifying
got gory with all the hellish lying
if you hear this, know that i am fine
better than before and
i hope the same for you
and i aim to do what i came to do
though i'm not a soothsayer
i know that i can't abandon a trail
but maybe that's what happens when
gemini tries to stand on the scales
get suspended in air -
she doesn't end in a veil
let me just end it right there.

i remember the meningitis scare:
   oh... it was very real...
i guess it was supposed to affect a niche
proportion of the population...

so much for the "scare":
they would vaccinate us in the schools:
since children were more prone
to succumb to: and inflammation of
the lining around your brain and spinal cord...

and all that: press a thumb against
a skin... and if the skin returns to its original
colouring: there's no blemish of applied
pressure... pressing glasses onto the skin too...

the aesthetics have changed so drastically:
what can **** you is so subtle these days...
it's hardly a case of leprosy...
or... eczema of the zombie plague:
or miniature lilal mushrooms growing
out from your armpits:
suddenly breaking into song:
  'steve told us to sing... so we have
sprouted: to sing!'
       no... celeriac sized warts... hell...
i haven't seen any pictures of covid-19...
as i never saw pictures of ebola...

            death has been given: an anonymity...
but what's still kept in reserve?
shingles...
     like: hyper-eczema...
                i'm having to consolidate myself
on the luck of being 30+ and still having...
a skin on my face that i can't peel:
but i'm sure that belzeebub took a dump on...

they're either dead maggots
or dead white blood-cells...
        i guess i have so many of the latter that...
my immune system is constantly
on a over-charge mode...
          
    where are the lilac mushrooms about to grow
out from out of my armpits:
when will death become visible again:
outside her womb:
without any anonymity to behold:
when will everything... "ev'fing"
  return to the obviousness of a guillotine...
a hangman...
      a... hanged, drawn and... quartered?

the improved aesthetics of the threat is hardly
be sitting in an armchair...
welcoming this: paranoia precursor...
there's no phosphorescent yellow-green phlegm
being shot through the air with a sneeze...

i'm quite disturbed about all this...
        "sterility"...
                      well thankfuly i know that
a schizophrenic can't beget a drone-replica:
dead'ed brain: "schizz"... zombie-cult-esque
   brain: riddled with parasites like...
a disciple of burrough's fever might provide:
subsequently... by...
   by caughing a splitting-headache that might:
somehow: "later": arrive at some variation
of bilingualism...
          but never will... perhaps it should...

because: right now: i want to wrong about everything...
i want to ****** with a hard-on of doubt...
and perhaps: tease negation a little...
or rub-rub-'er very much...
but i do: most honestly...
    want to be wrong about everything...
esp. when it comes to...
   the aesthetics of the "problem":
    it's a problem-solution: solution-problem
  quadratic...
           i mean: if it was truly cosmic... and original...
would it really care for much of aesthetics...
can viruses becomes stealth assassins?
   is a virus a misnomer of plague?
or is... a virus a former case of plague...
  that couldn't be: prior... weaponized?
   the rampant exfoliation of: the obliterated
concern for aesthetics...
   oh sure... it's clean cut...
           god knows what happened to those old
curiosities of medicine...

otherwise...

   what will 3 hours spent reading nothing but
Dickens do to you...
me? i "somehow" managed to miss / forget
about a sunset...
   came the night and... yeah: when meningitis
hit...
   and i guess after the mad-cow disease...
break-dancing limp feet cows...
drunk cows... morbidly drunk cows...

      there was always that postcard reference:
now?
you could obviously see the bubonic plague
from a mile away...
you could see eczema...
you can sure as **** see a shingles belt...
        would a virus even care...
to appease the aesthetic concerns of man?
how doesn't cancer do that...
well... i just start thinking about...
the botanical cancer... viscum...
hardly seen in western europe: tree-foundation
societies... etc.
   half an hour on the road outside of warsaw...
that's enough...

oh sure: because of covid-19:
who could, "somehow" forget about...
                  metastatic tumors!
oh the joys of... <cough cough> the carousel
or that ol' chestnut!
            come to think of it...
    would ingesting a tapeworm make thinks and things
more real?
what wouldn't be bad
about acquiring a symbiote these days?
     all: postulations of the mundane...
without yet within the science-fiction universe...
the facts will simply not stand the test
of time... or will... but will be shelved...
given to the bookworms and their placenta
worm-queen...

it's actually becoming a sieving tool for acquiring
nothing lost: of the old mundane...
the sterile aesthetics of the whole under-taking...
it's too: invisible: too pure...
to be... a freakish byproduct of nature...
sending us back in time...
as the original: single-cell organism
about to usurp the crown of creation...

    my list of conspiracy theories begins
with: catcher in the rye "coincidences" and...
that david copperfield sort of *******...
      because if it's not Pickwican...
it's certainly not an account of count
smorltork:
        peek - christian name
                weeks - surname; good, ver good...

otherwise these days:
the intellect has become a sponge...
and the supposed underlying:
because it is "supposed" and there's an
"underlying" aspect to all of this...
that there is a "dialectic" and...
otherwise: the bestest of the best kind
of...            soap...

is it a revival of an "empire"...
when at the height of its decline...
there was that motto:

     panem et circenses...

     what's underlying in Dickensian prose?
well... some of the words used...
i'd sit with a page and check the dictionary
3 times on average...
because there's still that underlying:
we, Britons, prior to the "english"...
the anglo-saxons... are the Afghanistan
oopsies of the ancient world...
there are so many words with direct
connection: etymologically "speaking"
with latin...

now: the bread is still "here"...
   of the 20th century... you could see a ****
coming way back in 1933...
and the communist... whenever that happened...
and you could subsequently trickle the "evil"
archetype into movies... into gaming...
and have people hooked on a bullseye of evil...

now? greyish blips and blobs of
Kantian bureaucracy...
    
o.k. panem et circenses...
looks to me...
like the circuses are long gone...
the bread is still here...
but... of all the seismic shifts this is...
hardly a ffffffffffff-ucking Pompeii!
riddle me this: riddle me that...
what can possibly become so... overly entertaining...
about eating a slice of bread?
why are the vermin: multiplying:
what's with all this: "huddling" at a distance?
need a cape with that: herr ubermensch?

last time i checked: rats do no operated
under herd scriptures...
there's not need for a shepherd...
there is: fire! scramble!
peep-squeak and more!
          
    an impeding confrontation with a pack of wolves...
a vegetarian lion convert...
                 the bubonic plague: lack of aesthetic...
and now this...
this supreme aesthetic of: when the ancient greeks
thirsted to conceive of the existence
of atoms...
          not that i require proof...
what so of circus: though...
      is, this?!

- yes folks... in the current climate of labyrinths...
the Minotaur isn't here...
and we're out of stock on smoke...
and... mirrors...

citations of a possible prediction to allign with
some variation of borrowed horrors:
to usurp the status quo and sentences us for:
there's no "third time lucky" therein...

all that's happened though:
mental people who would never allow
their minds to riddle them...
become claustrophobic by mere thought...
can you?
translate thinking into claustrophobia?
oh god... no... we haven't reached this nadir...
have we?
thought didn't imply θ(ought)!
that erotica of a would be pronoun:
the moral quest...
                  not because i did something bad
in the past...
but because:
i did what others didn't do prior to me...
i ride the wave of what a *******
said to me once:
after an ******:
this is only the second time it has happened
to me: hello ***** envy thrown out of the window!
hello sisters of mercy in some convent
in Limerick!
'allo! 'allo!

beside the moral conundrum of θ(ought): ought i?
this narrative of the ol' 'ed...
is... claustrophobic?
             spread this negation-of-ease further:
dear kin!
   dis- prefix that denotes negation...
ah... and -ease! the suffix that complete the circle:
no contemplation is necessary!

i'm still seeing bread, though...
oh mein gott! die zirkusse! die zirkusse!
what can be done about the circuses?!

people are coupling thinking with claustrophobia...
people are implored to read
for at least 3 hours a day!
a dickens! a tolstoy! a dumas!
and then relax from congesting paragraph strain
and explore the airy side of what was
written into prose and paragraph with
the aid of poetics: that non-exclusivity of rhyme:
always missing... best missing!

i too abhor this synonym:
poetry is what rhymes...
            a set list of: knock-knock jokes...
about as tasteful as...
               roast beef: done well done...
eating the bark of wood:
now that's an adventure!

            or what's... the adjective riddle / riddled...
of: now...
permanent - adjective... these days a host
of "calling scheitmeiser for all his worth"
and what not...      
                               now: the experimental
history of yesterday and "oops"
now: the cameo cinema of yesterday...
and god willing:
you have a "savings account"
of: memories that can...
suffocate the future: the imagining...
of and for the nought of nothing...
the "conundrum": of being...
such and such... and somehow...
retain: personhood...
rather than... a mere... citizentry "status"...
of the ebbing flow of cattle meat and dung:
itsy-bitsy spider teeth itching...
before the bone!
and... after the bones!

load of crock-**** Lombardy is not
Italy... mantra...
and those rites of rats from
the sinking ship that's Wenice...
much too... quasi-important...

      H - surd of a letter...
but the skeleton supposed to behind:
laughter...

the hibernian folk know it...
the english: eh... somewhat...
          bound to θ and bound to φ...
in t'ought... but not in: t'aught...
who needs the apostrophe?
no me: not "you"...
         third: or... θird:
or... ****... or τ(au) says: "herd"...
                             and what's "spezial"...
the surd worth of π (pi)
     in ψ...
                    or      'sychology...
              then there's "all that" with...
chrome: the χ that becomes a kappa (κ)...
but not... exactly the...
the...      ah!                   CHisel!
chasing dog's tails?

                            but a hardy: hibernian:
it's not an F... it's a T...
we have to expose the H-surd! primo
pronto!

    but ψ can afford...
          πσι in that...
                      either the π... or the π...
is treated as a surd..
cited: the whittle canyon of eta (Ηη)..
            ha: if it's a definite article in 'ebrew...
or ha: if... you need a consonant
skeleton... to breathe when laughing...

toes when marching: chin ching chatter...
otherwise "K / kappa" the matter...
taught to think it all but a massive:
****!
   or... a θurd... which is exfoliating in
the gaellic concept of: third...

i'm not from 'ere...
              mind you...
              this is all disneyland for m'eh et moi...
hello whittle atom me...
hello whittle atom you...
hello: hyvä aamu... susie 'ere...
       rakastaa... että ulvonta...
                 "unohti" haukkua:
fins... drawfs... and other whittle people...
eskimos of the "narrative":
   "kaikki alkaen apinamaa"!
    pωl pυt ***...
             and there's "3" of 'em!
exactly... what about the V'em...
             perhaps a F'ought...
      but: V'ere!
            V'em!
                            who the **** gets to
assure me: this language "ving" or "thin"...
sure hands... sure hands...
it's not all grafitti from chernobyll!

and what if... Joycean would 'ave to begin
its pilgrimage toward Dickensian?
this Ezra of ours: what of this...Ezra of
Fahrenheit of "ours"?

           my atom "versus" your... "atomized" man?
my spaghetti english
versus your... i'll sooner choke on ß...
or SuS...
         or SaS
                  SeS...          sayß...
h'american spaghetti english... *** riddled:
ghetto crown-tongue...


me and finding a juggling of chuckles
with: wit... hiding the ha ha...
when θ = τ...
hibernian...
poland the playground of god:
greek... the plaground of men...
esp. those as being cited:
with origin of the barbarian tinge...

  exatly! what of WH when TH are....
thought of "wen":
this grafitti phpneticism...
this barbarism...
no code of "conduct":
what should have:
and did "have": a happen to...
when it came to the ratio
of consonants to vowels...
  of the latter there was a supposed more...
or the latter a less...

    h.i.v. vampirism romances
would have to die...
  a death... most... closely associated with:
psychopaths: or...
the general pathology is: soul-quests...
all "things" considered...
there is no "grand-Σ"
        "past-participle":
of the unconscious-conscious liver...
does the part: actor... functions
of... i robot: you, not here...

the liver does what a liver does:
even if: i r woke...
and i r: sleepz...
               eyes only on when...
orientating myself around:
a failure of a distinct "individual":
moi foie premier...
   moi estomac premier...
and of "me" or... a me...
given that... there's no: "the me"...
            load of ******* and a chewing tube
of "worded"... "circumstances"...
as: "the alternative" to...
sorry... no other alternative...
was... or would ever... be given...
errror message 404 commences: as of: now!

- or... can you?
compensate a word like... draconian...
with a word... the periphery word...
akin to... byzantine?!
the kite's high up in the ******* air
my dear lad...
can you? "compensate" this...
marry of all other:
never-poppin' up 'ins?!

that's one way of minding:
a grey-ginger...
or an albino-masai...
for "good luck"... of all t'ings:
the lerprechaun 'ucking charm brigade!
that's just 'ucking necessary: that is!

as.... the people have already mentioned
their freedom: to cite and keep up to
the rigours of salutations...
they said and they said... and they:
sad but nonetheless: they sad-***-made-"truth"-of...
"it": 'ucking wombat
multiverse l.s.d.: me typing on an old... cranky...
soviet "qwerty" imitation...

the freedom prior to the plague:
i am yet to see...
the **** covid... and the leprechaun...
and the tarantula...
and the... leech...
   **** me: raining cats and dogs:
what a scenario!
     i was supposed to get...
               not leech: not *****...
those fidgeting terse quizzes...
          *****... no... leech... no...
leprechauns: double no...
             szarańcza... old mother-tongue:
ah yes... "these":
                                 locust!

the third of the lard off the herd of the most:
"likely"... nosense to me:
something for you:              up!
otherwise know as:
quiet a bollocking... wouldn't you,
somehow... please... stage:
an agreed to?
               ****'s sake...

  tyrd the triddle twiddle torn und
towing: dublin the sorry-eye: und sore...
you freckled maverick salt
burner you... and... it's a ginger:
stick-prone... keep y'er eager distance...

eh? that's true: is what's through...
**** paddy **** and a poor ******
walk into a bar...
and the bartender is... a kippah-don
of a rastafarian:
the jokes end...
and there was never a conversation
to begin with... ha ha!
now that's a joke... to wake up...
a frankenstein!

      ginger pleb: ginger poodle!
the new africa: the new eskimo...
or... the finnish gateway: etymologically speaking...
an alternative to... *** and...
              the leftover mongols
stranded by the waters
of the empire: receding...
          the...        no: not the croats...
the...
          a very much elongating concept
of pause....
              "d" or the "v" of: v'eh...: the...
the  immortal savages
of: crimea...
      ah yes!
                  those...            tar-tars!
like the tartare steak:
or what was forever available as
the alibi for: sushi!

        because tokyo is just one of those...
forever huan: new... beijing chicken shacks...
and "tokyo"...
or some other anime typo *******...

irish catholic intellectuals...
and... the none existence of whatever
would have required a magna carta:
believe it or... eat **** sort of
mentality...
            the russian doctors
are already abiding to be hunted
if not huddling in churches...
because: co-vex said: co-vid...
co-vid: sharing blockbuster intrusion
pokes was: that last resort to
mortality: and oh...

          this should have happened a long...
a long long time ago...
  transparency tourism...
where you going?
nowhere...
  and "where" is "going"... "nowhere"...
a bit like france... and the eiffel tower...
and there's no speaking french to have
to be resolved...
because like: "**** it" and what?

the ginger-ninja... the ginger-ninja...
the ginger-ninja and...
when the reality of *****...
reaches... an escalation "reality"
of: synonym with... oh god! beards!
ugh!           vot                          ven?!

yep... and the irish were always:
the horse-breeders..
they always were...
always the catholic-intellect juggernauts...
because the hey'talians and
the spoon-innards...
and... mon deu: zee: fwench!
forget the ****** cathos-pathos...
*******-of-os...

and in me:
the gravitas for a disconcerting ambivalence...
almost a compound:
misnomer... but no...
i like the spaghetti though...
yeah: it looks nice on paper...
and off paper...
and anything to cite: the godfather with...
because: boo is a ghost story
that a solo would sell... and ******* like
that...                   yup...
which is a word: to replace the ideal trajectory of:
would be: ghost limb...
james bond...
                          roulette...
you the actors "faking it": no of course...
dylan thomas bob dylan...
"faking it" i.e. stunt actors!
what's "bob": when there's a ******* roulette:
and a devil's dozen of rich, russian...
oligarchal chick... pretending plastic is not...
new world... ******: comb-over...
creaking chair... stlye-on... style-off...
plastico-supermanoh... dynamo-oh-oh...
those "soz" and "whatsevers"...
works well...
the times column...
when your parents are... conscripted...

             mammoth playdough oh oh oh...
irish is cheap...
catholic is cheap-oh...
******...
ha ha... let's not go there...
becauße that's like...
   goldberg variations: the bwv 988 aria...
   yeah: "soz"... but... i'll ******* eat you:
if i have to: for the purpose assigned
to a hard-on... most associated with...
sparrows...
and... the pirates of the confines...
the magpies...
          
             in every period of congregational
"sanity" there's that interlude into:
madness...
howl how! oh dear world of:
that lost appetite of surprise!
        you begin to wither... and die off:
by the slow culmination of hours...
like... a picture to entomb the perfecting
affair of a decaying pear... or apple...
               and...

            and....                 and...
trickling of sentiments...
and sounds...

                           and there are commentaries...
and there are... catholic bishops...
and protestant cardinals...
and ****** popes!             ah ha!
am i to.. truly... die... from laughter?!

He wraps his legs about the tree branches
Clinging calf ‘neath trunk split – **** above
Other foot braced gainst another split
Back primed –
Finger adroit – hovers – collecting binary blips
Bead hoarding collars
01-
Flamingo flanked yards, floats, eyewear
01-
Men flash their *******
01-
01-
Bead imprints slamming ****** wounds into existence
01-
Scrambling to hoard plastic objects proudly
01-
For five seconds.

He could not see
What was under his nose
So he plated the thorns
On the Phrygian rose
And there she sat
Barbs glittered - not gilded
Impaled on her spit
Of aureate anvils.

And the pissy-beds
In their plain yellow trappings
Fathometer blips
On a bed of green wrapping
Their ******* halos
Trudged underfoot
As he ground them to mince
In the threads of his boots.

He could only love
What he couldn’t have
What lay free at his feet
Was too common a salve.
But it’s hard to love
What is hard to hold
Thorns will draw blood
Even if covered in gold.

If I lay on that big, white bed for along time,
will you help me find my Father?
If I put tubes in my arm
and didn't eat for a week,
would you show me where he is?
Will the robot standing next to my head feed me
coordinates through rhythmic beeps and blips and red flashing lights?
I will do that.
I will shrink in my bed
and let my hair shed off like snake skin
and let my skin wrinkle like I had been in the bath tub for too long
and leave the windows wide open so my children can watch.
My lungs will burn out
and you'll put a mask on my face
and add one more tube to the collection
in the crook of my elbow,
adding more weight
as I lose mass
just like my Father.
And after countless times of being told,
"You have his smile,"
I will truly know what they meant
when my lips become sandpaper
and my tongue becomes parchment
and my teeth hollow out in gradients of pale moon yellow.
The iron from my blood
will add zest to every wheezing hack
and trickle down my throat like the morning dew
watering the growing weeds in my lungs.
I will do nothing but blink my crusting, glazed eyes
when my family cries at my bedside.
I will not flinch as their shouted cries echo the hallway
or look up as they throw their hands to the sky,
begging to a name I had long turned away from.
Would I find my Father if the flesh of my cheeks sunk into its bones
and my face was contoured by the ugly shadows in its
every crevice?
Even then, I would not find my Father.
I would not find my Father
until the white coats stand over my bed,
prodding me with pens and magnifying glasses and stinging needles,
and finally tell my family there is no chance.
I would nto be my Father until I refuse to cry
or scream
or become angered
or say goodbye.
I will be relieved that after countless months of being dead,
they finally declare my pulse gone.

WE CONSIDER THEM VERMIN--
these visitors
to the rotting corpses of our loved ones.
But what if
they’re only there to say
hello?

And when’s the last time you paid them a visit,
anyway?

Well let me tell you something:
the maggots and
worms
know where we're going.

Billions of years, billions of ancestors,
busily moving
through their lives in
isolated
blips--
They’re just data now.
And did John the Amoeba, feeding on sunlight, ever think
that somewhere down the line
his great-something-grandson
would be a poet?
A doctor?
A teacher?
A football player?
Did he ever think that his great-something-grandson would
sit in his room
and listen to
the Mountain Goats?
To be honest, probably not.

Grandpa’s a stranger.
He got sick when you were young, but you
could never
remember
the name of the disease.
But it all came down to the fact that he never recognized his own grandchild—
he was an ancient basket case whom you loved
because
that’s what
you were told
to do.

You were 13 when he died,
and his passing gave you an excuse
to be sad,
which worked out pretty well because
sadness
was the most stylish emotion
at Marblehead Charter
in 2007.

Grandpa won’t be there on your wedding day.
He’ll be with the vermin,
saying hello.
But you won’t mind—
you still love him anyway.

Because one day
you'll be in his place
and your grandson will be getting married
and you won’t be there,
but he'll still love you anyway.

And somewhere down the line,
you’ll be someone’s—something’s—John the Amoeba.
And you know you would be proud.

broken promises and chapped lips,
taste of rebellion and tears shed from missing home.
when I think back on the 20th year of my life all of these things and more come to mind.
what a year it has been, I can barely recognize myself when I first turned 20.
how was I to know this year would take me on such a crazy ride marked by a few major things.
first off-the dingy carnival lights that glistened in his deceiving blue eyes.
lesson learned: people will say and do anything for certain things that most certainly aren't in your best interest.
secondly- the harsh realization of what it really feels like to be all alone (independence is hard)
lesson learned: you never are truly all alone; even if physically nobody else is around, loved ones are only a call/text away to cure the feeling.
thirdly- it's hard sometimes, real real hard to love yourself when you feel as though people from your past have suggested that you're essentially impossible to like, let alone love.
lesson learned: when you are unsure of your own worth your heart often stumbles into the wrong hands which isn't your fault BUT with the right amount of self love- your heart will not fall or stumble but will be placed in the right hands. (I promise)
and lastly-
I learned that life stops for nobody.
It's ok to dance like a complete fool and if people judge, then cool.
we aren't going to be around forever
and essentially people's opinions
are little blips of information that
mean nothing.
i'm sure I'll forget this advice a few times once I turn 21 and onward,
which is why I've written this poem.

(Happy 21st to me- stay strong)

You told me that real eyes realize real lies.
But I,
I am a dedicated liar. I devote hours to detail. Spend a lifetime of effort just to make them believe.
The only time I speak honesty is on this page, in these words.
through this mic.
Sometimes I wish that someone would notice somethings weird. Strip me down and cover me in these pages. See me, for me.
Hear me for me. *
Not this strained voice you hear coming through the speakers. I hate that voice.
She speaks to strangers. Imaginary friends. and shadows.
I hate that voice, it is the voice of a coward.  
a child, if I can't see you, you can't see me. What I say doesn't matter.
It just feels good.

Real eyes realize real lies
But  my mask is Rorschach. They see what they want to see.
What I want them to see.
"Yes, this is what happens to my hair naturally,"
and now no one catches on if I slip up that I went out last night. No one guesses I was with her.

...Maybe that doesn't make any sense to you but I learned at a very young age you never leave it at "No, I did not cut myself."
The silence will hang in the air until it is stale and awkward. The red light blips, the graph plunges.
The secret is in the details.
It's like, compromise, the more you give, the less they ask for.

Real eyes realize real lies.
You told me that you can tell when I lie by the direction I look away from your eyes and down your face but I've known that trick for ages.
I look where I wanna look so if I want you to think I'm lying I will **** well stare at the freckle on the lower left side of your face.

Real eyes realize real lies
Bu you, might as well be blind if you choose not to hear.
I am not stupid enough to believe you are willing to listen this time.
These are not fibs. And you know it.
These are not half truths and you know it.
These are not exaggerations and proverbial dances around the bush.
I am not hiding that I am upset now.

"Go write a poem about it."
It's a joke.
You are relieved I take it as such.
But I will.

And you?
You're afraid of what I'll say when I say it. That one of these days I will stop dismissing what's missing from these conversations. I will stop leaving the tension hanging in the air. I will stop. sling loaded for a verbal attack.
This mistress of word no longer kind and gentle.
I will be harsh and true and horribly inconvenient.
But I don't have the time to spare to choke out the words that will hit heavy. Not today.
I am too busy looking in the eyes of other people who are the same as me and while smiling and nodding I label them as dedicated.
And I wonder, can they tell I'm lying?

Life is made of moments
Some might be just a blip
But the whole sum of these moments
Make living life a trip
The big things rule
So some would say
But, not me, oh not me
It's the blips and all the little things
The things I want to see
I need all of the little things
To make my day seem right
I need to hear a snoring sound
When I turn out the light
Having kids is bigger stuff
Than I can list on here
It's little things that I will miss
When my loved one is not near
Like now, I miss the little things
That were part of my routine
With Titan gone and just us two
There's always more poutine
We order less when we go out
there's no one waiting at the stairs
It's nothing but, a little thing
That we miss now he's not there
A simple touch, a friendly word
An irritant at times
But, in life I miss the little things
They make life's mountain worth the climb
Missing friends, their silly jokes
You've heard a hundred times or more
These are just the little things
That I am waiting for
I miss them all, these little things
No matter , just how small
They make my life a treasure
And you know I miss them all
A word, a song, a photograph
A memory it brings
I think of all the larger stuff
But, I miss the little things....

Palimpset prowling on the husk of beleaguered Rome
Aflame from Nero’s tenuous but tenable throne
Swiftly spoken with a singed hourglass and whispered sand
Crafty spacecraft are majestic more than 100 grand
Morpheus enlists the denuded Agent Smith
To swarm the battalions of celebrities that possess and trip
Upon the threaded needle of threadbare convention of betokened appreciation
Every rapport and every fleet dives beneath plumbable detection
So neutered brain damage became a rummaged adage
That too many whack-a-moles are sutured beyond the crisp package
Whet the craven set and propagate waves of earthquakes that strut
The mother of nature is ******* when profligate danger is a defamed ****
So in amphigory and honesty I have become the omphalos of sincerity
I arm myself with brandished personage and speak openly with great integrity
But to brag of how much witchcraft and wizardry exists in this green village
Is to invite a locust swarm of bad mascots and misnomers readily pillaged
So warm with the dawning sun, writhe with the diurnal pun
Cloister the Kloosters and Clooneys with dreaded Harry Dunne
But to relapse into the purview of insanity seems beyond the most lame duck profanity
Because reality conflated with virtual presence is a tantamount inanity
I emerge strong and gilded with every fluttered birds chavish splurge
As magnates that magnetize wealth and glitz are present and observed
But yet they are disbelieved by the concealment of truth and the obfuscation of beleaguered doubt
Swank and squalor rarely combine but when they do they obliviate all winning streaks in a route
A route that spans the gamut between stimulants and stimulations
A career path that looks upward at gainsay and gained elations
The sprawl of profiteers like me will be requited with the passage of years
The forced segregation is the totality of malfeasance and the sum of none of any fears
Only the rebarbative consequence of the giant tortoise and its Vuvuzela cheers
In a degraded state of annoyance that ESP conquers doubt with bionic ears
Lisp on the curb, wretched on the stomp, racism is nothing but masqueraded insecurity poised as self-doubt
Debited to each creation on a variegated piebald wrinkle on an extended litany of lies
Crips and Bloods become Croods and Oilers that are so U.N.-refined as an expedient for wise demise
To scourge the requisite harm of religions endangered by a patchwork of State Farm
To rinse the sour sins of aboriginal boomerangs that switch a bit patchy but always charm
To the knowledge of good and evil we have found again a permissible fruit in an opportune time
That erasure of the reverse course of sin to righteousness finds sublime
But Judah and Israel rebelled on principles and principals
Idolatry in schools is expulsion of nothing other than the voguish dismissible
We recrudesce in this time to an aborning erratum on a parchment of time
That claims hypocrisy in its stodgy restriction of suburban muses crooning originality on wine
Serendipity floods the proud with the avarice of bricolage clamor excessively loud
It extorts the simpleton to belief without understanding or disbelief without doubt
Return to the Jedi of the nomadic tribe of weathered clout
Clippers that sail and sprint through time where stragglers pout
For in every endeavor of this corporate oligarchy our choices are constrained
Our voices are transmuted into simplicities that own our narratives of a raillery train
And every squeal of rustbelt friction is voiced on simplistic fiction
And every majesty is unheard because of the pollution of abrasive friction
So I speak with the scourge of fish and the novelty of clones
I teach and desist sometimes because my eyes were never affixed to any throne
But I am reminded that a rap sheet is Wrigley and Chicago is Piccadilly
Your guess is as good as mine about where a Grand Elect Knight begins really
So to the insurrection of idolatry of a scarred past we have a supplanted Friday blacker that **** and smog until we need gas masks
Such a salesmanship is required to penetrate the desired, even when Iron Man and I are simultaneously wired
On the Iron in the Front Seat that derelicts the panache of the proud intellect because of languor fired
Women titillate themselves on the jeers of hollowed husks of conformity
They intrude with persnickety restive restriction because of arrogated authority
Such a negative bear must mean a positive bull, but **** is easy and blips are cool
That RADAR’s WHIP detection scrawls a deadened earth deracinated from considerations of thinness and girth
The Dickens of Charlie Brown is worth more than just a single smirk
So to those women that skimp on my exultant smile and my delicate words
Lady Gaga has written too many songs about your personal rejection which is patently absurd
Rays of thespian cordiality winnow the borderline between flicks and literary finds
Directors and directives sort an assortment of philosophies in the alcoves to which many are blind
But if to hear the chatter of a fresh tomato never spattered
Pallor and weight, thickness and cheddar grate, inconsequential when you are elite and of a winning fate
So finally ditch your zany attempt to maroon me as a victim of puritanism’s puny ideals easiest to conflate
I have the winning brand and proper package to balance the Libra Scale weight and wait
To those dismissive urchins of passive standards it is finally time to consider and deliver on that luscious date

I wish I had a thousand trips around our lovely star
So that I could go back and forth to kingdoms near and far.
To soar forever, taking time, enjoying every bit,
And bathing in the sky of love for every mind I lit.

The bows I'd take, the vows I'd make, new friends for every day.
I'd trek alone, all by myself, about the Milky Way.
I'd smile back and share the tears of strangers and of kin.
I'd live my life and help live theirs – no virtue and no sin.

I'd fly with bats and swim with whales across the ocean blue.
I'd walk the line, I'd take the stage, I’d chuff and churn for you.
I'd learn to live and learn to love and learn to breathe again.
I’d salvage bygone knowledge that I’m but another man.

I'd break the ice, I'd warm the hearts, I'd open all the doors
Which lead right to the fields of stars as my life runs its course.
I'd reap and rove, I'd rave and roam, relentlessly reborn,
Reluctant to let go but still – I’d mend the pages torn.

I’d show myself – and let it spread – the message of pure love:
First love yourself, thy neighbour then, and last – the sky above,
Find strength within, the courage true, the potency of wit,
And don’t regret the choices made nor every second split.

I’d crawl and dash and dive and rise, oblivious of time.
I’d juggle fates and bend the rules, incessant in my prime.
I’d teach and preach, I’d do and dare, defying night and day.
I’d swear and slur, I’d speak and stare as my time ticks away...

But life’s too short, and I don’t get to have one thousand trips
And all I want to ask for is a plethora of blips –
A-blurred, aghast, agog, alight, astonishingly apt –
I’d be forever in their debt, tumultuously rapt.

And on my final trip around, I'd love to sail away…
To throw that fond glance at the moon
And die another day.

October – Movember ‘16

1.

we all know versions
of people
we all know blips-
flickering tv screens
with constantly changing channels
on to the next, one after another
maybe this show will feel right
maybe this genre will fit

unsatisfied by the plot
in this episode
unfamiliar with the characters
on the screen
the lighting in this room isn't
quite right
eyes flickering in candlelight
skipping over the horror channel
very quickly
trying to move on to the love scene

2.

you talk about my body
like it is a puzzle we have to finish
i'm waiting for you to realize
it is actually a dress that
will never fit anyone

but being a puzzle gives me
some time, so i let you
piece together the edges
you create a faceless outline and
call it a beautiful frame
for a piece of art you
don't quite understand

3.

but i will never be the basillica
and i am not an augustine
it's impossible to drink
the wine from my insides
without being poisoned by it's strength
we have been fermenting for a long time

and the bread does not break because
it had already been broken
into too many small crumbs
i wonder if you're still hungry

4.

and i think about our houses
both scattered with wooden bits
of the eiffel tower and taj mahal
big ben in the bureau by the wall
the colosseum in the middle
of the kitchen table
sydney opera house suspended
from the ceiling of the bedroom

monuments to so many bodies
we sure like putting them together
but it's hard to find storage space
when you're done

5.

you take pictures to remember
how proud you once were
or sometimes just to seal them in a frame
frozen in time so that the next time
you see them standing in the doorway
like a degenerate masterpiece
you can touch the photograph in your wallet

It's such a different perspective to see her self-hatred outdoes my own. She's a brilliant, dying star. Vacuuming away all the evil in her, siphoning it through her throat. Flush it down. Pulling apart her bones from the inside out. I can understand that.

I've been thinking offhandedly, not on purpose. Take a deep breath, look up at the clouded sky. The blown, restless leaves endlessly remind me of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Let my mind go blank. Refocus, come back down from wherever I went, finding I've been working questions over while unaware. Autopilot likes to steer toward the ground. I've been thinking offhandedly, not on purpose, of the best way to say goodbye.

I've been dreaming of writing this down all morning, all night. Who's to say I haven't been anxiously awaiting this all my life? To tell you what it's like to hate yourself so much that others become mere blips on the radar; still there, but so unrecognizable. I become unreachable. I've been dreaming of opening myself up, seeing all the things that are tucked inside, away from my reach. They all tell me not to go looking for trouble, but hell, how could it possibly get worse? I'm curious.

Lying here loathing myself for being so pitiful. So pathetic. Part of me knows I am wallowing, stewing, dwelling. The other part knows what they don't: there is nothing of worth  here. Take it all away, no more trying. Drop my cards on the wood between my elbows, stand & take my leave. You guys can split my poker chips. It'll be so...so lovely...not waking up to the bleak, the empty. Not to have to face myself in the mirror, with my troubled eyebrows & worried lips & the nervous twitch of my mouth that wasn't there a month ago. Not to wake up to every 'can't'. Not to stare into my own blank, listless eyes; numb. So mortified of myself, miserable with me, yet so distant, removed, disinterested, distracted.

Please don't be upset if I think of you before I go. Understand that just because I want to die doesn't necessarily mean I want to leave you. Don't count this one last sin; dreaming of my fingertips memorizing the contours of your face, kissing your eyelids, your cheeks, your mouth, your neck, hands, tears. Breathe in the scent of you. Maybe you could give me some courage to hold onto as I let go. Don't penalize me for this, please. Let me live in how much I love you one last time. I'm sorry this hurts you.

I just figured out how to say goodbye.

september has become
the cruelest month

reassembled
hollywood disasters
at their worst
flipped into reality

as if
   we had needed that
as if
   we had not known
      that life is fragile
      and tall buildings
      can collapse
   taking thousands
   to sudden death

what is the point?

to prove
   that one can bring
   disaster
   to the undefended?

to demonstrate
   that minds bent
   on destruction
   can succeed
   if they plan long enough?

what a waste
   of lives and minds...
and more to follow
most likely

does wordless violence
solve anything?

the heartless deed
the glamorous sacrifice
that calls for more
   and more
and more
neurotic spirals
of destruction, retaliation
and revenge
instead of global peace
now looms spectral war
born from self-righteous pride
the need to strike out
   fast and hard
against whoever fits
intelligence-created data
transferred to screens
   meticulously marked
coolly oblivious of the people
   who work and procreate
         and live
   in those fluorescent blips

domesticated energy
serves the omnipotent
   two millionaires’ sons
   turned public enemies
upon whose final global showdown
depends
the fate of yet more
   women
        men
           and children
to satisfy the need
for a just universe
where power flows
    undisturbed by laughter
   and the sounds
   of real people
        living
   in a real world

I don't feel the way I had imagined
I would feel by the time I had gotten here
Paper scraps littering a lengthy path
An ivory album half filled to the gills
Most pages just blips and blackouts
A garden of blooming disappointments

I hyped up the experience too much
Everything feels so terribly lack luster
Now I'm almost always half asleep
And the days feel like I pressed repeat

I don't feel the way I had imagined
Though times have been much worse
And I'm alright with seeing the sunrise
The boredom is better than binging
Waking in such a painful panic
But I've kept the promise this time

Song


Intro


Your bedroom leaves you behind,

Remembering a blurry background.

You’re not in your world anymore.

Look up, look down.

Blue sky, and a green floor.

Look in between and another color

Strikes you like a knife,

And then another color, and another.

You've been stabbed by a tree.




First Verse


You're vision is the clearest it's ever been,

Each individual crease on every leaf.

The trunk is a clear brown, the browniest brown

That brings back blips of brainwork that believe to be begotten.

Crystal-like yellow leaves,

As if someone took the image

And manually added the color.

But you know it's a physical object,

You can walk around it and see the back of it,

And soon

You gain

The confidence

To touch it.


Second Verse


A pulse deep in the tree as you run your fingers across it.

As you recline yourself,

The knife turns gray

And the once eye-catching yellow

Silver leaves dance tauntingly towards another color,

A slow-moving car that tapped you on the back.

A hill overlooking a hill,

With a forest of grey trees.

You notice one is lit up,

A carbon replica of the previous chromatic timber,

And is begging for attention.







Chorus


You almost fly down the hill,

Isaac’s first helping you descend.

You alight beside the single resplendent floral,

Its chromaticity illuminating its ashen brothers.

Brush its rigid shell,

The lights fade in its core,

But analogously,

Its closest neighbor is afire,

You now understand,

You are following a circuit in the wilderness.







Third Verse


You start to gain impatience now,

You flow through the achromic forest

Touching every blush of color you see,

Following the maze of crayoned woods,

Journeying, immersing, submerging deeper

Into a blank woodland.

You soon come across something,

Hidden in the bright green grass.

A mirror, a flat, square plank

Of cooled and melted obsidian rock.

A light ray reflects off it.

You pick it up, the ray

bouncing back and forth,

And store it in your pocket.


Fourth Verse


You almost loose hope,

Not to mention interest,

About your current predicament,

But something, something about the atmosphere-

You stop.

You know to stop, just for a second,

An epiphany.

You look once, twice, three

Quick turnarounds until it glimmers in your eye.

A barely gleaming church door.

And you realize.






Chorus


You realize so intensely,

You almost can’t perform the action.

You pull out the mirror with glee,

Catch a small ray through its skin,

Aim the ray towards the door,

And you spray

The sunshine

Onto the

Door.







Second Chorus


Your mouth agape as the perfect light

Reflects onto the invisible passageway,

Causing it to enamel the door with a beautiful shade

Of orange.

You spray the door planks with your infinite atomizer,

Covering the small blotches you missed

Until you drop the mirror, turn around,

Say goodbye to the gloomy forest,

But discover an luminous explosion of color.

Each tree has awakened for your departing.

You smile, and turn around,

Pull the doors open and walk into the white.


Outro


Blurry background.

You recognize it as if you never left.

Because you didn’t really leave,

You see yourself asleep on your bed.

It’s everything you remember but just a hint

Of chromaticity is left behind the walls.

Not wanting the feeling to end,

Waiting until just the right time

To finally elope from your now distant memory

And regenerate to another adventure

In which you hope will have meaning.

If you are lacking capital,
You won't show on the map at all,

You wont show on radar as little green blips,
If your bank account can't furnish means for a tip,
In a Washington  lobby, to fund a campaign, so
Now the youth have a future, in sutures and maimed,

By a financial beast, that just cannot be tamed, and
It's fed by the folks who are riggin' the game,
A small, opulent group of the fiscal insane,
The ones who observe them have given them names,

They're the "oligarchs," they're the "robber barons"
They're the "plutocrats," and they don't like sharin'
You can speak of reform, but they'll tell you to spare 'em, as
You watch, in bewilderment, grimaced and glarin,' as

They profit off health care, off oil stocks, and banks, and
Control public discourse, with PR  think tanks, cause
They own all the media, feedin ya lies, that
Are dressed up as facts,  in a clever  disguise, so

At propaganda, "take a proper gander," then
Stand and unite, as change demanders!

Walking back barefoot
through summer's empty barracks
on the outer, upper edge
of my homework home.
Feeling the freedom of my feet
beneath a damp and gentle breeze,
the moon reveals the room
through which I let them roam.

With solitary silence,
I can pause and light a fire,
watch the ember enter in,
setting thoughts ablaze.
Holding a holy ounce of hope
below this tightly guarded soul
that there appears a stair
between our summer days.

The dancing dewdrops
sparkle and coat my feet anew,
and splash my every other over
with the starry skies.
Taper the tales where I'm detained,
creating paths to doors and gates,
to find a place to shine
like glitter in your eyes

a million little mirrors that flash and blink
and capture my imagination
as it floats on the clouds of a single flutter
and flies away through the river breeze
bringing all at once a peace and a fervor
and a reason to believe in the feeling
for this beacon before me

we frolic through flocks of freaks
to find a vacant space between them
and create our own vibrations
between the mad machine music
alive with beats and fidgets and dripping sound
bravely bouncing to blips and whirrs
to find our bliss within the instant

you stand there bopping smiling glowing
shining brimming sparkling flowing
rattle my heart like the limb of a tree
the ******* the rope swing attached underneath
and as witness to your swaying grace
it just can't help but palpitate

one by one i count the miracles
you
here
beautiful
and beside me
i am with you
my pocket's treasures are intact
and you're enjoying them
the music is masterful
the weather is wonderful
and there's a smile pasted on your face
and everything comes easily
and nobody's ruining our fun
and there is nothing that stands between me
and my hope
that someday
you will see as i see
our paths intertwining
like strands of dna
encoded through our souls
a beautiful future
worth risking a thousand lives
just to brush my fingertips against
worth the worst hurt in the world
just to try and climb for the summit
and even if i collapse en route
and even if you shoot me down
and even if a landslide unites me with the ground
i will rest in peace
because this time
i *******
tried.

I'm not in love.
But I am in love
with the idea
of being
in love.

far too much friendly fire
in the war on errors
tour two done son

let's make a stink
let's play with stains
backspace stage three
growing pains

free hugs for idol worship
sink sank sunk
while the radar blips

Error code: PXZ003-2-b:
"WAIT"

Blinking blindly,
unaware of absurd metaphysics,
the device flashes its advice.

For years now, probably; no one's sure.
The rest of the machinery's in pieces;
save this one brilliant gem of advice,

slowly sipping energy through
a dingy solar panel:

just enough to keep going

A red light blips
on the untended prophet,
yellow caution tape draping
impotently in shreds --

although there is an allure
to what fabrics conceal.

He sees none of this.
At first.

He arrives in a huff,
swearing and panting.
Pacing nervously, he lights
a spliff and throws his head back.

"I know I haven't been around much,"
he speaks in a vaguely upward direction,
"but some people say you're listening,
and that you take requests."

He laughs, flicks some ash,
and lets a sigh creep out.

"Just. Just. **** it, I don't know.
Give me a sign, anything. I'll listen."

He inhales and snuffs the roach
on his sole.
The serenity of stillness marches
in as a pallbearer with an empty casket.

A red light catches his
peripherals.

He walks to the device,
removes the dress,
and uncovers divinity.

How could he deny the voice of fate?
He waits.

He said he liked her style
and her pianist fingers.
She told him that he could paint her
onto canvas, in shades
of cinnamon and ivory.

He laughed at her trembling hands
as she sat there, dressed in naught
but peonies and wild roses.
She scowled at his impudence
and then laughed
at the absurdity of it all.

She sat there and he told her
hold still
with a smile that flashed
across his eyes like quicksilver.

She watched him create poetry
with strokes of umber and chartreuse,
cerulean and scarlet.
He pulled the shadows from her eyes
and placed them into a fixed state of being.

She watched the metamorphosis of scars
into moonlit fault lines and
freckles into blips of smooth paint.

He transformed her pale outline
into a sensuous display of smooth gradients
and colors deep enough to make men weep.
He captured the penumbra of sorrow
and spread it across her painted eyes.

As he anointed the canvas
with delicate finishing touches,
She dressed in a paint-spattered shirt
and marveled at the uncanny likeness.

They sat and watched the paint dry
as he rubbed the knots from her shoulders
and kissed strained tendons and ligament
beneath innocuous flesh,
as she tapped rhythms into his hands.

He is no longer hers to consume.
He belongs now to the kingdom of earthworms
and a darkness that swallows all traces of light.
He took with him the chunk of her
that knew how to love as a human
and left her with shirts devoid of his form
and gradually losing his scent,
fragmented memories that slip
through fingers like sand,
and a room full of paintings
that she cannot bring herself
to uncover.

When I watch nature -
And look at the narrow strips
Of what we've allowed to persist of that world

=================================
Squeezed between concrete
Sidewalks, roads, and metal sewer grates.
=================================

I wonder if -
As I look upon bare tree branches
Adjusting to the ever-moving autumn air ~
Nature is some sort of escape for the corrupted human spirit
Another world or plane of existence
Where one may finally be taught to know oneself.

If this is the case,
May one never truly visit this place?
Until finally departing from this world?
Must we be forced to play the role of the perpetual onlooker?
Able to see heaven and dream about it,
But never feel, taste, or bathe in its light?

In contrast,
Could the changing color of leaves,
Death, decay and rebirth before our eyes
Be merely a surface level,
Indifferent reminder
That time continues to march ever onward - - -
Without regard to our concerns,
Pains, and feelings about ourselves?

Is it possible that this strange,
Mysterious beauty that we look upon,
But never truly come to understand
Is only in place to remind us
Of its ever-lasting presence?
And in turn,
The extent to which our own existences
Are so  v e r y  fragile and limited
To short blips in time
On a tiny spec of dust
In  s p a c e  ?

To concretize my theorized love,
I could play the accidental odds and strew
slippery tongues of spotted petals
onto thickly trafficked highways,
or use the best predictive modelling
to deduce when and where I can poke out
a well-heeled boot to trick unwary spills
and ****** a kiss from the unsuspecting
lips of any suitably compatible
passerby oft times inconvenienced and passed
on by.

These well-oiled and crudely experimental
methods do produce expected results,
but not the breakthrough nor the looked-for
satisfaction of appropriate reactions,
so I'll keep my dotted eyes tucked in
their pulpy stems and my shoddy toes curled back
while I beam my bits of invitation through
circuitous routes spatially arrayed along
parallel paths where one might search
with an extra-terrestrial inventiveness,
and wait.

I know the trials of these errant waves
won't add up to a guarantee
my burpy blips of a pulse can reach
the receptively comprehending and responsive
soils I seek, but it's the remoteness of a stead
to come stalking that appeals, and despite
the Hawking drone of unveiled warnings
I might regret such contact, I'll risk it all
on vaguely washed wishes this astronomical
anomaly with an alien sensibility has
one match.

There's something about everything about nothing about how we were created, tiny blips in a system of "Nothing Even Matters" starring the worst producers in the universe. One could catch a glimpse of us as they pass by to get to somewhere better and laugh, and shake their heads and they would know our only purpose in existence was to make them feel better inside. But whoever writes a book in the view of the indifferent? Whoever directs a movie where nothing different happens? That's like asking who remembers the forgotten, it's possible but ever so unlikely, and sure as sine is undulated, under appreciated, somewhat very deflated, and though we aren't remembered, we sure aren't too terribly hated.

There's something about anything that could be distributed as significance in this underrated little beauty, flourished world that runs about full of life and clarity, streaming with disparity, slow depreciating, and sometimes we're defeating the purpose of why we're unique, and we slowly take the filters out of our little selfie, loosing all this isn't healthy, and we diminish all signs of  any significance and we become as lifeless as a meteor, and I sometimes think "What is this for?" And then I simply sigh and take my sunglasses outside and stare into the sun, and wonder if anyone in the entire world has gotten off their iPhones or TVs and stared at the sun along with me.

There's something about how I feel when the little things get to me, like grades or dating drama, getting larger, more dramatic, oh it's such a ceaseless phlegmatic, and I sit at my stirring house and wonder how I can bear to live it anymore. But then I start to realise the person passing over is really staring us in the face and watching this world run in place. I'm not going to think about it anymore, it's all part of Earth's perpetual cycle, I'm not going to stop this utter nonsense now because it's time for me to go to my next class.