I sit in the sun room, I am shaded for the sun
is only newly risen, low slung, just above the horizon,
behind me, over my shoulder, early morn warm

Slivers of sun rays yellow highlight the wild green lawn,
freshly nourished by torrential rains of the prior eve

The wind gusts are residuals, memoirs of the hurricane
that came for a peripheral visit, your unwanted cousin Earl,
in town for the day, too bad your schedule
is fully booked, but he keeps raining on you,
staying on the phone for so long, that the goodbye,
go away, hang up relief is palpable

The oak trees are top heavy with leaves frothy like a new cappuccino,
the leaves resist the sun silvers, guard the grasses
from browning out, by knocking the rookie rays to and fro,
just for now, just for a few minutes more,
it is advantage trees, for they stand taller in the sky
than the youthful teenage yellow ball

I sit in the sun room buffered from nature's battles external,
by white lace curtains which are the hallmark
of all that is fine in Western Civilization,

and my thoughts drift to suicide.

I have sat in the sun room of my mind, unprotected.
with front row seats, first hand witness to a battle unceasing

Such that my investigations, my travails along the boundary line
between internal madness and infernal relief from mental pain
so crippling, is such that you recall begging for cancer or Aids

Such that my investigations, my travails along the sanity boundary
are substantive, modestly put, not inconsiderable

Point your finger at me, demanding like every
needy neurotic moderne, reassurance total,
proof negative in this instance, of relevant expertise!

Tell us you bona fides, what is your knowing in these matters?

Show us the wrist scars, evidential,
prove to us your "hands on" experiential!

True, true, I am without demonstrable proofs
of the first hand, my resume is absent of
razors and pills, poisons and daredevil spills,
guns, knives, utensils purposed for taking lives

Here are my truths, here are my sums;

If the numerator is the minutes spent resisting the promised relief
of the East River currents from the crushing loneliness that
consumed my every waking second of every night of my years of despair
                           divided by
a denominator that is my unitary, solitary name,
then my fraction, my remainder, is greater than one,
the one step away from supposed salvation...

Yet, here I am sitting in the sun room buffered from
nature's battles by white lace curtains which are the hallmark
of all that is fine in Western Civilization

I am a survivor of mine own World War III,
carnaged battlefields, where white lace curtains,
were not buffers but dividers tween mis en scenes,
variegated veins of colored nightmares, reenactments of
death heroics worthy of Shakespeare

Did I lack for courage?
Was my fear/despair ratio insufficient?

These are questions for which the answers matter only to me,
tho the questions are fair ones, my unsolicited voyeur,
they are not the ones for which I herein write,
for they no longer have relevance, meaning or validity,
for yours truly

I write poetry by command, by request, good or bad,
this one is a bequest to myself, and also a sidecar for an old friend,
who asked in passing to write what I know of suicide,
unaware that the damage of hurricanes is not always
visible to the naked heart

These hands, that type these words are the resume of a life
resumed,
life line remains scarred, but after an inter-mission, after an inter-diction, an inter-re-invention
in a play where I was an actor who could not speak
but knew every line, I am now the approving audience too...

But I speak now and I say this:
There are natural toxins in us all,
if you wish to understand the whys, the reasons,
of the nearness of taking/giving away what belongs to you,
do your own sums, admit your own truths
query not the lives of others, approach the mirror...

If you want to understand suicide,
no need to phone a friend, ask the expert,
ask yourself, parse the curtains of the
sun room and admit, that you do understand,
that you once swung one leg over the roof,
gauged the currents speed and direction,
went deep sea fishing without rod or reel
and you recall it all too well, for you did the math
and here I am, tho the tug ne'er fully disappears,
here I am, here I am writing to you,
as I sit in the sun room.

Memorial Day, 2011

Where's your make up honey?
What happened to your hair?
New style
That's a different pair
New attitude ; that's cool
Realization that the new trend is rude
Huh? What you say?
You said at this rate the next fashion statement have to be nude
No more clubbing?
You tired of sharing spaces in places where you have to refer to Men as "dude"
Strangers steadily attempting to intrude
Now you making plans with family and friends
I heard you saying that you rather enjoy yourself with the people who been with you since the long ways
Recollecting the old days
I'm glad that the feeling is now mutual
And that you are finished with trying to be cute
Because you are already simply beautiful

Dam I need a blunt,
can't put up with this cunt,
I'm fealin a new person
My heart just feals like cursin...

I've bin hear,
in this new home,
sober a new rome,
If i had my shear bong
you'd sure  would hear a cheer song.
I'd feal you out so happy,
have my words churned out to sappy?.
I'm way out,
    I'm not burned,
I get it I sure learned
far out mars rover,
spot me out like your'e lucky clover,
out in a big croud
I'm rare like a drout  cloud,
like I said,
I miss my bed,
eatin all day,
    freakin all may,
Give it a doobie a precious fuckin ruby
Not lit Not fit
can-I-Just-quit?.

How bout a bubble and a bowl,?
no trouble nore parol,
you know i'm slick won't get in no shit,
just help a nigga out and blow me a hit.
  I love my jane we plan to mary
when she's gone my world gets scary..
So be it if i'm sketchy,
I'm posted monalisa ,
see me on the wall,
touch me and I'll fall,
  trust I see it all,
you walk right out the door and leave me on this floor,
I've seen it as it's low thats why I tend to flow,
Best of what I know is what minds like to show..
don't come back that lock is latched,
   holdin steady bit attatched,
I need a hook to hold me steady.
some one strong that will be ready,

I was searching my pockets for a story to tell my daughter on the night before Thanksgiving when she was looking especially nineteen, shouldering the immeasurable weight of being nineteen, and I couldn’t find one with a good three-act structure, but I started to tell her about the kind of vaguely existential warm knot I always used to get in my stomach when I went home from school for Thanksgiving, and how I couldn’t decide at the time whether it was happy or sad, but now I knew that it was happy for certain, and when you think about how once things change they are not changing back it can be kinda heavy, but you don’t have to think about it too often, and we had this new recipe for cranberry sauce this year and you don’t even have to get up early to watch the parade.

When I went downstairs at nine the next morning to put the turkey in the oven, she was smiling in front of the TV, sipping a cup of black coffee with her dad.

I'm just as inconsistent as the weather men are for New England,
From a sunny day that suddenly turn to rain,
From a rainy week to snow and sleet,
You can only rely on how unreliable they will be
for telling the future forecast of this up coming week.

I don't know what to write or say, my brain is losing its own mind, and my heart lost its way.
Summer started and I crashed into a whole new dimension of sweet intoxicating freedom. But the perfumes were overwhelming and I was scared with all this boundless time.
I searched for friends, but they were no where to be found. And because of this change, I took it out on the one person who never left. Badgering him to be something he wasn't. I was bored and done. Lost in love and wondering who I had become. He was gone to, for some of the time. I knew not what to do, or where to go, or who to even talk to. I felt like a caged animal who had finally be rereleased into the wild, forgetting how to behave its natural way. I withdrew into my security and fought the outside for it kept trying to kill me. I had let my hair run wild, and I didn't wake up till about noon. I was lost, and I felt like a bum off the street without a job. And I struggled to figure out who I was and what was my purpose in life, especially that right now. Right now when life seem to be drifting by and I had all the time in the world, but had nothing to fill it with.

I don't like being high because of the way it makes me feel
sobriety is alright with me
if you can show me that love is real
I don't need a wal-mart knock off
"Knock your socks off"
version of something I never really enjoyed
because if it breaks in three uses
then the effort was useless
and I'm left with bathroom and my left hand

But don't pretend you understand
the storm inside my head
Katrina couldn't hold a candle
and Sandy was taking notes instead
of practicing
like me in the seventh grade
when I had a guitar
but no time to say "Yeah, I play"

Studying a broad
doesn't make you cultured
it makes you lecherous
and I like that
why be perfect?
why be so Stepford?
when you can be yourself or anyone else?
because you could change your name
and move out of Nebraska
or New England, if you want
You could run away to Alaska
Your home would be ice
fishing off the coast
life would be so nice
and I'd visit you when the snow thawed out
and we'd never see each other again
two friends
playing pretend
like we were pre-preteens
and life was simple
like the silver screen projections
I have a confession
I made something up
so that you'd believe in love
and, in life, it'd be enough
but don't say that you're angry
don't tell me that you're sad
don't tell me anything
anything that'd make me feel bad.

It's not me, it's you
these words they haunt beds
but I can sleep at night.
Rather be cold, covered, and neglected
than hot, naked, and rejected.
Yeah you're winning cause you have feelings
but nothing is ever what it seems.
Crying and purging at the thought of my body
but I won't let you see me because I'm shaking.
You're so far away from my tree that I appear
to be still but my leaves are trembling.
I never asked for thunder and rain,
you were supposed to bury the pain.
Instead I watched as you endlessly shoveled to find
the root, so the the thorn in your heart can be extracted.
But I won't let you get soil deep
forever bound
chained and held in my hand
curled up defeated
a snail in a shell.
Sicker everyday.... all because I didn't wish you well.

Shame
fingers point
and they blame
you.
Libra weigh the scales
I'm tired of the lower hand
I want you so bad it's stupid
It's stupid that I want bad news
Yearning centuries now for something new.
I want you so bad it's stupid
it's stupid that I want you so bad
so bad, my want is bad,
but I'm stupid for you.

The Victim and The Villain
interchanging between the two
chemistry ignited in red
but now we're entering the blues
The positions they change as frequent
as lies that transform into truth.
The Victtim and The Villain
they live inside of us;
and they live inside of you.