When I was a boy
My life was erratic
Volcanoes in Antarctica
Jungles in LA
Shouts and anger; quiet farmstead

As I got older
My heart was erratic
Kisses in the hallway
Bruises on the cheek
Soft words and embraces; angry thoughts

Even older still
My mind was erratic
Screaming at the wall
More clever than ever
Lucid, powerful arguments; raving paranoid delusions

And here I am
I am erratic incarnate
A bundle of sluggish energy
A sonnet written for one girl and an excuse for another
A coil of madness tight around the bright spark of genius
A purely mechanical soul-filled destiny driven fate-less wonder
Do I laugh for the irony or madness?

Whenever I look in the mirror
I'm not sure what I'll see
Because the person staring back
Isn't really me

The person in the mirror
Is nothing but a lie
Doing what people want
And mimicking those near by

The makeup that she wears
The fact that she's lost weight
All just makes her look like them
The people she used to hate

The way she acts and talks
The things she'll do and say
It's absolutely horrible
She's truly gone astray

Then the smile on her face
It's the biggest lie of all
Because I know deep inside
She feels like she will fall

So I ask you this question
And please, think it through
Is your reflection staring back
Still the real you?

Bus full of people breathing inside a small space
Face to face, eyes cast down and explore
A small girl that hides behind bangs
Long thin legs
Tightly fit close
That are shear and expose
Insecurities
And people whisper
People point
But I remember what Teresa told me

A small man gets fired up
But can’t fight, he wobbles drunk
He wants to prove he is big and bad
That the girl who left him
Didn’t have his heart in hand
That he doesn’t bleed
He doesn’t hurt
He punches the next guy he sees
He makes him blue
Makes him bleed
And I remember what Teresa said
Two lovers hold each other tight
Teary eyes on a star lit night
Warm bodies fight the chill
Each wondering if they will
Be able to hold hands like this
Forever or if
Fingers fold into fists
As bitterness steals a kiss
Because the two girls don’t know why
People say they should die
They have always only loved each other
And I remember what Teresa told me

Oh,
You say you could use a love like mine?

Darling,
I've been waiting for someone like you
For too long.

i see myself in you
in everything you are and anything you hate

in the nervousness of your pleas
that brings stiffness to your neck - and mine
- and hides tremors from your voice

i have more faith in you
than you know;
more trust, in the soft longing of your eyes
than any of the pains you've commited
and your broken smile, teeth baring hate
for every single time you couldn't say no

i stack every murder under one flag.

people always say "that was deep"-but what does deep mean, like blood coursing through veins?-could it be general pains or maybe even psychotic dreams-to be deep would be deep in thought, im assuming not literal-its like you're jones'n fora specific mental flow-almost like you lost track of what you had-psh...i guess that expression is true, you dont know what you've got till its's gone

but since were talking about the individual its definitely not impossible to find-i guess we can just throw a rope to the soul with a hope it gets caught-like fishing line we search for that rock bottom, because life is much sweeter when we crawl from our caverns-since we dig these ourselves we navigate them quickly-its the abundance that gets us, rather the dig deep-in our soul we search for this attribute that we have always admired-hoping to base our life around that fuel that fires us

--BRD

(- This is originally a spoken word poem. Read aloud for maximum exposure.
-Asterisks indicate the necessity to pop your cheek with your thumb.
-Answer the two questions correctly and I will give you a hug.)

He fell asleep while traveling time
where a true name
becomes everything else.
So please give me a minute to explain myself
through the doorways
that I see champagne on a windowsill
walking across the room with blue
and fine china feet
saying again and again
drink me.
Until somehow
the words become a song
singing and swinging the bottle like a dinner bell for thirst.
A kind that we've settled to quench
with television
and somebody else's dream.
So don't pour my drink.
I'm trying to uncork it with my thumbs.

POP

It's flat
and I still have a tongue
so I will use it and I
I will use my thumbs to push back time
until hitler
becomes a baby.
Dr. King becomes a baby.
Until the left and the right and every dead genius in between
becomes
a baby.

Tiny feet trying not to crush the wet salad of the lawn
because it is green,
like my heart
that has learned
how to break fine china.
From experience,
let me tell you
it's a lot more tiresome than a blue dream
but he fell asleep on a boxcar crossing Germany
where mustard gas
drowns you in your own lungs
and he tries to breath between the joints in the track

the

click
...                             clack
click

as years
hurtle by.

Asking again and again,

"Who killed me?"
           &
"Who am I?",

until dinner was served without grace.
Until my head becomes stiff and bubble shaped
having been conditioned by
their
piles
&
piles
&      mounds

of
ob        cation.
fus

So we should tell all the baby hitlers,
that become children
that become us,
that a lie
is what you become
when abusing language to distort a reality.

And when you make a fist
you are handing lies out at random on a silver tongue.
But I still have one
and I still have thumbs
so sorry to burst your bubble but,

POP.

Child,
I don't mean to put

barbed wire

between us.  
I know it hurts
to have something so precious as the world
taken away.
But walls hurt worse
and through them only muffled sounds are ever heard
until your world is made of mute prisoners
that have forgotten what silver
really sounds like.

Blessed be
for I also have ears
so give me second place
and I will throw the medal against your walls.
Ringing out,
the universe doesn't look like an ebony tub,
with knobs we can't ever see,
full of infinite shining marbles to everybody.
Your mind
is a library of language,
so free will isn't a book written in english.
And tourists,
those know nothing infants trying to travel,
belong
where
           ever they
are
                             going.

Belonging like this medal bouncing trying to sing
off your wall
and
falls

into


your world.

Where again it will ring,

we've all been runner up

and somehow
we still get annoyed when another doesn't enter our library
instead of trying harder
next time.

So,
let me say grace.
Let me set l o n g tables
with the gruel that's been given
served on b  r                     n.
                         o
                           k  
                                        e          
china,
spooned
with sterling silver.