The first settlers to the area called the Lumber River Drowning Creek. The river got its name for its dark, swift-moving waters. In 1809, the North Carolina state legislature changed the name of Drowning Creek to the Lumber River. The headwaters are still referred to as Drowning Creek.

Three p.m. on a Sunday.
Anxiously hungry, I stay dry, out of the pool’s cold water,
taking the light, dripping into my pages.
A city with a white face blank as a bust
peers over my shoulder.
Wildflowers on the roads. Planes circle from west,
come down steeply and out of sight.
A pinkness rises in my breast and arms:
wet as the drowned, my eyes sting with sweat.
Over the useless chimneys a bank of cloud piles up.
There is something terrible in the sky, but it keeps breaking.
Another is dead. Fentanyl. Sister of a friend, rarely seen.
A hand reaches everywhere to pass over eyes and mouths.
A glowing wound opens in heaven.
A mirror out of doors draws a gyre of oak seeds no one watches,
in the clear pool now sunless and black.

Bitter water freezes the muscles and I am far from shore.
I paddle in the shallows, near the wooden jail.
The water reflects a taut rope,
feet hanging in the breeze singing mercy
at the site of the last public hanging in the state.
A part-white fugitive with an extorted confession,
loved by the poor, dumb enough to get himself captured,
lonely on this side of authority: a world he has never lived in
foisting itself on the world he has -
only now, to steal his drunken life, then gone again.

1871 - Henderson Oxendine, one of the notorious gang of outlaws who for some time have infested Robeson County, N. C., committing ****** and robbery, and otherwise setting defiance to the laws, was hung at Lumberton, on Friday last in the presence of a large assemblage. His execution took place a very few days after his conviction, and his death occurred almost without a struggle.

Today, the town square collapses as if scorched
by the whiskey he drank that morning to still himself,
folds itself up like Amazing Grace is finished.
A plinth is laid
in the shadow of his feet, sticky with pine,
here where the water sickens with roots.
Where the canoe overturned. Where the broken oar floated and fell.
Where the snake lives, and teethes on bark,
waiting for another uncle.

Where the tobacco waves near drying barns rusted like horseshoes
and cotton studs the ground like the cropped hair of the buried.
Where schoolchildren take the afternoon
to trim the kudzu growing between the bodies of slaves.
Where appetite is met with flood and fat
and a clinic for the heart.
Where barges took chips of tar to port,
for money that no one ever saw.

Tar sticks the heel but isn’t courage.
Tar seals the hulls -
binds the planks -
builds the road.
Tar, fiery on the tongue, heavy as bad blood in the family -
dead to glue the dead together to secure the living.
Tar on the roofs, pouring heat.
Tar is a dark brown or black viscous liquid of hydrocarbons and free carbon,
obtained from a wide variety of organic materials
through destructive distillation.
Tar in the lungs will one day go as hard as a five-cent candy.

Liberty Food Mart
Cheapest Prices on Cigarettes
Parliament $22.50/carton
Marlboro $27.50/carton

The white-bibbed slaughterhouse Hmong hunch down the steps
of an old school bus with no air conditioner,
rush into the cool of the supermarket.
They pick clean the vegetables, flee with woven bags bulging.
What were they promised?
Air conditioning.
And what did they receive?
Chickenshit on the wind; a dead river they can't understand
with a name it gained from killing.

Truth:
A man was flung onto a fencepost and died in a front yard down the street.
A girl with a grudge in her eyes slipped a razorblade from her teeth and ended recess.
I once saw an Indian murdered for stealing a twelve-foot ladder.
The red line indicating heart disease grows higher and higher.
The red line indicating cardiovascular mortality grows higher and higher.
The red line indicating motor vehicle deaths grows higher and higher.
I burn with the desire to leave.

The stories make us full baskets of dark. No death troubles me.
Not the girl's blood, inert, tickled by opiates,
not the masked arson of the law;
not the smell of drywall as it rots,
or the door of the safe falling from its hinges,
or the chassis of cars, airborne over the rise by the planetarium,
three classmates plunging wide-eyed in the river’s icy arc –
absent from prom, still struggling to free themselves from their seatbelts -
the gunsmoke at the home invasion,
the tenement bisected by flood,
the cattle lowing, gelded
by agriculture students on a field trip.

The air contains skin and mud.
The galvanized barns, long empty, cough up
their dust of rotten feed, dry tobacco.
Men kneel in the tilled rows,
to pick up nails off the ground
still splashed with the blood of their makers.

You Never Sausage a Place
(You’re Always a ****** at Pedro’s!)
South of the Border – Fireworks, Motel & Rides
Exit 9: 10mi.

Drunkards in Dickies will tell you the roads are straight enough
that the drive home will not bend away from them.
Look in the woods to see by lamplight
two girls filling each other's mouths with smoke.
Hear a friendly command:
boys loosening a tire, stuck in the gut of a dog.
Turn on the radio between towns of two thousand
and hear the tiny voice of an AM preacher,
sharing the airwaves of country dark
with some chords plucked from a guitar.
Taste this water thick with tannin
and tell me that trees do not feel pain.
I would be a mausoleum for these thousands
if I only had the room.

I sealed myself against the flood.
Bodies knock against my eaves:
a clutch of cats drowned in a crawlspace,
an old woman bereft with a vase of pennies,
her dead son in her living room costumed as the black Jesus,
the ***** oil of a Chinese restaurant
dancing on top of black water.
A flow gauge spins its tin wheel
endlessly above the bloated dead,
and I will pretend not to be sick at dinner.

Misery now, a struggle ahead for Robeson County after flooding from Hurricane Matthew
LUMBERTON
After years of things leaving Robeson County – manufacturing plants, jobs, payrolls, people – something finally came in, and what was it but more misery?

I said a prayer to the city:
make me a figure in a figure,
solvent, owed and owing.
Take my jute sacks of wristbones,
my sheaves and sheaves of fealty,
the smell of the forest from my feet.
Weigh me only by my purse.
A slim woman with a college degree,
a rented room without the black wings
of palmetto roaches fleeing the damp:
I saw the calm white towers and subscribed.
No ingrate, I saved a space for the lost.
They filled it once, twice, and kept on,
eating greasy flesh straight from the bone,
craning their heads to ask a prayer for them instead.

Downtown later in the easy dark,
three college boys in foam cowboy hats shout in poor Spanish.
They press into the night and the night presses into them.
They will go home when they have to.
Under the bridge lit in violet,
a folding chair is draped in a ***** blanket.
A grubby pair of tennis shoes lay beneath, no feet inside.
Iced tea seeps from a chewed cup.
I pass a bar lit like Christmas.
A mute and pretty face full of indoor light
makes a promise I see through a window.
I pay obscene rents to find out if it is true,
in this nation tied together with gallows-rope,
thumbing its codex of virtues.

I smell Motherland in the corridor
She crept up on me with her soap, drunken men and things I’d rather forget
I was thinking about death since I was 10.
.
The plane gets up,
Chicken soup is served.
Here are your nuts.
Have this lolly, the tension is getting
Higher
Higher
And higher
I cannot hear anything.
.
We are now in a very neat place
Incheon, South Korea
Fancy, shiny, pricey
Another plane, bigger
Higher
Higher
Higher
Yoghurt and cheesecake
I like this food better.
.
We get off, and even the ground shines
The air is very different
For the first day I smell this country it does has a specific smell
And after 5 years
You creep up on me, my love.
.

Falling in love is like driving without a seatbelt
You are vulnerable to any casualty, fatality, you are unprotected from chaos
I never understood people who drive without seatbelts
I never understood their courage
It must be nice to feel so safe, you have to invent new ways to put yourself in danger
He was thunderstorm
Exciting and powerful yes but violent, unpredictable and ultimately short lived
He would look at me the way a tsunami looks at a beach house
And all the while I am thinking it is a nice day for the beach
I never did see it coming, not that I ever could have
Love blinds you, blurs your vision, it makes you forget to pay attention to the dangers and direct your focus to the wonderful
I only wish I could have heard the sounding of alarms, could have escaped the burning building for I set it on fire
I have found I am quieter now
Not as ambitious, not as outgoing, not as much laugher hangs in the air above me
With him, most days I could grab my voice and swing it like a hammer but now I pick it up like a shard of glass scared of what might happen if I didn't hold onto it carefully
I have recently been asking myself if sorrow is an art we should pride ourselves on sharing
That we should not fear failure of broad shoulders, we should not be afraid of pain
Throw pity parties in collection of bitter humans
The kind of party where no one is close but everyone is friendly tonight
Love ties come under
Romance is not relentless in appearance
A kiss does not last forever
Passion dies down
Jokes stop being funny
Coffee is too strong
Emotion shows little respect to your inner organs
Affection lies down into its grave
Sometimes the things we would die for are the ones that end up killing us
And now, I find myself driving for hours without my seatbelt on, holding on to nothing more than the steering wheel and endless thoughts of you

One of my friends
quiet as he may be
actually paused today and asked
why I am so against wearing my
seatbelt.

Why?

I had no heart to tell him
that without that safety harness
around my chest
I am one step closer to death
and I prefer it that way,
no heart to tell him
while they all think my
suicidal tendencies are
under control,
never to be seen again.

They think I'm all better
but I've got hidden demons
always begging to come out
and play.

“LLLAAATIES & GENTLEmen, this is your captain speaking.
There is a teency weency storm that is abrewing around us – ‘tis but a trifling, little thing - so I ask that you please remain calm.”

The curious passengers crowded to look out their windows.  
Ominous clouds brigaded the skies with enormously vibrant, sharpened zigzag knives, cutting through the air with thunderous taps against the windows.  
The travelers went into a frenzy as one-by-one, each fell victim to the terror of the roaring victory cries.
As a crazed, indecisive pendulum shouts order of formation – back forth, back forth – the travelers scurried into the aisle, bumping into one another like panicked ants dodging magnified beams of light.

Suddenly the chaos had ceased.

In the very front of the aisle stood two of the most spellbinding flight attendants that had ever been seen. They brought peace amongst the fury inside the cabin without uttering a word.  

“LLLLAATIES & GENTLEmen, this is your captain speaking.
I apologize for the brief disruption; however,
we have a show for you his evening.
A lovely show it is indeed.
Please hand over your tickets, for at the end of the show there will be a special prize awaiting the lucky winner who is reunited with this item of admission.
Oh, and might I suggest, everyone quick look over to your right; there is a canyon to be seen. It’s a large one, in fact.
Ain’t it GRAND???
So fasten those seatbelts, and enjoy your ride.
Ta-Ta.”

The passengers began to do as they were instructed.  Along with the refreshments of soda pops and pretzels bites, the angelic flight attendants placed out black velvet hats and black sticks with white tips, centering them on the empty laps of those preparing for the delightful evening event. When all of the hats had been properly placed, the attendants returned to their stations.

“LLLAATIES & GENTLEmen, this is your captain speaking.
Please take note of the hats that rest upon your laps.
Seek and you shall find that your tickets have been placed inside.
For if they are not, you will be deprived of your surprise.
Ta-Ta.”

The puzzled passengers obeyed, and perching their heads forth, they looked down into the blackened velvet hats… A wave of surprise quickly spread throughout the cabin, for every person was the winner!  

“LLLAATIES & GENTLEmen this is your captain speaking.  Please tap your hats.
After doing so your prize will appear inside.”  The excited passengers reached for their blackened sticks with the white tips and gently tapped the brims.

KAAAABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!­

A thundering crash accompanied a blinding slash. For a brief moment I could no longer hear nor see anything.  I patiently waited to regain my senses.  I slowly started to hear an orchestrated, harmonic beat hitting the ceiling.  The white light that momentarily blinded me started to dissipate like an early morning fog.

What was the image that slowly appeared before my curious eyes?  A crimson ceiling it was.  It had everything a ******* painting deserved.  I was ecstatic.  I had completed a true masterpiece!  My personal contribution to our youth.  

As I sat in the last row admiring my work of art, a lonely tear trickled down my face.  My lovely acquaintance wiped away my tear and smiled at me.  “BRAVO! – BRAVO! It is simply exquisite!”

The heads were placed in the allotted location as requested.

I sat there with the deepest satisfaction twisting the upward curve of my mustache.  I felt the gentle touch of my delightful assistant slowly running her fingers through my hair.  The other softly placed her hand upon my shoulder and asked, “What next?”  I humbly replied, “We’re going to donate them to the toy store.  There they will be placed in wonderfully colored boxes that will play lovely music when the handles are cranked in a circular motion until the heads pop out!”

The flight attendant looked at me with great wonder, “Captain, you’re truly a remarkable man.”

Hello there, I’m Heidi.  I’m 17 years old but I’m no longer alive.  I was 16 years old when I died.  It’s been a year since I’ve breathed the earthly oxygen.  The air up here is so much fresher than down there.  It’s quite unbelievable.  If you listen closely, I’ll happily tell you my story even though it’s not very happy.  If you're emotional, please take a moment to make sure there's a box of tissues handy, because by the time I reach the end, you might need some.  I’m just letting you know.  It’s not a happy ending.  Anyways, have you ever fallen in love?  Not the kind of love that you confused with the real kind.  I’m talking about true, heart pumping love.  The kind where you'll do absolutely anything for, anything in the world.  Even if it kills you.  The kind that if it starts slipping away, you'll do whatever it takes to hold it together.  You’re probably asking yourself, "16 and in love?"  Yea.  Well, here is my story.  
It all started with the day Sammy’s dad got a new job out of state.  We lived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania for as long as I could remember and her dad's new job was all the way over in Long Beach, California.  "This can’t be happening," I thought to myself.  "How will I survive without Sammy?  She’s literally my life, the air I simply breathe every day.  She’s the only person I fully trust with my whole heart.  She’s the only person in my life worth talking to.  She’s so incredibly sweet, the sweetest girl I’ve ever met.  She doesn’t judge, she doesn’t cause any trouble, she’s real down to earth, well put together, and smart.  Everything."  It seemed too perfect, almost dream-like.  You know, the dream that you never want to wake up from.  Well, there I was living it and I didn’t ever want to wake up.  
People use to call me "The Dreamer" because I was always in a great mood.  I was always smiling and taking big risks.  I only took those risks if I absolutely thought it was worth it.  Which most of the time I thought it was.  In my opinion, I thought I was too positive but not cocky.  I was definitely not cocky at all.  I was simply positive and cheerful and constantly trying to cheer everyone else up.  Especially Sammy, I secretly thought that I had super powers.  I somehow summoned a power deep within myself that could make real smiles appear on people’s faces.  Real smiles!  The ones that create a bundle of energy instead of taking it away.  You know, fake smiles, they are forced as a result of wasted energy.  The only thing better than real smiles are real laughs.  My energy comes from laughs and smiles from other people.  When I created laughter and smiles, my energy level would rise to the top of the meter and I would be confident about everything.  I would feel indestructible, and nothing could ever hurt me.  So I thought.
When Sammy and I said our goodbyes that day, I surely didn’t want that to be the end.  I didn’t want that moment to be the last.  So I promised her that I would look for her in the future and we could get back together.  We’d keep in touch everyday with texts, calls, and the internet.  She got on the plane and that was that.  I didn’t cry.  She didn’t cry.  Until our backs were toward each other, then I couldn’t hold it.  We knew we’d see each other again and we were sure of it.  She knew I had a plan up my sleeve and that I was going to make sure everything was going to be alright.  Trust, number one thing in a relationship.
The next day I couldn’t stand it.  I couldn’t put up with the empty feeling anymore.  She wasn’t physically here.  I missed seeing her face, her smile, and her eyes.  I missed her laughter and her hugs the most.  My energy was dying.  So I thought up a scheme and I was going to follow through with it.  I called her up and told her that I was coming to see her.  Soon.  
I searched all my drawers and pockets for all my money.  I was going to have to be able to afford a one-way plane ticket and maybe a hotel if Sammy's parents wouldn't let me stay with them.  I wanted to plan for the worst just in case.  I wouldn't want to show up with no money and assume they'd let me live with them.  What if they wouldn't, then I'd be *******.  So after a while of looking around, I came up with 510 dollars.  Enough for a plane ticket and a cheap hotel for a few days.  I’ll have to find a job for sure.  But first, I'd have to go online and find the cheapest airline to use.
I picked out a few sets of clothes and fit them into a single bag.  I didn’t want anything slowing me down.  I didn’t tell anyone I was leaving or where I was going.  Besides Steve, my neighbor, I got him to drop me off at the airport.  We waited in line to buy a ticket to the first flight to California.  Fortunately, the soonest one was in a few hours and there was still a few seats left.  He walked me to the security check and then they wouldn't let him past without a ticket, so he wrapped his arms around me gave me a tight squeeze and he told me that he'd miss me an awful lot and if I ever needed any help to just call him and he would help out as best he could.  Which made me feel a ton more relaxed.  He had tears in his eyes when we separated.  I remembered saying, "I’ll text you when I get there."  I assured him that I would be just fine and he had nothing to worry about.  I also thanked him for being such a great friend.  He really was and always will be.  He stood there as I attempted to walk away, but then I turned and had to go back for another hug.  Then I was sure I was ready to go.  The second attempt to walk away was more successful than the first.  I felt him watch me the whole way till I turned the corner, out of his sight.  
I sat in the terminal for a long time, analyzing the room.  I remember that there was a cute little blonde girl with her dad, a guy with a mysterious black hat and matching trench coat, a tall thin girl with a guitar, an average looking group of 20 year old guys and a few old women.  Those were the only people that stood out, there was many more but I don’t particularly remember them.  After a while, they started calling seat numbers that were allowed to board, starting with the back.  My ticket said that I was seat number 22.  When they called 20 through 30, I got up and found my seat in the big jet.  The butterflies in my tummy are as hyper as possible.  I imagined myself with a butterfly net trying to capture all the fluttering creatures inside me so I could release them on the outside.  They were all crammed in there, fighting each other for space, and it was an unbalanced feeling.  I put my bag under my seat, sat down in seat 22 and decided to make a quick call to Sammy.  I told her I was on my way and I should be there in a few hours.  She sounded extraordinarily excited which made my heart pound.  She made the violent butterflies stop their fighting.  She also told me that her parents agreed to pick me up at the airport.  How nice of them!  Then a lady told me to get off the phone.  I thought it was rude of her to say that to me, but I don’t like making people mad, so I listened to her.  The thing I remember the most is when I told Sammy that I love her, with honesty in her voice she said it back.  Then I hung up and then I finally turn my phone off.  As soon as everyone was in and completely ready, a woman’s voice spoke on the income system.  She said something about there being flight attendants going around checking everyone’s bags and seatbelts to make sure they're secure.  There was the sound of my pulse in my ears and it was louder than anything else.  It was difficult to catch everything she was saying.  I buckled my seat belt but I left a lot of room for movement.  Before I knew it, we were up in the air.  Then I closed my eyes and that’s all I remember.  Don’t ask me how I fell asleep.  All the excitement must've made me exhausted.
The next thing I know, all of a sudden, I was thrown from my seat and I hit my head off the window and it sent sharp shooting pains through my nerves.  Everyone gasped at the same exact moment, and I had no idea what was going on.  I don’t think anyone did but I think we all knew it wasn’t good.  The feeling was like standing in an elevator, having the cables snap, and being dropped from 100 stories high.  Only it was a million times worse.  I was being thrown around everywhere.  I couldn't hold on or even fight back.  Everyone was in mad panic trying to grasp anything near to sturdy themselves.  I managed to get a glimpse out the window to see the clouds shaking.  That told me that the plane wasn’t working right.  Something absolutely horrible was going to happen, the feeling was so strong.  I heard a loud click and then a thud and I caught a glance of the little blonde girl across the aisle from me get hit in the face with a huge metal suite case.  It hit her so hard that it knocked her clear out of this world.  She fell limp and her head lay still on the floor, blood oozing out.  The puddle started streaking toward me, it told me that the plane was tilting or rolling over.  I noticed that her dad wasn’t around.  I stumbled across the aisle and held her in my arms.  I remember my vision being really blurry probably from tears or the plane shaking, or both.  I patted her cheeks to try and wake her, but she was out.  I held her tight and quickly took the time to look around for help but then realized there was no help.  Every ounce of calmness was clearly gone.  I set the girl in the seat and buckled her in.  I wasn’t sure if that would do anything but it seemed like a good idea.  The plane stayed tilted on its side then shook and it literally felt like an earth quake.  My stomach started twisting; the nose of the plane was dipping forward.  I took another look out the window.  My head was spinning, thoughts scattered everywhere.  Everything was moving way too fast and I couldn’t keep up.  I couldn’t concentrate or focus on anything.  I stood up and that was it.  After that, everything went black and then a bright white light took over.  Eventually something happened and I was floating above looking down.  It was a horrid sight, everything so lifeless and dead, unmoving.  Besides for the flames, they were more alive than anything.  Smashed metal, sparks and fire, soundless noise, and in the middle of nowhere, what was going to happen to all these bodies?  
Later, I somehow channeled my sight into a different location.  It’s been hours later and I saw Sammy and her parents in the airport.  They were anxiously waiting for my plane to arrive.  Little did they know, I wasn’t coming.  Hours and hours passed only making them more and more worried and confused.  I felt horrible.  I wish I could send them a message from up here.  They went to look at the departure and arrival screen and there was no time recorded on the screen for the flight they were looking for.  It was completely wiped off the board.  Her dad led them to the main desk to ask the man behind the counter if the plane had arrived yet.  A sorrowful look fell upon the man’s face.  He blinked away tears and you could tell he was searching for the right words to say.  He started to open his mouth but then failed to force words out.  He swallowed a gulp of air and he shook his head.  Something turned all their attention to the 40 inch flat screen on the wall where there was a lady reporting “heart breaking news” about a tragic accident.  He pointed Sammy’s attention to the television behind him, although she was already deeply fascinated.  The news reporter explained and then there were live videos being shown from a chopper that was looking down at the accident.  Sammy cupped her hands over her mouth.  Tears immediately leaked down her face.  Her parents were crying too.  Sammy collapsed to her knees.  I felt like I was standing right there watching everything but I couldn’t feel my feet.  I floated over to Sammy who was sitting on the floor with her face buried in her hands.  Her mom knelt next to her with her arms braced around her.  I waved my arms and shouted, "Look I’m right here!  Please stop crying."  But no one saw me or heard me.  I went over to Sammy and tried to grab her face to make her look at me, but I couldn’t feel anything.  I looked down at my hands and they were transparent.  I panicked and I knew this couldn’t be happening.  But it was.  I was dead.  
I channeled into another location, my house.  My parents were watching the same news channel but they didn’t know I was on that plane.  They didn’t know I was missing.  They didn’t know I was dead until weeks later.  When I didn’t come home that night, they called the cops and sent out search parties.  Whelp, they found me.  They identified my body in the plane.  My parents didn’t believe it because they had no idea how I would've got on the plane in the first place.  Then when they brought my body back to bury it, it was proof to them that it was fact me.  I absolutely hated watching everyone cry.  I hated that I couldn’t do anything about it.  Everyone that I left was left in silence.  I at least got to tell Sammy that I love her.  I got a last hug out of Steve.  Those were the most important people in my life.  I couldn’t feel worse at this moment.  
I felt like I was doing the right thing, chasing my dreams.
The dreamer thought she could fly.

queasy
upset stomach
shaky knees
spill out of a packed van
with choking seatbelts.
feet that are tired of wearing shoes
and sitting
for houuuuuuurrrrs
hit the hot concrete...
foreign land:
gas station.
dad tells me to run around a bit
stretch my legs
mom sits in the car
pregnant
fanning herself
smiling
at me
out the open
window
i smile back.
i'm wearing the white shirt
with the blue trim
that mom made me
special
for our trip
it has a silly sun
with sunglasses and a crinkly smile
that she embroidered on it
it is
my favorite...
i smell the acrid gasoline
look around
the first time
i've been
anywhere
i am only eight
dad comes out of the store
his hands full
of funny little cardboard boats
me and my sister
run up to him
he hands me
a chili dog
with onions...
first bite....
burst of onion
spice of chili
sweetness of bread
orange
mouths
i look at my sister
she points to my shirt
shows me the chili stain
against the perfect white
i
cry

much like an airplane,
crashing and burning
is inevitable for me
i guess when you fly that high
you forget not to look down

Read the palm of my hand,
Analyse the lines and see that it maps a highway with no destination
You became a long highway with high speeds and good music but as the driver, I knew it were to go nowhere
But as the passenger, you anticipated us to go everywhere  

And for that I’m sorry
You became a best friend that I resented
And I became the best friend that you had to learn to resent

Long car talks became our lingo and daily messages was our travel snack that we would crunch like a pass time
But as you found another, our cars collided
Inertia was met by fastening seatbelts and an accident we both denied had occurred  
And it's not that I’m jealous or realised I love you

But I am now met with suburbia,
With corners and cafe small talk,
Stop signs and round a bouts,

And I am to know that I can no longer rely on you like a country road but instead give way to another
I wish all the best for you
I know you once looked at my hands as a destination for yours
And honestly, sometimes I wish it were
But instead, they are creased maps leading to the nowhere for you
And everywhere for someone else

Although, I really hope you enjoyed the trip home

Why do kids think they are so **** indestructible,
When the whole wide world
Is just waiting to pounce?

a toast to the gods of self preservation
twenty one with plenty coming
allowing to pound sounds within
the crown aroused voided a founders of it’s bruises
spells hold the fold, I’m coasting with the best
resting in the east so I sleep with blinds low
the comfort zone is far from solitude
my molecules have aptitude to channel Jupiter
seatbelts are useless wastes of matter, excuse me
just a minute so you can miss me with that individuality
your calloused grip on reality impairs the singularity
old school, gold noose, silver lined diamonds
Jesus pieces reaped the seeds that teach your blind lids
came back with scabbed knuckled and heart scars
hustled the portal of pretension ever so ethereally
inner synthesis purged the day the plague hit
on the courts or the graves, you name the slaves
the game slayed the day the chains changed hands

The aroma of coconut milk
permeating the frost
of the windshield.

Vague scent of cigarettes and Febreze
in your hair.
Your teeth between my thighs.

Your tongue
circling mine
like two hyenas
scavenging .

You taste like
the tea you drank
half an hour ago.

Neutral
This car has been hit before.

I am frightened by your
automatic seatbelts.

There are no ways to safeword out of this life.
I know, I’ve tried them all.
Elephant, apple, Alaska, amen.
Tried screaming anything into the pillow my face is pushed down into,
Whiskey, tango, foxtrot, stop
Exhausted my vocabulary against the blanket my fists are balled into fists against,
Anything to make the beatings stop
But they just
Keep
Coming.
In ****, having a safeword is like wearing a seatbelt.
There are rules about having one
And the ones who choose to do without
Are taking risks.
We are born without lifejackets, without seatbelts and safecut scissors
Without breakaway glass or rubberized mats
Without any way to make the world slow down
Let us catch our breath,
And jump back in.
There are no hard limits in the real world.
So we bite into our gags and wait for the session to end.
Elephant, apple, Alaska, amen.

Cylindrical steel take me
         higher than I'll ever soar
                                              Except maybe
                                after the frantic sprint of rubber hooves has stopped
                                                   and I smile into your embrace
                                                                                            once more

Woke up early like I always do, no matter what I'm going through I sit and contemplate my present situation, like is this life worth living or am I wasting it, I got plans for myself but with what I know, I know there's a possibility of removing it from the shelf of possibilities, sometimes I can't control myself, so I get ******* let some shots off and restock, my life is just a ramble that needs to be reshocked like defibrillators to your live stock, cause global warming turned to climate change and they make it seem it's not an issue by keeping your mind invisibly encaged and your nose in the tissue, I've been changing, so when it comes to blaming there's no one to blame but the cats who put our work to shame, **** the industry it's why I live in infamy like the US has for practically an entire century, continuing forensically but fail to catch their own trace of criminology, instead blaming you for your ideology passed down from generations along with theology, some things are more believable like the inconceivable evil that's injected inside the bloodstreams of my people, makin them turn from people to machines, **** that I'd rather be trapped in Saturn's rings but sometimes it's hard to stop some things

- This world has been ruled, dominated, and conquered for thousands of years.. I think it's about time to let that **** lay to rest -

Man I've been living for quite some time, and all I've seen is the world go from a bright shine to a darkened shrine, but I guess that's what will happen when you're born into a world that's already fastened their seatbelts for a global blastin, end the nukes end the fed end the ******* who will leave us for dead while they happily sit in bed waiting for their master Satan to come in faster, the worlds a disaster but it can be fixed if everyone pitches in to dethrone their "masters", mathematical factors plotting out disasters cause they're done on purpose like previous stories remastered, some will ridicule me but it won't matter when they realize the truth that's been hidden educationally generationally, you're serviceably useful to the machine aka the system, but the system needs you, you don't need to listen

I'm glad I'll drive your next girl insane
With my phantom kisses that
May or may not have left stains on your brain.

Because you see, as perfect as she will be,
I **** red lipstick and trilbies and kohl
And it's rare in a woman to be able to watch Top Gear
Without thinking of safety hazards, and seatbelts.

I hope she knows that however loose she wears her hair,
She'll never be as wild as me.
And as cool as she sounds,
I have a bite like a kiwi,
And I always leave an after taste that isn't strawberry and sugar.

So yeah, she's suave and calm and collected, and that is **** fine,
I'll give her that.
But I'm sarcastic.

And I call you out when you become too boring,
Like for instance,
Not making me mad at you at least once a day
For making me think about things that I would like to just blitz over
As I do with many other things
Like the people who loved us.

Because all we needed was each other.

And although she pouts,
I smirk.
She has big eyes, but mine are of lynxes.

I'm your own personal minx.

And she knows I'll always be wrapped around your neck.
And however close she gets to you
I'm always right beside you, inside you
Every breath she takes,
Every mistake in love you make.

Cars crashing,
seatbelts couldn't hold them back
as they flew through the windshield,
waterfalls of glass
cascaded over the smashed front,
the ground sparkled coldly,
red glinted off of the glass
that was embedded into the flying figures.
Bodies hit the ground,
they made a hollow sound,
blood pooled out around them.
They were young souls,
gasping out their final breaths,
their chests heaved as they screamed.
People gathered around
crying hopeless tears.
Nothing could change their fate.
As the ambulance finally came,
and the cars were towed away,
only one thing remained,
it was the young blood that stained
the grey pavement.
No tears,
and no rain,
could ever wash away this blood
that now tinted the hearts of the people who saw
just exactly how violent it is
to die young.

To Salinas we had come,
Over a hundred miles from home,
The smell of turned earth and crops in the fields.
To the wedding of my cousin two days hence,
She was a lovely girl and I was very fond of her.
She was Mom’s oldest brothers’ only daughter.
All Mom’s family had come to attend the event.

Sleeping at an Uncles house,
Loud angry voices awakened us.
At only age seven, still a sound sleeper,
The voices actually frightened me awake,
Like a nightmare dream gone wrong.

Cursed shouting and some pushing,
Adults in night dress, robes and slippers.
The brothers and Dad still fully dressed.
In the middle of all that turmoil was my father,
Surrounded by Mom’s three larger brothers.
Dad was not a drinker,
But the Uncles had taken him out,
And drinking was not something new to them.  
One of them was nearly a professional at it.
Some years later he even died of it's effects.
The brothers were not normally mean spirited,
Yet always very protective of their little sister.
Perhaps they thought that,
No man, not even my Father,
Was good enough for their only sister.
A mistaken belief, that lasted for years.

A silly dispute had ensued,
My father’s pride was hurt,
A punch or two was thrown,
Landing where I do not know.  
Now, at two in the morning,
My Dad was ready to go home,
Nothing would stop him doing so.
Had any one tried further,
Someone was bound to get hurt.

My Mother intervened,
The car was hastily loaded,
As Dad sat behind the wheel.

My older brother and I still in our PJs,
Huddled in the back seat of the car,
Our eyes big and scared appearing,
For these were not normal events in our lives,
Before that night or since.

Mom desiring to be calm,
Attempting to reason with her husband,
A man having had too much to drink and
Suffering a bad case of wounded manly pride.
They were not two people used to conflict,
With each other, or anyone else.

The car was going far too fast,
This back in the days before seatbelts,
The fences and power poles were,
Speeding by in a blur of indistinct shapes,
Acted to further the unreality of that night,
Deepening my childish fright.

Suddenly the car swerved to the left,
And Mother screamed something,
The left front wheel struck an immovable object,
Our Chevy bounced into the air,
And my head smacked the ceiling.
The Rear wheel then hit and mounted,
The same hard object and once again,
For a moment I and my brother were in the air.

Our car was brought to a sudden stop half on,
Half off a concrete Traffic Lane Divider,
With three of us in that car, all crying.

I shall never forget the look
On my Father’s face,
As he peered into the back seat,
A truly remarkable expression,
Fear mixed with utter disgrace,
He stared at us for a moment,
Then turned his head forward.

In the rear view mirror,
I could see his eyes,
I watched them, as they turned to liquid.

My mother checked her sons quickly,
And then slid over to my Dad,
She whispered something,
I could not hear.
They sat there silent for a while,
My Father’s head lowered,
My Mom’s arm around his shoulder.

After a few minutes,
Dad opened his door and got out.
Mom leaned over the seat and comforted us.
Then got behind the wheel,
She almost never drove,
But backed the car off the concrete island,
Drove the three of us back to her Brother’s home.
My Dad swallowed up by the blackness of the night.

A few day later we returned to our home,
My Father was there waiting for us.
For the second and only other time in his life,
I saw my Father weep,
As on his knees he held us all tight to him,
He pleaded remorse and for our forgiveness.

I never saw my Father intoxicated again.
And of course we all forgave him.
I had learned something new that day,
My Father was not truly made of steel.  
As no mortal man ever is.

Write everyday.
Write everyday no matter what.
Write even at a loss for words.
Write down the sounds.

I make notes of the plane crashes
I've never heard, the brook trout
that never shook pond water
onto the brittle grass when I didn't
catch it, or the thunder cup coil
I keep kneeing trying to give the overcast
over the mountain something to compete
with.

And I'm not sorry.
       I'm not.      I'm not sorry that my
reborn Christian best    friend    has   seen the    light,
and I still scoff when people pray over potatoes.
And I only believe in plastic Polaroid postcards
from last decade timestamped in the white space
with Bic black ink.
I'm not sorry for that.

And truth is, I've never washed this black shirt;
just hung it hoping that moths' would ****
the sweat spots and leave
the fabric.

I clenched the gold cap beneath
my ring finger from the glass green
bottle occupying my lips driving
down the Marsh Creek bridge.
I wanted to relate / to be relatable /
relative to the sedans, and seatbelts
too tight to breathe, passing me.

At the end of the bridge, where there was no chance
of drowning and the road color changed, I parked
in the driveway of a wooden house. Its blinds
were up, shades pulled apart with two hands
like gas station freezer doors, leaving them
vulnerable to the hiss of semi truck tractor
trailer high beams slicing through fifty +
raindrops per second going a few miles shy
of sixty-five, yet the people inside moved so freely.
I  sat Indian-style—a term I learned at four
then learned it to be racist at fourteen—
in their driveway, and ate the gravel
they walked on trying to taste security
because all I'd had in the last few hours
were plates of refried fear.

Fear of audit, of my teeth breaking off,
and of ending up like Eric Garner
when I heard that wailing
Voice of Justice
coming for me in the distance.

Believers vs believers
A sign of judgement day
Spilling the blood of mankind
That is what the Lord forbade

The one being slaughtered
Is clueless as to why
A brother is taking his life
And the murderer also does not know the reason for picking up a knife

The state of mankind
Is beyond ******* up to be repaired
Long gone are the times when strangers cared
Every night is in competition with another to becomes the darkest and wildest

Next of kin worried about inheritance
And spouses taking out life insurance claims
The soul is bruised
But on a shell is placed a band aid

Fine wining and dining
Abundance leftovers in the bin
Whilst the neighbour starves
As people frolic in sin

Slaves giving birth to masters
Power in the hands of wrong
And those buried six foot under
Are suddenly the lucky one's

Knowledge decreasing
And ignorance on the rise
We compete in the construction of the tallest building
And mothers abandon their children

Beauty pageants
And *** selling cars
The ship of the world sinks
In broad daylight

Yet we un-fasten our seatbelts
And live by ride or die
Yolo people
Get an intoxicated high on a traitorous life

A year passes like a month
And a month like a week
Nothing remains but a name
Humans who massacred humanity

Joseph sits on skinny chairs, reads the funnies
she would be tall, pretty hair, she don’t see
see he won’t be reading one bit, he looks dumb
just staring, looking fat, broken, glum
she cleans up all the plates

—Put those dishes down, now is a time for love-making
I’ll take you now, and wonder if I’ve taken
steps enough to excuse my idleness; in time
you’ll leave, and supine, I’ll take a coat of lyme
and let the lines loose

We will communicate through touch and kiss
and enjoy the full of it, pull in the harvest;
light and movies romance the **** out of me
at last, we are at the end of all things irony
Christ that **** impersonal.

—This music don’t be coming from them
that is right, that is absolutely the end of them
they just end, I don’t care, I let it be
how come you so foolish, Joseph? I don’t see
why are you so foolish?

—You play the guitar by ear and plucking
at this moment they are dinosaur hunting
time is absurd and disgusting
I don’t understand it, I’m simply saying
you played some songs I knew at the time

But how different are your songs from mine
attach your seatbelts to your right hand buckles, fine
away with it, away with them all, please
I am telling, telling, understand, please
different in a few ways, love

—Joseph, you play the drums too loud
you are a big, dumb, idiot head
they end, it certainly has to be
it’s apocalyptic, something like this, said she
such a dummy you Joseph

the movie drums its so vicious loud
the end a dumb idiot head
that’s a thing she might have said at the time
and you are given a full witness to the violence of our time
Joseph plays bad harmonica.

Does your life
feel like a bad flight
on an airplane?

You saved and saved
to pay for first class
but got stuck in coach.

No matter where you went
or who you met
there was always turbulence.

And even that all-expenses-paid
dream vacation to paradise
went down in flames.

put it under your arm so it doesnt choke you in your sleep
just watch the road and don't think too much on anything
through the windshield in your dreams
just watch the road and don't think too much on anything

Radio static*

Crackle.....crackle....ladies and gentlemen
Please fasten your seatbelts at this time
The no smoking light is now on
We are beginning our descent
Into madness
I'm using my seatbelt as a dinosaur
To get in one more stick
Before we crash in a gasoline flavored fireball
No music
Nothing special
No one minding
It just is
A mommy holds her sleeping daughter
A buisness man
In a pretty little tie
Loses his mind behind me
Someone tells him
Be cool man your scaring the kids
Everyone is faced with the same question
I drink cold coffee from a Styrofoam cup
Watching the deer play on the clouds outside my
(Little window)
All those times I was embarassed around people and I prayed
"God, please get me out of here"
And I got up and walked out
I wish I could go back and save all those times
To use right now
But when I try to get up
And walk out on my own power
The door opens up ten thousand feet above sea level
And closing
This is the captain ladies and gentlemen
We have suffered a slight engine malfunction
And we are going to try to make an emergency landing
If you have any prayers
Now is the time to use them
All I can do is think about you
As I sit against the bathroom door
I know that if you were here right now
You would probably be wearing headphones
Listening to your "getting ready to die playlist"
Maybe you would put your head on my lap
And try to get some sleep before we get there
I can almost hear you say
"Where we're goin' we won't get much sleep"
So I close my eyes
And lay my head back
Lighting a cigarette beneath the no smoking sign

It is ok to be
not
what you are
still
becoming. She said
"you're not special." Grinding teeth and sodden rails. My car is exhausted--
downwind, held in the air like branches of birches and pines
humming with each blatant engine-stroke
which fall onto that bleakening
icedock and curl-- culled passengers tossed to sea;
unavoidably
sharp veer left, beyond surreptitious and frantic spectators
and through a once-pearl snowdrift straying into my mind.
M
C
M
L
V
Turtlenecks can't keep us warm and soup can't clear my throat.
I choke on
sliced rubber, seatbelts cut halfway-- from
Spring. pluck us like cattails
amongst my marshy solubles.
Exposes my larynx she-- ubiquitous sonnet spews forth.
What contrite aberration, wears Kalapodi temple dress
made of rose petals blown in beneath love's column
and presses with her thighs my vision?
There is nothing more to say-- meals served
raw on Winter holidays. Steaming
spoonfuls dried up on her palate--
Special in the way I left you there.
Special in being the same as I should have been.
And I, no-- I!
I can not talk any longer! The clouds I thought to taste
won't allow me to
rain
be-- once dangling from the ceiling, my dripping prevented
with a pale, cotton daub.
You see
the paramedics
even as they sheath my torso
and hold your head with thorped sieves:
The driver steered his vessel wrong
an action which robbed his passenger's breath.

First some dots,
Then some roads
That form a knot.
I watch above
A lush green spot,
A modest farmer’s plot.

When seatbelts click,
I feel the drop.
My stomach sinks,
Completely fraught,
From the futile battle
With luke-warm Fresca,
My bursting bladder
Is quite distraught.

We go down,
Then there’s a stop,
Through a gust of air
That is hot, we walk.
With movements like, a robot.
We take wing again,
And turn back the clock.
My headache is gone,
But my ears have popped,

This is a red-eye plane.

We're cruising along in your old off-beige '93 Ford Fiesta
The one with the great sound system
And I am miserable enough to drive us off a cliff

We crash backwards into the water,
Unbuckle each other's seatbelts,
Open our respective doors,
Grab each other,
And drown down there
Because we won't let go.

Long car trips
Crowded with junk
And cramping legs
Flashing light streaming through the window
Into the muggy car air,
A trapped fly banging on the glass,
Low rumbling like gravel thunder
And bursts of shaking
Rattling teeth and seatbelts
When you roll over stones
Wisps of vented air
Curling around your naked toes,
And sweaty, rumpled clothes.
Skin sticking to fake leather seats
The slight sifting sick in your belly
Sitting fat like a toad,
And hoping the stuff in the back
Isn't shaking or breaking apart
From the crunching washboard gravel,
And drowsy eyes, tired from endless trees
Slowly drift until you arrive in the dark

Mixtape coming prolly sooner then expected
Just like me! But far more passion is invested
Into these nourished flourishing musicals channeling beauty
I know one day you'll see the shine no matter how you view me
You can hide inside & draw the blinds; ignore me, or adore me.
Story goes, the fire stays alive, throughout the winds it's soaring.
I am burning and i'm flying now, you'll hear me crying out
"My love is unconditional, come join me in this flying bout!"
Please come flow and fly around, melting the tempting forces
That are always shrieking "DON'T YOU DARE GO IN THAT AIR! THIS CHAIR IS HOME, *****!"
Traveling the speed of flight, no motors, cells, seatbelts, or doors.
You'll start to wonder why they never thought of shaking feet from floors
Or you could say "No thanks, I'm busy, I got all my medicine."
Ok... Just know i'll always be around to give your head a spin c;
Direction with a mending twist, I wanna see you free as ****
A lion cub, a rising sun, the shackles falling from your tongue
I'll never win, I'm loser loser, still I channel breath & depth,
So if you wish, the floor is yours, keep following the steps,
I and all who fly will soar so far beyond our deaths.
We're always getting better,
Till the sun gobbles the shelfs.
We crack a laugh back at the past,
Glad we made it past ourselves.

Scattered Thought.
Coming soon.

We were flying over the Rocky Mountains, but you couldn’t see **** out the windows. I only knew because of the captain’s voice groaning from the speakers. The oval portholes only told of hazy fog and jet stream winds. Winds that caused the cabin to bounce causing babies to cry causing mothers to panic causing the repeated “ding” of the fasten seatbelt sign.

My stomach growled, turning as violently as the plane from over-priced airport whiskey and complimentary black coffee from an artificially amiable flight attendant. I had to take a **** but the overweight ginger sitting next to me was as immobile as a boulder — drool in the corner of her lips, a trumpeting snore escaping her hairy nostrils. Before passing out, she had told me that people from New Zealand where called either New Zealanders or Kiwis. But like the bird. Not the fruit.

Abrasive turbulence had the plane’s inhabitants on edge. Humans always crack at the slightest indication of danger. Like death is so much worse than having to sit next to a stranger who farts in their sleep while breathing in recycled air for 5 hours. It’s like before a snow storm. Everyone rushes to stock up on bread and milk. Fearing for the worst. Except in this case, everyone was checking and rechecking their seatbelts and making sure that the tray in front of them was securely fastened.

I could give two ***** if the plane suddenly lost altitude. Just started plummeting through thick milky clouds, losing mechanical parts like a dandelion being turned to seedlings in the wind. It wasn’t that I wanted to die. I just had so much on my mind. A **** storm, if you will, of anxieties and worries and feelings of inadequacies. I wasn’t wishing for death. I just wanted something more real to worry about than paying rent, or falling in and out of love, or landing my dream job, or which ******* tie matches my shirt.

But as the aircraft sliced through the fog leaving behind a wily jet stream, my window became engulfed by a clear blue sky. Below, the Rockies stretched across the land like a lovely spinal cord. Only the purest white light spilled down from space. In that moment, life was too brilliant for paranoia. The past, as irrelevant as the souvenirs that tourists had stuffed in the overhead compartments. The future, as uncertain as your chances of being in a plane that actually does fall from the sky. The only thing that mattered was I was floating above the clouds and not even Mother Nature — the **** responsible for earthquakes, floods and menstrual cycles — could bring me down.

i'm not inspired to smoke cigarettes because i'm always trying to get in shape but every finger i lift is a freighter's worth of dead weight.

i envy their lack of conscious thought;
i **** them in my mind for the disparity between their capability for labor and apathy towards the thought of an imaginary savior.

faith means believing what isn't there. you held me tighter when i told you that i don't wear seatbelts because i'm always dreaming of dethroning lamposts and kissing trees on the side of the Pike. foliage is far more gregarious without all of the gore but you said that you'd stay forever and your ghost sits on my shoulders like a dump truck full of ashes.

i don't know if i've ever written a full paragraph without dreaming of this pen sprinting through my chest, blood like nectar.

drink me and feel your potential dissipate like dust bunnies.

you would have stayed forever.

lie to me again and tell me that i'll wear my seatbelt someday.

Days feel hollow
Months get swallowed
Time is moving fast
I don't know how much time has passed
24 has turned into sixteen
I hardly have time to fix me
One day turns to 8
I try to be on time but I'm always late
Time slips right by
No matter how hard I try
The grip is not as tight
We're turning into light
Vibrating at a higher speed
Our physical bodies we'll no longer need
The shift is coming faster and stronger
I just wish my days felt a few hours longer..
Yet it is a sign of the changing times
Let's unbuckle our seatbelts and enjoy the ride

The day begins before it should,
and every minute is squandered,
before I jump into the car,
spilling hot coffee in my haste.

Then the rushing wind blows past me,
running through my hair in the dark;
headlights keep up with the sharp turns,
and the thumping stereo lifts me.

Parking, on time, walking briskly
to ensure the grandest entrance
to give a formal impression.
My echoed greeting meets my ears.

Hello, goodbye, I take over,
holding my vigilant station
as I toast bagels with butter
and wait for them to call me up.

"Ashley!" comes the petulant cry
and I manage to answer her.
"Coming!" And I take a slow sip
before heading up creaky stairs.

They want me to pick out their clothes.
They want me to help them get dressed.
I say, "You can do that yourself,
I'm here to do hard things, like cook."

Teasing, admonishing, waiting
for children to do what I asked;
I take one more sip of coffee
and the cup is gone far too soon.

Soon, they are eating their breakfast,
and I'm prepping backpacks and coats.
Something spills, and I clean it up;
then she says she forgot her shoes.

I tell her sister to get them,
but she won't go up there alone.
So we three climb the creaky stairs,
and come back with their socks and shoes.

We run out the door, lock the garage,
and jump in my car for a ride.
"Seatbelts?" I ask before leaving,
and they both ask me for tic-tacs.

A minute away, and I park.
They jump out and both wave goodbye.
I smile and wait for the school bus.
I drive to my next job, next door.