there are so many places to hide,

in my home at 17th and South screaming death threats at my roommates laughing diabolically playing  videogames and Jeopardy cooking quinoa stretching canvas the dog going mad frothing lunging  spastic to get the monkeys or the wookies or whatever random commandments we issue forth  drunken while Schlock rampages the backdrop,

at my uncle's row house on 22nd and Wallace with my shoes off freezing skipping class to watch March  Madness unwrapping waxpaper hoagies grimacing with each sip of Cherrywine or creamsicle  soda reading chapters at my leisure,

in the stacks among fiberglass and eternal florescent lima-tiled and echo-prone red-eyed and white-faced  caked with asbestos and headphones exhuming ossified pages from layers of cosmic dust  presiding benevolent,

in University City disguised in nothing but a name infiltrating Penn club soccer getting caught after  scoring yet still invited to the pure ***** joy of hell and heaven house parties of ice luge jungle  juice kegstand coke politic networking,

at Drexel's nightlit astroturf with the Jamaicans rolling blunts on the sidelines playing soccer floating in  slo-mo through billows of purple till the early morning or basketball at Penn against goggle- eyed professors in kneepads and copious sweat,

in the shadow tunnels behind Franklin Field always late night loner overlooking rust belt rails abandoned  to an absent tempo till tomorrow never looking behind me in the fear that someone is there,

at Phillies Stadium on glorious summer Tuesdays for dollar dog night laden with algebra geometry and  physics purposely forgetting to apply ballistics to the majestic arc of a home run or in the frozen  subway steam selling F.U. T.O. t-shirts to Eagles fans gnashing when the Cowboys come to town,

at 17th and Sansom in the morning bounding from Little Pete's scrambled eggs toast and black coffee  studying in the Spring thinking All is Full of Love in my ears leaving fog pollen footprints on the  smoking cement blooming,

at the Shambhala Center with dharma lotus dripping from heels soaking rosewater insides thrumming to the  groan of meditation,

at the Art Museum Greco-fleshed and ponderous counting tourists running the Rocky steps staring into shoji screen tatame teahouses,

at the Lebanese place plunked boldly in Reading Terminal Market buying hummus bumping past the Polish  and Irish on my way to the Amish with their wheelwagons packed with pretzels and honey and  chocolate and tea,

at the motheaten thrift store on North Broad buried under sad accumulations of ramshackle clothing  clowning ridiculous in the dim squinting at coathangers through magnifying glasses and mudflat  leather hoping to salvage something insane,

in the brown catacombed warrens of gutted Subterranea trying unsuccessfully to ignore bearded medicine

men adorned with shaman shell necklaces hawking incense bootlegs and broken Zippos halting conversation to listen pensive to the displacement of air after each train hurtles by,

at 30th Street Station cathedral sitting dwarfed by columns Herculean in their ascent and golden light  thunderclap whirligig wings on high circling the luminous waiting sprawled nascent on stringwood pews,

at the Masonic Temple next to City Hall, pretending to be a tourist all the while hoping scouring for clues in the cryptic grand architect apocrypha to expose global conspiracies,

at the Trocadero Electric Factory TLA Khyber Unitarian Church dungeon breaking my neck to basso  perfecto glitch kick drums with a giant's foot stampeding breakbeat holographic mind-boggled  hole-in-the-skull intonations,

at the Medusa Lounge Tritone Bob and Barbara's Silk City et cetera with a pitcher a pounder of Pabst and a  shot of Jim Beam glowing in the dark at the foosball table disco ball bopstepping to hip hop and  jazz and accordions and piano and vinyl,

in gray Fishtown at Gino's recording rap holding pizza debates on the ethics of sampling anything by  David Axelrod rattling tambourines and smiles at the Russian shopgirl downstairs still chained to  soul record crackles of antiquity spiraling from windows above,

at Sam Doom's on 12th and Spring Garden crafting friendship in greenhouse egg crate foam closets  breaking to scrutinize cinema and celebrate Thanksgiving blessed by holy chef Kronick,

in the company of Emily all over or in Kohn's Antiques salvaging for consanguinity and quirky heirlooms  discussing mortality and cancer and celestial funk chord blues as a cosmological constant and  communism and Cuba over mango brown rice plantains baking oatmeal chocolate chip cookies,

in a Coca Cola truck riding shotgun hot as hell hungover below the raging Kensington El at 6 AM nodding soft to the teamsters' curses the snagglesouled destitute crawling forth poisoned from sheet-metal shanty cardboard box projects this is not desolate,

at the impound lot yet again accusing tow trucks of false pretext paying up sheepish swearing I'll have my  revenge,

in the afterhour streets practicing trashcan kung fu and cinder block shotput shouting sauvage operatic at  tattooed bike messenger tribesmen pitstopped at the food trucks,

in the embrace of those I don't love the names sometimes rush at me drowned and I pray to myself for  asylum,

in the ciphers I host always at least 8 emcee lyric clerics summoning elemental until every pore ruptures  and their eyes erupt furious forever the profound voice of dreadlocked Will still haunting stray  bullet shuffles six years later,

in the caldera of Center City with everyone craning our skulls skyward past the stepped skyscrapers  beaming ear-to-ear welcoming acid sun rain melting maddeningly to reconstitute as concrete  rubber steel glass glowing nymphs,

in Philadelphia where every angle is accounted for and every megawatt careers into every throbbing wall where  Art is a mirror universe for every event ever volleyed through the neurons of History,

in Philadelphia of so many places to hide I am altogether as a funnel cloud frenetic roiling imbuing every corner sanctum sanctorum with jackhammer electromagnetism quivering current realizing stupefied I have failed so utterly wonderful human for in seeking to hide I have found

in Philadelphia

Imperialistic meddlers,
men of power greed and wealth
Western Imperialism
not too long ago
was once put on the shelf
Not too long ago
this name was never heard
Its name is New Order of DiSoRdEr
But still us folk of sanity
with eyes wide open
we see their compliance
lock-step herd vanity

In White House spin gone amuck
they throw their bolts of anger
to all countries on the globe
And with more and more displeasure
we witness their destructiveness
from sea to shining sea

But now I hear, see and feel
a distant faint rumbling the rising Valorous
the rumbling stampeding of democracy
by the forceful rightful anger,
the free-spirited valiant word
a word of truth and dignity,
the echo of today,
and aaah yes
to hear the thundering of the mass
To hear the thundering of the mass...

My autism's a part of me,

But it is apart, you see.

...

Who are you?

With your ‘normal’ view.

Are you just one thing, or are you a person

With thoughts & feelings, that are your own unique version.

Preferences, ideas, talents, and dreams?

That are bound by senses that meet at their seams.

Are you fat, short sighted or visually impaired?

Are you ever wondering why I just stood and stared.

Those may be the things that I saw the first time I meet you,

But you’re more than just your ‘normal’ diagnosis…. True?

As an adult, you have control over how you’re defined.

Your normality means your perceptions are refined.

So why would you single out one characteristic of mine that you can make known.

As a child, I am still unfolding, I’m not fully grown.

Neither you nor I yet know of what I am capable.

If you think of me as just one thing, then one thing’s inescapable.

You run the danger of assuming I have no chance of achieving.

And my heightened senses know this, it’s only you you’re deceiving

For I am not endowed with any ordinary sense.

You need to know this before I commence.

You take for granted sight, sound, taste, touch and smell.

Never once realising that these things can be as painful as hell

For me.

You see.

My world often feels hostile, and makes me so fearful.

I may appear withdrawn or belligerent, whilst others are cheerful.

Or mean to you, or antagonistic,

Defending myself, then going ballistic.

You tell me we’re going on a trip to the shops

And out of the world my safety net instantly drops.

My hearing, you see, is hyper acute.

But I’m put in the car, though I loudly refute.

At the shops, walls of people jabber and whoop.

The loudspeaker booms and adds to the soup.

Music blares and lashes and whooshes.

Tills beep and cough, a coffee grinder swooshes.

The meat cutter screeches, a baby starts wailing,

I’m starting to malfunction and am rapidly flailing

As trolleys pass creaking, and fluorescent lights hum.

I’m starting to panic, but also turn numb.

My brain can’t filter the input, the voltage is massive

I’m in overload with no chance of staying passive.

My sense of smell is stratospheric.

That fish on the counter is NOT atmospheric.

The man in front hasn’t showered today,

That Stilton cheese – someone take it away!

A baby goes past, it’s ***** needs changing.

Things are going faster and turning deranging

They’re mopping up pickles on aisle two with some bleach and a rag.

My stomach is churning, and I’m starting to gag..

And there’s so much hitting my eyes!

This trip has turned into the world's worst surprise.

The fluorescent light

Is not only too bright,

it’s that flicker.

The space seems to be moving, getting quicker and quicker.

The pulsating light bounces off everything and distorts what I am seeing.

I don’t know what I’m doing, or saying, or being.

There are too many items for me to be able to focus.

The world starts to drain me of my internal locus.

My eyes try to compensate by tunnelling my vision

Fans on the ceiling, twist my senses into nuclear fission.

All this affects how I feel just standing there,

and I can’t even tell where my body is in space, do I care?

You’re yelling at me now, and shaking my shoulder

But the fiery fog is down and is starting to smoulder

It isn’t that I don’t want to hear your instruction.

I just can’t understand, due to mass self-destruction.

You're shouting now, but what does "£$%^&&% NOW! !£$%^&*" mean?

My senses will **** me in a collusion so obscene.

Once we’re back at the kids home, it all feels less absurd.

And now when you speak, I can hear every word.

Simple instructions, that I know off by heart.

And I cling onto these so I won’t fall apart.

You tell me what you want me to do next and I’m able to reply.

Now I’m happy and it’s easy for me to comply.

Now I’m OK and I’m running about

And performing my ritualised songs, which I shout.

Then a visitor grabs me saying, “Hold your horses, cowboy!” – This means danger!

I can’t stop the horses, I’m me, not the Lone Ranger!

And I’m thrown into panic when what you mean is, “Stop running.”

But I don’t know that! Those stampeding horses are coming!!

That’s my life, you see, it’s not “a piece of cake”

When there’s no dessert in sight and you’ve made a mistake.

When you say, “its pouring cats and dogs,” I see pets flooding from the sky.

Tell me, “It’s raining hard,” so I won’t fear the animals will die.

Puns, sarcasm and allusion

Simply generate confusion.

Tell me facts and keep things clear

So I can live, yet not in fear.

It’s hard for me to tell you what I need when my senses are reeling

When I don’t have a way to describe what I’m feeling.

I may be hungry, frustrated, frightened, or perplexed.

But I can’t find the words, and lash out, angry and vexed.

Be alert for my body language, or my gestures and obsessions

Then you’ll handle my feelings like your own treasured possessions.

Watch out for me compensating for not knowing the right word

By mimicking my favourite film star, or something just as absurd.

Rattling off words or whole scripts, which will leave you confounded

That I’ve memorised from Disney, because they make me feel grounded.

They may come from the TV, or speeches, or a book

And though they make people give a funny look

I just know that saying them gets me off the hook.

Show me, show me! I’m visual, you see.

And I’ll understand rather than you just telling me.

And be prepared to show countless times.

I’m listening, despite my ritualised rhymes.

Visual supports help me move through my day.

They relieve me of the stress and I feel OK.

I don’t have to remember what’s happening next

For I operate on a visual text.

This makes for smooth transitions in my life

And we’ll finally progress without anger or strife.

I need to see something to learn it, because spoken words are like steam to me;

They evaporate before my mind's eye, and are gone instantly,

Before I even have a chance to make sense of them,

They've died in the ether, leaving me in mayhem.

I don’t have instant-processing skills.

Instructions and information are my life giving pills

Images can stay in front of me for as long as I need,

and will be just the same in years, for they'll never recede.

Without visual help, I live the constant frustration

of knowing that I’m missing big blocks of information,

Not to mention falling short, by being a misfit

And I'm helpless to do anything about it.

Unlike other people, I'm unable to learn

If it's normal interaction for which you do yearn.

I’m constantly made to feel that I’m not good enough

And people are stern and people are tough.

They think I need taking in hand and need fixing.

Never knowing the world and my brain are tranfixing

I avoid trying any new things, for I'm sure I'll get 'dissed'

And another grown up will be angry and get 'real ******'.

But no matter how “constructive” you think you’re being.

Look for my strengths, though they're hard for the seeing.

There is more than one right way to do most things.

It may look like I don’t want to play with the other kids on the swings

But it may be that I simply do not know how to start

They just think I'm weird, and set me apart.

Teach me how to play with others.

Remove my autistic shrouded covers.

Encourage other children to invite me along.

They might learn something of value from my life's different song.

And rather than spend my day as separate, secluded.

I might show an ethereal delight at being included.

I do best in games that have a clear beginning and end.

Random play is something my fears won't transcend.

And just one other thing, a sort of confession

I cannot interpret a ****** expression

Or body language, or other peoples' emotion

So in group situations I'm resigned to demotion.

I want to learn, I want you to teach me.

Reach into my mind and help me to see.

If I laugh when Tommy falls off the climbing frame,

It’s that I don’t know what to say, nastiness isn't to blame

Talk to me about Tommy’s feelings and teach me to say,

“Are you hurt, Tommy, I'll get teacher, then you'll be okay?”

If you don't I'll meltdown or blow-up, and get in a stew

And this is a thousand times worse for me than for you.

For my mind will go into overload

My sense of equilibrium will start to off-road.

For I'm well past the limit of my social ability.

As those off road lights glare at my own disability.

If you can figure out why my meltdowns occur, they can be prevented

And my behaviours will abate, less frequently lamented.

Keep notes about me and a pattern may emerge.

As your understanding of me will gradually converge.

Remember that everything I do is a form of communication.

It tells you, when my words cannot, how I’m reacting to each situation.

My behavior may have a physical cause.

Think for a moment, just have a pause.

Food allergies and sleep problems can affect my behaviour.

Just look for signs, for you might be my Saviour.

Because I may not be able to tell you about these things.

That blunt my affect and cause my mood swings.

Throw away thoughts like, “If you would just—” and “Why can’t you—?”

You didn’t fulfill every expectation your parents had either, that's true.

And would you like to witness a constant rewind.

Of the traumatic deficits by which you're defined?

I didn’t choose to have autism.

Or to live with this division

Remember that it’s happening to me, not to you.

But without understanding, my chances remain few.

With love and support, my horizons are broader

But I can't live my life by other peoples order.

Patience. Patience. Patience, are the three words we need to live by

For my dreams to be reached, and my confidence fly.

View my autism as a different ability

Rather than as a freak show disability.

Look past what you may see as limitations and feel for my strength

I may not be good at eye contact or conversations of length

But have you noticed that I don’t lie, or cheat at a game

Or pass judgment on people, and make them to blame?

I rely on you, if you can make me your personal vocation

All that I might become won’t happen without you as my foundation.

Be my advocate, be my guide

Be my strength, stand at my side.

Love me for who I am, and not what you know

And we’ll see just how far I can go.

Matt Revans 2014
©Copyright

what do i have to say
to keep the zebra stripes
from falling off and leaving only white?

what do i have to do
to keep the herd of restless rhino
from stampeding you?

what do i have to be
to get the giraffe to come and eat
from our acacia tree?

peace is less than me
and more than you
but we are almost free

Delicious hues of blue
Behind linen clouds
Stampeding
Slowly
From horizon
To horizon
As swirling calls of birds
Cheer them on.

The Serpent squeezes the mundane egg, for a moment in time,
…to begin the ages, turn the wheel, and so begin the rhyme,

The circus has commenced, a dancing, swirling motion,
…a pit of ghastly horrors, seen as a vast deep ocean,
…or celestial or cosmic, as some would have the notion.

Some of them were large, although some were also small,
…and grotesquely figured or disfigured, a scary monster’s ball,
…and trudging, stampeding, stomping or slithering down the hall.

There they danced, sang or prattled, where giants fought and where they battled, …thunder unto heroes rattled, with awful screams so frightening, and terrifying lightning!

Scaly, hairy or feathered, wet and fiery or weathered,
…conjoined, twisted or tethered, slithery writhing together,

Kingu and his wife, some say it was t’was his mother,
…his plan was war and strife, pitting brother against brother,

A ******* existence and so morally depraved,
…a state of sickly persistence, they found themselves enslaved.

Then abounding voice of heaven, that divided night by day,
…brought forth a princely king of Luke; the warrior Marduk.

Fourteen engaged in combat, the one against thirteen,
…and thus aligned with the ecliptic, at night they can be seen,  

Sloshing in the Apsu, beaten with the club,
…slain and torn to pieces, cutting channels of their blood,

A north wind sent them to their places, fixed on Tiamat’s wheel,
…and the starry constellations, did Marduk bring to heel.

This house has been far out at sea all night,
The woods crashing through darkness, the booming hills,
Winds stampeding the fields under the window
Floundering black astride and blinding wet

Till day rose; then under an orange sky
The hills had new places, and wind wielded
Blade-light, luminous black and emerald,
Flexing like the lens of a mad eye.

At noon I scaled along the house-side as far as
The coal-house door. Once I looked up -
Through the brunt wind that dented the ***** of my eyes
The tent of the hills drummed and strained its guyrope,

The fields quivering, the skyline a grimace,
At any second to bang and vanish with a flap;
The wind flung a magpie away and a black-
Back gull bent like an iron bar slowly. The house

Rang like some fine green goblet in the note
That any second would shatter it. Now deep
In chairs, in front of the great fire, we grip
Our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought,

Or each other. We watch the fire blazing,
And feel the roots of the house move, but sit on,
Seeing the window tremble to come in,
Hearing the stones cry out under the horizons.

in
Tanzania
where
migrating herds of
wildebeests, gazelles, zebras and buffalos
stampeding across
the
vast Serengeti Plains
ignite the world
then
write
their names
in gold
ignite
the
skyline of earth
create
a painted
watercolor sunset

Gemini sheriff of happy town
kills all the frequent cow-catching waffle machines.
He rounds up all his cowboys
and retires all the shepherds in a cloud most curious.
Somewhere soon there will be a better thing to do
than reach for the cookie jar all life long.
Unfortunately there will come so many who also wear the star.
All them good folks are stuck in a stampeding herd of confusion.

The other day
When I said that your face reminds me of a rhinoceros
I wasn't saying that you look like a bulky box
Or that your skin looks grey
I was really trying to say that
You make me feel like there are a hundred
5 ton mammals stampeding across my heart
And sometimes when I look at you
I can't even breathe
Because all the weight of wanting this
Crushes my lungs til my chest burns like an African desert
Consequently most rhinos are found in Africa
And I researched all of this in the hopes that
Maybe you would understand

You see the thing is I am not good with emotions
And I know as much about love as I know about quantum physics
And I don't even know what quantum physics is about
Or what it means for that matter

I've been trying to read all the romance novels that I could find
I've been trying to watch all the rom-coms I can torrent
Hell I even watched Valentine's Day thrice
But I still don't know what to do when I'm with you

I am unsure and clumsy and petrified
So much so that I can't even work up the courage
To hold your hand
I'm trying, I really am
It's just so **** difficult
When falling in love feels more like
Jumping out of a helicopter
A hundred thousand feet up
Without a parachute on

One day I will be able
To directly say what I really mean
Without metaphors involving animals
That only I understand
But for now let me just say
Your face reminds me of a rhinoceros

I've never known how to properly end a conversation with you, whether it be a phone call or a kiss good bye. Fingers fumble and awkward "I love you"'s and "good bye"'s drunkenly find their way out of my sober mouth. I never know how to say "fare well".

My theory is that I never want to say good bye in the first place. I'd rather be with you. Though you might be busy talking to someone else or in another room, I want to always be close to you. Saying "good bye" doesn't feel good at all. It feels like I'm going far away and I'm leaving a piece of me behind. I know I might sound clingy and suffocating, but I have adapted a terrible habit of needing someone around to keep me sane. I use to love to be alone, but now I go crazy with thoughts stampeding through my head. I hate to say good bye.

But I love to say "hello". Our "hello"'s are the best. We meet with kisses and hugs and sometimes chocolates. We meet with wide grins and bright eyes that catch the light just right at six in the evening. Our "hello"'s are heart warming and relieving.

The "hello"'s almost make the "good bye"'s worth it.

Almost.

How to design a killer society
by president whiteness
the imperial imagination
drone culture
drone language
drone purpose

a rough process
of putting your conscience
back into yourself
far away from what you look like
while having your experience
surrounded by those who fear
having their experience alone
awkward comparisons of experience
acting out in play
called
“how normal melts into experience”
you ****** expired
you are looking now
at yourself having been experienced
expired and ready for the next program

I destroyed leisure
white celebration
single handedly
found its brittle structure
and took it apart
piece by piece
as it squeezed and begged
I smiled as it crumbled
down back to nature
begging for mercy
begging to be taught how to live
how to be alive

i can give time
I can take it away

does time need electricity
to be charged
does time need to socialize
the harder it seems
the more easy my words come
the better they touch you
graze your skin barely
tickles
like I could never with my hands

I want my words to be a spark
I want you to be flammable
I want you to be mesmerized
by the flame I made out of your attention
I want you to feel warm and cozy
burning passion
scared of fire out of control
spreading
you need
yet fear so boldly
desperate nuclear dissociation
like the affection of whiteness
stampeding innocence

feining my writing
like drugs needles
love
too deep in limbs
they are coming
imperialism
*******
longing for
bodies
I want your mind
keep her body
naked hostage
of imperial lust
what happened to your attention
being an adult
I don’t know what the **** is in the future
but I do
so do you
I wanted to write to you
so I could just focus
on your eyes the next time I am with you
your moistness
melts my desire
I become more of a mystery
more mystery
until nothing but mystery
and then nothing at all

You're a happy invasion of my mind
Stampeding into my thoughts
Stumbling into my dreams
And owning all of my smiles.

❤️

Rolling down the road, in a sunset town
A pop from the tailpipe and a rumbling sound.
Never before have you seen the town like this.
Friendly faces, children running. Bliss.

A sweet voice, humming over the airwaves
Sultry and definite, like the end of this day.
It's stampeding to a hault, to an end of days.
It should have always ended this way.

The raccoon, his days of mischieve cut short,
Forever stagnant and flat on the black.
No one will build him his tomb, an animal mosoluem, no funeral fort.
What will happen when I die, what will be lax?

We all stride to and fro,
Oscillatory on this wavelength God-given.
What happens when we finally go,
When our own life is not living?

Men may say that life is long for fear of the afterworld,
For that untrodded territory in which we know not of
But I say that life is too fleeting,
For the fish which swim, the birds above.

What is life, when put to music?
Can you hear it better when the melodies mix?
Is the world more rustic?
Are we fools to its tricks?

Sunset falling on faces of a sprawl,
One day over, one to end them all.
I feel an ocean rushing over me
I find myself floating at sea

(For Black History Month 1998)


i have a wish
to be profound...
   to be proud and stronger
   and carry myself like the **** poets on Def Jam
voices of Kenya and kings, emblazoned
with wisdom, respected / permanence
tanned in words of Malcolm & Martin's reign...
   to have passions of Nubian queens
   wear a crown to herald my approach
head held high
   without raising a calloused hand,
   copper polished hearts
A presence that only demands simplistic
of silences in the awe, the inspired
unchallenged in my reverence--an African / American ability
   choreography / invention
   the first to dance, when others fear to
to keep it real and say it loud
my human wishes, strong, profound, proud...
sometimes
   gentille...

i wanna be black...
like King Cobra, a hood to umbrella fright
with venom from just my stereotypical sight
   immobilize and paint caucasians whiter
   to be well endowed yet humbly
complicated,
angry but with proven reasons unrequited,
to be singled out by mere appearance
alone, a Halley Berry poster, child - dealing drugs,
   respected yet in the poetry of chains
   creative even in these multi-colored pains
from a thousand lands of strife
music is sister, artistic is brother life
become ingenious
   saxophones in the moody blues,
   athlete of hurtles, jazz / boxing fights / sang...
gold medals, worthy for full frontal
news...

do i amuse you, with these longings?
think do you - it's a cursed delight?
   but life only
   excels with each challenge: our battles
against ignorance / shame defines
the worth we're given
our lot mostly restricted, our lions tamed
perseveres - tho' weep the dust of our ancients names,
and bleeds these,
our cotton soft truths some mistakes
   and Dolby stereotypes revealed
   re-assigned
now worn like brand new:
a garden painted stronger
roots - and robes of shackles' / thorns
sharp with unlocked prejudices
   brown can do no more (for you sir)
   criminal confidences find the unmoving wave of faith
a prominent jaw-line, obelisk-lips
kiss and smack / wet with loving lengths
it is ... no hurt in these earthen eyes
   evident
   stoic, strength, serenity
mine to dance and sing my apathy instead...
about the history, i wish to dis
yes, re-avow
empty empathies before,
   experience my thousands, marching
   Melato’s at the founding fathers' doors, will show
you how to open house
these ghettos of / our violent villages / of tar & soot
shadow our poor ever the more
our stars shine on
   broadway be our stage / Stomps / in the heart, hopes,
   styles rap / songs to battle racial profiles
racial cops in devil blue,
beating brothas, home video tell our news,
while our rich forget the rest
******* **** in their cribs
re-pimped, yes, ******* new money & *****
   of course, they are the talented ...
   almost gods on Apollo / knock on wood...
the music is still
the song still is
the foot is stampeding
the noise will be loud,

i will be proud
i will be profound
   in this time of redefinition,
i will be strong
(i wanna be black) like Etta James
at last...

Bruised and battered a friendship
Sometimes hangs by a tiny thread
As we came to the edge
Urged on , by all , but our own souls
We stop for friendship sake
Staring at the rocks of death below
We walked the cliff edge black
Hearts pounding like stampeding rhino
Charging our very path
Dragons of fear circle over head
Breathing fire over all
Pride clamors for higher ground
Standing tall and righteous
We fly high in the sky
Preying like vultures
Search for every fault

Feeling lost and alone
We seek the lower land
With pastures lush and green
And soil deep and rich
Where horses softly munch
Teaching us their gentle ways
For the loss of a friend
Can be to much to bear
In this already harsh world
Weighing like lead on our back

Like the captain of our own ship
We cling to the end
As our world sinks from under us
Breaking boards and smashing masts
Many splinter blind our eyes
As we float together in darkness
Waiting , for the storm to pass
Then the great sewer grabs our very souls
And throws us to the earth
Braking our ego shells
With troubles of our time
And sew new friendship
To be born anew

As only the friendship
Which has great strength
The power to endure many deaths
That see through much lashing pain
Can ever earn its name
For friendship forged in great heat
Will find itself sealed to the eternal time

Aging like a fine wine (if I liked wine)
Narcissistically loving, proudly broken
Daughter of the Pryors, Moe and Vickie, soulmates
Lover of calm breezes on my face
As I run the first of 10 miles on a Sunday morning made for me
Who feels invincible in that moment
And defeated, small, and petty the next
Who fears for her children making their place in a brutal world
Who would like to see America from a motorhome,
or Spain on foot
Resident of the heart,
living in the soulfulness of early ink-black mornings
Stampeding and triumphant

Adderall tears burn red lines down my face
Heart stampeding over my cracked ribs
The earth stutters a tipsy beat

As I shake on a train to no mans land
Orange eyes watching green lights zooming past
Living life as a watercolor stain seeping through ***** newspaper

Whoever you are I miss you

Far far away
As though locked in a room
A doll in a cupboard
Is a girl called Alice
Alice the stripper

I myself at home looking for connection
Flick through cams
As though searching yellow pages

My attention caught
As though an anchor
Was around my heart
I stop on Alice

Fragile and vulnerable is what I see

I take her to
""Private chat""
And I tap my keyboard
As fast as hummingbirds wings
To make a connection

But it is no use
As clothes fall of her like broken slates
Of a discarded building  
Only to reveal half robot
Half dead human being

I type, "STOP STOP"

But she is lost in her routine
An act of ****** pleasure

"Please stop" ,I type

But her soul scattered
As though beaten away
By stampeding Rhino
For a while we just
Float together
In outer space

Where are you Alice
My heart bleeds

As though a spell had been broken
A nervous silence is ruptured
And like Apollo 13
As she types "hello"
Houston calling Houston
A relief breaths through
My whole being

I type,  " hello there"
And ask how are you  
I thank her for her **** routine
  
Then she in response springs back up
As though being controlled
By a remote
Held in my hands

"No No No need no need", I cry I type
" just talk just talk I don't want this"

My heart feeling her vulnerability
Reaches through the screen
seeking to cover like a blanket

Shortly after she covers herself
With a beautiful Royal Blue blanket
I type ," That colour looks beautiful on you
You must wear it when Mr Right
Invites you to a ball
And I tell her she would be stunning
And would shine in that blue  
And the lucky man would be the envy of the ball

A sparkle for the first time
Returns to her eyes

Even more beautiful now I feel

It was as though a harvest moon
Had found a gap through
Thick clouds on a very dark night
As her soul returned home
She began to blossom
Like a brave crocus flower
Pushing through the snow

My soul danced with pleasure
As the love in my heart
Spun around her with the joy
Of a long lost planet
Who had just found his sun

As time passed my need to leave
The conversation approached
I asked her to promise me
To always , Love yourself Always
And to know that you are
A treasure
And that you are special

Her eyes began to well up
As my heart swelled up
As a tear drop fell on her being
It was welcomed like the first
Drop of rain
After a long hard drought

After on my way to friends I pondered
Why is it
Like diamonds in coal
Are jewels so easy to find
In dark places
But become so rare
In the light of prosperity

And why so easily condemned
By world
Which stands on moral castles
Built by the power of
Their own pride and vanity
They have their reward on their tower
I feel Jesus would say

I think
If the love in my heart
Is that of our God
I know who
HE LOVES MOST

For he was a young soldier
Who loved his Germany
With all his honest heart
Like a son and a Father
They belonged together
As he sank into his trench
On the north side
He was aware of a tide
And had no one to confide
For each each day he battled
Against all rumor
There was no where to hide
As he felt trapped inside
And had no one on his side
As what were quiet whispers
A fluttering humming bird
Were now great big Rhino's
All angry and stampeding
Into the forefront of his mind
Whats happening to the Jews
And were did Alwin go
Were did he go
And why did I blank him
The week before he went
For I am lost and confused
As Germany has sewn
Razors around my heart

What had he done
Where had he gone
As his heart ached
With an almost ancient hollowness
That echoed over his battle field
His eyes all embedded
Became a blood reded
Two hot ball bearings
Carving with a burning envy
Into the enemy lines
As pierced through the sky
He said to himself
At least their gallant fight
Is in the just cause of right
And he picked up his rifle
Like a fire breathing dragon
He roared lead every where
As he drank up death
Like a tonic it quenched
The fiery hatred in is heart
A hot lava that dripped with venom
As his blindly sprayed his gun fire
For he was truly lost
And ran like a headless chicken
Into the arm of battle
As he sort peace down the
Canons of a Russian tank

How he loved his German uniform
A beautiful rich blue
With shiny new boots
As I paint over my regrets
For I have covered my rusty imperfection
In a gold plated uniform
I wear my thin skin of righteousness
So that I may point
To the naked imperfection of others
I live within the narrow trench of my own pride
As there is fear on every side
As I call upon all my regrets
As it is time to retreat
Into the hands of my imperfection
For I stand naked in the sun
My ego no where to hide
For I will not pick a side
As it is time to let go of pride

Regret is the Axe
that chops down my pride
The splinter that wakes my soul
To its duties in this world
Regret exposes the Viper
That hides in the jungle of pride
The pointing finger
Is a sleeping soul
Resting within its own pride
Pride draws you into the
Narrow trench of war
While regret is the angel
That offers you peace
In the tranquil space of
Your own imperfection
That brings you new hope
Made up in heaven
That we can call on
To save us from our own imperfection
That one day we are perfection

Silver fox. Artist. Poet
W.H. Auden, flowery guff
Charming but lecherous
Stampeding to the ****.
Figurative drawings, posing
Who wouldn't be impressed
"Such a pity you have to get dressed".
A long time in the waiting
Eventually, " off with that frock"
Puzzleing slow process
Just let me inject me ****.
Hellfire! That's a novelty
Haven't heard that one before
Fifty shades lighter
Running for the door.
Four years on 'I like you'
Like is underestimated
Emotionally stagnant
Good job I was wasted.
Artist. Poet. Peter Cook wannabe
Lecherous small **** pervert
Loitering at the school gates
Tacky little Herbert.
Seventy four you craggy *******
Bet it still doesn't function
Roll up **** for breakfast
Bet you still ain't up the junction.

The mighty Atlas, father of those seven sisters,
Bears the weight of heaven on his broad shoulders.
And even one of the brothers three, lives eternal;
In Chaos realms, Tartarus' black abyss, in which
No soul returns, to gaze upon life's light once more.
Although, forgive me, I lie; a few, a few selected,
Have returned from amidst heavy woe, pushing
Down their sorrows. Orpheus ventured,
With sweet song, motherly ordained and with divine,
Unrivalled skill on his lyre, seduced Hades himself.
I too, challenge his great powers; and with her skirt
Flapping with speed, ride on Auroras saffron chariot,
Cooking the sky's dark covering wings, to a baking red,
While the sun gallops up, stampeding behind our cart.
I play, not keen, to act the fool, and lay these pale ivy
Laments in front, which my lips have yet not touched.
I place you in the centre, forests following, clear streams
Flowing as crystals sway on its surface; and yet,
I have not put them to my lips; but keep them by.
I praise not this, but sing, because together we sit
On this soft green grass; now the woods are leafing,
Now the year is at its loveliest, the cheeky girl
Pelts me with apples. Presents are laid up for my Emily,
I myself have observed where doves make their nests.
I'll pick ten apples, picked from a woodland tree,
And for you, I'll pick ten more tomorrow.
You breezes waft a word or two to the gods' ears
And to my pure white seraphim, for her to hear.
I love my angel most of all, for when I left,
She wept and said ‘So long, love, so long.'
Wolves are sad for the folds, rain for the crops,
Gales for the trees, and Emily, me for you.
I love my muse, let him who loves you share your paradise.
Let honey flow from him, let roses blossom
From his pores, to pick flowers and earth born strawberries,
To dip you, in springs of tears myself. My love is ruinous
And the sky extends no wider than my heart.
Say, in what lands the flowers inscribe your name,
The name of goddesses; for who fears the sweet,
Or feels the bitterness of love; let them drink their fill.

When my grandfather passed away, my brothers and I held my dad with slanted eyebrows and stiff, silent upper lips. Because we are young and foolish and still learning. Because we’d never really had to do the holding before and, as far as we knew, this is how men mourn.

We dusted antique left-behinds with delicate, moth-wing hands that fluttered here and there and never stopped trembling -- dead giveaways that within the corridors of our arms our heartbeats went stampeding, arrhythmic. We couldn’t quite bend them into the proper shape for prayer, so instead we ran them, with touch somewhere between float and feel, along every ashtray and age-stained picture album. In that moment I think we each wished that memory read like braille, but no one ever said as much. Because this is how men mourn.

We honored our patriarch with whiskey, hidden away for what must have been twice my age, between the carved out pages of old stacked books.
We drank like secrets. His portrait played witness.

We promised between our teeth with tinged lips tight, keeping words in that might otherwise crumble us like great ancient empires.

We singed and smoldered in a burn that coated our throats, quelling a choke that kept climbing its way up from a chest that never quite stayed sunk. Boys grow up loving the clinking twist of unlocking deadbolts but men peek through keyholes. Because this is how men mourn. Silent and straight with head only slightly slanted.

But when my father betrayed his rigidity with words that clicked clean like unfastening locks, we traded this stale air in for wind laced with the electric taste of thunderstorms. We forgot how men mourn.

When my grandfather passed away, my brothers and I held my dad with lightning behind bleared eyes. Because we are young and foolish and still learning. Because we have umpteen days left to dress in bittersweet vestiges and, as far as we know, this is how men live on.

You said, “Ask me what I am thinking”
Obediently I did
Swiftly you kissed me
Tongue, lips, all of it.
And suddenly,
I felt
E v e r y t h i n g.

Chills up my spine
Arm hair raised
Stiff and straight
Senses heightened
Heart beating
Stampeding
Like a band of thoroughbreds racing.
Intense sensations
Swarms of tingling and tickling
Like someone softly blowing
On the back of my naked neck.

A shock wave of pleasure
Feelings immeasurable
To anything I’ve experienced.
This was no ordinary kiss
Warm, gentle, firm
Just enough wetness
To keep motion fluid.

Lasting only 10 seconds
But feeling endless
Like falling into an abyss
A bottomless pit
Deeper and deeper
Rapidly dropping
Picking up speed

Until your hands released my cheeks
And all the warmth left me.
Overtaken by an icy breeze
Compared to the heat I was just feeling.
Like pulling covers abruptly off a body
While in the middle of a slumber.

I never liked the feelings of being stripped
Unwillingly, unexpectedly
Especially
When the everything was so inviting.

You kissed me without permission
Then the position I was put in
Decisions I had to make quickly after
Because what I say now
Outlines our future
Defines our label
Of each other.

You put that pressure
Onto me
I wanted nothing of that responsibly
At least not to that degree
Don’t ask that to me
To state what I think we should be.

10 seconds ago
I only asked what you were thinking
I was unaware,
Completely unprepared
To know I would be deciding
The fate of our relationship
This now sinking ship.

I can swim
But I feel like I'm sinking
Having to live with the dreadful feeling
I’ve hurt another person again.

I got to be the lead
As I’d always dreamed
I never expected my role to be
Heart Breaker.

I want to go along with it,
Put up with the charades
Be the good actress
And pretend things didn't change
Say for your sake
I feel the same way.

But for this show to go on
For my role to be authentic
I must be honest.

I guess some friendships expire…

Even the best shows don't last forever
Enjoy the run for what it was
And say goodbye
Because it’s for the better.

In this tan room cluttered with art deco mirrors
The accompanying voice, dancing like a feather, says “I heard you’re very lonely.”
This room is an endless labyrinth of rooms
turning over on themselves with no explanation
like a meat grinder of writhing bodies,
A chandelier in God’s sensorium.

My dreams are reality; painting the theatre bizarre
Mere moments separated by suspended animation
Two tiny abruptions ruling my perception.
Every bundle of absorbed organisms looking through their own viewfinder,
one no more true than the other.

Walking through walls like wading pools
I often wonder what I look like to other people
Behind every I resides the seat of sensation
stampeding in blind fear,
Trampling and suffocating the observer.

I look in the mirror and I only see darkness, an eternal abyss of black depth
There’s something there beyond the other side.

It's during times like this
When I wonder about you.

It's been
What
Two years now
Since we euthanized this beast of a relationship
Stampeding and rampaging
Leaving contempt and devastation in its wake

All the people rejoiced.
Finally,
They said.
At long last
Our prayers have been answered.
Glory be.

You deserved better anyway
Than this ****
So dense
For all his wit
This stupid *****
She couldn't even think straight.
C'mon, let's drink
Play badminton
Hit the beach
Forget about this ******.

Barriers demolished by alcohol and fatigue
Bravado has long faded
Given way to sentiment.

**** inhibitions.
They're legally dead at this point.

I should be asleep by now
But my thoughts are with you.

I don't want you back
(I think we're well past that point already, don't you)
But I do miss you.
The way we used to talk
About anything and everything
Your quirky, subversive little philosophies
That you gleaned from the mindfucks of your day.

Sure
Your friends hate my guts,
I'm guessing.
My friends sure as hell hate yours.
'That *****', is how they refer to you
'That nasty ***** with the rotten *****', to be exact.

Still I sit and wonder,
How are you?

I'm doing much better now.
That job of mine that you dissed on a weekly basis
Well
I got a better job now.
Dated someone briefly
(A minute compared to our three years)
Before she broke my heart
And skipped away.
Got a PS3, too, finally.
(Still no Mass Effect, sorry.)
Cut my hair
But grew a goatee,
Lost those love handles you always laughed at
(Thanks to my striking and grappling coaches and cigarettes
And my all-too repulsive coworkers.)

Still chill.
Still writing.
Although I've abandoned prose
In favor of poetry.
Whodathunk, right?

But I'm happy.
I'm sure you are, too.
It just bums me, I guess
How two people so crazy about each other
Willing to die for one another
Turn their backs on their families
Could go on and become strangers
Just like that
After some tears and substance abuse
And be complete and happy apart from the other.

It's 3 AM
And my thoughts are with you.
They never left you.
Not when I have to speed past your hovel of a house
Every day on the way to work
(And not a day goes by when I don't entertain the thought
Of running into you around the neighborhood)
Without wondering
If you've finally patched things up with that ***** sister of yours
If your parents are still ****** as ever
If you still think of me
Like how I think of you.

You're still probably up
Reading strangers' blogs
Like how you first stumbled into mine,

Or coding
Trying to beat a deadline
For yet another insufferable client from hell.

Because I really did love you.
You were an answered prayer
(By Lucifer, my friends would sneer,
Before spitting and demanding another cigarette
Another round of beer.)
But I truly did.

I just hope that you truly did love me as well.
You're still an enigma.
Very much so,
As much as the day I first met you.

4 AM now
And my thoughts are still with you.
When would they ever
Get with the program
And leave you
Like how I left you

With a final cry of
Enough
And a stride surer than a lion
Walking ahead of its pride

Because it's getting old
Smiling at myself in the mirror
All too pleased with what I'm seeing
Without having to ignore the specter
Staring beside me
Judging silently

Enough.

I'm haunted by ghosts.
Screaming profanities,
Shattering the barriers of solitude.
Banshees cursing me,
Leading them to the depths,
Of the hell I created.

The blackened pit,
I the tormentor.
Where my eyes pierce
Sweetest fantasy, corrupting innocence.
Filling hearts with dread.

Dreams turned into night mares.
Stampeding insanity,
Like merry-go-rounds
Drilling painful truths into
The painted fictions of hope
That we dream of as children.

I am the madness your heart craves.
And the poison that kills you.

Stampeding through the wind,
Navigating low valleys. Boom.
Thunder swallows me.
Reborn into bedrock,
The mountain side crumbles.

On the beach
waves collide with the shore,
coming from above
and slamming down
battering the sand.
As the ocean retreats back into itself
it claws the beach
and rips away its skin.
Clouds
huddle together and through sheer mass,
hue black.
Screams
bellows
and the pummeling sound of behemoths in disrest.
Tiny daggers drop from the riot,
denting the crust,
softening it.
And finally
the sand is pierced
by the feet of a hundred stampeding tourists,
failing to outrun the bullets
of a ****** in a rage.

Don't read if tyring. Don't think this is absurd. Don't don't love me.
My grandmas hands were gentle as the skin was raw from water. I loved her.
Now you know me. She loved me. always. wanting me to wear a cap not to freeze deep. I always beat up my brother at chess if we play slow.
Clocks bounce me out of my natural rhythm. My thought processes are sheer speed as light and love is. Now you don't know me. The best ice cream I ever had was in Köppenhagen. The best strawberries are from the nearest forest. Not there. Aaaapchoooo.
                      We posses only the internal first right to grow

To become longer and thirst. . . for each other to be subjected to
                                       heart throat belly sweet feet wrenched longings and the Psyche subtexted and restored on our Path
                   saved from the diaries of diabolic old id

Awww the crazy romantics overlaps my reason frequently thinking of you
overflooding my boiling red rivers, being genuine blooe blood blooms

                          The Enchanter Neptune is here within this perfect I am entwined making love to my Venus and the Arrow of Eros flies impeccably from the bow's tangental string long before it hit me in the core of my radiant formidability
                            formatting the infinite flowers open from the rose bleeding             tears of honeysuckle nectar alluring even the still air around us
              
                      breeze deep lovers
                         our written diaphanous dreams untangle this fluent love of fluctuations - "madam i'm madly intoxicated with thou love" - spinning
                    mind to body
                             pinnin' up our glowing souls to the edge of the nearest galactic centre approaching as a dark unforgettable symphony
                        attractive spirits permutating
visages, forms and visions
                          zebras, donkeys and magnificent horses stampeding
to the shores of passionate burning collision    

I have had this most magical dreams of different creatures emerging out of the ocean waves forming in the foam of their peeks, or as large as mighty waves when they grab you and swing you on their amplitudes. We are all velocity swimmers, for others we dive, for me you floaat above the mundane... I love your thoughtful elegance This style of a heart budding into ions of ineffable revelations
I was walking under ancient palm trees and healthy pines . . . on the Riva dressed in linnen summers dress . A humble content joyful human being Castaneda's legacy dreamer ... A spectator of energy waves on the real coloured gem deep dark azul and deep blue see . . . emerging flamingoes and pelicans transforming into dolphins, fish, little birds, turtles, lions, whales  
                          each other merging
as a cluster of maidens in Roman bathtubs waiting for Turkish honey to be massaged and soaked deeply into their bronze white skins as they were a perfect medium for younger mystics : As they are tempted to be untamed from untainment again
What I do  know
         is that        magic is floating all around me and I don't convey this simple fact with exact assurance in no time : are we sinking or gliding as a spectre of wave lenght

My friend din't love Aurora Borealis. He's too much of a loner and I felt that the triangular topography of my electro charged notebook
was a magnetic love tale from the enchanted forest. I was mistaken. I could . .  in my utter..  the immediate intricate love crush occured

Unintentionall y
for The Northern Exposures went surfin' south. From here we switch easily from one Galaxy to another. Easily! Come! Choose wise, my inspiration, my
Nebulae
    before the cosmic wind rattles my green bones and crush them into nonexistence, brawling and wavering the micro humus for the next generations.

I have given fair warning
Fires and floods and earthquakeing rage under the impending tsunami my battle cry
The stampeding hooves of my heartbeat render you unfit to stand the ground you say you own
Hyenas laugh maniacally behind my teeth and the monsters of the deep, the deep, the deep
Surface to become my living island
I have given fair warning
Your walls cannot hold
Your blades cannot pierce
Your lies will hang abandoned spiderweb in the corners and I will use the fire of my truths to burn them from existence
I am the web spinner now
I build the world
Catch you in my weaves
Succubus
Leave you dry
I have given fair warning

These hearts have become racist
What used to be kind
And all hope to be seen
is wasted
On the stampeding blind

These teeth have become stained
What used to be white
Has been darkened by the
viscera of
those consumed by the night

These hands have become destroyers
Fingers that once saved
Equal and human;
Clean or depraved

These hands have become destroyers
I feel you chewing the limb that
used to be there
Your skin is under my nails
You're burning my fingertips
And pulling my teeth

You strangle me deep
among the sea of leaves
Flashing advertisements
in my eyes, Listening to
my every word. You tell
me I'm sacrificing for the
greater good. But I feel
submissive. I feel hateful.

You say Eve is the reason
for the downfall of mankind.
She is nothing but of rib and
even bone cracks. Saying this
as you dislodge my jawbone.
I try to argue with you, but
my language is gone.

You say that a dog is harmless
if surrounded by fence. That the
owner of the dog should pay for
the fence. That the ***** could ****
or produce pups that would ****.
I am still without words and losing
copious amounts of blood.

I am poor and no-one will acknowledge
my death. I am someone people will
forget died and will have to be reminded
years from now, during a cook-out or
amateur bowling tournament. My legacy
is that of failure and being obliterated,
justifiably so.

These people look to money,
to colors on fabric idols,
to pages in a book written by
share-croppers afraid of flooding.

Remove me, so, to remember me
for what potential may have existed.
Kindly ignore that I never resisted,
and that I, the apex of forevers, was
always ungrateful. That I conformed
and became deeply hateful.