I've been loved.
I've been lost.
But never have I ever loved and lost myself this way.

the morning sun rises up above the horizon
bringing the world to life
it leaks through the windows
creating patterns on her face
she let the warmth take over her
and wiped away the tears from the night
she smiled the pain away
watching the earth wake up
and for the first time she was thankful
to live in this world
she cherished the moments of the morning sun
taking her away
but, like everybody else
as soon as she loves
it leaves.

As you guzzle down your emotions,
forcibly silencing yourself,
You’re actually drowning in an addiction;
Rather than your sorrows.
the liquid that easily slides down your throat,
is engulfing you in its depressively, thick brew.
Your eyes are noticeably bloodshot,
while mine are hidden behind hands and muffled tears.

She was born of a forest
And rests her heart  
Shallow in pooled dreams
Dripping further than her tears
Falling to soft earth.

She eats rosed lilies
and pickled cattails
All while
Her footsteps leave no absence known
As her lithe nymph body melts into the foliage.

And her arms permanently reach
Into the void of
All unknowable things.
Grasping at gossamer threads,
Like thoughts that can't be spun together.

The sound of your voice, it lingers in my head; It feels a void of nothingness to come with sorrow.
        I can only imagine, a world without you.
                                  Reality is cruel, but I was even crueler.
                       I showed you the worst, and you gave me your best; I
            could only say
                                              “Thank You”
                           For showing me how to be happy

you said
you were afraid
to lose me
and then you
faced your fears
and left

The poet lives two lives.
One on the outside,
And one in their mind.

When you look in their eyes
You could see an abyss.

If you looked long enough
You could sink into it.

But most people don’t see it.

Take the time to read the words, though,
And you would know for sure.

The poet lives in two different worlds.

I’m a little addicted
to your hand in mine
my body leaning against yours
and the soft smile you have
while staring into my eyes

I’m a little addicted
to being close to you
the sweet smell of your perfume
and the way you nudge me
when you want attention

I’m a little addicted
to holding you in my arms
your body so close to mine
and tracing words on your skin
“i love you so much”

I’m a little addicted
to you

The world doesn't care about you if you're ugly.
My problems receive no sympathy,
Will you please listen to me?
They say that suicide is never the answer.
How would you feel if you were as worthy as the gum stuck to the sidewalk.
Pretty girls laugh and smile and hold hands and party and always have a lifeline.
I have wounds from years ago that still haven't healed.
Life is hell for me.
I have low-self esteem.
I have social anxiety.
I have bad dreams.
I have not defended myself when I should of.
That's probably why I'm so defiant towards my family.
I feel like life is not for me.
But it's for the ones who are beautiful.

I’ve never received a flower
Or even a rose
But I’m a guy
So it’s acceptable I suppose
No kisses
Or sweets
No treats
That signifies ones feelings for me
No token of ones love
But I have gotten
Disappointment
Watered with hate
Planted in betrayal
Fertilized with lies
And maintained by fakes
Roses are Red
But my roses are dead
And crumble beneath my feet

i have thrown
my last coin
into a wishing well;
i sit back while others
tug at the wishbone
from a holiday bird;
i kill no more rabbits
for their plush,
little feet and i leave be
the first star in the sky;  
i rely on myself
over mountains
to climb.
four-leaf clovers
are safe to grow; tea
leaves i sip to seep
and steep within
my bones;
the call of a warbler
i hear as simply
hello; i search inside
now for love
and home.

I wish I was pretty.
I wish it looked like the sky was reflected in my eyes,
and I wish my skin was smooth like marble.
I wish my hair was thick and strong,
and I wish my smile brightened up a room.
But instead,
my eyes are more gray than baby blue,
and my skin is translucent in some spots.
My hair is thin and short,
and my smile is crooked and far too wide for my tiny face.
I’m still learning how to love myself despite how others make me feel-
because although this body may not be the most beautiful,
it’s the only one I’ll ever have.

Beyond the reef
                     in the crackling amber
the sun rises above the earth,
                     kissing river beds strewn with lovers

Passed mouth to mouth they whisper innuendo
the possibility of  living wet dream.
Bobbing bodies mimic boats on waves
and soon delirium penetrates a new country.

Heat and fire flare in bandied breeze
                          igniting insatiable shadow;
Pure and venial, the air incarnate
excites the ocean and orgies sing.

The quivering above ground
slithers silkily spilling watercolor rhapsody,
                         in a gush of white a fertile tsunami
reeks reckless abandon creating a new hemisphere.

Once by moonlight,
they rubbed sleep from eyes, hugging hurt
as they clamored high in ghostly pallor.
Some leading the dance, hungered for knowledge,
others play shadowy roles.
Yet wafting still, comes the foreign fragrance,
fragments of spirituality,  a longing to touch,
as abundance rolls in shorelines, green.
                         Offered mercies, fragile as wings
shades of truth, cascading like water, breathless
in the sensual splash;
                       how tremulous
                       the images of truth,
                       the threshold of tomorrow.

The agonies of memories past
entreat within my mind
I struggle with the pleas of self
to dispel them all in kind

Never shall I find the peace
which grants a kindred soul
For presently I battle demons
who wish to take control

I hesitate for but a moment
wondering where to turn
And as each passing day goes by
the countless embers burn

Must I swelter in the heat
of endless tortured flames
Or shall I conquer and prevail
to rise above the pain

Will Death relinquish all it's hold
and allow me to be free
With promises of blissful sleep
that's void of misery

I love you. I always have, since the second we first met.

Any time I was with you, I felt blissful and at peace. I couldn't imagine being anywhere else. All of my most powerful or cherished memories are the ones that you're in.

You performing literally took my breath away.

You smiling made me feel alive and like I had a reason to exist.

You crying shattered me into a million pieces and I'd cry later thinking about you being sad.

You holding me felt like home or the closest thing there is to heaven on earth.

Carrying your books for you at orientation was the most purposeful thing I've ever done in my life. I was so happy just to be helping you with something, even if it was as insignificant as that. The other guys on the football team would make fun of me for the way I looked at you. They said I looked like a puppy.

I felt like a puppy. I adored you.

My heart would race every time the bell rang since I knew it meant I could see you. Listening to you tell me about your day when you called me during the summer was always the highlight of my day. I loved hearing you talk.

I loved being important enough to you for you to want to share your time with me.

I could never tell you how I felt.

I'd never liked anyone else before I met you.

Any time I wanted to tell you, it would get lodged in my throat and I couldn't breathe. Or I'd tremble anxiously, looking at the words on my phone before deleting them. It didn't feel that important anyway.

It bothered me more that you were hurting and I didn't know how to help.

I don't know why I'm writing this. Maybe just to actually put it in words for once in my life. Maybe getting it out will make it have less of a grip on me. I don't know if I should pursue you or not. I don't know if I even have a chance with you.

Even if I did, I don't know if I'm right for you.

All I do know is that when I'm with you, my life feels whole and perfect and peaceful even when nothing else in it is.

in another life
i wear clay beneath my fingernails
and linen pants around my hips
fastened with a braided leather belt
rescued from my mother’s closet
one she wore in the eighties
when she met my father on the seaside of france
i carry flowers from the corner
down a gum-stained sidewalk
past the park i fell asleep in during one
slow sunday afternoon
there are cherry red stains on my pillow
some from my lips, some not
i’ve never been in love
but i’ve never felt alone
my nose is slender
and my collarbones flaunt themselves
beneath tanned skin
i am someone who drinks vodka and
orange juice while watering my plants
a longhaired cat licks its paws
in the windowsill
as i lie naked in the sunlight
reading tolstoy and kerouac
and obscure poetry introduced
by the neighbor in 4F
none of it matters
i am just like a cloud
like a creaking step
i share myself only through
spearmint breath and coffee dates
here are my sweaty palms
here are my uneven bangs
you will never know me

Waiting and hoping
Waiting
Hoping
Someday I can fix all I did wrong
Help my friends all get along
Maybe
But as I wait
And hope
And watch
Time goes on
Nothing heals
Guess I'll just keep waiting and hoping
And waiting
And hoping

she gave me her nudes
she was bare
and naked
and so out
and open
and i willingly
accepted it
because it wasnt the nudes
that showed her body
the physical aspects
that made her beautiful
it was the words
she didnt choose
and the spontaneity
that left her
either from her lips
or her fingers
or ink

she was as bare
as her nudes
and i accepted
her for her.

My death will be liberating.

And I do not say that in the sense
that I am going to find a cliff
and take a good jump off.

No.

I am just trying to find a
clever way to tell you

that I do not know what is going
to happen next.

You see,

there is a
fine line
between
dreaming and
mortality

and

I am finding out for myself
that being in love
does not always
involve

being awake.

And for my sake
I fall in love with daydreams,
nightmares,
hazy realities
and

the hung-over idea

of not being enough.

It is all out of my hands.
                 It is all out of time.

And the only thing I have left to do,
now,


is decide.

Maybe it’s because I like to watch the sun rise

Maybe it’s because it reminds me of your eyes

Maybe it’s because I don’t do well with the dark

Maybe it’s because I can’t sleep without your arms

But perhaps it could be the calm sounds of the city streets

Or the emptiness I feel in between my sheets

Watching a new day be born again and again

Hoping this day could maybe have a different end?

Or perhaps it could just be my mind choosing this time

To routinely overthink, becoming trapped inside these rhymes.

No.

A simple term,
It means so little.
But yet explains a lot.
Still not heard by,
People with forcible dreams.
With these two letters,
Able to enlighten my opinion,
On the oncoming situation.
Yet the ignorance of your needs,
Portray importance over,
The simple yet powerful two lettered word.

breathing the turquoise like lavender,
and sipping the blue summer.
bitter cold clouds glide and morph lava lather,
floating whispers cut by sweet pineapple sunshine.

soon, a moment, now
rhythms ripple the sky like skipping stones
we jump the music like puddles
splashing in the frequencies.

cobalt bass rumbles the earth hungry,
pumps the air with springing spirals
pushing and pulling the senses,
reverberating through cells.

heavy mud humming, stomping
echoes through our atoms dizzy;
balancing tuned body to innate electricity
the fizz of circulating lemonade energy.

we jump the music like puddles
splashing in the frequencies.

strawberry melodies spilling ribbons,
dolphin leaps of the spaces inbetween beats,
lines of colours overlapping,
colliding, mixing, merging, blending
in with the forest.

washing over souls the life fire sparkles
like a clear water cleansing harmonies,
sound waves crashing against inertia.
phosphorescent glow of re-charged love
for the world, for being, animation

flowing through burnt smoky ashes
of sapphire charcoal skies;
dimmed radiation of chlorophyll emerald days.
the smell of salt, dry bark, fluffy carbon mists,
trembling lights softening the eyes'
grip on outlines, loosening lies.

watching the cycles of patterns
tumbling colours through a mill rotating,
and the silence of listening
when the music comes to an end.

There's something about my wife that astounds me.
She won't use any appliance unless it's made by GE.
I bought her a washing machine that was made by Whirlpool.
That was a dumb decision and I soon learned that I'm a fool.
My wife got so mad that she caved my head in with a claw hammer.
Now she's holding a grudge because she spent a year in the slammer.
General Electric appliances are the only appliances she will use.
I'll remember that in the future because I don't like to be abused.
She demands GE appliances because GE brings good things to life.
From now on, I'll buy nothing but GE because I'm scared of my wife.

A desert wind blows hot and dry,
whispering a prayer for rainclouds.
The Milky Way spills across the night sky,
with Saturn and Jupiter shining down,
interstellar eyes
that see the white lizards
skittering in the sand,
and me laying on my back,
gazing up,
swimming in starlit possibility.

between us
our breath mists
as we pursue passion
this  night of zero  degrees
our ardour is  summers hottest day
as the sweat cools upon  bared breasts
we reach an apex our very own everest
and then become aware of the chill in the air

Poor Spider!  Engineered her nets
To cast among the eaves –
And now her silk supports the nests
Of enterprising thieves!

A Roguish Bird with yellow smock
And beak like crooked spear
Crept up upon the wing and took
His pick of all her gear –

Poor Spider! Crawling home to scour
Her bastion torn to shreds –
She sets to task , and in the hour,
Hangs dew-kissed curtained webs!

This depression
is borderline elegant,
it flows through my veins
like smooth jazz
or a dancer's pattering feet
on the cold concrete.
This life of mine
has chaotic undertones,
don't be fooled by the silence.
This poem I write
is a battle cry
but it's also known to me
as a declaration
of certain defeat.

Poems on a Mirror

~for Glenn Currier~

you don’t know me
I don’t know you;
poems on a mirror I ken
truly well

poems on the mirror saved, and then,
comme the seasoning of leave-falling,
poems dropping and drained...the post-it glue loosened by
the daily heat of watery tears,
making a space for
this one, for you...

there are poems and they arrive with fresh arrogance,
each an arrow demanding your all as a target regardless  
of what the shooter really thinks or wants, other than
obedient acknowledgment and their self-loving flattery

but some render where no rendering should be allowed

those are the ones affixed - ones you chose to join the chosen,
slapped onto mirrors - so many that they almost
cover complete your image from presentation

almost only because these poems are yours, you,
they’re the truly accurate reflection even if not your words,
indeed especially because they’re not yours

but they start your day as a poem should
and in doing so,
become you

What a Hall of Fame, to be a poem on Glenn’s Hall of Mirrors

go pick the plums...

You bring words like light to me
then open your mouth to the dark--

I see sounds at midnight
like synaesthetic flashes
wash the vanished world in color...

swimming against the encircling black,
my vision becomes ultraviolet blue.

If we are in a masquerade party
with no faces,
names,
nor identity

Just words,
and alcohols,
for both of us
to see.

Just soul,
and coffee,
making our spirits
flee.

Would you look at me
without a mask,
with a cover,
inside a flask?

Would you touch me
and dare to drown
inside my smirks,
smile, and ignited frown.

Would you run away from me
to set yourself free?

Or would you let yourself fall,
for a masqueraded soul?

Summer is wasted
on the young and
the restless
women go bare-armed
on a mission to prove
their youthful 'glow'
in floral painted dresses
that scream
"I'm pretty!"
And I sit in idleness
wondering when
Mother Nature
will make Her final move