-
A lone azure flower
growing from the center of the
cracked and muddy earth
struggles as the downpour pelts it
Saturating and uncaring
threatening to uproot and smother
it in a watery grave
-
The vision subsides
but the roar of the flood remains
the waters careen recklessly
enveloping
the gorgeous
the profound
the defiant
and
the unconventional
each one it swallows every
bit as precious
as any lone desert flower

A surprise gasp pulls forth the deceptive
chill of the nighttime desert air
Caught off guard even after five years
yet still in love with its unexpected curiosities
set against the immaculate
gleam of its unbroken night sky
It is momentarily forgotten
that all we've built beneath these heavens
is fleeting and miniscule in comparison
and that it is only a matter of time before
these aging and neglected structures
collapse into the desert's mysteries
but in this moment
we can be every bit
as infinite and grand

I locked my heart fathoms beneath the waves
assuming that it would be lost to time and pressure
Bewildered, I could not fathom how you carried it to shore
but was elated at the thought that someone found worth in what I had mournfully discarded
For some time since then we sailed on a ramshackle ship
my heart still shackled and guarded
but on occasion I agreed to let it out
as it bled abundantly, thinking this sacrifice
could keep our sails on course
Of course this was only a cathartic ritual.
I often wonder how long the leviathan followed you
How long you keep it under your control as it stalked below?
When did it start to rebel?
When did you realize you were not its master?
When did it realize?
The attacks came slowly, as if it was testing our reaction
Gradually ramping up in intensity and intimidation
The first time it threw me overboard
I swore I'd never set sail again
and now I struggle to count how many times
I've plunged into the depths
We washed ashore
We rebuilt
but it became painfully apparent this beast would not relent.
At times I was not convinced this prowling menace is after you at all,
other times I think its end goal is to devour us both
The only conclusion I could be sure of
is that I could no longer risk the open seas.
In an act of desperation I've stolen back my heart and fled to the desert.
I contemplated not telling you
but just as this tentacled monstrosity does not seem able to leave you, so it is with me
Should you find your way to this desolate and desperate refuge I've chosen,  I will welcome you with open arms
and pray that the creature could not follow where the waters do not flow.

We could not comprehend the horror lurking in our future
Deceptions behind the mask as emotions shift into phantom pains
Left unattended and feeling for hints of barbed spines
raised under our flesh
Flaying the remains of innocence and revealing a labyrinth of unending agony - a rolling thunder that snares in violent spins
as we beg for it to stop
It roars
It hurts
but most of all
It knows
These roulette curses dance across shocked faces
finally left forsaken for not living up to unattainable expectations
Left longing for genuine affection
while the cravings are predictably portrayed as ravenous
You should know by now
the longer
you wait
the more
flesh this
lunging bite
pulls away

Our love is our reality
If reality carries on
after we are gone
Does our love die?
Does it wither in a void
along with our other memories?
I hope not.
I hope it haunts the hills
outside of town where we used to
sneak off
I hope it lingers in the breath
of those who dare tread
on our graves
I hope it floats through space
wrapping around the stars
to become abstract dreams
in the heads of hopeless romantics
I hope it inspires them to tell a tale
they hardly understand
but feel intensely
as we did
when we were real

I drove off
swearing I would not
look back
but I'm already longing
So my eyes dart to the rearview mirror
and of course there's this
gaudy kaleidoscope
where smears of makeup have run
into clotted streaks of gore -
I tried to save face
with an awkward line
that sounds at home
in the life we thought
we were creating
and not the one we had:
"I do my own makeup...
and my own stunts!"
Amused at how clever
I think I am
my sides split to match my lips
Enough joking
there's too much road ahead
Drum roll and into
the down beat please -
You think that's funny?
Just wait 'til I stand up  
I begged to not have to
go through some kind
of initiation beat down
This is not
how one does affection
or atonement -
Feeling pressed?
Just wait 'til I come up
I've got a bone to pick
with these rings of factory
sealed solutions
bursting open only to
bring more pain than joy:
False advertising to be honest
but I get it -
I'm hardly linear anymore
Oh hell I'm probably more of a fractal!
- Which has it's own set of awful clichés -
but as expected
I can't stand down
so of course I'm rebelling and fleeing  
to escape the terror
I knew withdrawal from you would be
unbearable so
I oddly coped by engaging in the very
thing I ran from
Stumbling into fitful sleep in an
oh so strange refuge
and as expected
I can't come down -

He is a published poet
And I'm eagerly hoping
I'm about to unlock the secret
To turning my expressions
of torment
Into something that will be held
In equally high esteem

Finally he says
"The one thing I can tell you
Is that no one
wants to read about
your emotions anymore"

"Okay" I flatly reply.

I have reserved
audacious and capricious things
for you
things I do no wish to let linger
I have reserved these things
in hopes that you will return

Smeared interpretations caught up
in inversion mirrorball bathrooms
defying those punched up dust down reassurances
from
punk rock goddesses
emerging and
cutout of vagrant tunnels
Cast out by demagogues
spinning bottles determining fates
Falling to sidewalks falling from grace
no longer saving face from
a future washed down with the last call
This is how is all goes down
This is how it dies
Standing on the edge of a forever
that is all too quick to end

I will always be captivated
by the way you were framed
through the rain streaked
windowpanes
of a tenement refuge
known to only us
A blurred recall
of dancing snapshots
disordered laughter
and tumbling tangled locks
Your rhythmic constrictions
rendering speechless
damnation
as hypnotic passion
erupted from deep within
the universe behind your eyes
In those moments I understood
that I am cursed
to remain
a permanent fixture
of this crumbling
overdrawn quarter
I know now
that you
are something mysterious
powerful
and ancient
You have been here
long before me
and you will be here
long after
I am dust

You said you would love me

until the end of the world

but I'm glad you stuck around after

I was overthrown
by your hand
pressed against
the membrane
and absorbed
in capillary shades
of betrayal
Generations
smothered in cradles
prematurely suffocated
for anthems
that existed
in languages
you never felt compelled
to understand
And now
that you cry for
the fragile balance
of the cycle
The people in the stars
still loom
The people in the stars
still live
And soon you will remember
how it feels to tremble
and answer for your crimes

A sunburst flash
Chopped up ******* down
with blistered reluctant pull
and the choke of dry dusty pills
A floodgate rush
Terror campaigns
Denial rampant
Plagues...
...on all houses involved.

She was a cautious razor blade saint
with silhouette paint spiritual advice
casting her scarred brow wisdom through
phantom streaked watercolor caress
She spoke interpretations of waking dreams
in harbinger binge drinking remorse
abandoning masks for midnight unveiling
of fingernail abrasion secrets
She taught me to dance unabashedly
although she knew not a single step
She was everything

Changing sliced frames-phantasmic shapes
until all out of focus
No where is home
if we don't even know where we stand
Sliding a long treachery faster than
light intoxication and
slinking across the thin black line
Entire live spans and plans changed in the space
between a breath and a lie
Thresh hold reached intense beating
from forgotten spoil change
You do know that if you let me take the wheel
I'll drive us both crazy?
Brace yourself for jump
it will only work if we fall together
Counting down five-four-three-to-nothingness
End of line end of line end of time
Stop waiting stop planning stop delaying
The future never comes so
can we start again?
Delete
delete
repeat

the true
conquest of the bourgeois
is the
scalding envelopment
of this bathwater
and how long i can stay under
before
i have to face the blank slate

She was always concealed
in the graceful mystery
of the way that she carried herself
Seldom found conventionally attractive
but ultimately possessing the unrivaled beauty
one only realizes
when dreams of a one way hurt
come crashing into their reality
and scatter that
subtle something about her
that they will never get back

I had forgotten
the sensation of
painted lines
adorning my face,
weaving tales
of secret and sacred things
that would otherwise remain
undocumented and guarded.
As I scrubbed
off those caked layers
of primal mystery
before leaving the riverbank,
I couldn't help
but wonder...
...If I never returned,
was I washing away
my only chance
at something authentic
in this life?

In frozen terrain
with ash set ablaze
we stand together
through chilling nights
and searing days
Two forlorn war torn refugees
cribbing messy illustrations
of listless ****** creeps
hanging out on the back balconies
watching aimless graveyards
where cyber-gridlocked dissidents
reluctantly go to die
But we remain
and through the strain
the wrong side of history stares us down
with viper haired stone sober gaze
We ignore their judgement
and thirty pieces of silver
and instead scrape together
fists full of dollars and hopes
of change
to guard against
their pointless mutual choke point
when they absurdly perceive
our attempted dignity
and fragile windowsill garden
as signs of sinister takeover
Even as it all collapses at their necrosis
riddled feat they
diminish and return
Assets freeze and insults burn
threatening to bring forth
the death part
of that 'until death do us part' line
before we ever had a chance
to make that pact
Still
in the grim twilight of anguished
frostburn soliloquy
whispered by a tired world
begging to expire
You will always be
a godsend
and my reason to survive
against the fury
of a planet besieged
by endless storms
of ice and fire

Hyper reality
torched our dreaming eyes down
to charred empty sockets
and you should know
Like all the nasty swirls
wormholes swallow everything
because they aim to please
There is no what if
as it is apparent
we will -
in increasingly reductive fashion -
eat it all up
:remade rebooted recycled scrambled
deja pay-per-vu:
until
void
conquers
all

X.

We should pick up some
flowers

Why

Because that is how they
did it in the old days
fresh flowers on the table

Roses

Yes roses

Then I will pick some up on my way home

XI.

The roses died again

I did not say I would be very good at keeping up appearances

Oh

I know you
needed someone
who is willing
****** flowers for you
and present them
with thorns all removed
but
here in the shadows
of the gnarled bramble
I'm still wild and unchecked
as I will never cease to be

Light plays throughout the room
where the blinds were pulled off the rails
Slams and screams in the units
surrounding
grant a brief illusion
that I am not sealed up
Down to half a twelve ounce aluminum can
I can exchange for change tomorrow
to do it all again
For now though
Not enough to black out
Silently watching the light play
until the sun recedes
will have to do

The decay
you've wrought
with your doubled up beating
and distortion assaults
gives me no choice but
to fixate on new sonic romances
and I'm in love
with the way she cradles me
in that sedated groove
and the caress
of those faint record scratches
I need to
get through new time signatures
as I grow older
and apart from you

At some point
I got really into
this radical
pretend revolutionary
mocking revolutions
trash pop art
where it was about
not writing
beautiful or
compelling things anymore
but just regurgitating raw
thoughts and avante garde musings
onto the page
like careless splashes of paint
red and black -
- black and read
- read in blackest humor
sense in the senseless
nonsensical. -
No hallowed grounds -
no safe spaces -
no trigger warnings -
or safety switches -
No structure
no reason
trash trash trash trash
with maybe
just a hint
that buried beneath
this landfill dissection lab
of grotesque disregard
a muted glint of
grace and hope
yearns to be shared
once more

The shrill thrill **** of young blood ills makes the hill
become a valley of death writhing desperately in hands
too often dragging queens through the mud
all along the botched towers leaning and glaring
without caring
Instead intent-on
restricting oxygen with crass observation
only ever offering tasteless insincere apologies as afterthought
Alone and easily overpowered
clouded crowd-sourced asphyxia overtakes
just enough breath left
for recorded tied down violations
with faint traces of ****-shaming-victim-blaming
cat calls free-for-alls
and “don’t it always seem to go
that you don’t know what you’ve
got” ‘til it’s slammed shut stolen
and swollen gutted-paved-depraved
by gentrifires stoking those immolate night advances
and god oh god is it really too much to ask
to feel safe on my own sidewalk?

Love
conquers all
and
conquerors
destroy everything
in their path

Little Scarlet Mouse Girl
and I
had very little cash
left from pay day
in my days as a
projectionist at the
cheap theatres
and her time at
a head shop
that didn't keep very good books
But it was enough to
buy a few cheeseburgers
before my shift
on Christmas morning
and Little Scarlet Mouse Girl
says muffled through
a huge bite
"Jack in the Box burgers
taste like ****"
and quickly adds
"Not that I would know".
She dropped me off and kissed me
as the snow flurries gathered around
our feet
and I had thought for sure
at that moment
this was the person I would spend my life
curled around
Regardless of the drugs
her tongue was acquainted with

1.
You slipped out in the night
leaving only
your period piece illustrations
of lament configurations
and braided wyrm coils
burrowed and replicating
in hollows of sorrow

2.
The best I can do is
listless digging through
your scrapped dream junk gears
and pointed dagger crystals coalesced
all around contraband gifts
scattered throughout

3.
At this point I'd even settle for one more night
so our last moment isn't a
backlash conversion pressed
at the back of the neck
whispering
it's
all
over
now

I run my fingers across razor sharp hints of frost
The first signs of cold
sliced across trees by raging violent wisps.
Thin slivers of blood shimmer down the crystalline
coat of winter desolation
as these wounds gleam with crimson vengeance, cruel and empty.
Spatters of angry, scarlet disappointment gathering
in the pristine emptiness of this icy wasteland.
I do not feel this, I am numb to it.
To me, it is a gentle lock of your hair laying across
the soft rise of your collar bone.
I feel the passionate burning fire of your breath against
my neck.
Still, I have questions that these lonely trees cannot answer.
I lay down in the cold,
entangled in their ancient, deceitful roots
wishing they would provide me with answers.
But they only stare blankly
their sap laden mouths frozen, gnarled,
and silent
These are questions only you can answer.

In dreary codeine inspired nights
Where I have somehow
Wandered back into your bed
We forget who we are
Lose ourselves in
those lucid slipstreams
I know where we stand
And I never want to come down

I am
a smeared
scrawled out
conquered chalk outline
on an incinerated
cinder block wall
To be washed away
in seconds
without a second thought
Like the last beams
of a dying son's light

In a haunted dead fall
anchored by the more inspired
of my heartstrings
and the more hidden
of my hidden things
you reside

We pause to rest on the hilltops just before
the afternoon gives way to evening
While her young child
crawls innocently across the grass
A tiny cherubic visage silhouetted by the slow flare
of the summer sun enshrining the scene
She tells me
that even with these things
that bring her such intense joy
the darkness would not relent
It was always there taunting her
just beneath the surface

She tells me she wants out of these panicked strain eclipses
tugging cantilever protrusions through heart chambers
The worry of writhing sickness murmuring like scorned blasphemers retreating to cimmerian shade
Incessentally dominating
the pleasant moments of her life

I could not offer any reassurances
other than to say
Perhaps these moments
must interlace
forever woven together by
the passage of time
that we are blessed and doomed
to walk alongside them simultaneously
And that just as light and dark
are separate parts of the same day
Our experiences
are just different expressions
of a magnificent existence
on an unstoppable wheel.

There are years of
rusted crimson coating the rails
corroding the way we once traversed
and the secret walkway stones
only we could ever navigate
when the beaten path was
too crowded
have been smoothed bare
We anxiously stand apart
in this seemingly
final void of a thousand
chasms overgrown with
agonizing truths
Every bit of strength
devoted to fighting against
tumbling off the edges
As pain weighs on us with inevitability
falsely alleviated by tiny
brief
moments we disguise as stability
we scrape by
with scarce resources draining
We are
exhausted
and
hurt
and
unsure
Yet in this treacherous space
between us
that we fear falling
into
there is
An untamed look our
eyes
A tremble our
embrace
And a longing in our
hearts
that we cannot ignore
and I know
that our love can outweigh
all hurts

What is this life
of overwhelming
cognitive dissonance
denial
and outright hypocrisy
that comes with living
as a human being?
How is it that we
get so caught up
on agenda and ideology
when the very concept
of consciousness
and reality
is something we are
unable to fully articulate?
I have set myself apart
with thoughts forming murky
impressionist fluctuations
of ever spiraling brain chemistry
to where sometimes
existence
feels all at once
like an absurd joke
and a sacred and mysterious gift.
So many people seem so certain
as if they are pointed in the exact direction
they should be
Waving flags
and preaching their truths
and killing in the name
of a thousand other fictions.
In comparison to them
I am so lost
and defeated by the vastness of it all
And right now
the only thing
I know
I'm sure about
is you.

Although no longer
entangled
we will always be entwined
Not only through the things
we are obliged
but something unmarred
something subtle
something deeper
Two souls on the same plane
still moving across
undaunted by hurt
and hardship
and loss

-Not gone
Not apart
Not broken
Only changed-

Although these things
have been set in motion
and we may move
In different ways
To different rhythms
And time may find us
In different places
We will always be
something special
and something graceful

-Never gone
Never apart
Never broken
Only changed -

My dearest friend
Although it is time
For things to change
we will always have
those things
no one can take
or fully understand
We will always
be timeless
And always
on each other's side

-It is all only change-

This bitter endgame theory
is the remnant of us
tightly clutched in a loose collection
of dulled hidden blades I kept in
empty sugar pill bottles
for moments such as these
My shallow breath slowing
showing
nothing left but hesitation marks manifesto readings
to stave off never lasting mob stompers
losing control of thought criminal empires
All is lost with wounds swabbed in hopes of growing cultures
not inundated by murderland vultures
cackling that doomsday clock apocalyptic-talk
as they pick apart failed crop circles
The past is in the past but remains so tense
as you stand revolted by wretched plans
while wrenching cold calculating razors from my hand
because being allowed to touch seemed so unattainable to me
in the first place
and now that you're gone
I
am
so
scar struck.

And like an enveloping
transmission
with increasing frequency
you have become the only
thing I want to hear
You have always been
best in show
for mixed media
and messages
and now
I can't help but wonder
where this path you
are leading me down
ends?
Will this develop beyond
an ethereal blur wisping
through my everything and
anything?
And how was I to know
you would become
the brightest part
of my day?

Looking back I wonder if
I was a silent player
looking on while you were
held down and tortured in those
abduct taped conman confessionals
he was so fond of
Because the way I remember it
you and I were always standing
on the same corner slinging hope
while the smog encroached
but maybe you were disgusted with me then
like I am when I think back to watching
the scar strangled manner you were
loyally subjected to
I stand captured
Resigned to billowing abstractions
brought forth in my less callous moments
Looking out at these slurred flickers  
shackled and swinging in a nine to five iron cage
wondering if you would even let me out
if you held that key
in those perfect imperfect hands
I always longed to hold.

At first glance
the fight or flight flash trash light of the strip
appears to be a breathtaking rapid burst
of coming distractions
But after a few hours slinking and pulsating
with the grid pulling at your heartstrings-
Trudging through one closed door
where another creaks open
I realize it's really a slow burn disaster
coaxing me backsliding to where I belong
That is to say
that the past few years have been borrowed time
with little to no interest
All I've been doing is settling my accounts
and lack of accountability
Fulfilling obligations
closing out friendships and lost loves
with the efficient sorrow
one usually only sees on
the last leg of death row
Two approaches prominent in my desire for absolution-
Slamming cheap shots and begging for changed minds
depending on how much I wanted or took from you
in the first place
I am selfish
and I did hurt you
and I am even more selfish for trying to get you
to forgive me so I can check out and leave a mess
for you to clean up
But I am only here on someone else's dime
and all I have left to do is settle my accounts.

Blotched botched
word failures spewing forth
from defective machinery
subtracted from
popularity conquests
showing youngbloods
how to write up
this tragedy thing right
Mouthless voiceless
shapeless formless
avoidance and mockery
creeping like carbon monoxide admissions scrawled out
in digitized assault
and crying out
What kind of democracy is this?
What kind of freedom is this?
When torn from those clutched
analytical political land mines
I have to ask  
Before revolutionary words are mistaken and reduced
to stripped inspirational drivel
adorning office drone strike stationery
What makes you think
your
words can hurt someone
who wants to ******
themself
daily?

The woman I was supposed to
marry moved away long ago
And no matter how hard
I tried to follow the dust trails
I only ever came up short of breath
In the end of days
where it's always night
we spend time
in a broken down watering hole
on the edge of purgatory
and listen to muffled bomb blasts
bleeding on through to the other side
When she laughs she
stares up at the ceiling
and I can see traces of
repressed horror welling up in her eyes
I can tell she's thinking about
nitroglycerin sweat and splintered cells and scattered shells
before it all goes down
In the retro cartoon relapse nightmare
I've conjured for us to spend our time
The television flickers with the hissing reluctance
of reporters telling us to prepare for another
invasion
She finally speaks.
"You know there are no real sides right?
You know that back home there's just
dodging fire and not necessarily knowing
who it's from?"
She takes another drink
and tells me
"You could have come
for me, you know?
You didn't have to sit stateside
with endless excuses while the rest
of us had to be there on the blurred
front lines.
Still...I want to be with you now.
Here I am trying to look my best.
I like to wear
brightly colored ribbons
woven into my hair
and don't bother to cover
all the scars...because
that's who I am.
they can't take it back
and neither can I..."
She pauses to brush
tears from her face
and finishes with
"...and I think everyone
wants to look nice for the one
they love".

You call me
a piece of work
and a piece of trash
but
that would be putting
it way too lightly...
Lowbrow
down low
and never coming down...
...I'm a ******' fabulous
piece of fine art.
Here's a part about
the way the sky looks
today
so I can wrap this trainwreck up
and pretend
to be deep.
It looks clear and blue. What a disappointment.
Fin. QED. Mic dropped. Bombs dropped.

Hiding behind screens.
Sealed from the world.
Connected/detached.
The next best/worst thing.
Our precious intellect...
Our fleeting consciousness...
Boxed on a chip and stored away...
Hidden and safe...
Our stored binary dreams.
Malcontents under pressure.
Until they find the box.
Press the button.
All is consumed in flames.
We hurt the ones we love the most
and I love all of mankind.
Woe to an empire of blood.
Woe to an empire of blood.

We tread slowly
but not hand in hand
because of the damage I have done
Lighting flickers in once pristine halls
Straining our eyes and hearts
as we navigate corridors
we thought we knew so well
Plant life that was carefully nurtured
now neglected and decaying
leaving us have no choice
but to ration our meager supplies
Sleep chambers cracked
and malfunctioning
forcing insomnia and restlessness
on cold tiled floors
Ivory tower foundations creak
and rumble as inevitable
collapse becomes apparent
So many stories I wish I had
worked on
instead of sticking with the same tired
ones I neglected
We drift further apart with each step
I do not know if we are fleeing
or going down with the mess I've made
as we traverse the blackened remnants
of our crumbling utopia
I just know that I wanted us
to experience it together

Quantum grave robbery corpse bride stood up
acting as a grotesque sign post warning but
that tragic sideways glance splits seconds and
intersections spatters concrete bodies
Pathological investigation and morbid dissection
bears the heaviest weight
of horrifying and paralyzing eternal return
when time loops breaks you upon wheels
Tethered in bad faith
reminiscent of clamped surgical invasive insertion
Ouroboros chasing the dragon only to find the dragon is itself
taking shape as endless mass fed media distraction
Nativity naivety engaged in misstep
of evolution smolders like oaths broken from
talking heads revealed
as trumpeting propaganda warlocks
and even in an infinite period of time
they are still liars
No longer concerned with if it curves
oscillates
stays flat
explodes
is empty
Only want to know
when it all ends.

Seemingly random change greets me
as a phase shift just below all surfaces
In front of the face the world
Julia sets me apart
takes my hands
turns them to branches with
all my lines blurring
Planting new seed values
endlessly looping on one another
fractals endlessly transforming
infinite
and
beautiful
chaotic determination
I'm all mixed states and
dreams of you
Each flutter of your translucent wings
manifesting all new hurricanes
I cannot control
what haunts us next
I let go
With each iteration
I am free.

What good is a ******'s love?
No good.
Unless you too are a ******.
And even then...well...
we'll get to that.
But here's the thing...
Most people will abandon you
when they see the unkempt hair
and glazed over eyes.
When the phone bill doesn't get paid
so they can't talk to anyone
besides you and your murmured incoherence.
When too many calls in to work pile up
along with the dishes and garbage
and they keep wondering how long
until they find you drowned in your own
*****.
When you won't stop scratching and
when you are just plain all around one hundred percent
unlikable and annoying.
They will abandon you.
But the fellow ******?
The fellow ****** will stand with you
and fight for you
until the end of time...
...so long as you've both got junk.
Holding spoons and needles and
spinning those lies right alongside you.
The fellow ****** will hold a candle
for you when all other light
is gone.
But once it runs out-
-the money or the junk
-once they get what they want
they move on
to find a new source.
So a ******'s love is much more intense.
Like nothing you'll ever feel.
But in the end, you'll still leave them or they'll leave you.
Did you ever think we would be anything else
when all our heroes were liars and thieves and loners?
Suicidal freaks and criminals and junkies?
In the end why did we want to be just like these people?
Did you think that we could really pull this off forever?
But hey...
I've got one last hit.
Want to love this ****** one last time?
You should know by now
with me
it's never about the drugs...
...it's all for love.

It is only the sweat drenched
fever murmurs
of shell shocked honest ones
that can
and will
fully explain
the powder burn residue
and necrotic psychology
of what they have seen