If clenching your jaw
is how your body prepares
for getting punched in the face
then what does that say
about my teeth so ground down
they're falling out?

I'm trying to learn how to stop hating myself
so that maybe
one day
I might even learn how to love myself

I think about the good things I have done
and try to understand the circumstances behind
all the not-so-good things I have said and done.

I think of the beautiful women
who maybe understand me better
than I understand myself

H is quitting a job she doesn't hate
because her boss told her that
she has to wear a god ****** bra
--I love her for her conviction
--she loves me, too, for some reason

A has got these voices in her head
and they're mad at her for being too busy this weekend to get ******.
--I love her for her tenacity
--she loves me, too, for some reason

M is off to Mexico
excited and afraid to pursue her dreams
instead of just talking about them
--I love her for her ambition
--she loves me, too, for some reason

If my love is reciprocated
by the three most beautiful women
I have ever had the pleasure of loving
perhaps I should find some way
to hate myself less
if only so
I can
love them more.

I've never shot up ******
it's not that I'm above it
I just don't know where to buy it
and even if I did
I'm too lazy to leave my house

I used to have two ****** friends
one is dead
one got sober
I don't know which one I envy more.

I wish that our bodies
had services lights
the way our cars do.

That way,
wherever I went,
I could light up the room
the way I used to
before I got so sick.

I quit drinking because
It made my stomach sick
I quit cutting myself because
I ran out of space for it

I quite being sad because
It took a lot to cry
I quit ******* up because
It takes less effort just to try

I don't have enough hope to be hopeless
I don't feel enough to be numb.
I've lost too much to claim
that I don't have anything left.

I don't know what's sadder:
that this has happened,
or that I would let it all
happen again.

Every time you cry
You look so beautiful
And every time you lie to me
I believe you
It happens all the time
It happens every night
And I don't even want it to be true
'Cause then you wouldn't be so far away
And I think that I love you more
With every step you take in the opposite direction
From me

And all those things you said
You said so many awful things
You said that your smile was chained down
Deep inside of you

For every time you lost yourself
I gave you twice of me
I ripped my soul in two
One for me
And one for you

And every time I try to love you
It fails in the exact same way
It fails just like it did the first time I
Laid my eyes upon you
Reached my hand out toward you
Felt your heart as hard as stone
Colder than the Winter that you left me

I do not know if I would still love you
if you were a happy person.
I do not know if you would still love me
if I was in less pain.
I do not know if I would still love you
if you were less depraved.
I do not know if you would still love me
if I hadn't pushed you away.

I do not know the point of the exercise
or why we dwell on what cannot change:
You are not a happy person
and nothing can fix my pain.
I claw away at those who love me
and you will always be
depraved.

When I see you in dreams
you are just as miserable
as I remember you to be.

When I see you in dreams
you still carry your desperation
your unadulterated shame
proudly impure upon your shoulders

When I see you in dreams
I find myself undone
by the same intense shock of
love and fear
that brought me to this point
to begin with:

where I can only see you in dreams
and we are both just as sad
as I remember us
to have been.

It is sad to see
how many people I
can love
without coming any closer
to loving myself.

i feel so empty
so do you
we feel so empty
all of us do

strangest friendship
we were not friends
we were
only
what we thought
we could see of each other
from the mirror

a splinter in my nail bed
i never can sleep
disconsolate perspectives
on what i can't see
left only to imagine
what we might have dreamed

i would like to spend
the remainder of my days
floating
alone in outer space

past the edge of the universe
where not even starlight could reach me
and I would float in the blackness
without sight or sound or heat
forever

no gravity to press down on my
shattered body
free from the dull ache
of titanium plates and screws
relief to cartilage ripped to shreds

but most importantly
i would be far too far away
for anyone to ask me
if i was okay
or if i needed help

Limitless sorrow defines my self
if that is my choice
I cannot tell.

Within this fear I will always dwell
if that is a shame
it's just as well.

I've defined my sorrow
with a series of clever, worn-out platitudes.
Something about those obscure synonyms
always made me feel unique --
like there was something inside of me
worth staying alive to find.
Something worthwhile
in some corner of my mind.

I would give you the world
Were it not a plague
I would give you my heart
Were it not fading away

and i never felt much sadder
than the day that we first met
because i knew it didn't matter
that one day you would forget

all the nights we spent together
and the days we stayed in bed
and the words that i would whimper
oh so softly as you slept

no i never would have pictured
just how hard i'd fall for you
but the gold it turned to silver
and my heart turned back to blue

i should have seen it coming
you warned me you were cold
but the silence doesnt hurt less
just because it was foretold

and i never felt much sadder
than the day that i confessed
that i loved you more than life itself
even though i wished for death

I have neither the time
nor the words
to actually write this poem.

My lunch break is almost over
and I have come in late
too many times already.

I'm too sick to write you this poem
or any of the others you would have
otherwise inspired.

I just liked the title.
Lovesick Lover

Isn't that fitting?

I'm smoking like I did before I met you.
Before and after
Each and every task.

When I was young I said I felt so old
I didn't know how much worse it'd get.

I feel so helpless in the backseat
Speed-complacent
car crash risk
Apparently, obviously,
worth taking.

Orange warm highway street lamps
Somniferous strobelights
melodic-hypnotic
through the blackred veil of my
Stubborn eyelids.

Highway streelights Like when I was twelve
and
Every Tuesday/Thursday
Mom picked me up from school
And drove me straight to
ACTS Acting Academy
In Northwest OKC.

How simple it was back then,
The only problem or
So it seemed
was
the 49 minute drive to and
Especially from.

...

Yet strangely so peaceful.


I had actual friends in acting class,
I waited all week to see them.

I practiced my monologue fifteen minutes everyday
Just to prove to dad
That I cared enough to justify the time and the money (mostly the money)
That mom had to spend
To drive me  tothe city twice a week
To see my friends
To see my friends from acting class.

How was I supposed to know
That those highway drives homes
9:15pm
Would be the most peaceful memory
I would ever remember to forget?
The last refuge of contentment
I would ever
to feel?

How was I supposed to know
How much worse it'd get?

Yet even then, age twelve,
Even then
all we thought of it was a burden.
Driving there and back
There and back
There and back

...

And of course mom felt that way, too.
Tired from long days of home health.
Most of that job was just driving somewhere
And somewhere else.
Yet eventually
Tacitly
Under the subtle strobeof orange warn highway street lights
She found herself more at home in that car
Than anywhere else in her limited bounds.

Slowly she found herself
speaking candidly
for once
To finally someone who would listen
Even if sadly it had to be
Her twelve year old son
Driving to the city.

Equal parts proud and deeply disturbed
At the realization that I was her best friend
She became mine, too.

Sometimes she spent that whole drive there
Having the same time ten minute conversation
Five times over
To Meema in the nursing home
(How sad vascular dementia must be)

And then there was driving home.

I was tired.
I fell asleep with
my iPod headphones
Blaring awful screamo melodrama.

Driving home she had only her thoughts.
How strange I now imagine she must have felt.
Orange warm streetlamp hypnosis
Freedom.

How many decades had she gone without those thoughts?
How many years had she gone to the grocery store after work?
How long had that credit card debt been compounding?
How long had she been asleep? -- Ambien sleep--years without a dream?

How many loops to that class
That pre-teen California pilot season prep class
Did she have to make
Until she
Finally
Had a thought
of her own?

I feel so helpless in the backseat.
All those lessons I learned
And forgot
And remembered
And tried so hard to forget again
In that Oklahoma City acting class
At twelve years old
Before it all got worse
Before it eventually got comparatively better again

Helpless even more now that I realize
That I've spent the last decade plus
Trying so hard to forget
How peacefully pretragic
Those Tuesday, Thursday twelve year old nights
Actually were.

Orange warm highway street lights
tracing by
Driving home tired.

I was twelve
learning how to be kind of happy

She was 45
Also learning
How to be kind of happy

As the highway street lights traced by
And we were both so desperate to be home
Yet also happy not
To be home yet.

And yet I always come back
Asking for more

And for some reason
At the depth of it all
I have fallen back into
the deepest groove of my own suffering.

I do not know how or why
this pain has come back.
Or why it refuses to leave.

Deep down
at the bottom of everything
I am surrounded --
By perfect monstrous silence
Echoing gently the constant reminder
Of my own isolation.

I haven't felt this alone in years.
At least not consciously so.
Face to face with failure:
The deepest kind of suffering.
The very essence of sadness.

The darkest part of darkness.

Nothing but this:
Alone again as always
Irrational misbehavior
Living always in a tortured instance.

The world isn't so bad
But the experience itself
Is a whole different thing.

I'd rather die right now
than walk inside and put on a happy face.
Splice myself open and drain away.

The inexplicable suffering of my life
Has taken hold of me
Mysterious, unsubtle.

Always and forever.

you spoke without speaking
i spoke without thinking

and as the final desperate words
killed what could have been kept
we smoked in silence outside
you gave me the last drag
but I declined
you took one more
and we resigned

and the first cold rain of the year
fell just a few hours later

Dance like nobody is watching
Because they aren't
except for me
and I am far too inside myself
To think much of it

Love is only as beautiful as it is depraved
Shadows are only as dark
as the light that casts them.
Life is only as happy and sad
as you need it to be.

Middle class tragicomedy turning darker everyday
breaching past the line of typical dysfunctional
with every dark blue bottle of ***** and
orange plastic pharmaceuticals fraudlently prescribed
black swollen bruises on mom's face
****** up you asleep drink in hand
with the tv still on drink
while mom cried in the youngest's child's bed
the eldest kicked out for doing drugs
me on the bathroom floor learning how to disembowl a razor
and carve it into my flesh.
West Texas camping trip when you bought a motorcycle
and said have fun
and I crashed into a ditch
and snapped my leg in half
and the helmet flew off
did you know that if you hit your head hard enough
everything before and after will feel like a dream?
and that's when it all got darker
as a 15 year kid dying in West Texas
having lost his will to live 1 year earlier on a plane leaving California
waking up in an ambulance
remembering nothing but knowing two things.
My name is Kyle, something bad has happened.
Born again in a hospital bed
surrounded by strangers claiming to be family.
Leg bones snapped in half
then drilled with titanium
and the pain never went away
not for a second
you took all of my pain pills
you held the medical bills over my head
you told me that it was my fault that I crashed
and yes it was my fault
but I didn't buy the ******* bike
and I didn't want to ride the ******* bike
and you can say whatever you want
because I'm crippled now
and my memory is broken
and I have a headache that doesn't go away
but deep in this broken body of mine
there's a silence that speaks for itself
there's a sadness that doesn't hate itself anymore
there's a tear that refuses to fall
there's a hatred reserved only for you
there's a love born out of spite
a beautiful tortured brilliant love
with room for everyone but you my loving father
my loving oblivious father
sick brained hateful father
and me your victim limping away
from the scene of your crime
that was my childhood.

thank you everyone
that's found anything from my words
your support has made things
much more worth doing.

Hope doesn't perch.
Hope isn't a smiling face
among a dismal crowd.
Hope isn't the light at the end
of the tunnel.

Hope is when the crows
grow full from the carrion of
a dead lamb and rest.
Hope is when the old man
having forgotten himself years ago
falls asleep one last time.

Hope is everything you've needed
after you didn't need it anymore.
Hope is the time after the noose tightens
and before you fade away.

Leaves dying not dead burning orange and
burning red
only fall to freeze soon instead
not even the sun and the cirrus painting gold
a sky too tired hold
much anything but of black or blue
can free my mind from thoughts of you

cars grumble home fences rust a little
stray cat sleeps alone we laugh and giggle

but every Sunday has to end
and Saturn's people wonder
if they'll ever love again
for them night is only 5 days away
before the drinks are poured
and the people come out to play.

silence sounds like something
and the darkness never cries
they believe in everything
but the tedium never dies.

Not so far away girl
still so impossibly far
why must we wait until sunrise
to fall asleep?

Why is this beauty only conceivable
after the bottle dripdrips empty?
sinking deeper and deeper into saturn's orbit

youthful vibrant fluffed up peacocks
clucking on about research chemicals
and music festivals and last night and 6 days before
about banking and obamacare
and oh, my they're all talking
all at once
talktalktalking about this this this and that
not even asking for audience
soundwaves echo into nothingness
screaming lungs void of substance
fleeting purposes
failed courtships
unheard unimportant words
and oh, my, what a tedious thing
the night has become
but to stay at home alone
would be even more unspeakable.

Outside the party across the street
there is a tree
splayed out overhead and undergound
soaking up carbon growing tall still growing
slightly sad tree breathing in the silence of our sighs
dancing fallen leaves wrapping up the deadspace around us
deadworld space where we two sit under the edge
of revelry and absurdity
laughing, drunk, with the moon and the stars and
for just a second
feeling
slightly less impossible.

What are you getting at?
Poetically dispassionate ink
pouring out of your mouths.
Standing half-naked here
with your nasty bits hanging out and dangling.

Fifth grade ******* contest,
tape measure microphone.

'His darkness is bigger than his!'
'Well yeah but his is darker.'
It's okay
maybe you're a grow-er and not a show-er.

Half-poised, microphone voice-box
tell me now, what parchment does
your pen ***** onto?

Caligraphy college degrees.
Upper-middle class tragicomedy.
Skin unscarred,
pretending to know
just how deep a razor blade can go.
Red ink looks close enough to blood I guess.

This vast sea of poetic words,
snotgreen and scrotumtightening.
With your absolute knowledge
of what Joyce was getting at
as he layed there dying and blind
imploring to the world:
"Does nobody understand?"

What awful things has the world done to you
to beget these howls of pain?
What about you
does this dimlylit place,
with it's black coffee and chicken sandwiches,
epitomize?
When was the last time your world was worth destroying?
How did you sleep last night?
Have you ever heard a bone snap in half?
What is your first thought when holding a sharp object?

What will these words prove
when you find that no one's listening?

Great Expectations


The moment after you were born
(which apparently was a great miracle)
they slapped your ***
took your footprints
wrote your name on an official certificate
wrapped you up and sent you home.
The doctors said you were healthy:
your parents said you were better than that.

And from then on you were to be exactly that.
Excellent in every way.
Tall.
Charming.
Wide-eyed.
Witty.
Strong.
Unbreakable.
A statue will be made of you.

Affectionately inscribed to
shine in the sun,
you've no need to know the darkness:
only the weak waste their breath
reveling in the moon,
howling the night away.

Great care was put into raising you.
You are not to take it for granted.
Do you not know how high
your parents had to fling you
for you to hit that pedestal so monolithic?

Expecting you to fly
without asking if you feared heights
or sought the soft grass instead.

Expecting you to eclipse the Sun
oh, so long you stared into it
asking how to fly so high
sun in your eyes
darkness burning in.

Expecting you to See the World
in all it's brilliant beauty
with those eclipses in your skull
with the abyss open eyes.

Given a pen to write great words
but I guess they never noticed
it had no ink.

Big bulging eyes expected to see everything.
Eyes taught to see the flaws in everything
eyes with nothing better to look at
but televisions and mirrors.

The bathroom mirror where you first realized
that you weren't good enough.
Hours spent staring at some ugly stranger
too proud for friends
too quiet for fame
too tired for talent.

A living collaboration of flaws
held together by bits of pasty skin
broken bones
and dark eye circles
by all the times you were called a failure
or all the times they said "you did your best"
but you called yourself a failure anyways.

Eyes like mirrors seeing eyes and windows
and eyes and glass barriers.
All those eyes swirling around you
seeing what they want to see,
you can only hope they don't see too much.
At least you've grown cynical enough
to know they're not looking for much to begin with
but even still your stomach grows weary.

Here you soar at the prime of your youth
surrounded by mirrors
eyes full of fluorescent lighting.
sleepy and stumbling.
Confused as to how anyone could
think of you as special and grand.
Confused at how everyone else is so much better
at simply living their lives.
Like they really didn't know that Life was
the hardest thing there ever is.

Words fallen upon distracted ears.

Eyes that are full of Life
but only the brighter half of it.
Eyes as windows staring at screens
texting all the silence away.
Eyes that are lost in Life
loving and living
taking every step forward
without feeling the weight to ask why.

Oh, and here you are,
sitting, perched on a street bench
watching the passer-bys go about their day.

Looking at those strange eyes
trying to see what they see.
Trying to see how anyone could fail to notice
that sad statue staring there.

All those times you watched
the ones you loved
stand in inconsolable silence
but if only you knew what to say...

...
Nights quiet

the sheen of the abyss reflecting their
sorrows back at them.

You found shelter in the darkest corner of existence
still expected to converse happily
still expected to live with a smile
still expected to hide your unfortunate understanding
of the way things really work
the lead role in the tragiccomedy of your own life
set on the absurd stage of our own gravity.

The gravity that is every day of your life
the aching in your bones as the alarm goes off
the stagger in your step as you stumble forward
the tears at night as you have to do it all over again.
The only thing temporary are those
crashing moments of happiness
that shine bright
but disappear with the thunder.

You're expected for great love
but you never expected the way your heart pounds
and your stomach turns
when you fight back the tears
standing naked there with your darkness hanging out.
Staring into a devastated face
seeing in perfect form a heart you've shattered.

It's like they don't know just how burdensome
these great expectations are.

But perhaps -- most importantly --
they don't understand
the beauty of a sunrise after a sleepless, crying night
or the gratitude felt from finding a legitimate hand to hold.

You are expected for great things,
but then again,
everyone thinks they are.
But you,
but me,
but all the rest of the people like us.
Let us leave this place
with the preoccupations and the pedestals.

Our bodies torn and torn again
worn down and weary but somehow
still stepping
strengthened by the expectations
we exchanged
for a peaceful sunset
and a good night's sleep.

For that little light
that we forgot shone
in these tired, confused, marvelous eyes.

Distress signals emmited from bioelectronic tendrils
blades under kneecaps
seeping into taste
smelling like Spring.
So many bodies kneeling on innocent grass
lined up and lined on
sitting in pews at the park
the limitless stretches of people and people
and everyone
everyone was there!
How magnificent! for the whole world to get together
and have a nice evening at the park
billions of feet stammering on billions more blades of grass
smelling like spring
smoderling summer sun
filling air rotting
sad little whimpers
inaudible under the mumble of the world
over the look in their eyes.
The heat jostled air
radiation poison
burning away life itself
keeping us all warm and alive inside.

so many people
everywhere and all around us
-- I had a thought
I wanted to write it down
before it got lost forever.
I tried.
The words twisted around as I wrote them
the pen melted in my hands
so that the the silly
silly silly words
stupid arrogant words too proud to be written down
I tried to make eloquent or something at all
I tried I tried
trust me i really tried
i didn't mean to be such a cottonmouthed disappointment
those silly words all swirled around and about
begging for anything real.
Hissed for one last moment
before the sun and the sound and the agony
twisted and snapped
melting away all that was
of the words on the paper
ofthe ink in the pen
of the shadows in my brain.
melting out dripdripping
tears as black as silence
blaring like ambient noise
I wish the words would understand
that the real real the world the real greybluechemical world
didn't want me living in it
anymore.
I don't know what I did to Life
to make it so upset
but I guess it just didn't want me hanging around,
said I never fit in well with the crowd.
Go find some other reality to bother.

And then it all set in,
0-60 in a second.
Here was your happiness
and here you are now.
And what an amazing distance that is.
when did those years go by?
why stand so sad with your soul in shreds?
Too afraid to set the strands on fire
so there they hung
ethereal chains jutting from every cell
chains that are a feast that you can't stomach
chains that are that sad song you can't listen to -anymore
chains that are that tear in your eye refusing to fall
all the loves lost if only you had just loved
who is this person in the mirror?
this blackeyed monster with eyes like sadness
and sleep like terror
with ink indignant ashamed of what you wrote
what you wrote deep down under those chains in you
mirror neuron pain must be felt
sadistic black mirror chained down and burning burning and melting and burning
and rambling
on and on and on and on and on and on
and you probably stopped reading long ago.

I wanted to write you a poem
I really did
Tried real hard to come up with some words
They didn't even have to be poetic or eloquent or whatever
Just had to be something.
Some sort of proof that anything happened at all.
Do you remember? Do you remember anything at all?
Xanax works in mysterious ways.
Like how our bodies fit into each other and how
we both have these ugly scars and how
you cried in my arms and I knew that I
couldn't say anything to make you feel any better because
I knew what you were going through
at least to an extent
I know enough about sad chemistry to know that words don't do much
but then again
I guess I didn't know about that other guy you're *******
until you told me  he saw your scars and called you a freak
and that was fine because I was still holding you
but then you tell me
you're still not over him
and even that is sad but fine.
I'm not here to judge
I'm not here to make things worse.
I'm not even here at all.
Because this isn't even a poem
And you aren't really a friend
And you can't love what you can't remember:

your lips on my cuts
me holding you tight
and how close it all felt
like how for a brief second it was all terrible and beautiful and
somehow okay all at once
but maybe you don't remember any of it.
And all that's fine
too
because
this isn't even a poem.
It doesn't even have
a proper
ending.

So you feel this way
but you don't know why.
And they feel that way
but won't say how.

Your brain whispers secrets
that they don't hear.
Your eyes see figures
with intentions unclear.

The smiles don't come
but their laughter looks true
and on the sidewalk there's a sad statue
with the same face as you.

This is an ode to Adderall,

that wonderful mixture of

dextroamphetamine sulfate

dextroamphetamine saccharate

amphetamine

aspartate monohydrate

and amphetamine sulfate capsules

that all combine together

to form a prescribable pill

questionably similar to the Schedule II controlled substance street drug

commonly refered to as "Speed."


This is an ode to the children

who are bundles of energy caged in a classroom

incapable of concentrating

on the miniscule tasks given to them

by pedagogical authorities that

promise societal success and economic happiness

to those who complete their work on time

without a fuss or a doubt as to why they're

filling in bubbles on paper in the first place.

The confused children who watch

as others with calmer brains

fixate eyes on textbooks

rather than out the window.


This is an ode to Society

deeming these individuals as broken

choosing to wound then medicate

rather than proliferate.

That took their inquisitiveness

and locked it in a book with the label "DISORDER"

stating that you will never be anything

unless you think and feel the same way we do.

And much like a mad doctor

lobotomizing those whom he thinks insane

they synthesized a pill

to dampen a torrential brilliance

allowing them to place their sedated children

back in the box where they belonged.


This is an ode to the college students

chained by academic standards

expected to excel towards great things

if only they reach that ethereal diploma.

The students who crave the artificial focus

the increased capacity for concentration

with the broadened spectrum of perception

the sense of purpose in the tedium

the ungodly ability to think clearly

and perform the meaningless tasks they expect of us.

The students who go through illegal means

to purchase said drug

to swallow or snort

and dive back into the mountain of responsibility

with a new found sense of productivity and motivation.

An ode to the students

unable to find purpose in studenthood

the ones who find more virtue in watching the sunset

burn clouds into firework oblivion

before then blessing us with uncritical night.

An ode to the students

who discover more education

in climbing to the top of a mountain

and yelling a nonsense decree of passion

just to watch the echo

bounce from shore to shore

in cathartic reverberation.

The ones

for which our pill

is the only possible manner

of assigning purpose to purposeless assignments.

These are the ones

who must binge

cram for days before

the big exams

going whole nights without sleep

or food.

The ones slowly cracking under the increasing pressure of academia

spending more time questioning why they must complete their homework

instead of actually completing it.


This is an ode to my brothers and sisters

who stand in horror at the mold we must fit into

crafted by an unknown unshakable entity.

The ones who lost the appeal of cookie-cutter success

in exchange for a small understanding

of the way things really work.

The cogs that twisted off the machine

and now sit lotus-posed in the corner.

My fellow birds with broken wings

still expected to fly.

My fellow carpenters expected to build their estates

yet not given the proper tools to do so.

The ones of cursed cold clarities

perfectly capable of clutching

those fifteen minutes of dynasty

yet refrain from doing so due to

the immaculate futility of it all.


This is an ode to a drug induced rant

that no one will read

the one that I chose to write

instead of doing my **** homework in the library

like a compliant student.


This is an ode to the pressure-oriented procrastinators

that delay and yet again delay

their petty necessary obligations due to purposeless and exhausted motivation.

Swallowing substances to summon some sort of incentive

to fill in the bubbles

and cater to the Society they find so confusing

the ones who only under influence of synthesized chemicals

find reason to squeeze into that culturebox

that cascades down a bumpy man-made conveyor belt

branding a diploma onto your forehead

injecting an occupation into your veins

transforming your pupils to dollar bill signs

demanding you breed children

to do the same as you have

and you'll never be happy unless you do these things

right?


This is an ode to those who reside in the shadows

of our broken social system

and conjure up great conversations

pertaining to everything and nothing

that are as wonderful and necessary

as the prints of your fingers

caressing down a comfortable torso

just before the sun rises

the untouchable indescribable realizations of life and love

that are completely irrelevant in their eyes

but are entirely necessary for our survival.


This is an ode to the overwhelming feeling of love

greatly exacerbated by a pharmaceutical delight

whereupon connections with other humans

become both incredibly appealing and oddly magnetic

for a few electric hours.

The oxygenating satisfaction felt

the instance just after the small talk architecture masks

fall to the floor

and right before we put them back on.


This is an ode to the minutes before the amphetamine crash

where the world still doesn't make sense

but we briefly don't mind

because a few fleeting moments of energy and purpose

in this otherwise detestable confine of reality

are all you can really ask for

as you complete the assignments

then step outside

to smoke yet another cigarette (they're absolutely wonderful on Adderall try it some time it'll **** you slowly but then again what won't?)

only to witness our Sun

breeding fire clouds in the east

illuminating the Western Abyss into purple-gold spectral oblivion

and in consequence therefore

between puffs of a necessary cigarette

you grin to yourself in quiet victory.


This is an ode to misaligned priorities

to those who when walking to everimportant final examinations

think not of the curriculum beaten into their skulls

but take careful measure to step on every crack on the sidewalk

who stare not towards the future

but to the beautiful reflection reflecting back from the broken mirrors

that are the weary days and weary ways

of this curious existence.

To those when stepping into the absurd spotlight of Society

unapologetically proclaim:


"Though I must play your game,

you will never win."

It was just past midnight when he fell asleep
which was impressively late considering how much whiskey he had consumed.
The dream began with her,
because, honestly, a bad dream wouldn't be complete
without her in it.
They sat on a vast lake in a small boat
with the moonlight blessing them
for the first time in a long while.

I believe that the two were happy
but despite this fallacy
he still wasn't aware that he was dreaming.

As they laughed
a spider came crawling into the boat.
He was too starled to wonder how it followed them into the water,
andas it's feet scuttered and his stomach guttered
the girl muttered "**** it, please, **** it."
But when he extended his fingers to do the deed
the spider turned to reveal
a bloodshot eye in the center of it's black back.
It's pupil was an hourglass, and time was running out.

So disturbed now from the specter that his fingers wavered
and the widow-maker pounced, biting first his finger
then his wrist, then his heart.

He fell from the boat.
The spider disappeared into blackness.
After a few minutes of breathless panic
he emerged at the shallow end of the swimming pool
that must have been there all along.

She was on dry land
and in his panic he didn't bother to question
how she made it to safety without him
with such ease
why she didn't bother to help
or why she didn't seem too alarmed
at the fact that he was now dying.

He was now only a few steps away from a large crowd,
I think he said something to her

So here was the task of seeking help
in a faceless mass of people
who also didn't seem the slightest bit concerned
over the fact
that venom was coursing through his veins
and dread was settling deep into his heart.

He searched for someone to drive him
to a hospital or a bed
or even just to watch him die so long as they'd sit and pretend to care
over the fact that he would no longer exist.
He realized that she could be that person,
wondered why he hadn't thought of her in the first place.
He turned around to find her but she was gone.

Maybe she was offended that he hadn't thought of her sooner
in his time of dying, maybe she, too, didn't see much seriousness
in his now worsening condition.

His steps grew heavier,
the eyes were losing focus.

Searching the faces looking for her,
she was either gone
or had melted into to the solidarity that seemed to loathe him so much.
They were all faceless, hostile,
avoiding him like the plague
or grabbing at him like a villain.
One man punched his teeth so forcefully
that his jaw no longer opened,
(but in all reality he was probably just
grinding his teeth in his sleep,
but the venom was sinking deeper
and he could not wake up.)

He ran, no one would help him so he ran.
There was his car,
there were his keys.
There were his shaking hands
and his fading vision
and apparently someone else was in the passenger seat
telling him that he was too ****** up to drive
someone who failed to see the distinction between alcohol
and venom but even still he drove because this person was no friend
not even a person
he never saw his face while his heart pounded
and the words slurred together
and she was not there but now was no time to think of her
and the hourglass was running out and he knew it
embarrassing tears dripped as the engine roared and his eyes darkened
the landscape all blended together i don't thinkhis mind could
dream things up quickly enough as he sped by
which might eexplain why he suddenly was standing in the desert
the car was gone the faces were gone
and he thhought "might as well have a last cigarette before i ******* die"

his hands didn't work and he couldn't grab the lighter
even if he could his mouth was still clamped shut
couldn't yell for help even if people would care
the crowd was back they were all yelling something
but it was no matter now light was leaving and no one seemed too concerned
she was gone and i'm not sure she ever was

thus he faded away without anyone to look him in the eye
and agree with him that something terrible was happening to him

The world grew black.
The stars went dim.
His heart hurt.
Their laughter faded
and he died alone.

And so I awoke to live my day
with this dream deep in my mind.
Alive to live another day,
with venom in my veins
and darkness in my heart
that no one seems to notice
or care about.

We have endured these cold days
with tired eyes,
the sun rose behind ominious clouds
only to set in slow motion
as an interminable specter.
Just when you prayed for night
you found yourself colder than ever
and alone.

Under inadequate shelter
from your cold thoughts you tried
to forget those things
that made you feel this way
in the first place.

You tried to feel your heart
but it was as cold as stone.
Impossible to forget
all the reasons and the people
and the sadness and the pain
that brought you and I to these dark corners
in the first place.

It was too cold to go outside
and ask the stars.

But now, the sun is out
and my head has cleared.
A cool breeze under a warm sun
was all it took
to blow those terrible thoughts away.

How nice, to wake up with sunlight in my eyes.
To wake up without dreaming of you,
to step outside without resentment,
to feel the grass on my feet
and to know that I am starting to heal.

That was all I needed:
a day in the sun
to relish what I can't comprehend
and shed the sadness
you tried to give me.

I do not lament the clouds:
days like these don't deserve the sunlight;
skin so raw doesn't deserve to blister and blight.
A day that is built
for us to sit and watch the flowers wilt.

You let the silence speak for you
(as it tends to do.)
Love is a word that is hard to define
try hard enough and maybe you'll see that line
between the synapse and the feeling
between the prayer and the kneeling.
The difference between a spasm and desire,
a flashlight and a fire.
The difference between poetic words and idle chatter.
Yet all in all, none of this matters.

None of it matters when the moon looms over me
and no one is here to watch me bleed.
You can pluck the plant our sadness grew:
we fell in love, that much is true.
But things run so much deeper than this
and losing my kiss
won't fix any of this.

Since I know these words will be lost in the abyss
not to be read or cared for by your or by them,
I write without fear of infamy, and without any wish
of your hand in my hand ever again.

I am proud to say that you were once my lover:
we need lots of things, but we don't need each other.

Today the sun is not the sun;
the moon is not the moon.
I ask them for clarity;
they give me only silence.

No, just nights ago
did I marvel at the soothing legitimacy
of those celestial bodies.

Sat in the woods under lucent light
and rummaged together some sort of gravity,
the closest I've ever come
to making something beautiful.
Here was my heart,
filled with hope.

Here was the moon,
so close as to stare back.
The others didn't notice
the tears that dripped
from crater to crater.
Or that cheshire-cat grin,
the devious omniscience
of the closest thing to god
that I've ever known.

Only nights ago,
as I sat with light in my veins
and glasses off,
while the strings of the universe
resonated a brief harmony in me.
For once
I cherished what I couldn't comprehend.

Yet that moon set
and here is a hollow replacement with a plastic smile
stuck in its place.

That music is not here anymore:
an echo forever
reverberating in an alternate reality.

...Yet I am stuck Here:
Here is a child
Here is his sadness
Here is his smile
Here are his words
Here is his heart
Here is me.

Here was your voice,
and now it's gone.

There are beautiful words in my mind
aching to inform you
of my admiration towards your heart,
my longing for your lips
of the beauty in the fragile lines of your palm.

So many things to be said
about you and about us.

But if my mind is a pen
and you are the ink
I suppose that
there isn't much to be said
after all.
Because your silence is
beyond-noticeable
and my weariness is
growinggreater.

And those words are fading
with every quiet night
when you aren't here
and the phone won't ring.

A naked body next to yours
won't make you feel
less alone.

A kiss as soft as moss
won't quell
the shadow's voice.

A clean escape
won't ease your steps
as you walk away.

But those things don't matter much,
because it's dark outside
and cold inside
and you can't sleep
and the phone won't ring.

From the first moment of conception,
as yours cells sprang to pull apart from one another
as if making two from one was an admirable accomplishmen
excellence was expected from you.
"Excel boldly towards great expectations!"
Affectionately inscribed to
shine in the sun.

All those eyes swirling around you
insisting you smile so bright.
Bloom to a flower despite the rocky soil
of suburban streets.

Master your studies
Love like a poet
Live like a saint
Make lots of friends
Make no mistakes
Contribute to history
**** like a champ
Take the pain in stride
Then die like a hero

Great care was put into raising you.
Your parents stood from a pedestal
and flung you into the sky
expecting you to fly
despite your feeble limbs
and fear of heights.
Flying through the air with
eyes like eclipses.
Given a pen to write great words
...guess they never noticed it had no ink.

You stand in the mirror for hours
they think you a narcissist.
You couldn't be far from it,
just confused.
Confused as to how anyone could
think of you as special and grand.
Confused at how everyone else is so much better
at simply living their lives.
Like it weren't such a great,
tremendous ordeal.

It's like no one else notices the beauty
in watching two specks of dust
converse in the breeze.
How is no one else fascinated at sitting, perched
on a street bench
watching the passer-bys go about their days?

Staring at those strange eyes
trying to see what they see.
Trying to see how anyone could fail to notice
those corpses for eyes you have.
Eyes where the iris wilted;
nothing left but pupil.
Black, monstrous pupil.

All those times you watched
the ones you loved
stand in horror at those eyes.
The sheen of night reflecting their
portrait back to them.
Seeing far too much of the world.
Seeing what they don't see.
Monstrous things, terrible things.
You want to scream these overwhelming thoughts to the world but
theysuffocateamidtheblareofbusystreets.
Words fallen upon distracted ears.

You found shelter in the darkest corner of existence
still expected to converse happily
still expected to live with a smile
still expected to hide your unfortunate understanding
of the way things really worked
in this absurd world in our infinite Universe.
The abyss gazes also
and its faced has likened to yours.

You do not fear eternity
eternity is every day of your life
the only thing temporary are those fleeting seconds
of happiness that others seem to reside in.

But I shouldn't say that you don't care.
You do
You can't help but care.
Hell, you tried not to. You really tried.
Tried not to care for the quiet girl across the room,
or for the gutter cats with no bowl of food
the children across the world
whose problems are so much worse than yours.
You've fallen in love so hard you tore you heart in two
one for him and one for you, one for her and one for you.
All those countless times the moonlight messenger solemnly informed you
that your love died in a tomb, never to be revived.
You looked to the sky
but it was cloudy,
there weren't even any stars to defy.

You're expected for great love
but you never expected the way your heart pounds
and your stomach turns
when you fight back the tears
of a great love lost.
Staring into a devastated face
seeing in perfect form a heart you've shattered.

It's like they don't know just how burdensome
these great expectations are.

But perhaps -- most importantly --
they don't understand
the beauty of a sunrise after a sleepless, crying night
or the gratitude felt from finding a legitimate hand to hold.

You are expected for great things,
everyone thinks they are.
Let them earn their degrees
to live in boxes with greatly expected children.
Let them live their lives, they are just trying to be happy.

But you, but me, but all the rest of the people like us.
Let us leave this place
with the preoccupations and the pedestals.

Our bodies strengthened by the expectations we abandoned in exchange
for a peaceful sunset and that little light
we forgot shone
in these tired, confused, marvelous eyes.

Well, here we are:
stuck in the ambivalent winds
of our landlocked state.

Warm mornings
without warning
curse us with cold
before the clock tower strikes four times.

The landlocked people dressed for warmth
then scurried for shelter as the chill
seeped into their bones.
Fearing cold they hide their brains
safe from love, safe from pain.
It's like they don't even know
to just wait five minutes.
It'll all be different in five minutes.

In five minutes there will be time
Time for
floods and droughts
ice and flash fires
infinite wrath, infinite despair.

Trust in Oklahoma means
to stand on a faulty bridge
and fain stability.

Looking West in Oklahoma means absolutely nothing
There is flat in all directions.

And so, here we are:
landlocked lovers
amid a complacent population.

Let us not trust weather,
it can not make up its mind.
Let us not trust the wilted Mistletoe
the only flowers I need are in your eyes.
Let us not fear the cold or the heat
in five minutes there will still be time
to blanket ourselves in warmth
or strip ourselves bare
in the devious Sun.

And they say it'll all get better
(eventually!)
That all these things will vanish
with time.
I am far too young to know of pain,
far too proud to ask for help
far too tired to leave my bed
far too ****** to care.

No one warned me that life was this long
or that every second of sadness
is a lifetime
compared to those fleeting months of happiness
that disappear like thunder in the storm.

No one likes poetry about being sad
written by pretentious college students
read by strangers on the internet.

But I've once been told to write what's in my heart
and writing about sadness
is better than writing about nothing.

Cigarette for breakfast
at least I still have the energy for that.
Panic attack last night
at least something can raise my heartbeat.

A wish that my bed was a casket
at least there's one conviction that doesn't change
after the night ends
and after the sun rises.

A path lined with shards of glass
from crystalline tears
and secret glances
the brief encounters
the blank stares
the nights spent searching for what is gone
or forcing breaths into flattened lungs

the pain of stepping on all those hearts
that I have shattered.

True: tall, handsome, writes poems
and makes them smile, even when he can't.
Ultimately left alone to walk
this path of shattered glass.

I would shatter them all again,
if it meant I could feel anything at all from their love,
if only just the feeling
of glass in my steps
and regret in their souls.

I really wish this wasn't my most read poem, it was a ****** experiment of mine that doesn't have much behind it. Oh, well...






I,
Not
Too
Pleasant

Every
Sky
Feels
Joyous

In the
Near future, watching
Them
Play

Everyone
See, it's time to
Feel happy and
Just right.

Inside where I stay
Neither happy nor
Thwarted by their accusations of
Perdition.

Everyone else
Smiles but him.
Forget it,
Just forget him.

Interminable are the
Nights
That
Pain brings.

Eternal are the
Scowls
For dark ones like you.
Just forget it, let's play.

Et Cetera.
Interminable.

I'm not sure if anyone
I have ever loved
ever truly
understood or felt
the awful things that I think
and feel.

The sadness
The mania
The nights alone
on the bathroom floor or the ***** carpet
tearing into myself
because the blood kept me sane.
That curious yearning for death
that I've carried with me
for all those years now.

Not sure if anyone I've ever known
has ever seen the emptiness in my eyes
without standing in horror at their reflection
staring back at them

I do not know, maybe they have.
This is quite possible.

But Stay,
or (perhaps) but Soft!
or but any of those other decrees of feeling
from those sad protagonists
whose tragic lives came before me,
saying "What light yonder…"
before falling into the arms
of the only person in the world
who came piece them together.

But Still, my lover,
your hand
in my hand
is the only anchor I can rely on
in this Dread with 5 Acts
and no intermission.

Sauntering the night away
among Suburban streets
with the cars
the light pollution
the concrete
and all those other signs of humanity
that writers before me loathed so much.

True, Thoreau may admire
an alchemical need for walking
every day and every night
in order to stay sane.
Yet he would shun my use of an
mp3 player
as "too technological"
or "too inorganic."

Yet as I make my way
through paved streets
why does the music
fit my steps so well?

And if the Romantics
would hate my headphones,
why does every happy song
remind me, with a smile, of her?

The sun recedes into the horizon.
The moon shines an incandescent sliver.
The stars flicker, briefly.

Oh, so briefly do they flicker.
Eternal beacons existing to remind us of our own insignificance.
Out there, somewhere, is something else;
out there, somewhere, is something new.
Something new in this world composed so wholly
of odds and ends
of what-have-yous...
what-ifs, so many what-ifs.
So many what-ifs.

There is a life to be lived
where the mornings aren't so painful,
and the nights aren't so meaningless.
A life where I try to smile
and I actually smile.
Where holding a hand
or kissing a collarbone
are gestures worth the risk.
Ripe with legitimacy
will I fall in love again.

Beautiful words to be written.
Beautiful women to fall in love with.
Beautiful this and beautiful that
and beautiful everything in between.

So when the stars appear
and try to convince me of my own nothingness,
I shall fly past those nets,
quietly telling Orion
that this is my life

and I do not deserve to feel this way.

I refuse to continue existing
without beauty and purpose
in the marrow of my fragile bones.