I confronted my own smile
cursed in magenta
and alum
dysregulating away
from hitting its mark

It had been cheating again
wayward and wanton
thinking I was not watching
its curved tinctures imagining
them twitching

this is what I came to see
with its feet up captaining
coffee and papers, strewn,
of course, about, about that
time you came

I've never
written anything
I don't think
I've never
thought anything
I don't feel
I've never
felt anything
I don't believe
I've never
believed anything
I don't know
I've never
known anything
I know

I am just
this unconnected
thing

Flailing in space
as life's way
to waste

Had to be given
a name
didn't I

Somewhere thankfulness shows up with gratitude and you feel this glowing glow and for just a moment you're the TV show and you have the glowing glow this is a real thing this vibe if futile some percentage of the time

I have no distance to keep
nor a pattern to seek
I've closed my eyes
to not see my lies
and now a brushing touch
isn't too much

the video
hesitates
and stutters
     no wait
ers
that  that that
that's my life

drinking future
smoothness
  no wait
drinking now
spoonfuls
gulping
missing
splashing
yeah

mean
to mean

Will you take me
from here
I think at you

Please don't **** me
I grit at you
My fear

I broke into
where I save
my soul

Had to have
that inner
gold

Sould into
I expect
denial

All of these
capitalizations
No nuances
Just slights
of hand
Major league
swings
no hits
Air stepping
aside
Scenes often
repeated
Gunning again
shocks and after
falter and flail
today's distance
has been run

I'm still banging
my head
off of your death
as if

There is one time
I cannot

Was the darkness right
about the light being

I am in danger
the  danger of
the danger of
clambering out
of this thing
seeing this thing
that isn't grand
that is a chain
I would clamber
I would climb
I would rest here
Really I would

I've run out of the space I had
to get going to get up to speed
and the ramp the ramp I ran up
it ended it ended before I wanted
it to end

So I've been
just like you've
been

Spinning
seeking
trying

unspun
nightly
now

and here
just here
'gain

I sink beneath waves
knees exclaiming kicks
I do not execute or
anything I just look

No redemption none
no one redeemed nothing
pulled back to here or here

Why are you leaving me
oh why why why
are you leaving me
don't leave me don't
leave me please don't
leave me please

I am littered
across this
landscape

Scattered
even shattered
I've become bits

Before the lights
lose their power
I glitter I glint

Thousands as if
rings ran around
red things beating

Before the light
fails and I darken
amongst chances

collect me before
something anything
arrives and thrives

Nice shot
this thought
in this barrel

to be triggered
bayou
by you

knifing again
and again
and and and

carved of time
waiting art
unpaints

a nice picture
executed
perfectly

Attended the funeral
of my best friend today

Life goes out inexplicably
leaving confusion behind

and carries on against me
against my heart against

my breathing without
desperation as if I could be

not desperate to see you
not desperate to know

some **** thing any
**** thing other than

Remember
everything
is loosely based
on reality

My sound is less
I acerbate squarely
on the keystroke
a weakened ka-lick
of delivery

Then when
my head
begins to sag
I know
my neck
pinches
and I'm
back
for
a few lines

I have to consider
I thought what

I understood to be
expected

I saw old actors
and turned away

It will be better
I felt assured

I'll accept no false transit
as I stand up finger up
just do it to get it
moving on
as I stand up
remembering how
and then spasm
of unused
*******
pressed back

I was raging
I really was
I was caustic
aiming
to dissolve
all all
memory e
take out
the best
so's not
to feel
its absence

My life is
a bunch
of half-done
abandoned things
like

Scrambling, I assure you,
from a distance
try get over those commas
will ya
I can't find the ****
to whatever this distance

is

and am ambivalent maybe
or not about what not
and
well
you

can this be crossed
is this my shell
clamming up
footing off

snick snick
something is
advancing
subterranean
stranger
I know

When you hear a new voice
and it comes from inside you
and you realize it was always

Poetry is laughably
serious
If it gets you

At what point
must we divide
Prospero?

It's when I was
inserted
involuntarily
into the
universe
that the
trouble
started

A mysterious woman
reached out to me
online yes online
and asked me
what are you looking for?
someone, I said, with a huge
and cleverlerly broke it in two
sense of humor
"please send me a picture of yours
this is non-negotiable"
she sent me a picture
and, well, I checked the box
anyway

This arcing line
we know
this line
as it rises away
crests its charge
and begins to fall
gracefully
then lands
ungainly

I have no idea
I didn't even
write this

Nobody hears
anything
  I love you
ever

Someone said
in my head
about
my poetry

Gifts

Having never seen
the next line

Some version of you
accreting
stalagmite be you

Some version of you
inflaming
coarse-ware are you

Some version of you
concluding
am-ending by you

flesh hostages of mind
ignored ache in signs
well what did you find
signaling low decline

flesh given up on its
compass its direction its
falling down its grit
and i think this is it

what's it I fallen in
hi recognizing kin
and this immoral din
the cacophony I'm in

can't see around when
in dark water pens
its trial-ing rants rends
nothing so much as ends

I am
one dragon away
from catching fire

I've been never
and once upon
a time
And I never
knew the angle
bending
To suit the shape
of always
running

I hit him
in the head
in the  broken
spaces
of knowing
I know
I did

The strings of
"That's bad"
Play in my head
Play in my head
A webbing, a netting
a wobbling warbling
wrought stringery
would be ringery of
shoulds and oughts
soughts and naughts
expensively bought
making ******
thoughts

and that's the
big swinging

think I think
I have a line

in my sand
now its here

cross it there
to indicate

a willingness
to unbutton

dark trousers &
frothy thoughts

I have rants
they are
the in-thing
So many
perhaps
I should
number
'em
Apply
nicknames
sort them
in order
of likelihood
to save
the universe
flat tepid rants
for sale
it turns out

The hokeyness of time
its environs and its chum
change
Taking up all this space
occupying restlessly
ever
The next door neighbor's
fenced-in green acre
rising
And while you're sorting thru
waves, lines and knots
tangle
Laughing or is that coughing
with here's the thing
again
If I can find you reach you
settle somehow in you
convey
Oh the center of thought
and say all 'bout the laying
of now

I need water and
a rub down
because I have
been thrashing
against you
or my imagined
you you you
every **** thing

The tilt moves
and I am leaning
down again
I spin myself
right roun' or
some such thing
and the lean in
I feel it like
it smashes
not this time
my foreleg 'tracts
and springs