My hands do things I’m not aware of

They hide my keys
In the pockets
Of freshly laundered pants

Behind
Under
Inside many
Many
Pieces of furniture

Dangling from my bicycle lock
(For 3 hours)

Hanging from the front door lock
(All day long)

By a flower growing
In the crack
Of a sidewalk
That I had knelt down
To examine

In the fridge
Yeah
I know

My hands lock my keys up
In the backyard shed

In the trunk of a car

In a car’s ignition
With the motor running
No joke

And of course
Inside my house
While I am
Outside my house

One day my hands
Unbeknownst to me
Will lock all of the doors
And throw all of the keys
Away

At this point in my life
I’m fairly certain
I’ve told more falsehoods than truths
And most of them to my gullible self

I’m trying to remedy that
In the hope of hating myself just a little bit less
(Wait that’s not true)
In the hope of being forgiven if I’m found out
Which, I guess
Is why I’m writing this dumb poem
(Wait that’s not quite true;
I think this poem — and I
Are rather clever)

Apparently now
If you end a text message with a period
It means you’re *******
Because who needs a period
When each of your utterances
Is circumscribed
By a thought bubble

At least that’s what I heard
On a podcast
(I’m an old)

So if I text you
And use punctuation
Will you take offense?

Will you be able to tell
My old-school emojis
From that punctuation?

I certainly hope so :-/

Writing things down
Feels like
Plucking hummingbirds
From inside my head
And holding them
In the palms of my hands
In front of me
So that I can
Eye them
Microscopically
Then
Let them go
And finally
Finally
Exhale

So many years
Feeling bad about myself
Berating my being
For being
Fundamentally flawed
Fragmented
Irreparable

I wish someone had noticed
Me
Pulling the hair off of my head
Me
Flailing about
Like a trout
Out of water
Me
Stepping on
All of the rakes
Unintentionally
But also
Sometimes
Fully aware
Of where
They were lurking in the grass

And I wish they’d said
To me
Stop
Stop
Stop.
Breathe.
Look around.
You’re ok.
You’re ok.
You’re beautiful
And young
And you couldn’t possibly know
How quickly time runs away.
So stop.
Stop saying
What’s wrong with me?!
You can stop
Because I’m here
To tell you.

What is wrong
With you
Is
That life
Fooled you
Into thinking
That there’s something wrong
With you.

I want to fly out of myself
And soar and dive
And forget I was ever born

I want to be borne aloft
By heat and wind and rain
And the scent
Of a lilac-laced evening
In spring

I want to fly out of myself
And away
Far away
From
you

Grackles
Pecking at the lawn.
Pulling out terrified worms

Grass
Still wet from spring
Showers. Bright emerald green

Green
Sunlight hitting the blades
Just right. Backyard lushness

Grief
Already grieving for the
End of summer. Why?

I was nine years old
I looked at my body
In the bathroom mirror
And crumbled to the floor
And cried
And thought
(Seriously this is what I literally told myself)
I’m falling apart
Preteen drama queen

One day I’ll peel myself off
Of that floor
I hope

Music doesn’t belong to me
It never has
I thought I’d discovered it

Well, actually I did
It’s just that others
Had gotten there before me

I wanted it to be mine
Because
It made me feel
Special
Resplendent
Alone but
Less so

So many dead musicians
So many unborn
So many much better than I

It’s ok

Because I
Discovered music

I get it why people believe in god
I get it
It’s nice to have
A voice inside your head
Telling you
Everything is going to be ok

I’d rather let
The dowsing rods
Of my heart
Lead me to where
I can dig down
And divine
What is definitely
Not ok

Broken
Broken
Broke
My back is broken
It pulls the air
Out of my lungs and
Silences
My song

I’m trying to write
Something
Something
That’s not about :
- me
- me
- me; or
- dread

I’m failing
Miserably

Gardening involves killing
Worms
Many of them

Think
Before you dig

Are the roses
Worth
The guilt?

You don’t have to write everything down
In one poem
You’ll get to
Every little
Piece of mind
Eventually

Now sleep

The world is burning
And drowning
And trying very hard
To get rid of the infestation
We have become
And all I can think of doing
Is writing poetry or jerking off
Which I think you’ll agree
Are basically the same thing