Twenty times two is twenty-two;
I've got all of five years on you.
Please paint me in a hue that pleases your palatte.
I hope you brought enough blue.

I find myself longing for something I used to be able to do when I was half my age. Something that now seems way more complicated than it used to be.

I miss lying on the floor of a dark bedroom, staring up at the ceiling while listening to songs on vinyl.

Such a simple recipe,
one would think it'd be pretty simple to recreate,
but they'd be mistaken.

I miss lying on the carpeted floor of my best friend's bedroom, listening to beautiful songs while watching her ceiling fan spin slow circles in the dark.

Sometimes, we don't realize how rare certain ingredients are until we find ourselves without them. Something that used to seem so abundant, so easily accessible - now gone. Long gone.

I miss lying on the carpet next to the one I thought I was in love with, the tips of our heads nearly touching, feeling tempted to just move my hand over ever so slightly to grasp hers, while listening to her records in the dark.

Such simple things that used to seem so close.
Now, so far away.

What happens to deleted poems?
Do they go to the same place as aborted children?
Somewhere between heaven and hell.
A purgatory perpetuated by the misery of doubting one's self.
Maybe they condense into clouds like vapor into rain,
only to eventually fall back down upon our heads again.
In the pained expression you wear on your face,
I can read nearly a thousand words unsaid.

What I told you yesterday had an impact on tonight.
Combined with what I said today makes it kind of frightening.
I've been extra-sensitive to coincidences lately.
My mind readily noticing when irony strikes.

If I've told you twice, then I've might as well told you a thousand times:
my friends are not good people,
and I'm not very nice,
So take a hike.

What I said two thousand years ago just echoed back tonight.
Recalled saying it just yesterday,
back in a different life:
My friends are all I have,
and they make me feel alright,
so if you've got a problem then go and take a hike.

Ninety million years ago,
dinosaurs roamed the earth.
The bulky massive precursors
to all of my friends' births.
They say a man can be judged by the company he keeps,
and these are all just metaphors,
but we've got claws and jagged teeth,
so come and get yours.

I spend my time with predators
learning to prey on the weak.
They accept me because I know all of their secrets
in a language I've spent two-hundred million years learning how to speak.

I've been extra-sensitive to coincidences lately,
like how all of my friends have such thick skin.
I suppose it's got something to do with my past lives,
the way they let me in.

I said it yesterday and I'll say it again.
Stegosaurus never stood a chance against Tyrannosaurus.
A well known fact amongst my friends;
Believers of evolution and survival of the fittest.
One day we'll rule the earth again.

I felt the switch engage,
and wondered why you couldn't do the same for me.
This car can go 140 babe, and it ain't got no roll-cage.
If only women could respond as quickly as machines.
Just put the pedal to the metal sweetheart,
so hang on to your seat.
I gave you a baby.
I bought you a ring.
I told you that I love you.
This is how you thank me?
Oh no.
You got a little more than you bargained for
when you asked for a ride home.
You've got another thing coming.
Like that semi headed right for us.
Just hear that engine sing!
Like that little piece of me and you.
If you think that it should die,
then why don't we die too!?
Let's all go out together,
like one, two, and little three.
We can haunt this road forever;
we'll be a ghostly family!

241 and I'm almost done.
Drink until the sun comes up.
Making room for two with one.
More is never quite enough.

Drain it down then get filled up.
I felt empty til you showed up.
Energized now,
I'll try my luck.

"Hey girl, do you wanna F*?"

"What you need is a true friend.
A girlfriend/boyfriend.
Someone to play house with and make pretend.
2.5 kids and a white picket fence.
A dog and/or cat - you can't forget about that."
(I see a red door and I want it painted black.)
"What you need is a woman,
or maybe a man."
I took the **** prescription
and threw it into the trash can.

The prince and the pauper.
The princess and peasant.
Perpetuating old cliches,
because aren't the differences pleasant?

Romance needs some room to play.
Fill in those gaps of mystery
with grandoise schemes and complex games.

Everyone's a winner.

The beauty and the beast.
The ******* and the tease.
The sheltered ones who live in dreams,
and the streetwise kids who do as they please.

Everyone loves a mystery,
but old cliches only capture so much.
Why do we need a conflict of different world views
to pluck the strings of our hearts?

Music inspires my poetry.
Lyrics describe my life.
I'm in love with the sounds that capture my soul.
I'll sacrifice it all for the sake of a melody.

My heart pumps in tandem to this beat.
Three or four minutes to relieve all strife.
If I get into a fatal car wreck tonight,
I want this song to be playing.

When I put pressure on piano keys it's like I'm freeing myself.
Pouring it all out between the notes.
It speaks to me and here's what it's saying:
This is my release.

The crownless head is unbearably light,
while the body floats off into the night,
with limbs popping like balloons against a jagged sky.

Fools pressed and folded inside paper walls.
The echo of one passionate wail can tear this whole thing apart,
but to think twice would be to think for far too long.

The trick is to convince yourself that you're not only dreaming.
That this scene features more than just one meaning:
To wake up screaming in a silent movie.
To spew vibrant ***** all over these monochrome paintings.

(To dance in a bathroom while the discharge of bowels are drowning down the bowl.)

To crease rays until your shadowed mainstay bathes in fire -
stealing meaning from featureless things to replace the ones you've been leaking your whole life.

I fear I might be here all night,
tuned to this droll channel of jokes' echoes and the laughter of dead folks.

Tomorrow they'll find me in the dawn's gray light,
(chair slowly turning around on its own,)
face skewed and awry;
blank eyes staring inside my skull.

The Sad Boy woke up and thought,
"Something feels different . . . "
though he couldn't quite be sure what it was.
Whether a lessening of one thing or an increase of the other,
he simply turned the pillow over then went back to sleep,
wondering.

If you were grey,
I'd show you all the shades between white and black.

If you were suffering,
I'd be your heart attack.

If you were spinning,
I'd be the equilibrium
to right your world so out of whack.

If you were poor,
I'd barge through the door
with both hands full of cash.

If you were a pool,
I'd dive off the high-board
just to make a splash.

If you were dead,
I'd sell my soul,
just to get you back.

From raw to refined.
A simple word, ill-defined.
Let's not get hung up on semantics,
but instead,
romanticize everything we've ever said;
about love,
about loss,
about life.
Everything is meaningless until it's been applied.

A day full of retail therapy
punctuated by anti-capitalism posts on facebook propogated by a person I've known since kindergarten.

Life can be funny in a way that doesn't make you laugh,
but at least it tries.
Isn't that enough?

I got mean-mugged by a stranger's bulldog through a window-front while folding my laundry on top of a surfboard that'd been repurposed as a table.

Purposes can be rearranged.
Full moons can rise over days that were strange, only to turn them into stranger nights.
But the strange can make things interesting sometimes.
That's got to count for something, right?

First day off after a month and a half of long days at sea.
I blew off every single plan I'd half-heartedly committed to on the smoke deck without feeling the least bit guilty.

Feelings can be unfriendly sometimes.
Sometimes you just have to choose "Me."

I've always wanted to **** a psychiatrist.
I think it'd be hot for someone to hear all my *******.
On the couch meant for listening, while their legs are spread;
I'd pay what's more than fair to know what goes on in their head.

I know this kid who once made his psychiatrist cry.
I swear to god, he's my hero.
I worry about him sometimes.
But I don't get paid for that ****, you know?

They're so fond of handing out pills.
Psychobabble jargon and all of that swill.
"Your emotions are too strong. Take these and they'll be killed."
******* psychiatry.
It's adorable.

"Did you know that your profession has one of the highest suicide rates?
What are you doing tonight?
Wanna go on a date?"

I bet they hear a lot about ****.
Do you think they might get off on it?
Poor *******.
Your career choice was a mistake.

No, really though, I think it's pretty great.
Trying to help people function properly and stuff.
Psychiatrists are hot.
They can all get ******.

You give me answers to questions I never even asked.
Why do you do that?
It's as useful as knowing something bad's about to happen,
just after the fact.
I've never been there before, so how could I go back?
This feels like a joke taken too seriously -
not even good for a laugh.

Ford and folded to the river bloated.
For whom should we give thanks that our liver floated?
I'll bet three shanks that we'll hit the banks of the gold coast before we'll ever be able to afford it.

The odds aren't in our favor.
Cashed out and half-cocked but still fully loaded.
Goaded into a rhino's bargain for a goat whose milk has already been exploited.

I told you this was a bad idea.

There's a difference between being with someone, and loving someone.

There's a difference between having a place to sleep at night, and having a home.

There's a difference between being lonely,
and being alone.

Sometimes, I feel too old and cynical to appreciate the beauty of anything anymore, and it's times like these I'm tempted to walk around at night with headphones on and listen to that one song from Blonde Redhead with the heavy piano and ah's as the only lyrics.

It's okay to go to the movies by yourself. (I mean, I've only ever done it once, but it was totally fine. The guy who sold me the ticket wasn't like, "Don't you have any friends?" and the people in the theater weren't constantly looking at me from over their shoulders and saying things like, "Is that guy really here all alone? What a loser!"
At least I don't think they were . . . )

Ditto for restaurants.

If you have a history of boyfriends/girlfriends who don't treat you very well, then you probably have a thing for negative attention.

If you don't trust/can't accept love, it's probably because you don't love yourself.

If he/she isn't interested, move on.
No really, move on.
I'm serious, cut the crap.
(Okay look; even if by some miracle it ever actually did happen (and I don't even like to use that phrase because it might give you false hope that it could,) it'd never feel right. It'd feel like you worked way too hard for it and that they only relented because they just got bored or curious and said, "Oh, what the hell," and then but only you'll be constantly waiting for them to get tired of you (who they never even really liked in the first place, so like, how can you possibly expect them to keep liking you until, you know, deathdoyoupart/forever/happilyeverafter and whatnot,) which will make life a living hell and far more stressful than it ever would have been if you'd just moved on the moment after she/he initially rejected you way back in the beginning.)

If someone doesn't share the same views as you, don't waste your time and effort trying to convince them to. (If anything, it's more likely to repel them.)

If you think someone has a false impression of you, don't waste your time and effort trying to correct that impression (you'll likely just solidify their false impression of you by doing so.)

If you know the right way to live, then you're probably doing it wrong.

The only thing worse than a poet who thinks they don't deserve love from anyone is a megalomaniac who thinks that everyone should love them more. (Sometimes I can't tell the difference.)

If you've been waiting for something to happen before you go and do that thing that you've been waiting to do for a long time, but only haven't allowed yourself to do it yet because you've been waiting for that something to happen first so that you'll then be ready to do it because that thing that you were waiting for has happened now and so it's time to finally go out there and do the thing that you were waiting to do because of the other thing that you were waiting on is over now so there's nothing left to use as an excuse to wait on doing it any longer for, only but now there's this whole other new thing that it seems you have to wait for to happen that came up as a result of that other thing that you were originally waiting for that you weren't expecting to happen as a result of the thing happening, and so now you're waiting for this other thing to happen before you go and do that thing that you've been waiting to do . . .

If you think you're being witty or clever, don't let on.

If you still can't figure out who you are and what you're about or what you truly believe in, even though you've been trying to so hard and for so long and doing all of this soul-searching in order to do so, then just give up.
(You'll finally figure it out shortly after.)

Silence tastes like a bit tongue.
A mouthful of iron -
ready to spit blood.

Safe in omission.
Silence is stubborn.
Guilt through admission,
but hidden in cupboards.

Break all the glasses.

Silence sounds like a drama on mute.
Destitute actors waving their arms in vain.
The quiet makes us different,
but it always sounds the same.

I'm sorry about your floor,
and I apologize if some got on you.
I just can't hold it in anymore.
Could never digest this -
I had to spew.

Been taking it in for years.
Way too many to count.
A regurgitation of the regrets and fears
came pouring out of my mouth.

I'll clean it up.
Don't you worry about
that.
Just hand me a mop.

There's no going back,
though the smell still makes my stomach turn.
You'd think I'd know my limits by now,
but it seems I'll never learn.

I will spread my opinions like a plague,
which is exactly how they'll paint them.
By "them" I mean the proverbial "they."
The ones who will color me as paranoid and insane.

They'll say not to listen;
to disregard it all.
It's the nature of the games they play.
They push us to the edge,
Then publicize the fall.

Do not watch the news.
Ignore all commercials.
Pursue beauty and truth;
embrace the controversial.

"Any book worth banning is a book worth reading,"
so read them all with zest.
If you get the feeling that I'm preaching,
remember,
only you know what is best.

Going inside and out
Compression to stretching
Something like breathing
Exalted expression

Who's playing this squeezebox?
Can I make a request?
Play something lively, loud, and fast

My heart's tied in knots
My brain's hanging on
By the skin of my teeth
For the length of one song

Dance like you're dying
And dance like you're dead
Life is little more
Than a song in your head

Break down the walls and let it all in
Dance as if this moment will never end

Move to the rhythm and jump towards your soul
Suspended stringless puppet under no one's control
Fall down to yourself right on top of the beat
Spinning in the center of where all the lines meet

Slow it down for the break and take a deep breath
Potential energy buildup for what's coming next
Those chills in the moment right before it all hits
Soul body and mind caught up in the mix

Hear it; explode
Supernovate the senses
The death of a star amid a galaxy of faces
To be born again
In a jet stream of limbs
I find enlightenment
At 150 bpm

Some people are beautifully abstract movies:
enlightened visions of an idea come to life through cryptic scripting and inspired cinematography.
Slow burns full of brilliant dialogue that leave you thinking about them long after you've seen their open endings.
The kind that only the intelligentsia could ever truly appreciate, with a poor audience score but universally loved by critics.
The kind of movie with a cult following that comes up in late night conversations amongst hipsters sharing their opinions on the pieces of art that have made the biggest, longest lasting impacts on them.
The kind that takes hours of scrutiny and analyzation just to feel like you've arrived at some vague sense of what it all means.

And then there are people like me,
who are less like grand artistic visions of profound cinematography,
and more like reality tv.

The kind of thing a working suburban mother tunes into after a double at the local diner/supermarket/pharmacy counter.

The kind of non-committal, light-hearted viewing that never comes close to demanding your full attention. Just a myriad of characters brought together with a loose premise and slightly coerced tension.

The kind of thing you could have a conversation over, and walk away from and come back to, and still know what's going on, because it's just all so obvious - it never requires much thought.

The kind of show where the actors have every viewer convinced that they're something that they're not.

In the whirlwinding downpour I can see what it's for
Some semblance of a peace of mind disguised as wanting more
And filtered through your anecdotes I see the picture clearly
A moment as profound as this I'll never hold so dearly

Sincerely this time, I really must go
I'm combating with the ghosts of things that I can never know

Give me your hand, a hug, please just something
Because this ain't enough; I'm dissolving into nothing
I need one more chance, two more lives, three more times
So that I may reapply it to the format of my mind

"You're on the precipice of something, and soon you'll be left with nothing but memories and time."
"Sounds like a recipe for disaster."
"Sound's like it'd go good with some wine."

It's an odd feeling,
being proud of someone for completely removing you from their life.

That's where I found it, but it's not where it was,
so I'll pick it up and put it somewhere else just because.
This is what it looks like. This is how it walks:
like a quarter machine capsule on a pair of chopstick legs.
Cup it to your ear and you can hear the ocean lying.
Lie down on the sand and you can hear the mollusks dying.
A storm is just a bunch of sad clouds collectively crying.
This is the part where you float away.

Dream with me, and be my breath
Melt me down until there's nothing left
Then dive inside as we turn into
Something that resembles neither me or you

Carry me down to the river bed
Remind of all the things that were never said
Float with me through the current
We'll arrive bone dry at the water's edge

Dissipate these visions past
Drop the things you can not grasp
Take my hand and we'll figure out
What you and me have always ever been about

I have daydreams of turning you down.
You come on too strong and I uncomfortably say,
"Uh, I should probably go now."
Then I leave and you cry, wishing I had stayed.
While on the road I feel pity, but know it's better off this way.
I'll laugh about it as I fall asleep,
then wake up to never think about you again.

Meanwhile you'll slip into a downward spin
full of drinking and drugs and self-destruction.
A series of abusive men will leave you lost in a haze.
Dumped by another boyfriend, you'll go through a lesbian phase.
And for your fall from grace, it'll be me who you blame.
You'll spend the rest of your days cursing my name.

It's just a reverie, I know.
Only romantics truly drown
and you are not a romantic!
I have fantasies of turning you down,
but in reality, it's the other way around.

It's alright.
No big deal.
I don't even, I mean,
I didn't even . . .
Nah, really, it's cool.
Everything's okay.

This is the torch that burned your parents.
"Hand it here," said the children.

Memories are moments in past tense.

The music fades and the lights go out,
and she's gone again,
like so many times before.

Silently beckoning me to follow her into oblivion.

Beyond the stage and behind the curtain she waits,
to **** me into one last escape.
One more moonlit escapade over forbidden landscapes with the sweetest of fruit clenched between her
teeth.

To ride carefree and reckless beneath the trees that shield us from our cruel fates' twisted shine.

Once again and for at least one more night,
I am yours and you are mine.
I can feel your pulse keeping time with mine.
A whole universe out-of-whack,
but here's this one thing synchronized.

"It won't last,"
she gasps, with an arrow in her back.

It never does.

My body juts forward with the impact,
and I hold her close one last time,
one more one last time until the next one,
as she whispers in my ear:
"Find me, my love.
Find me again."

Glorifying alcoholism is *******.
Putting pain on a pedestal is appalling.
Celebrating mistakes is a travesty.
What's with this obsession with tragedy?
Isn't there some helpline you should be prank calling?

Win or lose,
you're bound to lose some friends,
and even though memories may be like little movies in your head that you can play over and over again,
the truth of the matter is:
They've already ended.

She told me to stay but I got lost in the echo.
Sometimes I can't help it,
I've just got to let go.
And she shined through the chasm like a sun's ray through clouds.
I always wonder what she could be up to right now.
But no, it's not me,
and loneliness stings.
Wherever you aren't is where I'll always be.

I gave her a sign.
Delivered it twice.
Her sympathy is boundless;
she was always so nice.

Hip to the trip as we both drop our objects.
Clumsiness is one way of saying I Love You.
Speech dissolved a long time ago; became an excuse for just staring.
I cannot seem to convince myself of no longer caring.

This poem should not be written.
These thoughts should not be thunk,
because I'm a little lost right now.
I think I might be drunk.

You're the one who hides beneath every thought that I do think.
The cause behind my highs and lows -
you're the reason why I drink.

Please leave me alone.
You haunt all of my dreams,
and turn me out until I'm coarse -
I'm splitting at the seams.

I didn't want to love you.
It was just a game.
Elaborate revenge for calling me "cute."
I underestimated the heat of your flame.

Big mistake.

Now I'm burning for you.
In the smoke, I see your name.
It repeats through my head as I writhe in bed
again, again, and again.

"Hey, can I ask you a favor, please?"
I said, to the most supportive members of my family.
"Sure,'" they said.
"Feel free to ask us anything."
"Here," I said, handing over my pack of cigarettes.
"Please get rid of these."

"Gladly."

Please no more cheddar,
I feel bloated and old.

Scarfing down mozzarella with a sick stomach groan.

You're trapped in the restaurant
missing your home,
while I eat grilled cheese and soup all alone.

I've got a thing for steady beats and repetitious lyrics.
It's a sure-fire recipe to make it stick inside my head.
Strictly preferable to whatever insipid thing this person might have just said.

"I'm sorry,
I was thinking of something else.
Would you mind saying that again?"

All of these people
Just trying to get along
And I've got my keyboard
And I've got my song
And I sing it out loud
To find out who will sing along

All of these thoughts
Now have somewhere to go
And I plant this seed
And I'll watch it grow
And somewhere in between
The most spectacular show

All of these feelings
Succumb to being overwhelmed
A desperate attempt of the lost to be found
And the trees sprout up from the soft fertile ground
And the birds give words to the sweet subtle sound
Of a life never lived giving birth to right now

Poked and prodded
'til brokenhearted.
Now the game's *******.
The stomachs knotted.

Pushed and pulled;
Together, alone.
The game's not over . . .

(Pick up the phone.)

Why are you so wacky?
Why can't you just be sane?
You've done a number on yourself
and the inner workings of your brain.
Take a deep breath, you'll see, for sure;
all is not so lost.
Make a path back to the shore.
Our light will guide you through the fog.

You don't understand,
I'm homeless in the sand;
my castles only ever crumble.

Then don't build them so big,
or so close to the tide.
Tame your pride,
and learn to be humble.

I'll share no reefs with bottom-feeding things.
I'll use no shells only fit for a hermit.
I'd rather spend my days in the melodic waves.
I've  got what it takes;
I know how to endure it.

Swimming in swirls.
Dancing with smoke trails.
Hung up on these girls
with their golden locks and pigtails.

Curl me around your finger.
Strung out on different pills.
Let's leave this place together
and fulfill those greater thrills.

Hear the music echo
in those ears that still ring.
Move your body to the rhythm.
I want to hear you sing.

Sweet melody.
Released free and clear.
Tonight we are in harmony,
but tomorrow I'm not here.

I saw him take off,
launched headlong into the stars,
with gold and orange sparks spiraling out of his arms.

I wondered if he was afraid
to be alone up there with all that empty space,
forever out of reach.

But then maybe, it's not so empty.
Or maybe, he's okay with it.