I suffer from a disease that goes by the name of Loneliness.
It's an ancient affliction;
some sick kind of curse,
and those who know it best often boast: it's the worst.

But every now and then,
I look around me to see some fat cow in the company of a dead-eyed chudd -
spewing out a slew of inanities for lack of the cud.
He finally shuts her up with a kiss on the mouth,
as they walk off hand in hand.

I think to myself:
"How in the hell did they find a cure,
but I can't?"

The creepy crawling tingling sensation of taking a bow to an audience of one.
Even subatomic particles change direction when they're under observation.
Human beings, on camera, pretending to be someone who they're not.
Caricatures of who they might be if their life's story were just a plot.
I'm trying to connect the dots.

Circles coinciding with one another like a venn diagram.
Taking different perspectives into consideration;
a visual representation of colliding world views
with some hope of a middle ground that we could all pass through.

Puppets with their strings all tangled up with each other.
I can't dance properly with your knee in my back.

Moon through the trees,
smiling at me.
And echoes of words full of abstract meaning.
It's a series of seriously silly things.

I must have blown up at least thirteen balloons tonight.

Rubber meets fire.
This line ends with an unfulfilled . . .

Remember that one time when I asked you if you remembered what happened way back when?
I forget what your answer was then,
but I remember how much it meant to me to be reminiscing with the Queen of Forgetting.

Remember when you used to care about memories?

And we went careening down streets while screaming in a mix of anxiety and exhilaration.
Each day blending with the next; driving past every chance we had to turn back,
living as if we were on a never-ending vacation.

Remember when you used to have fun? When fun was number one and everything else was boring?

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And when the Duchess of puking tried to kiss the Archduke of Douches.
Our toes a familiar sight while seeing double.
How we used to recite unrecyclable verses while climbing into the back seats of hearses.

Remember when we used to actually talk about things? No, not like this. I mean, passionately. Remember when we used to get so heated about a topic that we'd practically be screaming at each other?

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And swinging through trees that we'd climbed against better judgement;
passing under streetlights that painted haloes around our dark heads.

Remember when you used to laugh in a way that didn't sound frantic? When your grin didn't look so much like a grimace?

And going to public places in broad daylight just to read the faces of those who couldn't see beyond their own noses?

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And looking at our toes and hitting pavement but then bouncing up again to get caught in the hurricane of everyones' perceptions of what was happening

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Remember when you used to make genuine human connections with other people?

just to find ourselves in the Eye of the Storm, staring at each other, grinning in a way that isn't frightened or frightening;
Laughing in the way that isn't desperate or forced, but hearing it get warped by the howl of wind surrounding us.

Remember

How to

Wind that's closing in.

Poets are sociopaths
masquerading as artists
who've convinced themselves they know how to connect to other people
while having no clue where their own heart is.

They're meeting in laundromats.
They're meeting in bars.
They're meeting at stop signs, grocery stores and parks.

They're meeting at that new hipster restaurant downtown
(I've read that their noodles are to die for.)

It's happening all the time,
all around the world,
right where you live and everywhere beyond.

Young hearts intertwine at the drop of a dime.

Lonely hearts march on.

Nevermind famine and drought,
some flowers can't help but to burst through asphalt.
Autumn may turn leaves brown orange and gold,
but some stay shining throughout winter's cold.

There are trees that survive hurricanes.
Their roots dig deep
into untouched mineral veins.
Unable to be disrupted by furious winds or rain.
They thrive off the chaos and grow from the pain.

You'll never taste a fruit sweeter than one that's fallen from an indomitable tree.
You'll never know the bliss of climbing to the top of it,
and feeling completely free.

Strong roots dig deep.
They throw out new branches despite their disease.
Those stoic statues that remain steadfast in the eye of a tornado.
Hope is the kind of thing that floats.

Swimming on the surface of shark infested waters.
No amount of teeth can cut through me.
I've got an image that gives me strength,
and an unlimited amount of buoyancy.

Consider this soil fertilized.
I realize life is grown from great seeds.
I've fallen asleep amidst your limbs,
and I'm dreaming of the most beautiful things.

People can't read minds,
even if it seems like they can sometimes,
but at least a few can read between lines;
what do they find?

Surprises.

(I doubt it.)

People can feel all kinds of things
without saying a word about it.

Life's a mess.
My soul is quiet.
My playing is inspired!
I've been reading half the day.
Man,
I'm freaking tired.

That and these and this and those
And in Spanish it's asombroso
And I just want you to text me first
So that I may practice my drunken verse

I wish it didn't have to be this way
I wish you could understand the things I say
But I've a history of being misunderstood
I'd teach you if I could
But I'm not sure if I should

I just want you to know how I feel
Honestly it's the only way to make it seem real
I've often told people my problem is that I'm emotionally detached
I'm hoping you can help me to take my feelings back

But where have they been?
I guess I don't know
Scattered through so many parts of the globe
Sometimes I feel I've exhausted them all
Way back with my mother when I was still small

Do I bother you?
I can clearly see why
I often delete your number until you reply

There was this one time
With this one guy
Who I once told that he was my best friend in life
He smoked DMT earlier in the night
Of which I refrained because I'd already seen the light

He proceeded to get to drunk
And he's got quite the temper
Then placed his hands around my neck and said something I'll always remember:
"Stop telling me how to think!"
It deeply affected me
And I accepted my fate of being strangled at a party
But then he let up
And I swear I felt let down
And struggled for weeks with the many revelations that I'd found

Am I a monster?
Am I obscene?
I always thought I was nice
But now I know that I'm mean
I can't bear the weight of how it all seems
Can't deal with these feelings
Don't know what they mean
And the worst part is
When he was choking me
I didn't panic
And I didn't scream
Because it was the way I've seen it ending so many times in my dreams
And when he couldn't go through with it,
I swear
I was angry

The mundane has become the new strange while the old strange is just a page ripped out of a journal burned years ago;
The ashes of which trace lines in a face it's taken years of one-sided mirror conversations to come to recognize as your own.
The past is a blanket that's been ripped off its clothespins by winds that blow across some place you can't remember living in.

It was never all that comfortable to begin with anyway.

A truth was told.
The world wasn't ready for it.

A truth was folded and filed and tucked away for a later day when it'd be needed.

An urn was molded.
It was turned and kneaded and glazed
and filled with the burned ashes of a truth the world never needed.

A tour was organized.
A collection of scholars in things eclectic and obscure
observed things they'd never been privy to before.

They took notes and wrote essays for graduate programs they'd never be accepted to.

They wrote about deep-seated issues that drew connections from me to you.

But they never got published.

It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.

Sticky sweet,
and all but complete.
I'll meet you out there,
and that's a promise.

The next time we meet,
we'll be struck by half-forgotten dreams of things that might not have happened.

Don't you forget about me,
and I'll remember you.

False memories we'll believe to be true.

Somewhere someone I love is not thinking about me right now.
Somewhere else is where my mind lives most of the time from now on,
and I have to write this to a song I haven't listened to since the last time I lost my mind in some nowhere town,
thinking of no one I've ever loved.

Stand up.
Back off.
Just leave me alone.
These vines have grown over everything,
and it's hard to find a home.

Break through.
Nevermind.
I'll keep this carpet clean.
It's seen things you'll never know.
Only vacuums know what I mean.

Hear me out.
Ignore me.
**** up everything.
Spit it out in failed attempts to capture the moment.

When everything goes sideways,
it's the diagonals that make the most sense,
But whether they're rising or falling -
well hey, what's the difference?

Dragged nails across thin snow, clawing for dirt,
leaving trails like staff lines.
Dead leaves landing like notes;
A song of anguish.

My dad talks in his sleep.
He says the wackiest things.
My mom and my brother's fiancé  are on the back porch drinking.
He's asleep.
So is my niece.
She's on the couch next to me while I'm watching Louie.
This all after coming home from a party where the singer of my band tried to ****** me.
Before I drove home I did some drunken text messaging.
Sometimes, I swear,
I don't know what to think.
It's all so absurd,
yet charming in a way.
I fear I'm bound to go crazy.
I've got to get away.

What's going on between passion and peace?
Why do they seem to be mutually exclusive?
Can't they go hand in hand?
Like the calm before a storm,
or afterwards -
everything's damp.
Returned to a state of rest.
Cleansed.

I like to think they can.

I keep letting ideas of a poem I plan on writing about god slip out of my mind without being written down.
I keep feeling sick again and I've long since forgotten how to deal with it.
I read today that anti-depressants are changing the way that our culture is evolving.
I keep feeling like my head's about to explode and I can't remember the code to stop the countdown.
Which wires to pull.
Have I ever really known?
I keep allowing thoughts of her to keep me from getting proper sleep.
I keep washing my bedding because at night I feel like I'm being bitten by fleas.
I'm awash in thoughts of social constructs and god,
and yet,
I can't even pinpoint what it is that I believe.

His phone was full of pictures of the most random **** because every now and then he'd get into a mood where everything looked beautiful.

If you are who I think you might be,
and if you're actually reading any of these -
if you're not just an offshoot symptom of my paranoid descent into insanity -
then I want you to know
that I've got something to say:
FUCKYOUFUCKYOUFUCKYOUFUCKYOUFUCKYOUFUCKYOUFUCKYOU
Go away!

I'll try to get this one out before I'm stumbling drunk;
a few lines I want to write about art:
It's a three letter word, as is "God."
I find it all in chaos.

Words have their uses,
but they've been perverted to the point of being almost worthless.
Only the cool kids know where their power lies now.
Get out there and make some music.

Come all ye married, all seasoned and old.
Come all you fearless, you young and too bold.
Come all your summers and winters and falls.
Come all who've no clue and those who know all.

Come along now, let's go.
Yes, you come too.
We've got assignments, and so much to do.

Come all you old haunts and come all you new.
Come all you Christians and heathens and Jews.
Come all your falsehoods and half-lies and truths.

Everyone's waiting, there's space for you.
Scrape up your courage and lather in glue.
Roll around the table, we'll eat what sticks.

Come all you ******* and come all you *****.
Kick off your trappings and get down with this.
Cinnamon scented candles and ****.
Nutmeg caramel melted down to the wick.

A year's worth of longing come to an end.

Can't have a party without ******' ****.

I am the King of Mixed Messages.
The Duke of Indecision.
The Prince of Sheer Panic facing a life sentence in prison.

I've sabotaged my subjects;
****** on the peasants.
I'll admit my reign of terror hasn't been none too pleasant.

I was the Monarch of Mayhem;
the Baron of Bones,
but some shining knight pulled a coup and now I'm left here dethroned.

On paper, it seems,
like little more than a non-event.

Sure, I mean, there have been a fair share of extenuating circumstances in the interim. Novel experiences. In-office romances. A plethora of deserved and undeserved advances. Premature deaths.

Hell, maybe I've got it backwards. On paper, it seems much more exciting than it's been.

Truth is, when it's happening in the moment, it just feels like drowning. It's hard to distinguish between which wave is which when each one is just contributing to a collective denial of your next breath.

But I'm breathing now.

It's almost overwhelming.
My lungs are telling me to keep it this way.

But my mind is telling me different. It's saying,
"This is too much. Shut it down."

I haven't packed my bags, but my mind's already gone.

His words are pretty.
His words contain worlds of swirling color and sound that swell up to drown out doubt and uncertainty in those who hear them;
sweet to the point of toothache.

His words are performance.
His tongue —a contortionist—
bending unnatural ways to produce sounds that soothe and calm and placate.

But don't be deceived by such pretty things,
for his words are poison.

Staring back into nothing
I felt a compulsion to fall
It felt like my spirit was leaving my body
It felt like my soul was drowning
inside of myself
and I thought

If nature is heaven
then concrete is hell

In the face of
a neon ancient god
once worshipped by the indigenous
peoples of the amazon
I had a sense that He was angry with me
that I'd done something wrong
He took something from me
but I don't know what it was
and I thought

If I'm just a stack of molecules
then I'm falling apart

I pooled into my shoes
which sunk into the earth
and I thought

If I ever have to die again
then I'll pass on rebirth

Are you sure you want to slip into that drink?
Being numb to the world isn't as great as you think.
Granted, it can make dealing with people easier.
It's hard to give a **** when you just want to sleep.

But you'll say things.
Things that are strange and mean and way out of character.
You'll become a caricature of your former self.
Even if you never knew who you were before,
rest assured, the drinking does not help.
Soul searching goes out the window when you're constantly blacked out.

But you won't be able to do it every night, try as you might.
Some entire days will be spent in bedridden recovery.
Your body will finally give in to that much needed sleep -
the kind you've been painfully longing for all week.
But the bliss you'll feel at this will be bittersweet,
because it's during these times that you'll dream.
You'll dream alright.
Frightful things that I can't even begin to describe.
Mountains of dread that will tear you to shreds,
and they'll feel far more real than your liquor-drenched life.

They'll drive you from your bed
to go and do it over again.
Make another fool out of yourself.
Alienate all your friends.
"Ah, **** 'em! Who needs 'em?
I don't even like them anymore."
Then the rumours will spread.
They'll call you a *****.
They'll call you a *******, a liar, and weak.
And they'll be nothing you can do about it,
because no one takes you seriously.
Even if they never say it out loud (and they won't,)
you'll know it's what they're thinking.
(Projecting is a psychological side effect of continued excessive drinking.)

There will be times in between,
fleeting moments of clarity,
where you'll look into a mirror and think:
What the hell is happening to me?
You'll catch at a thought as it crawls through your brain
and realize it's completely crazy -
that you are actually (no ****, legit) going in-*******-sane,
and you'll laugh.
You'll laugh because you'll know exactly who's to blame.
You'll be freaked out and terrified,
but you'll laugh all the same.

There will be other times too,
after all the rants and raves and screams and shouts,
the tears and fears and crippling doubts -
there will come a time when you want out,
but by then it will already be too late.
They'll be nothing left inside but anger and hate.

So before you sink into that drink, I say,
Wait!
Before you go breaking hearts and lose all your friends,
get out while you still can.
I hope you're listening.
I pray you comprehend,
because if shame doesn't do it first,
the dreams will get you in the end.

Only to realize that the roses smell like bile,
because some ******* threw up all over your garden while he was black-out drunk.
Two days later,
you connect the dots and realize that ******* is you.

"It's raining skulls again," sighed jelly head,
with his brain leaking out from his nose.

"Nevermind," she said
with a tissue in her hand;
"Skull rain's good for the bones."

The faces don't match the voices.
The voices don't sound right,
and a sunny day such as this one
doesn't just suddenly turn to night.

I think I might be dreaming, I whisper to myself,
who then nods in agreement
and points to the way out.

The scents don't match the scenery.
The scenes aren't adding up,
and politely asking the gasping walls doesn't make them stop.

"I'm trying to find my way out of here," I say to my own face,
who echoes back the question
after a short delay.

I point to the space behind him,
then he points at my head.
I think I might be dreaming,
or else I might be dead.

I see myself as I was before
walking in through the Exit door;
confused and lost and in need of help.
I calmly point him to the way out.

It doesn't make any sense though,
and it's the farthest thing from fair.
*Walls don't even have lungs,
so how can they breathe air?

It's being swollen by a feeling that you can't put into words,
but you try to anyway.

It's something to look back on in later days,
which is today,
a day that ends in a night in which you feel the same way.

It's a guiding arrow through the maze you've made inside your mind,
the one that in theory,
will end with you finding yourself.

The fake said to the phony,
"I'm hip to your jive and the smell of bologna,"

Meanwhile, homegirl still pronounces the L in salmon.

Somedays are deep fried and pan seared to perfection.
This is not one of them.

The bonafide bonerless guy cried aloud that he wished he would die,
so we took him out for ice cream.

The bars and stars and cars and races.
The dates and states and quakes and phases.
The quirks and shakes and guilts that stack like spinning plates.
(Not everybody makes it.)

When they come crashing down, just look for a broom.
If you use your hands you'll get blood all over the floor,
(and we don't bleed over lost causes anymore.)

To the bright shiny people with a radiant glow,
I'd say this one's for you,
but you already know.
And so, this is for the others:
The battered and bruised.
The broken in shambles;
distraught and abused.
Those who think that they make no difference.
I'm here to acknowledge your existence.
This one is for you.

The world can be cruel -
known to deal a bad hand,
but you've still got to bet,
and play the best that you can.
It's better than just sitting at the table
as a cynical, do-nothing, always complaining and then
criticizing those who take part in the action.

You hate others because you hate yourself.
You're hopeless because they've got you convinced that you're living in hell.
"I can't do anything right," says the self-loathing pessimist.
You can't change the facts that make up your past,
but the fact is that you can always change your future.
There's hope for you yet.
No longer will you deny your own happiness.
You deserve it simply because you exist.

Did we not all squirm and twist our way to the ****
to get there first so we could worm our way in?
Naturally,
no one remembers any of this,
but it had to have happened because otherwise
we would not exist.
Not as we are now -
not how we've always been -
so I say raise your fist in celebration of that initial victory.

Even if you haven't won one since.
Even if you feel bogged down by misery,
it only means that you've let yourself temporarily forget that it's miracle at all that you even exist.
You're a part of it all just because you are there.
So I ask of the forgetful,
the indifferent,
the scared.
How can you not see the beauty?
How can you not care?

It's not so hard to be happy
Though it seems much easier to be sad
You've just got to put all that nothing on a scale
And weigh it against everything you've always had

Something in the way that . . .
something that was said.
I don't know if I ever knew a way to not feel dead,
but everything is swirling.
Everything at once.
I lost my mind a couple times just to rise up from the swamps.
These reeds do leave their marks.
This mud has ****** the color.
I'll sleep beneath the cypresses to feel closer to mother.
She speaks to me in dreams of things that only once were hinted.
How shall I ever get along after being so afflicted?

Life is so friggin' weird, I'll tell ya.
The older you get, the weirder it gets,
and it just keeps on getting weirderer.

Grossly weird.
Wrongly and disturbingly weird.
Upsettingly weird.

But then, now and again,
pleasantly weird.
Delightfully, excitingly weird.
Weirdly endearingly weird.

Then weirder still.
Off-puttingly weirder.
Over-sweetly weirdly weirder.
Understatedly, low-key weirder to the highest degree contradictory weird.

Maybe weird isn't so weird after all.
When it's the only constant in life,
then weirdness becomes the only reliably normal thing, oddly enough.

Let's dig a well together,
then we'll fill it with all our dreams;
Precious gems, secret treasure,
a myriad of fantastical things.

So when reality gets caught in our throat,
and we get that feeling like we can't breathe,
we can just go out to the well that we've built.
We'll never again go thirsty.

And if a nightmare slips in -
attempting to poison our well -
we'll just fish it out,
and bury it in the backyard.

You bring the flowers,
I'll bring the shovel.

Sarcasm's beat,*
is the word on the street,
and those in the know are attempting to grow
something a little more sweet.

Keeping it together in front of my uncle,
but I'm not though.
I failed.
I'm a wreck.
Look at what you've walked in to.
I don't care though.
I don't care what you do.
The feeling is mutual.

Fresh pain from an old ache.
A blow to make the heart quake
after having been painstakingly
reassembled.

Eyes ablaze,
she held my gaze
as I stood on rubbery legs
and trembled.

Ring toss, you know,
where you try to get a small plastic ring to cling to the top of an empty bottle?
I've won it twice.
Both times, took home the biggest prize.

DUI's. I've had some close calls.
Passed a field sobriety test once,
but maybe she was just being nice.

Dice games;
I've only played three times in my life.
Lost a lot once,
but won big twice.