She was put together
like the glistening gold,
the perfect patty,
of a McDonald’s hashbrown.

He had fallen apart
to mutilated mush,
the saltless
slivers of the
school cafeteria’s.

Sharp. A streak of white trailing its way into
my inner soul. Putrid. Sour. The bottom of a
porcelain lid, wiping the brown smudge, the red
of a woman’s pain, the smallest of life’s creatures.

Cleanliness. They say. Fresh spring. They say.
Whatever label they place on the bottle, nothing
can erase the facts. It’s rotten. Vile. It’s an eraser,
putting a pretty shine on an object’s history.
Removing its very being. The trail lingers.
It spreads like a poison, inflicting its warning
to whoever’s watching the path. An eraser
is only useful until it’s erasing you.

I see a little house on the hill
Nothing but time to ****
I write this song
'Cause there's still too long
Till the weekend in suburbia

I'm just some dumb kid
And I've been trying to hide it
Stuck on the bridge
But I fell with it
Just tell me my face is blue
Trust that I'm being true
My happy little pill of suburbia

It's just for tonight
Don't go looking for goodbye
I don't mind that you think you're right
Standing in the eye of suburbia

You don't need to go
But accept that you withdrew
Love it, do you?
The quiet in suburbia

I need you to trust that I'm lost
I've been out here for too long
'Cause you know that I can't trust
****** up for nothing
I'm all alone, in suburbia

That last one was my antidote
Telling you it's time to go
Like kids on concrete, oh
Reminds me I'm not home
In suburbia

A glass box, sitting on the wooden shelf carved
by an unknown soul, in an unknown time.
The box is solid, invisible, humane.
The creature who lives there is trapped,
yet he does not know anything else.

This box, his glass prison, is his whole world.
His freedom, his nature, it is here he travels
from one side of his spaceless cage to another,
searching for a purpose; a meaning.

Yet how can there be any meaning
when one’s life consists of a water jug,
filed down wood trimmings, a few brown
pellets, and a spinning wheel.

The wheel, and its monotonous motion,
saddens me. There is no destination, no
ending goal, just energy wasted on a lifetime
of potential. The poor creature had such
potential. If only he could leave his cage.

You are a snowflake.
Beautiful,
but I wish you’d melt
just a little faster.

I am a princess. Climbing the metal castle
surrounded by the forest of julienned trees.
A pink tutu complete with a fortune of tulle
flows at my waist, replacing the cotton of
normalcy given that morning by the queen,
my army turning into peasants on the ground
below me. Fellow children who wish not to
play with royalty, fellow children who do,
but alas, this princess works alone.

Sliding down into the moat, swimming across
the wooden hot sea, I enter my limo, the red
skeleton of a car, pushing soldiers out of my
way. They obey their highness, they always do,
or their actions are blocked from memory, a
storm of denial sugarcoating my beloved fantasy.

The limo, transformed during the voyage into
a shimmering carriage, stops at a stable, four
trusty steeds at disposal for any who come
across them. One’s fur the grey of used snow,
stomped upon by the hooves of peasants lasting
generations. Another the brown of rich milk
chocolate, named by those consumed with
hunger, to be used by the full returning from
high tea. A third the shimmering blonde as
the prince’s hair, the appalling matte of gold,
the foil of the one before. The last, dark as
night, a hidden soul trapped behind the plastic
eyes, watching as wars pass, powers change,
alliances grow and crumble into ruins.

The steed stops upon the princess’s destination,
the lone place in the kingdom where she can find
peace, where the chattering of peasants can no
longer disturb her daydreams, where she and her
court can enact royal business, where the swing
of her gavel rings loud and clear, where she can
study in peace, where she can play, where her
throne lies, two abandoned sisters sitting near.

It is here that the princess finds her solace; it is
here that the princess erases from her memory.