In a golden glow,
while you slept,
I strung together
a few haiku
for you
and sang them
to a sad tune,
the only one I knew.

Your words are like clay
before the kiln,
I try to mold them
into thousands of different shapes,
and it's never right.
But I don't
like to complain
and I'd have to say,
I think I handle pain
pretty well,
wouldn't you agree?

Your explanations
need explanations now.
You speak to me
in worlds,
I only know the smallest words.

Your mouth races my heart,
I always give you a head start.

I will chase you all the way home.

When I was sixteen
I would trade
my allowance
for some feelings
every Friday night.
I'd pull on the strings
and pull on my hair
until I was discordant
and bald and
still in the dark.

I tried hard to see
what they wanted me to see
in country, when it came to metal
I just couldn't feel the steel and
hip hop failed to have
the same effect on me.
When I was a sick teen,
see, that's when I found indie.




What did you think you'd find in the avant-garde?
beautiful, new, perplexing, plexi-glass box
where rock stars go to suffocate
and die
(keep kitsch alive).
Really,
what did you think you'd find in the junk-yard?

Glad I missed the rhythm of those loops.

She called me




She called me
a little *****

in which five knuckles
and four spaces
were the only faces
that ever turned a light on for me.
Or off, as a matter of fact.

Write it on a flier, or
tie her up in the back of a limousine,
ask her to give you some sugar
and send you to sleep.

Just don't be weird about it.
And seriously,

pay attention,

you just might


burn something.

I think my voice is changing.

I press four fingers into my forehead
and smoke a cigarette like that one writer
I was too cool to ever read. You know,
they treat you like a ******* drug?
A ******* drug!

Past lovers,
and their coat hangars,
I don't wanna talk to 'em,
I don't wanna touch 'em.

But I do;
it's easy to cut into
those veins once you've
found 'em.


*I'm sorry,
so prone
to wasting time,
I love when my head
spins on an axis
all of its own.

A lot of the kids I went to school
were so **** sure of themselves
they would prattle on about
how macro economics was their passion
or how a major in accounting
is their dream
and there's nothing wrong with that
but would your would be passion
be your passion if you were homeless?
if you were terminal
I'm talking like
one year left on the clock
is your passion what you'd still be pursuing?
so you have a passion?
then go out and get it

When I first sold myself there were
black cottons, brass buttons, iron crosses, steel machines
All the marks of war
All that searing heat
With all that pretty malice
Spilling Paris in the street
‘Twenty marks’ I called
‘Twenty marks’
That was 1943
And Piaf was doing well

Nurse, do you know what it is like:
To have a man inside of you
that you could never love?

There was, once upon a time, a pretty little ****
black cottons, brass buttons, iron crosses, steel machines
Lying on my floor
And Maman was starving, and my sister, too
Dignity wasn’t half the tax it seemed before
He gave me a baby, and a disease,
That was 1944:
Piaf was quite successful, then

Doctor, can you fathom:
Having sores all over you?
Yes, down there, and
all up and down your thighs, your body burns.
Can you feel that?

Then, the Germans left, and the Allies came, all
black cottons, brass buttons, iron crosses, steel machines
All of that decor
Fleeing, running out
On the French horizon
Retreat
The Allies were the same
‘Three dollars’ I called
‘Three dollars’
That was 1945:
Piaf was languishing
Paris had died

Jacques, my dear:
Those were our times
smoky cabarets, sculptured croons, fine wines
your rifle on your back could wind my morning with worry
and with my scourges, you took me all the same
but what I remember is:
black cottons, brass buttons, iron crosses, steel machines
then:

nothing

“Monsieur Boursin - she has passed.”

He sobs,
it sounds like
war.