a man in a trench coat
walked though construction
after dark,
dead branches grew
from the holes in the
end of his sleeves,
the night painted
over retinas
but his skin still seemed pale,
dyed dark hair
shined without hygiene,
and his boots
kicked the road torn,
I though of columbine
when I saw his trench coat,
I saw guns and children hiding
I heard shotgun shells
breathing smoke
onto the pylons,
I saw brand new
blood pained lane lines
in the middle of the road,
I couldn’t make out his face
but I looked at a smiling maniacal,
and I was just driving by
and it seemed cold,
I had the window down for a smoke and
I smelled tired exhaust
from sleeping machines,
and it was then that I realized
he was most likely walking home
from work or going to get milk
from the convenient store,
perception will always drape over us
in a cloak no one else can see,
it will never disappear and
to the trench coat man I apologize.

ask a stranger if they’ve wanted to die,
and if they answer no, they’re lying,
the inevitability of death has many
turning blind eyes to dying
or the thought of such circumstance
is a circus dance on a tightrope
with living in sights ahead
and death below,
it has people trying to balance in place,
rather than walking forward,
and a visually manifested
tunnel vision view on life
is hard to come by
unless you’ve come to terms
that when you die
there’s going to be a bit of happiness,
the tamed lions you know
are bound to turn on you,
and the trapeze is bound to fray
like the limbless man
who will eventually
wobble away,
and the only thing left
is a ring of fire and
the crowd is gone,
and falling off the rope is
almost inevitable.

I respect therapists
like I respect anthropologists,
they dig and encounter an ampersand,
they can always inform beforehand
and foreshadow results,
but they found my bones
below 6 feet
and can’t form an answer,
they knew where to search
they found the ticking finger
pointing at lazy fissures,
and buried blisters
but dripping shovels
keep raising a faded flag
that says
“they’re nothing here keep moving”

I finally realized that
when I grip a rose
the thorns are in my hands,
and the pedals don't wither on their own,
I promise breathing soil and
give pale pavement,
few grow through the cracks
but don’t survive too long,
some call it urbanizing,
but I prefer perpetual,
they feel heartbeats in the soil
and I’ve buried myself
in continuities,
and a stagnant earth
gives birth to a dormant death,
some call it wilting,
but I prefer realization,
no one compliments
the garbage in a
wind coughed garden
but everyone steps over
a cement rose,
I’m still here
so the dirt is still beating
and I promise to keep
the trash off the sidewalk

the spider drops down as I lay in my bed
"just the person I needed to see," I said
"every night the ceiling stares back at my face
so my eyes wander to the edge."

"you're always in the corner consumed by your web,
and the same question always spins in my head:
what's it like living in the darkest corners of the room?"
and he said,
"the darkest corners of life only exist in your mind."

my second personality,
he loves you
and i hate myself but
he loves you,
he told me the other day
where to find you and
I didn’t want to look
my eyes were burning,
but his throat was too,

I feel bad for him sometimes,
he doesn’t think very clearly
but he knows how to write,
very well actually,
we have similarities,
we’re liars,
our brains are the same,
kind of,
we wear the same clothes
for the most part,
he takes them off
easier though,
he likes to yell
and get angry
at nothing,
he hits things
and i wake up with the scars,
he’s selfish, he doesn’t
believe in karma,
he has no conscience,
he sits outside
and watches his breath solidify
and doesn’t feel the weather,
he likes to bury memories
and then sleeps with shovels,
i shower every day,
he doesn’t,
i can feel him coming,
i have to go,
i’m getting scared.

she told me to write about
the happiest I’ve ever felt;
the happiest moment in my entire life,
and there is never such a circumstance
in it’s singularity that can be defined,
but in a string of circumstances
a definite divinity can be seen
through the cracks;
sobriety, the comfort of sobriety
makes me feel not quite as content
as the comfort of intoxication,
but the fact I can find refuge
in both is enough to make me,
the way the legs of my bedside table
are cut uneven and the way it
dances when I write,
the knuckle of my *******
kissing a hot coffee cup
in weariness, it makes me,
clichés and the cologne of
grass after rain
petrichor and nasal stained
memories make me,
smokers coughs and phlegmy
clearings, mental crosswalks
with hands and I still walk
with my mouth,
that makes me,
the sky,
and the ground,
mailboxes with the flag down,
telephone poles with expired
promotion posters,
faux homelessness
in small towns,
leaves changing,
trees dying and
coming back to life,
how the wind feeds
conservation,
weeds growing in pavement,
dandelion stains on new jeans
or new jeans staining dandelions,
snowfall,
struggling to pick eggshells out of
yolk bowls,
*** and cigarettes and they dont
go well together
for me at least,
abandoned barns,
barns in use,
the sound of tires on
gravel driveways,
the strength
or lack there of
to smoke when I’m sick,
it makes me,
the look of others when
I allow my dog to kiss my mouth,
the top fret of a guitar,
it’s low and reminds me of
a child’s cough,
wearing my fathers
stained white tee’s
under 80 dollar plaid sweaters,
it makes me happy,
all of this and more make me happy,
but I still can’t touch mirrors
and listen to the way I breathe before bed,
and thats why I sleep with a fan on.