If I were you,
I'd wear my armor
on the outside
too.

I gently **** your snakebites
to taste as brave as
you.

I am never so sure
than when I steal
avocadoes
from beneath
your swinging
knife.

A careful kind of coward,
we pretend to be calm,
budgeting our secrets
like money or time,
waiting for some weather
or high holy eyes,
to take down the china,
to feast on each other.

Some souls ferment,
become bearded and bent,
don't miss their legs,
have something quiet to say.

Let me leave you gently
to come back content.

In the church of strong spirits,
we carry our own crosses,
slouching towards morning,
for some sour barley god.

On the best back way to the park
I met an old well-meant friend,
gave him greetings, condolences,
and directions,
everything I'd found since.

I know every inch
of this, my hell,
and I've never seen
you before.

Your pain is a false debt
I want to forgive.

I read a poem
about silence
aloud,
sat down,
held my breath,
wrote this.

The soft side of starlight
keeps winking
through my blinds,
surprised that I'm awake,
asking why I'm scared.

"Can't you see,
can't you see?
All the breathing,
all the blooming?

A curve or two away,
a month of brave at most,
weaving through the pines,
there's laughter there
that's yours."

In tiny sips,
you make me
bubble
burn
and lick my teeth.

I kept asking you questions
about yourself,
but you only shrugged and
smiled,
until at last,
you invited me in,
saying, "I have more sheets
than I need."

And there,
stenciled on the walls,
were all my answers.

My shuffles echo
in half-built homes,
I vault muddy wadis
and stomp in circles
like a baby elephant
throwing a fit,
until the too-slept dawn
makes me see me
too much,
so I
track dirt back
to my
safer nest.

tragedy,
like joy,
is built
in tiny
parts,

you can never
track
just how
it happened.

life is full of swallow hazards,
plastic pieces,
straight lines,
sharp edges.

People can't stop praising
your laugh and your wit.
They tell me every day
about your very long legs.

But me,
I love your deep cuts,
your cultic elbows,
your hidden hairs.

The weeds that find
the cracks
in your concrete
have begun
to peek through
me.

Every time I boil water
my mind bubbles elsewhere
hotter hating those long
dead half men
who braided you
painful patterns
caulked you into their
weedy concrete
buried you in their cheeks
to hide their untimely clenching
and us younger uncles
pure and weak
left with nothing else
but to sigh
and scorch pots.

little tiny pretty thing
pulling at my mustache.

i can't bring myself
to make you
stop.

my face goes numb
and i giggle like a baby.

of all the people i know,
i still fascinate
only you.

I've grown less fond
of grubby dreaming,
have had enough of hope.

I distrust bright colors
and new mirrors.

I need layers of dust
to recognize
my lived-in eyes.

Here the flags are made of stone.

The mossy British god holds vigil
from a humbled candle spire,
and the old kit bags,
one by one,
are unpacked.

Grass untrammeled
Lines unbroken
Liquid living spouting life,
reflecting something
more gray than red.

We are each our own cenotaphs,
having lost you,
lost us.

How do we give it all back to you,
you castoff children of hell?

We only know to give it
to ourselves,
and to carve you like Pharaohs
for a while
for a while.

I've started to wonder
how much *** you had
in that salty
Subaru summer
you won't shut up about.

In grayer skies,
I squint less,
dress warmer,
laugh more.

Some long-haul trucker
told me about
a buffalo people
who have very
light souls
and bathe themselves
in seeds.

Drops drop in, out,
around,
the whole shape of me,
tracing my creases and
loving my lines.
That, and nothing more.

I soap myself silent
and refuse to be jealous
of how well water
knows me.

I don't think I've
ever been in love
with someone
who wasn't a
friend.

I don't think I've
ever had a friend
who I wasn't
a bit
in love with.

"It must have been hard for your mother,
not having any children."
Ann Lowell.

You have to admire
these people,
so ready to love the worst in
themselves.

Remember when we were all legs,
all pomade,
all grayscale and bright,
when our joy was only getting bigger?

Yeah,
me neither

and I think I prefer
being bored
with our color.

It's a nice place to spend the afternoon though.
It's beginning to be a habit
with me.

Like two friends
on either side
of a swaying drunk,
birds and leaves
are always ready
to catch me.

When I watched you through the window
dodge rain to get mail,
I was spiked with the need
to shock you
with words.

But David and Solomon,
our mothers and Coke,
those selfish *******
invented every beautiful thing,
repeated them over,
and left no good word
I could say to you first.

I've been keeping track
of each shudder and smirk,
making field notes
of your apologies
and your
demands for apologies,
quick sketches
of your grace.

One day you won't surprise me.
Then I'll put you in order.

I was just about to admit
that nothing ever changes.
Then, you had to go and get beautiful.

Every time you fall asleep,
something
nearby
awakes.

The stupidity
of children's songs
is second only
to forgetting them.

Seeping through my starving eyes,
the neighbor props up windows,
walks around my veins in slippers,
seems to already know
which corners give
the best light
for reading.

Two inches,
you frighten me
and
make me swoon.

I'm at a loss
to know the difference.

I can't tell you why.
I don't know why.
You're living just as well as I,

but baby mouse,
I'm sorry,
you're going to have to go.

Why is Death always scowling?
Does he hate the life he takes,
or the death he gives?

Love turns tragic in Persia,
in Venice,
in China,
in graveyards,
in movies,
in poems.

Love gets deadly
in candles tall as men.

Only after we fail
to bring it back
from where it's gone,
do we ever think
to join it
where it's at.

The lines of your body
swerve and sway,
but I have found my faith,
and all roads lead home.

Now that we've learned
to love each other
so freely,
we make private fun
of everyone else.

We barter our secrets
for slices of carrots
or getting the door.

We negotiate our names,
swap stories for stories,
sell future favors
for the *** we just made.

At night we lock the door
and smoke each other
like cigars.

We scatter our profits,
roll around our wealth.

We soar like stocks.

I found you on the front steps,
fed you food and lies,
made noises til you laughed.
I stitched you over,
wished you well.

Why are you trying to get me to hate someone right now?
The world's not ****** enough,
you gotta spread the news?

two floors below me
someone's turning seven

to the sounds of beanbag slaps,
updates on cousins,
spanish singalongs,
and a dog stealing cake.

i freeze myself in flyby squealing.

i cough into my elbow.
my coffee grows cold,
afraid that if i'm here too much
it may just float away.

I shove the noon backward
and never choose to sleep.

I slink heel to toe
on each terracotta day.

Ether phases, cones of power,
lunar cycles,
witching hour.

Many mansions, herbs and candles,
live aloud,
the goddess answers.

your armory of sneers
is like the statues in the alcoves
of notre dame.

sure, they're all different,
but people only notice
one or two.

I came to
in a cobblestone temple,
ten-foot square,
but full of things.

I found there lightbulbs,
and gnawing,
and came across
cooking,
everything but windows.

when the bad things come
i starve them,
when good passes through
i launder the linens.

the cornets blow
and i brave up straighter,
the weather knocks, i put on
clothes.

i pay all the debts that make it back to me,
and the chores get done
eventually.

but as a friend
to a startled, starving anchor,
or as a citizen
of a chronic coughing country

i have no clue
just what to do.

Between the borders
lie bubbling mires,
thick but porous,
pockmarked and soft.

A chorus of croaking warts,
"Slither through my friend;
take back whatever
is yours,
but please
please
please
add us to your maps."

i was never half so naked
as you torturing your genius.

when you put me into poses,
made me lines and blue,
drew me over death,
sketched me skewed
atop your live-in girlfriend.

when you found your lost
love
and painted,

and when you found it less impressive,
you and that child,
sealed your cold, careless
portrait of me
behind ugly bricks,

made art of your apology,
and grace of your grace.

Do not soothe the pain.
Do not kiss the pain.
Do not bribe the pain.
Do not take the pain.

Don't argue with the pain,
the pain talks too loud
for civilized discourse.

The pain refuses
all rules of order.

Do not explain the pain
lack of water.
Do not name the pain constricted
blood vessels.
This is too humane
for the thing we call
the pain.

If you should begin
to consider
making the pain a guest,
remember the pain did not knock
and leaves wet towels on your body.

Never ever ever
write poems about the pain.

It is
generally advisable
to avoid
making pro and con lists
about the pain.

Whatever you do,
do not pray for the pain.

The pain has no soul.
The pain cannot be saved.

No.
As a godfearing citizen
of a blameless county,
it is your solemn duty
and right
to
****
****
**** the pain.