I wonder if I really am kind hearted.
Most people think it’s true,
But maybe I’m just afraid of being mean-
Maybe I’m afraid of being you.

In quiet nights my grandma cries
We talk of death and people’s eyes
We miss our words, she sees a vein
I ask her, but she’s not in pain

There was a sort of whizzer boy,
The tinker blinker clinker boy,
With gears and knobs and springs abound,
A head full of thoughts and gears that go round.

He liked to paint and make and build,
For every craft, yes, he was skilled.
“Working hard but with time to play?
Why, that’s my favorite kind of today!”

But what made him different, you see...
He was always quite metallic-y,
And when it was his time for bed,
He charged his battery, and turned off his head.

Sometimes as I step out of the steaming shower, I see myself in the mirror and cant help but question the reflection. The way my body curves oddly trying to smooth out the bones underneath, how the small red lines appear from thin air, how broad my solders appear, spread out like a mountain range instead of a blooming pasture.

Then, I remember the Greek Statues with their pear-shaped bodies, and my towel drapes across my shoulder to become my sash. The soapy water beads are my olive crown as I stand poised.

But my face isn't up to par anyway, and this isn't the Greek period.
I think my sculptor forgot that, or maybe he wasn't that good with carving faces.

I saw your shadowed twin last night
Under the open moon
And as I walked I heard your voice
So hushed with an echoed tune
Your scent dragged along the wind
All things I’ve missed the most
Your gentlest touch on my sleeping skin
My dear, my love, my ghost

take the express to 45th and step over the yellow
line and track and train uptown and downtown to mid
town to city sitting in aluminum carts as
the white collars fall asleep in sync
adjust the ties and breathe the cold
air fogged and smogged around
the tops of the buildings scraping skies

how complacent are the suited
up for sleeping in the dull talking and shuffling
up one stands to fill his seat
reserved by a backpack and briefcase
clattering against the aluminum
blur as the buildings mesh outside the window
pillow for his unbothered head
dreaming nonetheless

I’ve seen this girl hanging around before,
A couple of times I suppose...
Everybody’s always telling me about her-
How she acts,she speaks, her clothes-

But I never see her how they do,
And I can’t seem to comprehend,
They tell me she’ll have a big future,
When I just see dark dead ends.

I’ve seen her hang around before,
But it doesn’t make it clearer,
‘Cuz she always just stares back at me
In the dull reflection of the mirror.

in that stillness moment i, questioning
why people stare through (and stare within, staring through)
that fuzz or mush like their covered window panes (staring within, staring through)
that shy window pane that turns

eeyoyvrbd   e r o e b y v y d   e  e  y  y  o  d  b  r  v

so that i (staring in, staring at) may roam in

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turning my mind to that fuzz and static, becoming fogged window pane
to look out (and stare) like rain droplets caressing
so rough they fall to pound that pavement
pavement so coarse and electric like the peppered mountain range
where i stand
my shoes fill like leaking boats
to roam, to wander, in that desolate diorite range (staring within)
questioning (staring through) as time joining
disappearing
as headache turns everybody to everything turns

eybd   oryoy        ebordyoev  ydeb       dbeyodebe           dyobyobye
ebdoybeod       ebdoeboy debot     vverbdyodv   verdbey    odbver  vebsrobe      ybddoeb

The sheep in wolf's clothing,
The fraud the fake-
Does that bundle of grey fur,
Hide the mistakes you make?

Sing of sleep little sheep,
Or are you still awake?
Do those howls and growls
leave you too frightened to shake?

You've got them convinced,
So let's hope for your sake,
That they'll never realize,
And that you'll catch a break

One day I found myself afloat above the clouds,
Above thick gossamer mists created from the silver moon,
And those billows stretched thin across their deep canvas and joined in an intertwining infinite ocean,
Swarming around at their peaceful resonance so gently and smoothly flowing-

One day I found myself afloat above the clouds,
And I didn’t know where I was going

I want you to sway me,
Like how the moon dances with the earth,
Tugging your tides as you hold me close,
And making sure I don’t get lost
In this big wide dark abyss.

Darling let’s dance in the sunshine.
No matter how far away it seems.
We’ll explore each other’s secrets,
And send our whispers on rocketships,
To remember that we’re never alone.

Let’s slow dance until the end of time.
Where I can see your face forever.
Because without you,
These stars don’t shine as bright.

You took my hand and lead me away,
past the clock and through night free,
out to the hideaway where the sleepless wandered,
we sat in the dark, under a tree-

Roots winding past our sneakers,
wet grass and muddied debris,
and stars meld into streetlights,
far past under the tree-

You took me into your arms,
you spoke so quietly,
but i'll never tell you that I heard,
every word, under that tree-

I know you said you loved me

Lavender lotion
Mom told me that would make it better
Just breathe once or twice
And put on that one old fleece lined sweater
Pray to god and heaven and angel
Put my thoughts down in a letter
Lavender lotion, lavender lotion
Was nothing but a happiness debtor

Why are there worms when it rains
Gathering to the surface for air, for sun
The pinecones curling like dead bugs
Like upturned cockroaches and beetles
The scent of forgotten aquariums hanging over the dirt
The petrichor stained metal handrails
With grass soaked pools

And after it rained
The corpuses of worms sat
Gruesomely pressed into pavement fossils
Beneath a brown soled sneaker

I've got a pair of little black boots
boots that tell monochrome stories;
So when you see my little black boots,
think of their colorful glories.

I spend my lifetimes chasing the unfathomable
Resonance of nostalgia and melancholy that blends
Into my grandmother's bed, a storage box, a picture
Frame by frame they jumble together sepia toned like
Toys, music, buildings, the time you fell onto concrete
Walks to the schoolyard away from music box cradle songs
Your mother would sing to you before you slept
Wondering about the world, the unknown, the darkness
Overcoming you into the lulled unconscious playground
Spurring up the pain, the reminder, the tug from the beyond
The realm of describable, was it ever even here?

I am the thunder that you never hear,
Suffocated in air and light;
Electricity,
Fire,
Lightning’s tiger-
(The roar you associate)-

The fighting call;
The alarm,
Rough, harsh slice of the night,
Unafraid,

The creature caged,
The light you saw and died in nothing-
Defining silent isolation,
A cage, a room, a tomb-

A buried body still alive,
The suffocation, the air, the light,
The absence,
The void,

How unremarkable I seem from the epitaph, from above,

So high above me, are you, you stand;

You morn me, I am alive,
Alive and buried under and under six feet of fear and anguish-
Of all the pains of past and future,
Of all the unsurety,

I can still assure you;

I am the thunder,

Waiting.

People undervalue being alone-
Turning everybody else into white noise mush that turns my brain all fuzzy inside and out,
or having the rain pound pavement into ravines and mountain ranges,
rivers left behind that cause my old shoes to fill up like leaking boats.

Being alone is kind of okay.
I like feeling like a ghost sometimes, roaming around in the fuzz or the rain like the tv pictures floating around in bad-connection static-
And time goes very slowly and you wonder if it’s even passing at all...

But you’re alone, so it doesn’t matter how long you disappear for, it’s just you and your dull headache.

When I think of you,
My body shivers,
My throat starts to burn,
I become weak,
My head pounds,
My stomach churns,
I want to yell for help,
But I guess that’s just the side effects,
Of taking your poision.

I think its time
I want to feel the homely sting
To lie under artificial waterfalls
and let my head drown in the noise
and still feel my own silence
and punish myself for the things they say
because its true
and its time I face it

no, NEVER AGAIN
you promised...

I am dressed in a gown
A blue paper gown
With the ribbons tied at the front

A crepe paper gown
Open at the front
The kind you scrunch and fist into gift bags
Crepe paper, but thicker, like asking the deli man for a bigger slice

But the white deli paper is folded over my lap
A big paper towel, a napkin

Stagnant water sits still in a silent spring
How suffocating