can you patch it up
my dreams are stuck
and it’s been a nightmare
given they don’t give up

fix it.

each bead it chips fell off
and smothered the chip
on my shoulder to dust
i’ve become cumbersome

like father
like sons
like my lust
for their love
and our love
for lost blood

cantankerous

dear mom
it’s your fault
i miss you
i wish you knew
each piece of each
morsel of my heart
beat
more than these pieces of paper do.

they embody my body
language
scattered
sporadic
mislabeled
man and mishandled
like me with
the three i
speak fluently
incompetent and ineffective
ly. suffixes that suffocate me
as ***-backwardly i
awkwardly demean
when i mean to
seek through them the
clarity
you misperceive.

i couldn’t tell you
why i’m me
or how i came to be
the part of we
you’d rather
weep over
as does one
with the dis-ease
of a disease
that precedes
the deceased.

weep not over me justifiably
just
if i believe
it’s not i
you bereave.

-

WEDNESDAY JUNE 27, 2018
02:04 AM

this bathroom floor tile
knows me better than you do
you slid through
and the caution
slippery when wet sign
you took is the only
difference between the two
pictures in the funny papers
mercury and magazines
now we’re all victims
and more confused
you refuse to breathe the life you took
back into me
like my restless tears refuse to keep this filthy floor clean

he can’t stand me in the daytime
then with the sunset so does his fight
and i see the sadness
in his eyes
that along with mine
elopes to pause time
hoping to intertwine  
yeses and nos in our minds
back and forth
swinging like see saws
south and north
sing me to sleep
with your arms
till the grip of your palms
lets me in peace
rest
like i so often
dream

-end

does it directly
affect me
or arouse sympathy
i have to screen
what i hear
i need to keep
from feeding
the screams
that used to
use me
i was used
to losing
to them
like my sleep
and me
once i lose
all my dreams
i warned
of how i’d be
and today they see
i mean well
till i mean
to be me
mean

nightmares say
i’m inspiring
nightmares say
they thought
i was only real
in their dreams

now they believe
in miracles
in me

i’m worn
like these scars
that won’t let go
even when i go
why because

the show must go on
always of course
never off course
even if i’ve been
off
cloning the track
that lacks foot molds
in an ongoing
marathon

no one warned me
of what would come
from wars
we would’ve won
had i
thought
all the ones
i lost
could
have been
mine and yours

now all that’s ours
is the loss  
they keep saying
they’re sorry for

he embezzled thousands
of me
endlessly
dressed in no
skin
resembling
white sheep

the wolves insist
it’s not him
incessantly
investors with cheeks
pen checkered checks
and i bleed

their flushed flesh
left me
and for a full year
i sat and still weep
overfilled till deep
i pressed down on me
to let my heart beat
me free as those tears
i now let leak leaps

the shepherd believes
he breeds herds of meals
who tell him they teeth
on sights of him meek
i hear him repeat
this isn’t me

a bitter pill
is better sweet
reality
is bittersweet

perhaps i’m him
and he is me
and all along
the wolves
were sheep