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Father Christmas came and slipped
through the cracks
of my poorly constructed home
so quickly
and quietly
that I hardly marked the date.

I suppose it's my fault
for spending so much time
listening to angsty
drums and guitars
scream my name
that I can no longer hear
his voice in the tear
of wrapping paper
and Mr. Crosby's tunes.

But I caught a glimpse,
between the blinking
of red and white
on my tree,
when my mother smiled
as I opened my new suede shoes.

He's out there, hiding,
that *******:
old man Christmas.
Hiding and trying
to make me change,
make me surrender
my joy to the jaded
state of adulthood.

I will not.
Jenny and Malcolm
lie in a field
on a hill
straddling the countryside
at midnight.
The grass tickles
their toes and noses
as it flows up
getting the stars.
Jenny passes the roach
and sings the blues.
Malcolm casts
a long line of smoke,
fishing for meteors.

"You think
there's anyone
out there?"
Jenny asks.

"I knew a kid,"
Malcolm says,
bobbing his head
to Hendrix,
"18, in Philly,
went to grab
a bag of dope,
but his buddy's brother,
he was nine at the time,
wouldn't go,
so he had to go,
thought it would be quick
so he brought him
but forgot the cash
and tried to dash,
but the kid wasn't so fast.
They caught him
and laid him to rest
with his head on the curb
and teeth in the gutter.
After that, he said
he couldn't be the same,
forever paranoid,
society pushing him
towards suicide
or addiction.
Desensitized
he decided
he wasn't made for this place
so he got high
and rode a cloud
out beyond
where we stare now."
**** brown grass
covers my yard,
saddled
by dead gray skies
that **** rain
on my holiday.

Where is Christmas?
Will it come this year?

I fervently remember
swirls of snow
everywhere, a silent,
peaceful, white world
in which I could think.
There’s less now, each year.

My mother no longer bakes
those delicious peanut butter
cookies with the Hershey kiss
in the middle.

I can’t even remember
their smell,
nor the heat of the oven
to be my blanket
after I walk inside.

Is Christmas coming this year?

I don’t see the smiles
of holiday cheer,
just the grimace
of old men,
tired of buying presents
and putting up decorations.

Maybe it’s my eyes,
but I'm not sure Christmas
will come this year.
Fire on the mountain,
flickers of devil in the sky
I once found peace here
until they came by.
I can only grab
glimpses, as she slides
her fingers deep
among her golden brown hair.

When her eyelashes spread,
black, thick,
from behind
a simple blink
catches my eye.
I need castles made of sand
instead of men made of snow,
eventually we'll fall into the sea
and bath in sun induced slumber
among our kingdom in the sand.
I need to get off
my own back
and stop screaming
in my head,
but unfortunately,
it seems the only way
out of this self
imposed masochism--
madness, logically,
I simply let go
of all things
and exist,
observing,
like a sanyasin
yet I sin
until the *** runs
and my hands fumble
dreams looking for change
so I smoke them
and then desire
goes with the wind
and ashes
of my dreams past

But I can't be that,
I want my belief
in destiny back,
my hope for the future
and ambition I lack
I feel like--
wait--
I don't ******* feel,
I just want,
fulfill instinct,
and wonder where
on the timeline
it bent and broke,
time shattered
and I lost myself,
still taking up space,
like my body would know,
senses dumbed
like I've never been through this
I've been numbed
into complacency,
seeking only comfort
and safety
but nothing entertains
me, though this God
we've created
all things are possible,
but not one completes me.

Or maybe it's just the rain,
for a month now it patters
a lullaby outside
the misty mountains
are my brain's haze
from these rainy days
when all of June confused
itself with autumn
and had me looking forward
to a slow snow fall
and the oven heating the house
with the scents of childhood
with those memories
I can be whole again.

I just want to ******* feel,
unless we talk anxiety,
or numb notions od doom,
but now there's not even enough
cigarettes to touch sentimentality
like when I stood on my porch
puffing through ten
like I had it figured out
but now there's too many ways to go
and I'm laying in the road,
not dead, just covered in tracks
on my back watching the sky
for the fourth of July,
praying for a spectacle.
Time,
that ***** *******,
will indeed one day
**** your mother.
Rome rose
among seven hills,
shone like pearls,
and burned,
like a witch.

The known world
fell dark for ages.
Priests and rats-
one in the same.

Art brought light,
minds brought invention,
rejuvenation!
the world taken across the sea.

Crow's eyes spot land,
natives felt steel,
trailed tears,
a new world.

But, what if Rome
never ceased rising?
Fish out of water
but covered in snow,
from any angle but one
you'll never know
I am
the ******* consious
of God.
I am
the Sinner.
the
Just beyond the black iron fence
a haze settles on a parking lot
lit with the ghastly orange glow
of the old street lamps that
tower like rusted butlers.

I crack my window
and billow a gray cloud
that swirls amongst a
***** mist.

The butlers’ bulbs buzz mechanically.
The fog grows thicker.
Amidst it the parking meters
take shape of  metal tombstones,
pale in the darkness
beyond the glow.

I wonder how they died—
they beneath the tombstones.
This place—this city, have you—
boils to the brim with people,
with so many recipes for tragedy;
it’s no wonder they put tombstones
in parking lots.

— The End —