Gather your mind, let's fall
take the very last of your ink
and paint the stars in negative space
I'm here with you
I'll be here with you
I'll hang on even when we crash and burn
and there's nothing to salvage
and in the crater we'll lay for eternity
staring at the dead light above
and digging our faces in the ground
when the sun's rays return

common as stars seem here
they never fail to amaze
I can't stop staring
I feel like I'm in a beautiful world
a bubble of endless beauty and wonder
speechless. thoughtless
full of nothingness yet filled with hope
though I know in the light
and bustle of day
in their absence
I can't see beauty without feeling the importance of action
here all you need is to walk with your head in the stars
not caring what happens
no use bothering with the ground
and the dangers that may lie ahead

walk alone
slip into the night
mountains wrapping you up in their arms
encompassing the silence
as utterly alone in this world as you are
there's no need to be selfish
involved with self-absorbed worries
you're still a shelled seed
but how can you expect to change
when you close every open door with a spiteful shove?
I'm nothing but another blur of flesh and color


the cold nips into your pores
making breathing sting
and the wind caresses you much too hastily
reminds you that you remain anchored
to comfort and the day to day routine of feeding into to wants and needs
living from one commercial structure to the next
little support comes from within
I look to the stars and feel the serenity of being invisible
we rely upon the external to get us through
I pay little mind to the world's aches too absorbed in my own
but the stars remind me to feel blessed
and relinquish the false pain I hold on to

My heart skipped a beat
Shaking hands won't let me sleep
I feel my labored heart
Popping in and out of my chest
My murmurs mean nothing
The hunger is hard to communicate
so I let the rhythm of my desperation
play out in Morse code
as my blood pumps at amazing rates
Your skin is salty and sweet
the perfect solution to my tasteless life
but they claim my way of survival is inhumane

My body begins to eat itself
the muscles and fat I harbor
disintegrate from armor to fodder
I eat away my insides with eagerness
Trying to beat the tape worms and maggots to the finish

I know I brought this on myself
When I bit off more than I could chew
My greed overpowered my need
I over-worked the fields to cinders
And only thought of providing for my own
I cursed the gods for my adversity
The buds of rice began to turn to stone
The fields no longer receive love
or the gentle touch of forgiveness

The gods favor those who wait
Those who expect nothing from their efforts
Those who do what is virtuous and selfless all on their own
Those that demand are met with empty hands
for they are but pretenders with no faith and no compassion
Panic and starvation plague their families
The beating of their hearts like a symphony of crickets
Go rampant through the night
Only to stop in the coldness of the sunless morning
Cholesterol clogging their hearts

I am a jar long over due for some orange juice
with gaps and crack that hold me back
from the sweet sunshine hack
that is orange juice
this sticky sweet substance
this sun streaked pulpy mess
stays bottled up
with a smile so diffident
challenging me to break the rules
and let it out of its transparent cage
to clog my insides
with its smooth sweetness
but no
not me
I resist this instantly
I throw the bottle in the junkyard
far away from my periphery
where it remains hidden
sweating in the sun alone
left unkempt in neglect
unloved and harshly blinded by the rays of light
the sun beams penetrating its body
stabbing
leaving clumps of tissue
and sweating tears
but who sympathizes with an orange
once it's beaten to a pulp?
yet I still cannot avoid the sun-****** gunk
or keep it out of my mind
for it is a part of me
it nurtures
purges me
I feel so naked without it
and eventually i give in
to this titillating temptation

I may not be smooth or secure
or able to hold you or keep you from harm
but will you take a chance on me?
and be able to forgive my malice
and come back to play
a role in my empty jar glass?

Before the sun peaks through the sky
Lighting all the things I wish to hide
Before the early birds rise
There is a tranquility
The silence is eerie
Calmness settles over me
I find peace and acceptance
Within my incongruity

The uproar in my mind
Is temporary replaced with feelings so sublime
I feel my body glide
Levitate to meet the sunrise
I have no need for explanations
or external reassurance
When kindness lies within my own eyes

Walking down the dirt roads of this ghost town
I think of the rarity of this complacency
My eyes are no longer crusted shut
I feel no need to reflect or recollect
I merely observe the beauty
Enjoy the present unfold before me
And wish for the apocalypse to come
To make this absence of human activity a permanent reality

I cherish the foiling of connectedness and singularity
Alone but always together
The wildlife waking in the cheatgrass
soothes me into serenity
reassuring me that the sounds of consciousness
will not affect this new-found levity
I come to accept the ticking of time
And I radiate optimism and readiness for the day

I wait for the bus with patience in place of anticipation
I love driving through town
relying on others to get around
As long as I am not the one in control
I am comfortable being lost and directionless
I enjoy the distraction of the passing landscape
It seems too immense to be
a manifestation of my imagination
The way it removes me from my sad body
Into something much more than me
The beauty of the world is limitless
It envelopes me
Sending me to equivocal destinations

I feel this weightlessness become a headache
And soon I come back into my body
And into the thoughts and obligations I try to avoid
Fearing that this moment of happiness
Is slipping from my reality
I try to find some peace of mind
but I have no motivation to fight for an illusion
I return to my old darkness
Avoiding the light and the images it shows

With no basis for its existence
I begin to see all displays of optimism
as noxious naivety
promising but never quite what it seems
when it comes to me
It's always superfical and fleeting
Like the affection of my mistress
It is devoid of any true meaning

My mind is empty and I feel the need to sow new seeds
Never satisfied no matter how much I read
I browse these inklings with wonder
Holding every word for good measure
Because skimming always seemed defiling
Stripping you of the respect you deserve
But also stripping me of the opportunity
To see the meaning behind your words fully

I cannot say my awareness is heightened enough
To truly sink you in
But I want to try to absorb you
And breath life into your stale skin
I find so much beauty in literature
The lust for it is hard to remove
I sometimes devour you with too much haste
Letting some of your wisdom go to waste

As profane and disturbing as your ideas can be
Your consciousness comforts me
You are always there for me in times of need
You keep me company during anxious and sleepless nights
You distract me from my hell-bent self-destruction
As my analytical side puts me in a straight jacket bind
And the beginning of tomorrow weighs heavy in my mind
You take me away to experience different thoughts
Show me the world through fiction and teach me fancy diction
As well as enlighten me about culture, history, science and philosophy
And catch me up on the news and political hypocrisy

I hang on to you more than I ought to
But I lose interest sometimes in your tedium
You protect me from my reality
And always give me something to think about
But sometimes I need to live my life
And reverberate your magnificence in my own way
Instead of hide behind your cover

But there are times you bind my attention with every line on your spine
And I lose myself in you
I observe the way others have loved you
Weathering you with light
coveting you
braking you in
taking you to places you've never been
And you encourage me to do the same
Learn what I can while we still have time to spend
And enough interest to come back time and time again

I value these pieces of your mind
Splattered out in the lines
It fills me with inspiration
But I am impatient
Childishly demanding the wisdom of the world
To be imprinted in me instantly
So I devour your writing greedily
My lust for you and only you is insatiable
But I cannot commit to anything for long
I begin and you end
despite this break up we'll always be friends

I still scatter my attention
and I find myself seducing and perusing every book I see
Superficially accepting the flattery of imagery it imparts on me
I've spent so much time seeing things at face value
But now I want to see the deeper implications
The origin of these thoughts and feelings
And I don't need to possess you
But I do find the need to collect you
As well as share my love of you to the world

I try not to judge a book by its cover anymore
I want to see both sides to every story
I want to wipe my life clean of opinions and subjectivity
To open my heart and mind to new possibilities
Develop my intellect like Fitzgerald
So I can entertain two contradicting ideas simultaneously
And accept each one equally

My quest for knowledge
Has been more about the destination than the journey
And I now see my destination has never been definite or outlined anyway
you help me explore what lies within the interconnectedness of all existance
and this journey will never end
no matter how useless it seems to be
You force me to keep me on my feet
and help me push through the wayward bends

Strings are attached to each of my joints
All you have to do is tilt your wrist
and I am propelled into action
I surrender all control to you
And you are happy to commandeer
and play the puppeteer

You move my body to the beat
Leading me wherever we go like a herd of sheep
Time inclement of fluid movement
Synchronize perfectly to the dramatic music
the ****** always sends my heart rate into a frenzy
like a series of erratic stab attacks
I anticipate the end
as my feet are raise farther from the ground

You make me leap like a deer
running with such fear
from the cruel inventions of man
there's no time to think or hesitate
the dread begins to crescendo
with the power behind every violin
as I succumb to your whims
and dance like a sylph
weightless and wanton

Manipulation is a game you relish in
and you always put on the best show
You use my body better than I know how to
and you write out the script of my destiny
putting force in my step
and stretching me to express love
in order to vanquish the demolition of empathy
when humanity can no longer feel much of anything
but the anger and guilt and the emptiness of apathy

Hypocritically, you pay no heed to me
The things I abide as you paint your vision
Never cross your mind
I am simply a prop you molded in the image of your lover
the one that rejected you after years of chase
the moment you had her went to waste
and the longing never quite went away

My body was a product of your creation
but I still like to call my soul my own
you chipped away at me with such determination
and I shed curled wood instead of tears
as you carved my features with haste
making me into the form you wanted me to be
but you left nothing but a blank slate for my face
so you could put others in my place

I let you play with my limp legs
Finding disgust in every touch
but I find no reason to reject it
No energy of my own to deflect it
My arms bend to hold you the way she never wanted to
but these encounters are merely sets of occurrences
that have been written off in your script
as being scant of any meaning

I am your prototype but never the real thing
And in this cage of fibers I can rarely call my own
I begin to hate the matter that made me
and you, my creator, for having the gall to maim me
into a very disposable little trinket
because that's all that you see in me
and your influence is hard to shake

I feel weak with my self-inflicted derision
and the cultural mess we've attached to gender and labor division
creates a self-fulfilling prophecy of limitation
that I can't seem to burn from my mind
so your direction and guiding hand
helps me feel like less of an ignorant swine
as you introduce me to the art of feeling
I put up with your demeaning ways
so long as I remain the star of your play  

These sets of scenarios give me depth
and I embody all the roles you throw at me
but there is such emptiness in playing pretend
and experiencing and expressing beauty
when I am devoid of my own free will  

I have some comfort in mild mindlessness
because the infinite possibilities cannot intimidate me
and my inhibition cannot confine me
to a small fraction of what I have the potential to be
when you are there to steer me

I let you color the world for me
and put words in my mouth
but they are never able to pass through my lips
and you pay little mind to what I feel
when emotions are reduced to signs of hysteria
I attempt to articulate the fear through my body
As you manipulated me to express
lust, unrest, distress

Matter collides with the power of your inflections
the vibrations of your voice
sets in motion uncustomary emotions
that you awkwardly subject me to
as you pull me into situations of speculation and scrutiny
and turn dancing and passion
into a practiced routine

You view me as a rag doll
a petty squirrel
whose job is to be seen not heard
who suffers in silence
and takes it like a girl
If being wooden is a curse
being a woman is worse
because I never quite compare as far as intellect
and I long to prove myself wrong
but I am still like Pinocchio
trying to turn myself into a real boy

Hedonistically I wake up wondering what the world will do for me
Rather than what I can do for it
I have no ambition for greater things
I don't wait for my hour upon the stage
But you prop me up on your knee
And force me back into the light
Showing the world what you have done
Boasting of my blessed life

I am introduced as a product of you
A thing of delight
but never worthy in my own right
I never move until you force me to
I stay in the same place just in case
you need me for a new performance
a means of entertainment


In your crazed state
you gyrate the axis
sending me dancing at a violent pace
the sweet sentiments overlooked
and your fanaticism fuels a fire of fear and fury
a furnace that brings light to my indifference
and I feel my eyes are open now

You have been bottled up just as I have
in this dreadful dynamic of reliance
you used me to release your repressed ideas
your rejected love and your animosity
But no matter how much sympathy I have for your cruel art
When you try to rest your head on my wooden chest
My body rises with a need for revenge
And I snap my lid shut and decapitate you
So I can finally breathe on my own again
And detach these strings that bound us
as slaves to infatuation

Your gray matter is divine
I like the way you rhyme
You leave it all behind
because all inhibitions do is eat away your time

I don't want life to wane
to a sad state of disdain
so I keep up this game
and wait for you to flood my mind

I create a new me in every moment
while I let the memories of you unwind
I try to find a way to embrace this life
no matter how unkind
I feel full of emptiness and wasteful ways
but around you I try to put up a face
morph my ever shoulder-conscious body
into something I recognize as a valid use of space



I look through your window
Eager to see if my old skin has shed yet
I watch myself change shape
Like a skinwalker, I give up my coat
and steal someone else's
But I can never call it my own
and I can never feel at home
so I drift in the dark
hoping to warm your heart

I try to make my actions align with my words
so I can make myself real
but I never want to translate the things I feel
and every attempt to voice my beliefs
seems like I'm putting on a set of false teeth
I've got the armor but nothing underneath


Worry of judgement consumes me
My brain is ringing like the rails after impact
remembering the first time more vividly than the present
I'm a depressed undercover pessimist
A charlatan and a fabricator
I'm sober in my insanity
comfortable with the my self-aware self-destruction
Eating the leftover proverbs
To give me food for thought

The same questions fill me to the brim
The water's leaking out
The panic's setting in
My cup of water is too full
and I'm choking on the flow
I don't have a clue what to do with curiosity
I never let this feeling leave my lips
I can't explain what it and what it isn't
so I just move my finger tips


Somehow I can keep a conversation with you
and I enjoy you more than I ought to
I observe what I can
Slip into your shoes and point of view
Read into the pursuit of peace
You ameliorate my imagination
Give me faith in humanity
I feel less animosity
I let the mercury in me liquify
So I can produce my own light
Breath in and relieve my heart
from the pressure of years
spent stumbling in the dark


You are not a voice showing me the way out of the fog
but rather a hand covering my ears
so I no longer have to hear the echo of my thoughts
I spend the time tracing lines on your face
checking to see if anything has changed
the way I feel is constantly being re-arranged
defining it is never worth the juice it takes
but the lies I feed myself
empower me in this situation rather than degrade

I try to live in a new skin
around you and your friends
fit into the outline of who I set out to be
but every clone of me is messy
and I can never tell if I have changed yet
or if I will ever kick the habit
of being utterly hiffy and uneasy
burning with rudeness of my anxious impulsions
justifying inaction because of power displacement
but always trying to prove something

I make friends with those unwilling souls
that I thought would change me for the better
Open me to a world of ideas
and liven the lonely light I've been harboring
but you can't force things
and you can't always shake first impressions
I try to comprehend why I stay friends
with people only for their usefulness
Settling for those who think I'm adequate
Always conscious of what it may look like on the outside
rather than enjoying it for what is it


30 seconds is all it took for you to size me up
you read people so easily
it's easy to pass me off as devoid of heightened thought
but I managed to change the current when I finally spoke
Ranting about trees and sustainability
And my desire for invisibility
I was surprised how quickly you were convinced I was worthy
and like most compliments I can't take
I rejected your eagerness all too readily

I loved all your rants about black jesus and justice
about community and shared happiness
over material wealth and vanity
I'd rather listen and remain invisible
but somehow I still want to reach out
and grab a look of approval
but like you said, we don't listen to learn
we listen to reply
so I tried so hard to be so sly
and convince you I was super fly
sayin do or die
but you were too **** high
and I felt like I had fooled you
with a terrible lie

But with your soft skin against mine
I feel sublime
I'm wasting time getting close to you
When I have so much work to do
Reconstructing this mish-mash of metal
This wood with all the wrong angles
That is inside my fleece
That composes me
I've fenced myself in too long
And this restlessness is insatiable
I may be directionless but I'm able

I doubt my love, so my love is equivocal
I feel capable of loving you and everyone I know
even though I am just beginning to love myself
But love is definite
not something you quibble and question
and even though what I feel is far from real

I still want you to tell me everything
about philosophy and hypocrisy
about the ins and outs of what gives life meaning
about the uprising and government desecration
about what it means to have free will
But I may never tell you how I feel
Because I know your turmoil has nothing to do with me
when all my whirlwind nausea is centered towards you


You are a sapiosexual intellectual
the thirst for knowledge is alive with you
that curiosity grip me too
sets my mind on fire
and I dip into the news
you inspire a passion to find a purpose
and always follow through
but I know I cannot live as you do
the care does nothing but wear me down
because this fraction of attraction
Will leave me with nothing but a sound