You were red,
I was blue.
You turn lilac whenever I'm near,
Then red violet when you talk to me.
I turn teal when you smile,
Then uncertain as indigo when you call my name.
Then yellow came around,
You turned orange.
I turned green.
Whenever you're with me I turn you brown.
Now I disgust you.
Now I ***** you.
I strip myself of the hues I've made.
Now I'm just black.
Devoid of anything, of anyone.
Of us, of you.

When the sweat is dry on my brow
I will get up.
I'll be able to focus then better, I think.
The sweat is linked to a general malaise,
where objects drift in double shapes...
Not unpleasantly.
But smarter, I think, to stay. At least,
Let the pupils dilate, and left eye
Recalibrate it's aim.
The salt and sweat malign the eyes,
which either slip too fast past the the target,
or arrive a bit delayed.

You said:
Maybe we'd be happier if we moved on with our lives.
You're seeing something in Iowa that was likely there all along.
And the more I feel like you could slip away
I become more paranoid and afraid.
Wondering now who you're with,
Whether this path ultimately leads to my replace.

Though maybe we both agree, then, with what you said.
I can't hang on to something that long got on a plane and left.
Or try and **** through wires the delusion of a scent,
that dissipates, reductively, with every breath.

Though I will rephrase, in my own way,
the sentiment I think remains:
It would be more prudent to
Let the nose and lungs to rest.

         Let us be ungreedy with breath.


If you move on I will let you pass.
I cannot hold you within me,
And these cavities have not the space.


         But I will taste your color again, perhaps,
         In the wind, a laugh,
         The wet heat of a lovers face.

         I will taste your color again,
         In the wind, a laugh,
         The wet heat of a lovers face.



If you move on I will let you not just pass but
dissipate.
And rebuild a more modest faith:
Just once, to inhale again something like what went.

(And still remember what it meant.)

Never trust the establishment
They do not exist for our benefit
For they believe  that we exist
For their convenience
Their only purpose is self-perpetuation
And they think that our only function
Is to accommodate that purpose
Whereas our true cause should be
To get rid of the *******

                                        By Phil Roberts

I must have been raised wrong,
I believe in being generous.
I think people should be loved;
That meanness can be onerous.
I have seen what evil does
And I want no more of that.
I don’t think that selfishness
Will really feed the captain’s cat.

I have watched back biters
And gossips and thieves
Bring themselves all unawares
To the point where everyone grieves.
I have witnessed liars who get
Tripped up on their own tales;
Regular folks and politicians
Get the air taken from their sails.

I know well that our elderly
Have already done their job
So it’s fine with me if they just
Sit around and act like slobs.
They took care of us when we
Were the indolent folks kids are
So, they are entitled to rest,
More than we are, by far.

I was raised to let people be
If they had some philosophy
That did not match mine
Or even the vast majority.
Someone thinks a different way
That’s fine if it hurts no one.
Not everybody thinks the same
Carnival rides are that much fun.

I saw for myself that people
Were individual in so many ways.
Different in how they dressed
And what they had to say.
Some liked sports TV
And many preferred the soaps.
All of that is fine with me
So, why call each other dopes?

Is there something wrong with me
That I don’t go along with the crowd?
That I don’t enjoy the fights,
The sports fans shouting out loud?
Am I silly for not slowing down
When I pass a wreck on the highway?
Well, if I am, then that is fine.
I will go on doing things my way.

I broke up with God
at our favorite eatery
in our favorite booth.

We settled into familiar creases
and asked for the usual.

My eyes lazily staring at fingers
stirring the straw around the ice cubes,
God cautiously spoke up:

“Is something wrong?”

“Nothing.” (Thinking about the dormant phone
concealing behind the lock screen
the open Facebook tab
lingering over the relationship status section.)

They silently mused over the laconic reply,
til the waitress showed up with the food.

“Thank you!” God blurted with agonizing alacrity.

I received the sustenance lifelessly
and aimlessly poked at the burgers and fries.

The waitress eyed me with vague inquisition,
popping a bubble in the gum between
big teeth, refilled my water
and pirouetted hastily.

We ate in ostensible harmony,
the silence gripping like a chokehold,
the visible anxiety and subdued resolve
settling like a stifling blanket
over the child waking
from a nightmare—

Til we couldn’t breathe,
and I ripped back the covers
and looked into the eyes
of my tormentor.

“It’s not you, it’s me.”

God, taken aback by the curt statement,
dropped their burger with shaking hands,
silently begging with wetting eyes
a greater explanation.

So I elaborated:

“It’s not you, it’s me.

For your immaculate conception
was created by human hands,

your adages rendered obsolete
by human words,

your purpose and plan for us
distorted by human nature—

I cannot hate myself any longer.

I cannot pretend to know you at all.

Who my mother and father say you are
is not who my friends think you are,
nor my teachers, my pastor,
the president, Stephen Hawking,
Muhammed, the KKK, Buddha,
the Westboro Baptist Church,
Walt Whitman, Derek Zanetti,
******,
and Billy Graham.

I am told you care who I bring into bed (and when),
and what movies I watch,
and what music I listen to—

I have not heard what you say about
child soldiers, the use of mosquitos,
or the increased destruction of the earth
which you proudly proclaimed your creation,
or the poverty and disease and famine
which has ridden so many of your children—”

God interjected,
“But you’re chosen!”

I snorted,

“You say I’m chosen
to spend eternity with you—
why me?

Why’d you pick me among
thousands, millions, billions?

I’ve been told I’m ‘chosen’
since birth
by others like me—

those with fair complexion,
blue eyes,
blonde hair,
a firm overt ****** attraction towards women,
and a great big house
with immaculate white fences
delineating their Jericho.

I’ve already fabricated eternity
here among the other ‘chosen’
and there is a world of suffering
right outside the fence
and I see them
through the window of my bedroom
every day.

Am I chosen,
if I don’t vote Republican

Am I chosen
if I am Pro-Choice

Am I chosen
if I cohabitate with my girlfriend

Am I chosen
if I never have kids

Am I chosen
if I say ‘Happy Holidays’

Am I chosen
if I don’t want public prayer in schools

Am I chosen
if I don’t want a Christian nation

Am I chosen
if I don’t repost you on my wall
or retweet your adages?

I’m tired
being the ubermensch,
for it has not brought me
happiness
and I blame you.

I will not ignore
the cries of the suffering
believing it is I
who is destined to live
in bliss.

I will not buy
Joel Osteen’s autobiography(ies).

I will not tithe
you my money
for a megachurch
when another homeless shelter
closes down.

I will not tell a woman
what to do with her body,
or a man
that he is a man
if they say they are not.

I am neither Jew nor Gentile,
and I will stand with
my brothers and sisters
of Faith and Faithlessness,

Gay and Straight,
Black and White,

and apart from these extremes
free from absolutes
the ambiguous, amorphous
nature of Humankind
which I praise.

There is much pain and suffering
in this world,
potentially preventable,
but hardly can I believe
it’s part of your plan
to save
me.

I will not be saved
if we are not
all saved—

not one will burn
for my divinity.

The gates will be open to all—
and perhaps you believe that too,
but I’ve gotten you all wrong
and that cannot change,
as long as there is
mortality, and
corruption, and
power, and
lust, and
greed.”

God whined, growing bellicose,

“It is through me that you will find eternity,
I am the one true god!
I am the God of your fallen ancestors,
it is because you have fallen short
that you need me!”

I replied, growing in confidence,

“We have all fallen short,
yes,
but we are also magnificent.

We have evolved,
we have created,
we have adapted,
we have survived.

We have built empires,
and we have destroyed them.

We have cured diseases,
and we have created them.

We have done much in your name.
We’ve done good,
and we’ve done evil—

And unfortunately it’s all about
who you ask.

Your name is a burden on the oppressed
and a weapon of the oppressor.

You are abusive, God.

You tell me you are jealous.

You tell me apart from you I will suffer for an eternity.

I’m scared to die, yet want to die,
because of you.

You have made life a waiting room
that is now my purgatory. It is

Hell On Earth.

So you see,
it’s not you,
it’s me—
a mere mortal
who has tried to put a face
to eternity
and it has left me
empty.

And also,
it’s me,
for I have learned to love me,
as I have expelled your self-loathing imbibition,
and the deleterious zeal
I have proclaimed
through ceaseless
trepidation
and self-flagellation—

I have learned to love me
by realizing I am not inherently evil,
that my body is not evil,
that my mind is not evil,
and, ultimately, that
there is no good
and there is no evil.

My body is beautiful,
my mind is beautiful,
this world is beautiful,
and we are destroying it
waiting for you to claim
us.

I leave you
in hopes to see you
again one day,

and perhaps you will look
different than I have
perceived or imagined,

and in fact
I certainly hope so.”

Just then the waitress strolled back up
with a servile smile:
“Dessert?”

“No, thank you,”
I smiled politely.

And with that,
I paid the check,
and took a to-go box—

walked out into the evening rain
to my car,
put on a secular song
that meant something real to me
and drove off
into the night—

feeling for the first time
free
and alive.

Give me something. Anything to quiet this feeling; this hollowness. Is this what happiness feels like? Is this what it’s like to be content?
I’m empty. I am a vast shell of a vessel that’s filled with such potential, such hope; but I waste it.
I’m wasted.
I’m wasted on the thought of you. The thought of you with someone else. The thought of being alone.
I don’t want to be alone.
It hurts. It shouldn’t hurt.
I am empty.
I don’t know how to feel but I do when you’re near and I wish that it would stop.
I want to be happy always.
I don’t want to be dependent on you for the sun to shine. I don’t want to feel as though you hung the moon. You didn’t. I did.
I’m wasted.
Wasted youth. Wasted love. Wasted space.
If this is what it is to be content; to be happy…
It’s a numb feeling.
Everything is perfect and yet…
I’m empty.
I love with a burning passion, so much so that you get torn up and scorched in the process.
It is not a slow burn it is all consuming.
It consumes me.
I’m consumed with a lonliness when you’re gone and when you’re here I yearn to feed it.
I need to feel you, I need to be near you. I need to know you’re not leaving. I need to prove to myself that this is real and that you are here and that you love me.
If I don’t I burn, my fire stays in me and it burns, it burns, it burns.
I’m overbearing.
I’ve scalded you; it’s too hot, you can’t breathe I’m smothering you and I can’t stop.
You push me away and the flames grow larger.
But when you go, the fire slowly dies out.
I’m not passionate.
I’m not a writer.
I’m empty.