Pool of blood turns sticky
Icky thick tick picked off and tossed aside
carve a pumpkin-
watermelon smile
black teeth grow
sprout green,
a textured ridge
bridge the gap between what I mean and what is seen.
I think of you in your blue room
With all the pieces contrary
love isn't real but imaginary.

Twists and turns
Describe the spaces and races
Body processes, yearns
To learn how you tie your laces
Stars group in a constellation
Pointing the way
And through the devastation
I see them like wounds, say
Did I ever tell you
I love the blue
In your eyes.

I am as alone
When I am with you
As I am when I am not.
Fat tears
Invisibly streaking down my face
Whiskey and lace
Pills in the cabinet, just in case
I feel like taking all of them
Because I can't look at men
Without thinking of the tricks
Slithering up their sleeves
The hearts they collect and break just for kicks
Whiskey and lace
Whimsy and taste
All the contents of me in this jar
Here, take it, I can't stand it anymore.

I live on the moon.
Rocketed here last noon.
A Running Away
because of my mind and child's play.

I spend all day
building people
Out of moon-dust clay.
An army, A steeple
All without pay.

This is my punishment:
Slash at the sun,
Smell not a single scent,
And see no one
made of anything but clay.

Pills and rocks
Take them to
Not feel tired anymore
....If only

Diamonds like ice
broken glass
Cut cold

Age gathers bold.
Not so pretty
When it melts;
I long for, I long for
Choosing something else

I was a victim
Of your addiction.
One of your numbers
It's too bad
You don't keep count.

I was one of your poisons
You used to try
to ****
All the slices and scars
All the sadness and pain

I was one of your mistakes
A strong one
That put bars over the door
Kept all the razors at bay.
Would never run away.

Yesterday you gave up
Addictions
Poisons
And
Mistakes

Today I gave up
You

It isn't your mystery
Or history
That makes me stick around.
It isn't because you pound
Away at me,
Or have the right key.
I stay
Because you just may
Be a habit, an addiction,
Just a whirl-twirl fiction,
greasy slab of meat,
***** spike on the bottom of my cleat.

Everything I own was stolen
From you
Or him or them.
Where have you been?
Locked in a den
But now I'm on the run.

Stain on your fingers
Maybe, I hope it lingers
Because there has to be evidence
Of existence at all
of the sadness, towering tall
I mark it on my wrist and on the wall
With clear paint and razor-claw.

Is there something to hold onto?
Everything I own was stolen from you.

A lighted grid,
bleeding orange beams
and black rivers,
gazes up
confusing a steel bird
for a shooting star
wishes made
and regretted
burned in the stratosphere
of the folds in your mind
and the flatline of your heart.

I try to saw
My body in half
The gears and springs
Broken sensors
Machinery of my other half
never quite disengages
I pour out its contents on these pages
So as to not get oil
On your ear
It's broken? fix it.

Well
B'twixt you and me,
Who wants broken machinery?

Here is this voice
it is just a whisper
would you turn your head
to lean in closer?

Imagination says
there is a space
where I am not a chore,
and a place
where I am not cold anymore

Reality says
there is an abyss,
where I am a water glass
that can't feel a kiss
as you turn your head
what did you miss?

Gather the sand.
Shift it
Comb it
Stroke it
Like a bitter demon
On your shoulder
Or her shoulder
Equally, they smolder
Set it all on fire
Pills and solitude
Melt into glass

File folder mind
Pulled loose. Tossed around.
Paper flutters like birds and clouds
Slow decent
Into madness
I never chose
Even though the Buddhists say otherwise
I watch it all settle around me
Blood and mud stains
Never stayed in the lines

I fell in love with the colors first
A contrast green, gold
Blue
Underneath.
Then the words
So many and so few
Sighs and currents
Cold shivering view
Distance and near
Not having enough eye
To see all
That once was here.

Make blown glass plans
Tasting of peppermint and lime
Feeling of golden bubbles and time
Eroded by ***** and cancer

The floor I walk on
Bare foot
Made of shards of blown glass plans
Look at these hands.
Tasting of iron and callous
Feeling of sharp disappointment and malice.

Very best
never quite enough
No sleep, no rest
As rough
As the Rockies
Mountains of pink skin
monster
What else do I call it?
How do I **** it?
These things aren't taught in school
Hot metal skewer to hand over to you
Here, I know what you want to do.
Very best
Never quite enough
It's tough,
So here are all my knives and matches
To take me out in batches.

Heavy silver hair
falls silently,
a razor slices away
the tiny slivers closest to your scalp.
Markers stencil
where he will saw
a report speaks
dry and clinical
of how it took you away.

The water in the sea
In my eyes
Stinging but clear
Maybe you were the first and last
To see me
As I am
To race me down the beach
The first and last
I would have run to
I would have wrapped
My life around.
Stinging but clear,
It was always you, my dear

Sew back together
Feather to bone
Stone to gravel
Unravel skin
Search somewhere for something sharp
Harp strings, heart strings
Both play the same melody:
Forget all this revelry
Pains and pleasantry
All feels the same to me.

I thought I saw you yesterday
Through my blurred vision
A piston engine, stopped
And was left to rust
In the front yard
They say we all come from stardust
There mustn't be any left
Pick a card, any card
The one you want isn't in the deck

Half of my face
Is scared
Is scarred
It's the part I hide
In the shadows
In the back of the room
With tint and highlight.
Ugly Textures
And those scars
I bandage
And, behold, I manage.

I take cold showers
To save the hot water for you
One plus one isn't always two
Green plus yellow is blue
Black is the absence of them.
I know the monsters' den
All too well.  
You're a resounding bell
A deafening cannonade
For nothing was I made.

So you'll realize
I don't make sense.
What usually happens:
they lose interest.
An inside-out umbrella.
A stained iron.
An oven-fridge on the roadside.

I'm a black ash candle flame
Sheets made of sandpaper
Skin made of bugs
Nails on a chalkboard
Love pulls and tugs
When you're around,
I yearn to build
Rock solid block
Out all the sun.
I yearn to put my hand on yours
But I'm afraid it'll melt.
A cascade of butterflies soar
Orange air
Burns to black ash
By candle flame.

Words lost
I take all of this at some cost
Pictures dull
A cognitive lull
A black backing on my brain
Suction, please, irrigate this wound with rain
I'm only trying to approach reality
Full of blisters and malady
Boldly following my repeating word
All my memories have become blurred
Nothing makes sense
Everything moves into past tense.

I can't erase
your penned-in face
I killed a man
That's for sure.
Long days begin to blur
The sting
Of her lips
And the clink of a ring
Sing of bullets
And thin streams of *****
Or blood
Or death
Or love
It all sounds like evaporation to me.
I sat at her grave
Maybe told her I'm not that brave.

Could I ever call your name
Loud enough
To be heard?
Words herded through your mind
In one, out the other
But I was just a puddle
On your living room couch
A sheer sweater draped over me
Ridiculously.
Every face I show you ficticuously
Shows you
Your reflection

This place makes me angry
because the heater is out of control
because my mind is out of control
because here is where even cacti die
dry
barren
yet full of concrete buildings
mortar
metal screws
yet there you are, a sprout
green
small
yet blossoming tall.

Skin and sand
Swords that stab
Babble away at the point:
An inarticulate ***
Of
Confusion and lust
Dissatisfaction and trust
Or distrust
Or apathy
They all feel the same to me.
The floral pattern of your pillow
Is imprinted on my jawline
The last mania
The last game of trivia
The last time I felt something
Skin and sand
Are the only things I demand.

Compose,
Gather, rather throw together
A set of words
Birds talk the same amount of nonsense

Translate these electrical impulses
Repulses of boys
Or men
(I can't tell the difference anymore)

Decompose
This body
Because its shoddy
It's not all have

But it is all
I am willing to give to you.

When I was born
they cut off my tongue,
so I spoke in colors.
Spitting red in my father's face:
an invisible vapor
lingering a decade or two.
I tried washing it out with blue
and black
smelling of tar pit tantrums
it oozed microscopically from my gums.
Generating sums
of recycled metals
gray and solid crushing my body.
I licked in silver whispers
gold drips on my seat.

I keep repeating
a staccato pleading purple
please pay
in love.
Please stay
said with one white cloud above.

I grade your paper on what I see
Or what the Validictorian gives to me
She tells you to write in pen.
Come on boys, grow up to be men!
The only thing she cares about is if you’re in ASB.
Pleasing the teacher is the key.
You’re up the creek without a paddle,
If you have your own style of hitching up the saddle.
The horse you ride is like a paper,
If you don’t follow format you’re sure to fall.
This riding lesson has taught me nothing,
Except that conformity wins them all.

Reanimate a dead fish
hook through the lips
hips sway a song I forgot the words to
cue the sad violin
sin satisfying for a second
beckoning over the edge of a tower
power of gravity and lust
foundry of trust.

Ocean skies
In your eyes
Reflected upside down
Me, a clown
Big red nose
Pacing the rows
Counting up all the things
Make my soul sting
Do you like me or are you just desperate?
Maybe a little of both.
Can you keep this oath?
Only if Art agrees.

My head is a sea
of gasoline.
It smells strongly
of travel and
it smells slightly
like the breath I was able to take
when dad got out of the car.
Fill 'er up.

This arm
on this clock
is a match
hovering over me
a plume of fume
rising up to hug the flame
and ignite my life
turning to a simple scheme
of color and strife.

Then, I'm a pile of rubble
because this machine sea blew.
Where will I sleep now?

Mountain, steep grade
Laid, paid, never stayed
I worship the void filled
By my imagination guild
Mildew dreams weaves tight
Across my right side brain
Jumped on a train
To take me away
Pay in love
Pay in day
Pay in night
Whatever you can afford
Cut the chord
A chain link
Steel metal mountain
Steep grade
Remain unpaid.

Claw at your eyes
Ties tied tight around my *****
As Plath would say
Mother may
I please just cut myself in half
Throw away the ties,
Lies, and sighs
Muffled by ruffled feathers.
Walk around free
On sea
Touched palms.

I sent you my body in a bag
Of ones and zeros
It waits on your doorstep
Unopened.

Blunt force,
bone broken in half,
temporary tattoo:
that's her, him, and you.
The lions know what to do
when the snow globe shatters
fake flecks clear, revealing the tatters
and making it easier to see
what is outside of me.
Claw
Mane
Blunt force,
just after a kiss on the glass.

Leaves turn gray
And fall away
The pressure is too great,
And you are far too late
I ask the universe
Or fate
To send some help
But it only hears a curse.

My light isn't light
He said
It's un-light
In the brightest possible way,
I long to gulp down
A beautiful soul
To replace the one stolen from me,
The one lost at sea
Instead, the un-light
Gulps me into its
Violent absence found
In leaves turning gray.

I wait
In the lilies for you.
Counting every breath
And every petal
That falls.
Finding something that solves
These wolves you face.

Whiskey and lace
Placed careful in my life.
Stray hair. A knife.
A long night saying no
And.
If you know what's best,
You'll just run. You'll just go.

Live without hurting
him, others, and the spirit.
Unattainable

Hold on while I burn
my life down.
I've collected all the tinder.
I've chopped all the wood
Dead
Flaked bark and pale flesh.
I construct a magnificent
castle around my life--
tiny, buzzing, confused,
I've trapped it in a mason jar.
It's locked in a desk drawer  
Locked in a room
In the highest tower.
Now I drop the match.
Does glass burn?

An apple with an arrow through it
You didn't keep it, just threw it
At me. Sharp thorns overtake me.
I only wanted to show you my aim.
Tame the animal, curl flame
Around your finger
I would love to linger
Just a lifetime longer
But paper snowflakes are no stronger
Than this cheap plastic mask
I was never cut out for this task.

White satin sand,
an expanding black sea,
calloused hand,
all stark against the lonely view of galaxies.

This is the moon beach.
Where I build them rafts
and, just to teach
me a lesson, they take them away.

Since I stopped making
rafts
there is nothing left for the taking.
Which someone once said is the definition of Perfection.

They laughed at her
Standing there trembling
Like a naked and skinny calf
New born and stilted
Slanted a little to the left

I laughed along
With them
Sorry,
You're not who I thought you were
Maybe I'm not made of bronze
With golden hair
Nothing metallic
Nothing precious
Just dirt
And dust
And rust
And a black wax heart.

They laughed at her
I laughed along with them
Because there is nothing else left
Of you
Or me.

I wanted it to be us
Pulling away from the bottom
Of the deep end;
But smeared lipstick reminds me:
This is only temporary.  
They will only love you
As long as you are loveable
As long as you are good

I would have shook off
This dark veil
To see you more clearly

I would have loved
This world
In its chaos
Beautiful spirals in and out
Of madness
Of loneliness and beckoning
Over and over
A tolling bell.

Joys and pains
Wash past me like sunlight
Breaking through the clouds.
What I long to say
Stands before me
Just out of reach
Just past the horizon.
What I long to feel
Flees from me
Just far enough
For me to know its shape.

You never see the dark side
Of the moon,
Just like you never see
The light side
Of he
and she.
Just be
as I fall through a lotus blossom.

You don't need a brief.
Briefly let me like it
as our,
Or
Your
Words slip around
Or sound
Just briefly
As our's instead of your's

The sound of your voice
Fake lullaby in the distance
And fading fast
They say you gotta
Love the one you're with
If you can't love the one you want.
Are these the same people
comparing wishes to horses?
Outlining courses
With white chalk on the grass?

I have a seat among the ants
Grabbing ahold of your hem
Falling asleep to the sound of your absence
Your memory turns from coal to gem

Cry off this expensive mascara
The salt makes lashes
Stick together
That's what helps, they say
Stuck together
That's what people become, they say
Peel you off like a toffee string
Lick you off like a pesticide ring
Pick you off like a bathtub drain
Get used to the pain
Because it's the only guarantee
Kick me off like an ant on the sidewalk
Dust me off like a spider web
Push me off like a rock at the top of a mountain
Cry off this expensive mascara
Ten down and countin'