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b e mccomb Aug 2016
when i turn you down
on going out
please don't take it
personally
or think i don't
love you

because i do
love you
so much that i would
rather stay home
than make you have to
put up with me

it's not like i want
to be controlled by
my mind but if i am
i'd rather you didn't see.
Copyright 5/8/16 by B. E. McComb
b e mccomb Aug 2016
the person who decided
to put their old
movie theater seats
in front of the
swimming pool
was a gosh **** genius.

and i often think
about streetlights
harmonizing with
brick walls.

(don't you hate
travel, though?)


yes, i do
but to get out
of my mind i'd
go straight to anywhere.

(i've missed this
but now i know
that straight lines
aren't static.)


THE SOLUTION
(you see)
IS PAIN
(fully obvious)

I DON'T KNOW WHY
WE'RE STILL SUFFERING

are we hurting
or are we back
to where pain is
felt as strength?

when you see
blood
do you see
regret?

you should
i should.

STOP PLAYING
THAT **** PIANO
I CAN HEAR HOW
OUT-OF-TUNE YOUR
FINGERS ARE WHEN
YOUR EARS DON'T LISTEN.

(and don't you know
that when you lay your
voice flat on the sidewalk
it sinks in the cracks?)


there's nothing like putting
poetry in a music notation
book to make you
realize how useless you are.

i have my reasons
all written in
hieroglyphics that
i can't read
and i have more
reasons
all written in
shades of lonely and
ceiling tiles.

so sue me
for the truth
i'm just afraid
of being hurt.
Copyright 5/5/16 by B. E. McComb
b e mccomb Aug 2016
at three a.m.
your breath should be
rounded
rising and falling
peacefully
calmly

like waves on a
smooth beach
but now everything
has fragmented
pixilated and
deconstructed.

your breath is being
dragged through your
lungs in triangles
half shapes without
softly curved edges or
serenity of form

gasps of air so
sharp they could
slit your own
dry throat
from the
inside.

and tears
so cold you
wonder if they're
shards of glass.

please
the next time
your body
becomes a vandal
against the windowpanes
of your mind

please
oh please
remember that
deteriorating
stained glass
can be taken down
from rose windows
by a master artist
and restored
pane by pane
each inch of leading
one at a time.

but repairing
is a process
and a process
takes time.
Copyright 5/4/16 by B. E. McComb
b e mccomb Aug 2016
i don't
leave
easy

not places
not people
not anything

i don't
leave
easy

i love
too
much

and hate
too
often

but i don't
leave
easy

once i've
chosen that it's
worth my time

i'll fight
to the
death

and cry
through the
night

but i sure won't
be leaving
easy

i'll
stay

lasso stars
to pull apart
constellations

run through
hell in
bare feet

to
stay

i don't
leave
easy

maybe
i've already
gone.
Copyright 5/3/16 by B. E. McComb
b e mccomb Aug 2016
i'd put my lips
to the exhaust pipe
and breathe in the
fumes if i thought
that exhaling them
would help.

and i would go back in time
listen to a rambling
speech each week
again and again
if i knew that it would
actually teach me to breathe.

or perhaps
but no

have you seen the way
it pools in the cold air
a man-made mist
of toxins and forgotten
words that we never
cared enough about?

i could choke
on it
it's not real
anyway
it's just vapor
burning papers

burning bridges
burning gas.

one of these days
i'm going to start
walking
and heaven help
whoever tries
to stop me.

i'll walk past
the town line
the cutoff where i should
have turned around
and fall straight off
the edge of the earth.

and all that will be
left of me is
a passing whiff of
exhaust on the breeze.
Copyright 4/28/16 by B. E. McComb
b e mccomb Aug 2016
i could write about
a lot of things
like my day
or how the pavement
looks when it
rains slightly.

or how the parking lot
feels when it's full
of cars and void of people
or how i feel when i'm
surrounded and
afraid.

how i'm angry and
insecure and
i don't owe anyone
anything
not my friends
not enemies
or elders
not an apology
or a single
**** explanation.

but i think i'll just
forget about the
whole thing and
write about death
or something
nice like that
after all it would
weight less on me
then the words
on my fingertips.

i had assumed
that i was done
struggling with
all that identity crap
but now i've concluded
that everything we ever
fight is a battle for
our own lives.

and it's odd
to think that i can
have such a strong
sense of myself and yet
my personality can
be so unlike that self.

there are more layers
to a parking lot than
what you might
first expect.

i suppose at one point
there were grass
and trees and pure
unadulterated dirt
and then somebody
leveled it
maybe added a coating
of gravel and
paved over it and
put some vehicles on top.

but that doesn't mean the
layers aren't still there
under the asphalt
i mean.

and that's what i'm saying
is that i've got something
under the pavement
i just can't get the cars
to move out for long enough
to tear up the layers.

i feel other people's wheel marks
burned into my skin
and the signs and lines
that proclaim no parking
have been vandalized and
ignored for too long.

how do you tell a parking lot to stop
without looking crazy?

and there lies the
exact problem
i care
too much
what people think
i look like
and i don't mind if they
think i'm insane
but i mind if they don't
like me
there's a big
difference you know.

and there goes
another piece
falling into place
and the
puzzle not
yet completed.
Copyright 4/25/16 by B. E. McComb
b e mccomb Aug 2016
a discomfort
radiating
upwards from the
***** of my feet
up my calves and
through the muscles
i try to keep
from twitching.

some nights i could
wash my hands
twenty times
and still feel
sweaty and
hopeless.

i could give up
sometimes
i know where the
blind curves are
and the tallest trees
in the woods
and i know how
much it hurts
behind my spine and
inside my rib cage.

i can't
breathe
i can't
breathe

and maybe giving up
would hurt less than
trying to hold myself
steady and trying

and

and

thoughts keep getting
cut off in the middle

i can't
breathe
i can't
breathe

i've had dark
nights and
slightly lighter
nights and
quiet damp
nights and
buzzing summer
nights and
throbbing multicolored
nights and
nights so deathly silent
i questioned my own sanity

and some nights
where i wanted
to just
give up

nights
nights
all of them were
nights.

i can't
breathe
i can't
breathe

i would run away
from my problems
if there wasn't this
discomfort
in the ***** of my feet
radiating upwards

and also
if i could breathe

*but i
can't
*******
breathe
Copyright 4/23/16 by B. E. McComb
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