Delicate whispers tiptoe across tightropes
My eyes flit between skies and
Crawling ivy, seeking so shyly,
Darling, won't you stare through me?
I can feel our branches entwining,
Heartstrings unwinding,
Curling like my toes in bed, but

Instead...

I am taken by beauty,
These curses of duty,
Forever spinning my head
It seems you could take me,
But I must be broken and
Mended, gentle and gilted,
It seems as though enough has been said

Are you unhappy with how we hold hands?
When every finger fits?
Does my beard tickle or prickle?
Or does it turn you on?
A silly, little, fickle thing,
To cast my doubts upon
Does my voice scratch or scrape?
Does it surprise and delight?
Or does it swallow you
In the endless ocean of night?
Can I make you happy?
And have enough to spare?
Or am I driving on empty?
Too gone to care

I wish I had my own quiet corner of the world
Where I could be my quiet self
And not have to think so much about
Where I left my head

Walk away…
Into the deep summer sun
Each step an imprint
A reminder of who you once were

Look to the sky
Look to your future
You are there
Waiting for yourself

I’m standing on one leg in my slammin’ salmon pink room, with my curvy waterbed, staring at the silly, swaying Appalachia hillbilly trees
That laugh with a country accent that slows down and up and down and
I’ve never been more scared of that picture by Van Gogh
The skeleton man with a cigarette in his mouth
Like a thinner Freud! (Like a doctor)!
My frenzied scribbling is like an ****** to a forty-something housewife that enjoys
Late nights drinking wine and Vicodin cocktails to give her some
Semblance of normalcy (Necks suckling over me like rainbow breakdance)
Their voices are back again…
They’re crowding all around me…
These walls These walls
Speak to me
These walls These walls

I like the pink walls because they talk to me in my mom’s voice
And
when they get too loud,
God sits quietly in my coffee cup and whispers to the nurses
Brightly, angrily! He tells that silly Lilly to
Make him take his medicine
And like an obedient child,
Or a bride to be…
I do
Now when I stare out my window, the trees no longer laugh
Skull with Cigarette becomes a soft reminder of home
Which reminds me to pick up the cordless landline and call my mother
To tell her that everything is quiet now and that
My soft, white bed is made and my room is clean now for her to come visit tomorrow
So I lay my head down and fall asleep
Cradled by walls of silence

I Don’t Know
And I don’t think I ever have
Known what really matters to me
Sometimes I do but it doesn’t make much of a difference anyway
I’m no better than I was before
And I don’t think I will ever be
Anything more than just another
Beginning without an end
How did I ever get so lost?
Walking down the wrong path.
Refusing to listen to your true self.

I can remember snapshots of color
Images wrapped in VHS tape and
Forever frozen and left to crystallize in plastic bins
Sips of tea like tiny raindrops christening my lips
Forming mornings and memories anew
A slew of
mournings and memories
Of the only acceptable displays of emotion being at funerals
Where I would feel hot tears slink down my face and onto the floor of the coat closet
The only place that I could feel comfortable expressing how I felt over someone I never knew
I don’t think anyone would have minded
But then again
I Don’t Know

I am D.D. of Forever
dually desired
In mansions made of crystal
I gesture gorgeously with
Fingers to lips and mouths
I am one of many
Beautiful
Bashful
Ghoulish
Garish
Flaring
Flaming
Life-savin­g magicians of endless forevers
Sunken inside my brain
Seeking to share shorn madnesses
So far away from here

I am D.D. of Forever
Dually Desired
And just one of three
If you can guess where I stand
I will meet you there
On the island of The Ancients
Safe and Safe and Sounding
So fine

I'm beginning to cross the end
Shorn away from mother's side
Distant shores steal stolen glances
And break away with the tide

Let me speak, sweet child in crimson
My whispers cut through rivers,
Valleys and streams
Of forgotten breath
And broken being

I left his head in a puddle of blood
Wave after wave,
A broken being

I went to lie by the shore
Something so still you would not believe
Forever isn't always
In the land of broken being

Empty killing noises
That work to flatter futility
Like a figure in the night
I am a figment of your imagination
Like tattoos on old wounds
You help me hide from what will always remain
So when you let some guy ******* tonight
You will find the words that slither from his tongue
To be oh so clever
Which leaves me to wonder
What I didn't say to keep you forever

I'm trying not to mind
That I'm sleeping all the time
And every thought of mine
Drifts to you

Back to those summer days
Hidden in a cloudy haze
When I would
Give myself willingly to you

It reminds me of the way
The words you always used to say
Like "I love you" and "goodnight"

But all those little things
Fade away into the spring
And become nothing more
Than a sigh

Now it's winter here
And the words I once held dear
Have turned away and said
Goodbye

there I watch my whole life
somewhere between the earth and sky
Thankful that we never parted empty-hearted
    
    Thankful that we never even made a sound
And with everything you brought in
You never let me hit the ground

What was my life before we met?
I, a traveler, lonesome and weary
You, beautiful, now and forever
To you, my love, I bid a soft
Good morning
And I am lonesome and weary no more

D.D. is drawn
To places of remembrance
An animal magnetism
So naturally strong
You cannot help but ignore
Everyone around you and fall
D...D...Deep Down
Into valleys and ravines
Of boogie-woogie-oogie gone by
Bye
Bye
Bye

The endearing way in which you grab hold
Onto the stillness of my soul
Once again fulfilling every wish
Of both you and I
To give and to receive the warmth and comfort
Of your limbs entangled with mine
Provides my soul with the nourishment
For both you and I
And under the moon, lie just us two
In love and life and laughter
Your smile tears me away from my suffering
And I am made whole, yet again

Tired and weary
I climb my ivory tower
And sit above those
That wish to tear me down

My heart and mind
Go out to all
And give to those
That need my silence most of all

Lend me your soul
And I'll give you my ears
To bend until they break
Because I love you so

And when I'm there
To listen to your last
I hope you'll think of me more
Than just a friend

Afraid of what lies beneath the surface
I retreat into familiar lands
That hold me close in barbarous arms
And in the night I see him
Turning in his dreams
Sobbing/\ laughing, until/\until
The earth becomes too much to bear
And he is alone again

His father came to him without words
"I Fear Myself" was what he said
And in the morning I awake
To see him in the mirror

I look to my bedroom wall
And escape into a thousand lifetimes
Cascading into brilliant gems of
Liminal reflection... caught!
Only to slip away again into the edges of forever

Tell me where your heart lies tonight
If not with me, then some other way
Too fearful to stand, you shy away
Back into the cosmic glow of
All that will ever be and more
One time, a wife
Four times, a *****
May my tears and fire take your heart to shore
And in The End
The Very End
You'll find my heart cries for more

Sharp tears sit
Like soft diamonds
On her sharp,
Angular face
Dark brown eyes
Pour forth the pasts
Of those who were kept
Silent...
And made to be
Still...
She cries today

I wish you would just wake up
And not stare at me through those closed eyes
Because not seeing you has been
Killing me lately and I wish I
Could just finish a simple
Thought that you were okay
I'll ask again anyway
Are you?
Awake?
Or fading away again
Into urgent, impatient
Pale Dreams

Soft and sure you walk with me
With feet that kiss the warm horizon
Your hand in mine, we swim for shore
And kiss eternity forevermore
We smoothly glide into the night
To face the dawn in warm embrace
And wait for morning's soft reply

My dreams of you are (have become) a heavy blanket:
                            a lie to bathe by, a comfort I drown in.
As every radio static memory blends into infinite color.
                             It becomes so hard to imagine that you were always really there.
           And worn as I am, can you hear them?
                       And now I am, so afraid.
                                With silent anticipation,

How long has it been since I last saw you?
When did we last fill the room with lively, sapphire jabs?
When was I last your son, or your idea of him?
Floating softly through the eternal Autumnal sigh of leaves
I write Letters to Home in my mind
That speak to you like we used to
Quietly alone, I watch the gray sky fade
Into this new world, never to be seen again

Hilarity is often a combination of truth and comparison

Wild for you to notice                                                     Hello again...
Inside my beat up brains                                              How could I never
I scream for silence                                                         Be where I
For silence... I make no fuss                                          Fall I could
If you've ever known                                                      Never see or
What it's like to scream                                                 Know just how
And not make a sound                                              Much you meant

                                                        To me
                                                         You are  
                                                       The same
                                                      As always
                                                     As before
                                                       As above
                                                     You never
                                                       Did change

Lightning strangles the night in a gossamer shade of nostalgia
Sweetly stings, softly stabs, surreptitiously signaling disregard
For those that gave you breath and form…
I aspire to explain myself, serenely, and yet the words
Crawl out of the back of my skull like stagnant spiders
Meticulous, menacing, utterly terrifying
Yet vital and obligatory…
Yet everything…
But nothing yet…

I could tell you about our time
Of two people lost in a fire
I could tell you of warm satin
Warping the edges of forever
Melded by hot tears, unable to
Quench the darkened well inside my heart
It was a time when everything
Was forever and
nothing
Was never again
And every word we spoke was a tidal wave
Deliberate… Constant… Always…
And then it was no more
Oh how quickly you rocked
Back and forth
Back and forth
Sobbing like a child
In that instant
I could feel your soul
Being so honest with me
For the very first time

It's not enough
It's never enough

For you I hold up half the sky
And all I can smell is rain
Thank you for watching
Thank you for waiting
I have been
Patient
Long Enough
Drowning here alone
The nature of love
Is to steel the…
I wonder if we’re…
I won’t shy away from your
Shimmering crystal perfection
I only wish to be
Swallowed whole
And pass away into the dilapidated sunset
Shaking boldly at the frozen moon
As cool drops shake one another loose
And the morning sun brings the same
As it never was

End of the road
No time to cry
Only in silence and memory
Will I see you again
Cut raw like hands in winter
My mind searches for time immemorial
To know, to know, to search
Through light and dark
I swallow Heaven once more

Mother can you hear the violence?
Mother can you hear the violence?
Father can you feel the space?
I’m dragging my dreams through the darkness
Where silence and shame
Lap longingly against my sides
I’m searching the stars for
Little surrenders and quiet misgivings
To take away what
I wish I never knew

How long can you hold this forever?
Pulling myself down into the water
Every direction is breaking me while
Still waters rise like dreams
And turn to memories
Now every clearing shines
Love is surrounding me
Like birds that chase the skies
I just want to go home
To my windows
And stare...
Oh it can be so lonely
Still waters rise like dreams
And remind me
Of what it is to be free

Quiet, spacious racing
Familiar faces placing
Curious looks inside my eyelids
To be brought home again.
So hold me now, you're...
Holding me now
I am the one to be loved
And broken by your embrace

You leave my mind teeming with thoughts
Like lavender glittering on a ridge
Today, like us, is magic
And I get the feeling we've been here before
While I watch the raindrops pelt the floor
This long road whetted with rubber,
Longer than I remember
We're here, then home, then there,
Longing for

It's all a dream
And I'm not sleeping
I'm not sleeping in
So hard to see
What you've been keeping
You've been keeping from me
Because all I want is to talk to you
But I can't breathe
It's like I'm tasting
Defeat
Now I Can't Be
Even if I could tell you
I wouldn't even speak