Pulled from a shelf and myself on a lounge,
I sit with the brittle paged book.
Try as I might, my immersion is dashed
From the sounds of dinner cooked.

My will delivers a writ to read,
My mind runs to and fro,
The television demands my attention.
Progress, none will flow.

Instead, I sit with prose,
And write a poem on the fixation.
Five minutes have passed; The T.V. now dull.
Finally, I receive my satiation.

Things get better in the same way a cut heals;
Obvioulsy, with time,
But also with pain.

In pain, we have a gift that keeps everything real;
Grounded in rhyme,
But also with shame.

The blood shows everyone how we feel;
Some say you're fine,
But some step closer to share all the same.

Things aren't always perfect,
But I wait for a spring day.
With open skies and honey bees
And nothing in the way.

Winter has brought pain,
From many cold, cold nights.
My steering column veers,
From slipping on the ice.

I wait for rain.
I wait for ants.
All things have a balance;
All things have a cadence.

All things must come to an end;
The day, the week, the minute.
Man counts the hour alone,
He stands upon his great throne.

I have counted all these things.
I have stood as all men stood.
Everything has lost its sheen;
I have done all that I could.

I think I like how it feels;
To lose each and every thrill.
To hold on by a small thread.
I walk with death as a friend.

I chewed my fingernails down to the bone
And when you moved your lips I listened
With intent to understand your tone
And see your smile glisten

I speak of heavy weather often.
Pouring rain here, thunder storms there.
But today I fell in love with fog.
A form of precipitation that softens.

It makes bright orange street lamps turn into light warm fires.
Takes the busyness of a road and shrinks its view,
to only whats in front of you.
And it is this, that focusing effect, that fills me with a desire.

Now, I ask the gods for soft weather.

These fingers quickly till the dirt for words buried in my mind
I can write free verse or I could rhyme
I can make haiku
Though its not necessary
To portray my heart

Struggle, I have become; I'd like to find my voice.
Amongst many a great poet, I am the furthest ripple from the rock thrown in water.
The lowest branch on the red wood.

Don't believe in such tactics as motivation; a devilish dependency lies there.
No, it must be discipline that is fair.
To write strictly; to write deliberately; to write however I want in those ways.

"Yes, but did you see the way she looked?"
Motivation from the deepest nook;
Inspiration that sings rhymes.
Free verse couldn't emphasize.

Simply put, maybe there's a time and place.
For different styles, and different tastes.
Iambic signature, saving grace.
Freely spoken, unknown fate.

Hello, cool air that carries news
From northern breathing trade winds
I've gone all night not sleeping
My stinging eyes make bad friends

My attention span is waning soon
My work will be so **** thin
I cannot stop obsessing
O'er my present next of kin

"Once I was-" and "Once I had-"
Don't pay me any mind
For I am just a sleepless boy
But with a man I'm intertwined

I mourned my childhood; that daydreamin' boy of the past walking in the woods with friends.
Sweet child that knew no bounds.
This laughing kid with his head in the clouds.
**** the dreams that flew away; given my chance, in that past I would stay.
A eulogy for the electric being I once was; no current was ever strong enough to hold forever.

On my birthday in 2016 I blacked out. Usually, bad things happen when I blackout. This time was different though, I was a very pure version of myself. How pure could it have been really? I mean, there was viscous alcohol running through my veins. I was always told alcohol wasn't pure; I still believe that.

  On such a night, I can remember the blur of pixie lights hanging outside the rooftop bar. Mixed with tequila, the lights created almost a room of light around me. I remember the girl that put a plastic sword (used for stirring drinks) in my hat. I loved the sword, it must've meant something to me. She must have meant something to me that night, but no longer.

  Thats the strange thing about such small moments. People can mean so much one night, and then be gone in the next. She was on her way to Colorado, Montana, or something the next day. I never saw her again. I'm not sad about it, but it does leave me confused. I'm not one to believe in purpose, but I do have some inkling that its a possibility we cross paths in a biological rainstorm. Maybe our biology determines our chance meetings with the fates.

Down a winding trail I stood;
Looking back on the way I came.
A blue bird sang in suburbia.
A younger me walked in the rain.

What a free day that must have been,
Or is it simply my imagination?
We walked down the path together;
The road of our summer vacation.

The rain has dried; the dirt now cracked.
Easier to move on than look back.
Our path now gone, and terribly overgrown.
Still, we always know this was our home.

Everyone speaks of falling in love
As if its something to strive for
My screen tells me that this is what I want
And the dopamine injection is just to die for

I wanted to try it
And try it I did
I've spent 10 long years living by your skin

I wanted to try it
On myself, in fact
The self-loathing is too strong for me to love I back

Have I forgotten Autumn in a name?
Did I forget the warm blood in these icy veins?
Last year had I sung my last song on a floating memory?

Red leaves, red leaves
Falling trees, soon likened to me
Cool air on the breeze
Soothe voices that smoothly ease

Downed by the crack in the concrete
"I know its over" Morrissey sings
Oh mother,  I can hear my happiness coming back to me

When I was a kid,
And I still am in many senses,
I sat in my room

I stared into the dark and conjured up monsters
I was afraid of them, but they were welcome
If the could play nice

I read books while they watched and threatened me
I played guitar when they'd stop yelling
They would hop on my shoulders
And I'd feel their weight
So, I worked out to make my body stronger

These creatures would get bigger and stronger just like me
At one point they were so strong that I wanted to **** myself at 18
That thought had always lingered though

They dug me a hole and called it a grave
They said they were going to throw me in
And I was terrified by that
And I wanted that feeling to go away

I asked them if they wanted to go for a walk before that happened
Perplexed, they agreed
And we went along

I got to know them and why they wanted these horrible things
They were just as confused about themselves as I was about me

We stood there trying to make sense of us as a group
I realized that we were, in fact, a group
We always have been
We always will be

I'd forgotten that they were just as lonely as I was when I was in my room
I'd forgotten that they forced me to become stronger
I forgave them in that moment
A moment suspended in my reality

Pick up your guitar boy
Keep that chin up
Your life's not over yet
Its only just begun

I want the lights to be softer
And the noise to be gentle
So many are so strong
And I feel so brittle

Breath into me again
Resuscitate my lungs
I want to feel like I did
Once when I was young

Familiarity comes to me
Lying on its back
It never wants to stay
It said theres something I lack

I can't fall asleep again
Im not sure I want to

I feel the radiating heat falling off my engine
As I sit by and partake in a ritual passed on from men before me
The smoke hits my fingers and I know this is a religion that should be forgotten

In my mind im trying to prepare for a service to a community I betrayed
By getting behind a wheel while I was emotionally unvailable for those around me

A sense of accomplishment inside me for fixing this now radiating engine that sits besides me just a few hours ago
There's something to be said for hard work

I'm doing okay
I have a past, but it doesn't define me
It let's me know that I'm just as human as anyone around
And humbles me when that sense of accomplishment trys to turn into a beast of triumph that is above the world

How long before the next group leaves?
Are my interests now just a fling?
Do I truly know who I am when no ones around?
Or do I lie to myself to stay on this weak ground?

When was the last time I grabbed my guitar?
The wood that held me together when I fell apart.
Now it feels like  distance away
As if I drove out of town just to give me a break
But forgot my way home and started a new life
In this lonely town that holds all my lonely strifes

Tingle on the tongue
Knives in my lungs
Sorrow
for what I've done

Haze of mind
"All in due time"
Flicker in the wind
Body coaxed by sin

I want to meet somebody while on tour
A fellow musician that can see the whole
An open mind and a muse
A broken hand that lit a fuse

Love, love carries us
Not for more than an idea
A simple brush stroke away
From a smile that isn't out of fear

We wrap ourselves in kerosene
burn for those who care to see
What we really shine for
A lit fuse leading to what's in store

According to me
Falling in love is a mid-tempo jazz swing
Where the air is chilly
But she is not

All I can see
I only have eyes for you and me
And I smile when the lights look bigger than they are

I could get along without you very well
But why would I squander such a grand tale
When you are here and very near
I can feel the swing ring in my ears

Just wanted to know if I could go home
You've kept me here far too long
I've stood in the drunken downpour
While you berate me with your stubborn core

I miss all my friends and the ones that let me in
There's ink missing from my timid pen
Yet here you are to offer it back up
Right when the chaos erupts

And here we go again
With our sparks and our ends
Are we dancing for ourselves when the lights cave in
Or can we even distinguish the love we began with
Its just for us and all that we extinguish

You and I
You and I
You and I
All for you

The rain makes me ache with memories
Black coffee, your books, and my singing
You were something borrowed
I was something blue
Honestly, the rain reminds me of you

In spring I drank mostly wine
Listened to Buckley all the time
Constantly pestered you with the knowledge I held
Of a poet that was six feet under and very pale

But you'd listen

And in a sweeping moment I knew
There may never be a love like you
Your art spoke of this type of entanglement
And it seemed by the pictures it strangles quick

Yet, the world felt softer now I think it through
Because I'd rather go back than sit here and brew
This coffee taste black, cold, and shrew
This isn't what reminds me of you

I'm starting to believe loves a terrible thing
Something you may never wish upon an enemy
I'm thinner in a metaphorical sense
And I wish you weren't on the fence

I can be too sometimes
Its only natural when you watch flies
Going one place to the next with no destination

Ill save you for when I get back
Monsterous potential for now I lack
But maybe just a little scratch
Of this bug bite so I can relax

No, it only makes it worse
A hot spoon on my skin could take the curse
Or maybe if I rid the flesh as well as sin
Give it up for the mess I'm in

Like God, I give and take
To myself, this creative stake
But block these things that must align
So I can stay within the lines

I need to tap into a root and find my own brew of amber tree sap
So I can examine it in a lab
The scientific method of my being and consciousness
Because you can't fix something until you understand it

The first step is locating the issue
Taking all the memories and flipping through them
To stop at the ones that incite my curiosity
And explains many atrocities

The second step is accepting what was
This is difficult because our culture doesn't like the past
"The past is the past, move on"
I reject the notion and say embrace it

The third step is constructing a mutual agreement between my body and mind
That my actions will not harm any part of mankind
And this includes myself

This marks the change

The fourth step is enacting the new self
Taking old books off the shelf
Spending time with all the new matter I've created
Cultivating a consciousness that will harvest good things

How long until all my laundry smells different?
Do the walls even look the same with me not there?
Send me a postcard of your new stage of life
I want to reminisce on all of our plights

Once again, I put paper to pen
I think of all the times I've wanted to quit
But there was still a rhyme scheme in my head
And oppritunity in bright seductive red

Off in the distance, but I can see it
Its only interested in poets with cranial diseases
It knows of self doubts and coyly plays
Among the pink labyrinth of our brains

She is beautiful and rare
She is destructive and snares
But she is momentum and change
A swinging gate of every phase

Smile in the mirror to show yourself you're happy
Faking self esteem only gets you so far
But I can tell you what its like when you are laughing
You'll never see how beautiful you truly are