Tonight
I am going to make love to myself, to remind myself of
What I feel like.
I will hike
To the summit of my
Entirety
And entirely
******
On the ****** of my
Truths

Jane stood
in a field of kale
waist high
gazing toward

the Downs
you stood beside her
your hands
just touching

fingers feeling
warmth
cows nearby mooing
we’ll have to go up there

in the summer holidays
she said
take a picnic
mum’ll pack

it for us
she likes you
you gazed at her
sideways on

her dark hair
tied with ribbon
her grey coat
buttoned to the neck

coming to her knees
that’ll be good
you said
I went with my dad

way over one day
while he was working
amongst the trees
and I found small skeletons

amongst the fallen leaves
don’t what it was of though  
probably a squirrel
Jane said

or rabbit
did it look like
it could have been
a rabbit?

no idea
you said
it was small
could have been

a squirrel I guess
I put it in a glass tank
along with chalk rocks
with sea fossils inside

she nodded and smiled
she held your hand tighter
and she drew you
though the kale

toward the edge
of the field
where cows
were eating

the fenced off
kale crop  
and you walked
onto the dusty road

between hedgerows
and down the lane
by your cottage
the lane narrow

the hedges full of birds
and song
and you sensed
her hand in yours

her fingers thin
entwined with your fingers  
and on you walked
by the small stream

at the side
the smell
of the farm
in the air

the cows
and hay
and she there
beside you

her hand
and your hand
her coat sleeve
brushing against

your arm
her eyes
full of dark beauty
her lips slightly open

no words just breath
on the air
and you feeling
that joy of just

being alive
and being there.

You came like wildfire
Indistinguishably incendiary
Struck my butane skin
With phosphorus fingertips

Clouded myopic eyes
Saw the ashes to ashes
Flushed lackluster lips
Whispered dust to dust

What you left me with:
A collection of burnt bridges
A drawer of regrets
A heart of hieroglyphics

Feeling pretty unfulfilled
here’s a cheers to spending that
twenty-second year
over worked and under paid.
Unhappiness disguised as routine
mingling about with bursts of extremes
that I mistake for real living.
The grog, the sweat, the drowning struggle
to conform to that American bill paying drone.

I think in black and white
but I always create in color.
There’s a pounding at the door of reality,
unrelenting, it has claws poisoned with truth.
-- my idealism again,
begging, pleading, swearing up-and-down
that I have to get out--
that there is never a “right time”--
that to change--I have to
and its not a decision this grind can consume.


I sprint through the hallways of my self
hello, again World.
It was all that I needed.
I breathe.


*(I hope this happens a thousand times again)

The world is lonely while they cry for help and
                    they reach their hands up.
In words, in books, in paintings,
                    they portray their loneliness hidden or blatant.
But even that isn't enough to highlight
                    the lowlights of our lives
It's in our blood, it's in our veins, our bones,
                    it's in the cigarettes that we smoke.
Which fills the air and wails out loud,
                    screaming a symphony of isolation.
It's hidden in the corners of the cities,
                     hidden in the tall green grass of the countryside
It's everywhere you look, in famous words,
                     in ancient books.
It fills your mind, it takes you hold, it's in the tiniest key hole,
                     but enough.
It's enough to spark a burning fire, to long for another's touch,
                     to feel desire
From another human being,
                     to share in what is the only thing worth keeping
Human company. We long, we dream, we scream for it,
                     and we hope it favors us too.
It's overwhelming, it makes me, it makes me long
                     like so many others
We are not alone in our loneliness
                     and what a queer thought that is

*“Wir können uns einreden, dass wir mit einem Buch nicht allein sind, wie wir uns einreden können, dass wir mit einem Menschen nicht allein sind.”

Once I was so shy
I
Wore a groove
In my tooth
From eating my hair

And my words.

Once
I stood still so long
I grew tall,
Pulled by gravity that dragged my head along

Far and far away from the ground.

If that makes sense.

Once, I ****** on Jelly beans.
Then,
I chewed on your thoughts
And spat them out
Mangled up

Oddly, kind of improved.

Once, evolution visited me
And like a baby chimp
I grew a broader skull
And thicker skin
And I filled my flesh

Pushing out all air and dust within.