i was born at the heart of a ribbon jam
      my analog pulse
tap
   tap
      tapping
out the lyrics of my fight song

since day one
india ink sludge blood has flowed
     from my dog-earred heart
          straight through to my ball-point fingertips

my DNA lays in cursive wait
     leaping from the pages
        into the light
at every aching plot twist

card catalogued depictions
   
  not of how events factually unfolded
          but of how it seems they could have unravelled
if this were a paperback i'd planned to read
   and re-read
alike

but alas
when the lights go out
     that's it for this round
          and i'll be down for the count
          no matter how hard i fight

but words...
words know not death
     solely evolution

they change their shape
   their time
      their place

a word can only fade
     like aerosol on dust colored cinder

a single word will outlive one hundred empires
   one thousand governments
      ten thousand authors
and so
   it's within articulation that my loyalty lay
   and in my words that i'll find my home

here
in the lowercase swoops and loops
   of the 'A's
      and the 'E's
      and the 'D's
      and the 'G's

...and those little cursive 'Z's that hang just the same as mom's old hammock

           yeah
           home

with every inhalation of stale inhabitation
     i'll exhale a poem

my regenerative reincarnation through catalytic creation

i tried to write you a letter
     once
but was unsure of the address for the heavens where you shine
     not "Heaven"
          per say
but the stars that gained your carbon as you selflessly gave it away

          turns out celestial bodies aren't listed in the yellowpages

i tried sending you smoke signals
     twice
but the message was so **** long
  and it read more like a song
    and you never much liked my lyrics anyway

i moved on to morse code
     spent night after night lying on my back with a flashlight
dripping ceasless patterns of dots and dashes into that murky blue puddle of midnight sky
     as if maybe you'd reply
with a simple "hush"
and a shyly sigh

          it finally dawned on me that you probably couldn't decode it
          that your parents probably never made you learn
               i cursed them for not teaching you how best to reach me

now
     i'm getting older
and colder
and alot less wide-eyed and hopeful

now
     i just hope you can hear me speak

the click in the back of my throat that comes with trying not to cry
the sincerity in my 'love you's
  and my 'miss you's
    and in my uncensored ungaurded love that i ash onto your headstone from the end of my pregnant joints

now
     i just hope you can taste the beers i bring to share with you
as i'm rambling along the rails of my de-railing train of thought
and ripping through that sixer i brought
          you and your cheap taste in beer

i hide the bottle caps in those little metal vases that your mom keeps filled with florist foam
     and different colored silk lillies
          they always look so nice

now
     i just hope you can read me
better than you ever could before

i hope you've decoded the lines in my palms
and the ***** of my feet
and the cracks in my nicotine teeth
     as i'm smiling wildly at the earth that keeps your ashes safe
          close to her breaking heart

i hope you can read the quotation atop your grave
     i'd have never imagined that the one permanent thing i could ever give you
          was the last line
          of the last text
          that i'd ever send your way

i meant it back then
but now
      it means so much more

"sleep sweetly, philly, you will never be forgotten"

Your legs stick out from my side as you sing from the corner,
A challis to your lips, contracting flesh from your hips, you drink and I know you think more then most so a quick glance is all ill shoot you
I wonder if the house dj knows your favorite songs, you've both been regulars for quite Long, he plays requests for the crowd but you've still grown quite close, and he plays your special requests the most, but it's almost like you sing to me, I've
Seen some of the back wall, and you've seen me stumble and almost fall, but I caught myself staring at your angles, and I just can't make sense of them, I Am no Albert Einstein, and I hate the recognition of time, so I party all the time, and I forget about what time it is and the dj plays his favorite songs

You know that I like you a lot,
But this is just the thickening of the plot,
You love elephants, just like you they never forget, wise beyond your young years, golden hair pushed behind delicate ears
You can walk as slow as a Turtle, but in your face lies a sprinters hurdle,
And there were freckles asking to play connect the dots upon your  shell, With one look upon your precious face i could clearly see that you had just walked through hell, and your feet were tired and had begun to swell, but you still greatly longed for your home in the sea
I asked if you wanted to stay , and have a conversation with me, you said you weren't quite sure, for calling your name was the ocean floor, but You wanted to look upon my face for a little while more

I stay awake
I watch everyone's wills break
You say you want a real man
Someone with a plan
You are a freeway with no one on it
An expanse, with no one on it you dream for a little bit
I trap myself for my sister, to please her mean ole mister, you are warm and welcome like a helping hand, lets hope it works out like you planned
I watch the world digitilize in front of my eyes but not all know that real eyes realize real lies

Hearts beat red hot in the summer
Kicking dust on attraction
The right side of what's wrong,  is the right side of a gun
Smoke em if you got em, and shoot towards the sky, they can take them from me when I die
Disease takes you quick, like a setting winter sun, I only knew you when we were young, but we shared some fun, you didn't deserve your fate
Now there's thunder in my head as I try to sleep In a foreign bed
I'm glad I left while I still had time, New Jersey was an abandoned mine, waiting to cave in my shoulders beneath a ton of boulders
Now Each day I grow wiser not older as the nights get short and colder
The sun rolls me over,  ill explore you like a planetary rover, your the first sight to fill my eyes since I've arrived