I drove today, down black and yellow
snakes, houses lined the banks
of the concrete river the snake
slithered into,
children played and parents watched,
I was revving and gunning and lost,
not on the streets, in sheets that smelled like someone
far behind me, in eye water and lilacs,
or two lips,
Then I parked the car,
shut the door,
and fell to a puddle on my
bedroom floor,
I am great, I am hollow,
I am wretched, I am hollow,
Let me evaporate
Let me evaporate,
please,
Let me evaporate

My greatest worry is that
no one will ever love me
I try to tell myself that
it's over rated
Some where in my bones
I swear it's been fated
that I'll sleep alone on the couch
till the day my lungs give out

I clutch at every act of kindness
afraid they will see my spineless
self-conscious
I'm haunted by things that aren't dead
just floating in my head
I guess I've said
what I came to say
Now it's back to another day
of being just
O
K

I'm a valley, green and fertile
but the floods are coming down
from the mountains that
rest at the top of my lungs
I can't get out of my skin
my own shadow is so hard to run from
The waters that start pouring down
remind me of when I was something to someone
That feeling, yeah
That feeling, yeah
it's what kept me breathing, yeah
now I steal from the silver screen
or make it up in my dreams
but sometimes I have to open my eyes
and see the lovely lady next to me
was just a pillow
and the warmth was all mine
cool it down with a forty and luke warm meal
What's the deal, what's the deal
I guess I hate to feel
this isn't even a poem just a storm of my emotion
just loathsome self pity
my words are ******
and my attitude is worse
I always think I'm dying
so throw me in a hearse
and forget about this verse
it's the pits
it's the ****
it's nothing worth remembering
just like me
just like me

I think I'd do pretty well
as a functioning drunk
I wouldn't have too much
wouldn't take it too far
wouldn't drive a car
I'm content with the bus
I like seeing all the faces
even though no one
looks up from their phone screen
I'm good at pretending
we all connect somehow
like we were all friends
in some other time and place
I'm more friendly
when I'm not sober
feel closer to happy
I don't mind being a bit shabby
maybe I'll go buy a beer
maybe I'll go buy a bottle
maybe I'll just go

Bukowski gets me
ham on rye with a little bit
of wanting to be nothing
cheap wine in a trashed hotel
a permanent spell on my
self control
all this time I thought I loved me
but I'm sinking
everything I write is a repeat
**** my novel dreams
**** my poetic schemes
I think it's time to sleep
for about five years
so I can wake up with no fears
and disappear
like each season

The air in my bedroom is blue,
I float through it, a stark vessel
tussling against the dark hue
desperate to nestle into sheets,
or clouds,
or weary dreams filled
with a dark street,
a slammed foot,
and a hair's breadth
from turning a deer into dead meat,
resulting in a crash,
leaving a dead me;
Only to awake shaken,
recollecting a statement
from my grandma's dementia ridden mind
"I always see it with you,
it's always right behind..."
then I sit up with a sigh
and a shrug,
and open up to the blue air,
at least whatever it is
will always be there,
will always...
care

Tomorrow will be three weeks
since tobacco flowed past my teeth
*******, I'm stunned
although I'm now addicted to coffee