I find hope
when there is none
But love is a fine wine

I sleep when I'm tired
I fight when I'm drunk

I'm always tired
I'm always drunk

I lay my head down
on your shoulder
If my head is light
I am drunk

I see your headlights
over my shoulder
My head is not right
I am drunk

Meet me here
at a quarter passed four
in the morning.
I'll be the boy
in the duck sauce t-shirt
you can wear your favorite
Lollipop skirt.
I'll have my my secret
Neutron bomb.
Your hips will be destroyed.
I'll pull my bright red wagon
and a handful of other toys.
I'll dance the flute
and play a jig
You can drink as many
Long island ice teas as you want
I'll be your rodeo clown
Your laughing hyena
Your pinstriped suit
Your Knight that you dream of.

cast out
chucked away
deep-sixed
discarded
discharged
disposed of
expelled
flung aside
thrown down
jettisoned
deserted
jilted
vacated
left in abdication
aggravated
outcast
rejected
eliminated
forgotten
given­ up
godforsaken

you told me i was an eagle
simple as that, i believed you
tied my shoelaces together
took off my shirt
jumped from the roof with you
holding my hand

you told me i was unstoppable
so i never gave up
still making propellers
out of paper mache and
over-watering the succulents

you told me you loved me
with your fingernails in
the soft young flesh of my back
you swore you weren't a liar
but we were both drunk
you wrote your phone number on my cast

you told me once
that i was a big engine
and i took it to my powerless heart
did some body work
ran screaming through the streets
roaring naked at midnight
perched on a solar eclipse
singing sinatra to a cat.

she has endless power
over me because I
gave her my warm body
to wrap herself in & when
she did I had fireflies living
in my heart-chest & sometimes
she'd hum to them a lullaby thru
my chapstick smeared lips
or lure them out by
tickling my ribs & calling herself
mrs-my-last-name

that was two winters back but
I can still hear her perfect white teeth
& tongue bounce as they pronounce
the last vowels in it

young you
and
young me
shimmy down fire escape
together?

to-night is one of those long nights
where i have a moon conversation
tell it my dreams & fears--it just spits cloud-wa-ter
back down in my face

where i climb the roof & clear
my throat--close my eyes
& pro-ject my melanchol-y toward the stars
punching the empty sky

it happens occasionally
some-times under a gibbous moon
(i don't have a choice)

where i lay on the cold grass in sweat-pants
shout & sing to the sky --or--
run a-round getting dirt in my toenails
swatting pine-cones out of the hands
of low-hanging branches

my ears & nose tip shine
under the feather orph-an
clouds

where there's still wi-fi no matter
how hard i tried to escape it

i get twitter-pated on a pretty girl's facebook
but never introduce myself in person

where i listen to mahler in the dark &
receive spectral messag-es

write scattered dew-drop poems like
ginsberg did

rock back & forth

maybe cry a little

rub one out--

finally
go to sleep a-round
dawn
----------------------------------------------------­----------
& wake again
snug as a bug
sleepy numb--reluctant
to find a ****-stain poem
w/ my last conscious fingerprint
expand-ed into cyber-space

last night i stayed up late after the sun kissed the horizon's eyelids and wrote poems as letters to all my exs and some to my one night stands lying to them about not being scared of the dark anymore and that i don't recall the exact shape their outline made on my bed sheets.
this morning when the sun rose pink through my window i
did not lick the envelopes instead i lit the corners with
matches and shouted out their names to the walls in
my bedroom. my feet did not take me to the
mailbox instead i'm standing on cold toes
naked in front of the bathroom mirror
waiting for enough warm water to
collect in the tub for me to bathe
in. tonight i'll drink the star-
light that spills out on
the cold kitchen
floor tile and convince
myself i've never truly been
loved by anyone; that i've gotten
here by sheer force of will. that i'm
fearless and invincible while my fingers
fumble with the heavy pistol and my tears
write her name in the folds of my favorite shirt.
tonight is another late night holding sepia pictures
of her because i'm scared to go to sleep alone now. my
whole body hurts when i think about the new empty closet
space she left and how her hand would find a nest in the soft
crook of my elbow when we were walking anywhere or the fresh
shock of electricity when my fingers first found her fingers and her
fingers tied my fingers to my other fingers tight around her waist. my feet ache, because the first time we danced it felt like i had swallowed
a gallon of violent purple hummingbirds and my earlobes are
burning swollen because her painted lips aren't here to cool
them down. her finger nails found the place between my
shoulder blades naturally and i feel so foolish because i
gave my whole self to her but it was an unwanted gift.
it's three in the ******* morning again and i'm
writhing under the thick down blanket but her
velvet toes aren't tucked deep into the small
of my back for warmth. before i choke on
my mistakes and crush my fat tongue
with a bullet i just need to ask her
why

why did i lose you to him?
why are his hand prints on your hips?
why does he get to wake up next to you?
why can't i think of a good excuse to call you?
why did my right foot disappear when you left me?
why does his morning breath get to tickle your eyelashes?
why can't i remember what your nose looks like when you laugh?
why isn't my pillow as comfortable as your bellybutton?
why do you have nothing to say to me anymore?
why does my mouth still taste like a bird's nest?
why did you take my cast iron skillet?

finishing a book
is just like
killing a christian family
on a drunk Sunday drive

finishing a book
is just like
slamming your clean-shaven face
into a brick wall

finishing a book
is just like
inhaling pure oxygen
and then spontaneously combusting
into thin air

finishing a book
is just like
brushing your teeth so hard
that crimson paste drips from
the corners of your mouth

finishing a book
is just like
watching a toddler bathe
himself in lighter fluid

finishing a book
is just like
puking when you're passed out.

i remember that night on your front steps
smoking cigarettes and talking with your mother
while
i cradled your heart and
you cried on my chest

i remember middle school english class
and your first thong,
pink and white and blue

i remember we made that bourbon summer
last until december

i remember bottle rockets and champagne
the morning your brother died

i remember carrying you home
in the rain
the day after you escaped from the hospital
and you cried then, too.

i remember lying on the cold ***** tile
of your mother's kitchen
whispering Neruda in your ear
shivering & sweating with you
that night we took ecstasy

i remember the first night
you let me slip an honest prayer between your lips

Last night I
Buried my dreams underground.
Fleshy as a corpse
Edgy like the corners of a time capsule.
Once my cup was sloshing round,
Now it's barely half full.

This morning I
had almost forgotten what had happened
But I heard muffled sounds.
They were still alive.

It made me wonder about
What it takes to suffocate
A dream.

tonight, i am far too weak to become a star
i am a drunken river, all is possible until i reach another life
i am a weeping madman on the creeping sidewalks of solitude
i make secret deals with buddha in the desert
we will find the temples on neptune
with flaming radars and silvery kisses
we will battle with this massive electric dream and
undoubtedly become monsters with nowhere to lay our heads

my feet are washed with death
my breath is tinged in ecstacy
i am naked without identity
i am the black felt tip
of a pen dancing
across white paper
i should be left alone

there is a fold in the universe
surrounded by millions of suns
and diamond gold and mercurial fire
we can dance and sing and live in it
without ourselves
without money
money made of nothing
bellowing over eternity
money made of failure

pure thought
written on paper warheads
being fired off
at the moon

i will ***** and become
the hidden son of whitman
i scream
i starve
i will walk through fire
and be reduced to white powder
i will leave jet plane streaks in the sky
i will be remembered bliss on your lips
you will see the mediterranean rainbow
hear the seagull flying over dolphins screaming
and i will swim through the atlantic sun and
weep for this antiquity

i remember taking morning impulse beach trips with william
to the white sand on the right hand coast of old florida
wearing sunglasses on our eyes
and our hearts in our front shirt pockets
jesus, must have been twenty ten because
i was too young to drink in bars
and he couldn't drive
the windows were down and we were catching
intense sun on the opposite sides of our faces
listening to a playlist of songs we wanted played at our funerals
swore we'd be there for each other forever
as we choked down stolen purple vitamin waters
trying to smoke a divine bowl while discussing
the advantages of miller high lifes over
pabst blue ribbons for light beach drinking with
two tabs each on our tongues or buried in our cheek-meat
as we crossed that lion's bridge
dreaming we'd drift off into that cloudless blue sea-sky

i remember falling in love
for what must have been the first time
half drunk on champagne and ojay
blasted out and overdosing on sunlight
sitting pretty on the carpet floor with jennifer
with our legs tangled together
whispering secrets playing with shiny trinkets
and small meaningful totems
while the other boys laughed
and smoked on the balcony

i'm suppposed to be writing the world's greatest poem
but i get distracted by fractal ocean memories
because i'm already twenty-five and nowhere special
we've both sobered up by now i guess but i
saw ol' bill just the other day and we still
find time to laugh and sing to each other over tacos
he'll be married soon and i've learned finally that it takes
more than ******* someone to keep my bones warm
we've gotten our **** together so to speak but seperately
i'm still getting used to revealing myself to myself
figuring out how to be honest with the little boy in the mirror
how to be in love with my big nose
and that i'm really only twenty four

i spent seven days in a foxhole
eating sand and burying the secrets
of former lovers.
i gave myself the silent treatment
for the first four days
then i sang for the other three.
i dreamed of cowboys and westbound trains
and i had an old sack full of bottles
so i wasnt alone.
i was a fine toothed comb
or a skill saw
and i felt useful for once in my life.
i crushed a box of lightbulbs on
the fourth night
and i found the prettiest place to sleep.
i hung photos on the wall of the prison
to keep me happy
and missing you.
now i live in the basement of the world
and i wish for nothing more
than a swiss army knife and
one word from you.

I am a raging river fed by rain.
I flow hard against rocks and logs.
I flood my banks in the springtime
and I seep into valleys.
I catch leaves and seeds during the fall,
and I deposit them southward.
I drift along slowly in the winter.
I feed creeks and mountain streams
and greedy bears and hungry fisherman
and I brought the Grand Canyon down on it's knees.
I am the lifeblood of the mountain.

You can find me in the sweet nectar of the desert cactus.

i wish i was a black poet
or a woman with a twisted ankle
even a teenager filled with brooding angst
because then my poems would hold more weight
people would listen
i could recite them with my eyes closed
brow furrowed, talking with fists
my throat swollen with passion
i'd get applause -- an ovation even
for spitting on the microphone at poetry night
blowing the roof off
destroying walls
seeing all rooms at once
instead of despondent laughter
in an empty bar
the clinking of glasses
and the obligatory whisky after.

but i'm white
and only in my twenties
living in a vaccuum
nothing terrible has ever happened to me
sure, i have problems

but who the **** wants to hear about
not learning how to tie my shoes until i was 9?

quitting every sport, not because i was bad
merely because i wasn't the greatest to ever play
and no longer saw the point?

adhd and couch surfing in new orleans?

how hard it was to learn to roll the perfect joint
when i was 17?

the fact that i had an itchy ******* last month
but switched to organic detergent
now it's a field of velvet daffodils down there?

no one's posting youtube videos about
doing laundry on a tuesday
not meeting a pretty girl at the laundromat
instead teaching a mexican boy multiplication tables
and a couple jokes, then leaving with
half your clothes still ***** because you gave the boy
the rest of your change to buy a girl he likes
a pack of her favorite gum tomorrow
or
losing your cell phone until thursday afternoon
then the bill collectors start calling

i have good credit
i bought a used honda last year
at a good interest rate, i haven't missed a payment
i'm never bothered at airport security
i live alone, take my coffee black
or with cream and sugar
write checks and balance a budget
on sunday mornings
hate cats, never vote or testify in court
i went swimming yesterday
laid down in thatched grass, alone
don't smoke anymore
quit drinking too
don't own a boat
time moves so fast
i cook, sometimes with wine
friends seldom visit
i stand on the balcony, naked
my house is quiet
except when it isn't
and jazz floods the kitchen
i dance through the hallway
with an invisible lover
and she drifts silently away
uninterested in my melancholy poem
as i slosh sweetened tea on my bare chest
i hang on
she hangs up

*******.
why don't more people read and respond
to my poetry?
am i doing something wrong?
am i not good enough?
am i fake,
do i miss it more times than i hit?

this thing feels so real to me
and maybe
a select group of other peers--
but am i just greedy?
i read other poets on this site,
and let's be honest,
some of them are ****.

but i like
some others
and i try to engourage
these talented few

but when some fourteen year old has 257 fans
and she's not a REAL poet
that ****** me off

i know
'everyone has something to say'
but some of it's not relevant
or even coherent

and 'one man's trash is another man's treasure'
is a ******* gimmick if i've ever heard one

and i don't ******* understand that.

i know i shouldn't be looking
for anyone elses' approval,
i should just write
whatever the ****
comes into my head,
but maybe i'm a selfish *******
and the viewership of other poets
really means something to me

you all know
what this feels like,
i'm sure

i just signed in
and i have 168 'notifications'
AND NOT ONE OF THEM IS FOR MY OWN WORK.

am i needy?
am i feeling unworthy
of my own 34 fans?
do i feel misunderstood?

seriously?
sometimes i feel
like
joining this site
was a sick joke
on the part of my consciousness
sometimes i feel
like an amputee in
a three-legged race.





(you'd think that i could find solace
in real friends that are interested in poetry,
but those people don't exist for me)

**** me until i see god
**** me i'm falling apart
**** me i'm a prophet in a hiding place closet
**** me like we've got no place to go
**** me until the curtains fall down and collect dust
**** me sticky in a cloud of glitter
**** me and use the tears of angels as ****
**** me broken like a key and lock
**** me breathing on the freedom of a mountain
**** me with your shoes still on
**** me i'm crazy until i go blind
**** me under the powerful moon
**** me crying and laughing at the same time
**** me constant like a leaking faucet in the cold kitchen
**** me like a queen ***** her king
**** me weak on the stairs
**** me in the middle of a flower
**** me on a fault line shattering california
**** me always and even after that
**** me i'm
                             melting
like tupperware in the micro wave of your
                             *****

you taste like candy
and i am starving and swallowing your tricks
i dreamt of a greasy hotel and
a box to sleep in.
i am not a cannibal,
i am not a sky diver
& and i am not a pilgrim,
but i hunger for your body
and i'm falling for your holy curves.
i will hang from your window and dance in the sunlight
even though i am not a pink velvet curtain.
i am a garbage-collector poet,
fresh from the allabaster market
who has found the words once lost
in a dark fox hole
near the bend of a lazily flowing river.
all i need is a dime and a glass vase,
a short story and a wet cigarette.
i've come back to town--i climbed right out of that stop sign
standing on a shotgun bullet-holed volkswagon
with a 7 day hangover
holding burning grace in my hands and you say
"lead me to the garbage"
carrying with you a bag of soggy french fries
and i stop to show you a dying tulip,
and we watch as it floats into a cloud.
we'll hide all our money in a glowing furnace
and as i try to write this with a water logged pen
you show me pictures of shirley temple with her head in a noose.
my name is not moses, and i do not want to be remembered.

i cast off pure light in the cellar
i steal kisses and pray
with my tongue sticking out
ask me for a paper favor
& i'll send you a geranium poem
molded in the shape of
a silver swan swooning
i am the sandman's pupil
fighting an epileptic fit
& growling at the governor
i gave my love a cherry
she tells me how it tasted
i gave my love a chicken
now let's start a revolution

have you ever
sat
and wondered about
the putrid smell
of corpses
and what happens after this--
all types of magical forces?

have you ever
stood
in line for hours
waiting only
to be
insulted by cowards?

I've often
wondered in the morning
over
my donuts glazed
how you can
not talk to me
for several days;
but when you do
it fits like a shoe,
and now just what
are we going to do?

have you heard
sad words
whispered from a lover's lips,
and if so,
did it bring a tearful kiss
or
was it more like
a lustful hiss?

wrapped up in aluminum foil
head resting on cracked concrete
surrounded by winking lights
and blinking eyes
warmth from the glow of humility
basking in the rays of a two dollar toaster
cardboard dwelling and trashbag scenery
paper towel t-shirt, styrofoam socks
salt and pepper lunchtime
pedastal reconstruction
hot coffee burnt tongue
peanut allergy and poisoned water
locked cabinet, rotting condiments inside an unplugged refrigerator
dying romance read only in magazines
purple heart scrawled on my arm
syringe full of bourbon plunged directly in my eye.

you uncoiled my winces
with your aching summer breath
desire coursed vivid thru my veins
like the diamond sparkle of dawn-light
we intertwined & you attached yourself to my soul
& when you watched me, i felt seen
--a flower blooming in the basket
on your windowsill in the teeming light
my passion dissolved the disquietude
more simply, you set me free
you rearranged me
you dismantled me
& when i revealed myself to myself
in a swirling mirrored vertigo
i was drenched & purged on the altar

& now the emptiness is the consolation
i carry like a dream in my hands
the silence between us the only refuge
then the rains came in june
& bludgeoned the sky
it groans in despair
my chest doesn't burn anymore
it feels more like a bruise
& i linger among the futility
& wind-ripped flower petals
outside your shuttered window
like a frigid dancer on the brink
of nihilistic oblivion grasping
only for the bottom
my guilt does all of the thinking
in the wasting light
& the last note of your goodbye
barely greets me long-forgotten
from the dim shore--
one last regret--
another secret kept from me.

You want to beat us
over our heads with your crosses
You want us living in garbage
You want us to give ourselves to gods
named consumerism
named money
and fame
and celebrity.

You want us to ignore
history and
buy
buy
buy
into your
debt ceiling, your tired excuses,
we are to sing your siren's song
and tie our own nooses.

to be honest, I'm exactly what i wanted to be
i came here looking for the truth
and to find someone else out there
who holds something i want
more than anything else in the world,
someone else who breathes diamonds and electricity.
i have an audience now,
and its time i came to grip that
you all are more important to me
than any girl i've ever touched,
i'm ready to admit that.

I had a dream last night
You were a bird
and I was flight
You were a plane
and I was Orville and Wilbur Wright

I had a dream last night
I was a helicopter
and you were the hot soft sand
I was taking heavy enemy fire
And I came crashing down to hold your hand.

I had a dream last night
You were a grenade
and I was my legs
Now I am a torso
confined to a wheelchair
You blew me to pieces and didn't seem to care.

Mike Arms--1 day ago
write a few lines, I'll match em. Can you do it ?

david badgerow--14 hours ago
banjo strings frayed by broken fingernails
fistful of downers to sleep this night away
i open my eyelids out of dream, singing ladies'
eyes downcast thru fear & tobacco smoke
wake up, roll joint, get this day started.

Mike Arms--10 hours ago
being pure ether ain't no ****** picnic
this september looks right at ***** smearing
its pale arms reaching clearly into murderers
lungs groping mute celibate
if you beheld her whole form means silence

david badgerow--10 hours ago
lying back on the car seat, her eyelids heavy
she breathes diamonds and pure electricity
in an endless velvet desert, radio warbles over a hill
"oh, if i were young again, legs spread leaning against a table."
hard labor, aluminum tubes between
continental divide
echo chamber vibrations plunging
their tiny lamps in and out of her eyeball

Mike Arms--8 hours ago
Hard Luck Man
crossing floods
inanimate intelligence

is assassinated
they cross themselves
a world deaf

*** revolution
worst gamble
you remain

a harp has been strummed
a banjo picked
a heart has been numbed
a ****** flicked
a page has been thumbed
a sharp ice pick
a mouth has been gummed
a desiduous tick
a cigarette has been bummed
a virginal stick
a town has been slummed
a slippery ****
a ***** has been ******
a little *****
a lonely man jumped
a fall and a click
a crowd has been pumped
a comedy shtick
a mind has been stumped
a clever trick

he waltzed right into
your entryway
the same door you
closed on me

he paraded straight down
your hallway
you didn't pause him
to stop and
say please

when I was there
I tread carefully;
even got down
on my knees

he twisted your ****
and opened you up,
I simply asked for your keys

he made a beeline through
your corridor
he barged in because
you asked for more

he is where I'm
supposed to be
but I'm not what I
had hoped to be

heaven calls
my name but i'm a hard-headed man who
turns soft at night

heaven knows
it ain't what you got it's the way you shake it

heaven says
keep your hands where i can feel them

heaven is waiting
outside the gas station
in cut-off denim shorts
on our way into the mountains
over dolly parton bridge

indigo dusk spreads across
inexhaustible country sky
torn wet clouds stretched blue at twilight
a big-chested wind comes howling off the lake
dissecting our immortal kiss
as the pink sun meets her planet-doom
leaking on my balcony like a falling curtain
blessed with an affinity for moonlight
lingering drinking pale wine
we took baths in lukewarm vanity

she is a long legged sorceress smoking a cigarette
half awake because i've got the covers again
goose bumps crowd onto her little bare *******
dewy legs sliding among mine
rousing my bones and heart alert
as the bright sun dances silent
like a new carnation dragged from bed
bringing a giant unscrambled sunrise
across my section of heaven's blue sea
but is mercifully eclipsed by the cream-skinned
breast of a purified failed angel
exploring the feather-soft mountain of my body

we drank cointreau in the early morning
against the collage of saxophones
expanding among criss-crossing body odors
and thin magic on my lipsticked neck
i'm gaining strength over my neuroses
all my fear and doubt disappears into joy
no longer huddled in paper misfortune
reintegrated with ecstasy
in the smoky labyrinth of her eyes
as her fingers light as dreams
draw complex patterns in the flesh
of my back and buttocks
like secrets written on wet paper
none of it       was            real        before          this           moment

when i first saw him
he was wearing untied boots without socks
sauntering across a hilly grass field
to calypso music playing in the
background or my imagination

i was so overtaken by his spirit
when he brought me home that
i succumbed to drowsiness for three days
curled simply into his armpit and
danced upon the galaxy

when i awoke he was massaging my feet
checking my reflexes for sun damage and
soothed my soft bruises with a milk plate

he kisses me in the morning with enthusiasm
and we share a room for breakfast as he
teases me with ecstasy eyes and i'm
no longer nervous around strangers

last night i danced across his bedsheets
he giggled and rolled his eyes at me as
i stood with the light of the sunset shining
behind my ears his rhinestone eyes locked
into mine for more than a moment and
my knees went weak my fragile hips collapsed
reclining into his chest like a middle eastern
pillow

i think his sweaty neck is delicious
as i sing to him through a vibraphone
in the magical kitchen
licking his skin clean i'm bathing
him in a sunbeam stretched across the tile
beneath the bay window

although i'll never understand why
he leaves or where he goes i know he'll
always return to me as the sun grows cold
and the white moon begins to weep her new
lust onto the blooms in the front garden

and in the meantime i keep myself warm
wrapped in a ball of yarn talking in circles
to myself spinning and catching strands of
cloudlight in my unsure hands

when i finally see him in the driveway
at the sky's edge picking flowers for me
the confusion melts away and the pain
from my wonky leg becomes
suddenly forgettable

as i watch him putting on clothes
in the morning just before dawn
or towelling off after a long day away
my eyes play with him and i let him know
how i feel with my body aroused
merely by his tone of voice nudging
him with my cheeks on the tight spots of his ankles

he is beautiful and strong full
of compassion and i'm so afraid of
being alone again i'll do anything
to squeeze him and keep him so
i scratch his back every morning at 5am
exploring the sharpness of his shoulder blades
to remind him of the things
we can do together
and to make sure
he's still alive

i'll never give up longing.
i'll let my hair grow long like a prince
and tangle with the leaves in autumn.
let the pinecones fall around me like dead money.
i'll let fall become winter.
let myself become a crusty savage in a cave.
i'll let my teeth clatter against my tongue.
i'll let winter pass unburdened.
let the nights grow long and deepen.
i'll let the slow inertia of sleep come heavy.
then i'll let spring.
i'll let the tangerines ripen on the bough.
i'll let the afternoons stretch long and hazy in front of my feet.
let the fleeting birds find me on the lawn.
i'll let pollen collect in my bellybutton.
let the dragonfly light on my finger.
i'll let my jaw unclench.
let myself be shattered into fragments.
i'll let myself forget the bad stories.
let the rain wash away another year.
i'll let into my raincoat.
let my throat open and sing.
i'll let the breeze take my voice away in the field.
let myself become astonished.
i'll let the smell of the summer mist
enter my nose and stain my cheeks.
let the ocean impress me.
i'll let the sand bring me under.
i'll let myself cry on a mountaintop.
i'll let the sun guide me up a tree.
i'll let rage and calm and joy come together between us.
i'll let my body writhe.
i'll let kindness unbutton the fence i built there.
i'll let this impossible planet get lost.
i'll let america forget my name and orphan me.
let the elastic mirage just lazily dissolve.

Hey!
I'm down here
with bug bites and blood smears
just trying to climb up a ladder

Hey!
I'm down here
with all doubts and all fears
just looking for momentum to gather

Hey!
I'm down here
with the Bikes and the Beards
just grasping for a rope or a tether

Hey!
I'm down here
with hardened gums and dried tears
just wishing for hope or a feather

Hey!
I'm down here
with the poets and the queers
trying to write down what really doesn't matter

Hey!
I'm down here
blinking lights and drinking beers
straining my ear to hear your chatter

Hey!
I'm down here
with full lungs and three cheers
banging pots to make a high clatter

if i was a leaf blower i'd wish you were a stationary bike
so we could be forgotten together in an unused garage

i want to be a candlestick holder if you're a dinette set
so we can dance close under the chandelier in the quiet foyer

i'll be an old stained t-shirt if you're a chest of drawers
and i'll slip inside and live in the back of your heart forever

if you're a tennis ball and i'm a chewed up shoe we can
hide from the dog in the dark under the sofa holding hands

but i am only a rooftop
that you won't lay on
you are a thousand stars
out of reach and too beautiful to
acknowledge
me

hold your tongue
until
you're soaked in saliva

hold your breath
until
you can't get much higher

hold my beer
until
I finish with your kiss

hold my hand
until
it can't get better,
this is bliss.

hold your liqour
until
you're puking into a plush beige carpet

and I will

hold your hair so
you don't look like a cheap harlot
or some trashed starlet.