Ella Fitz’s rendition of Dream a Little Dream for the umpteenth time.
Louie comes in tune with that righteous horn.
I drink more as I sing along, off key.

There could be an entire SECTION of books written about us.
How we fell into that great whirlwind.
How we learned to hate the world when we didn’t have each other.
How we re-kindled, for that brief, brief time.
How I thought maybe we could love again.

We had hours that turned to days that turned to months.
We were the perfect piece of short fiction
An art form so gloriously undervalued,
(by both the audience and the creators)
Until we found ourselves in the Middle
(the worst feeling in the world.
Because like purgatory or super glue:
you're stuck.)

We said goodbye.
And I found I had residual emptiness.
I became residual emptiness.

I loved again, but it wasn’t anything
Like the masterpiece we had.
I knew because
Every day with him felt real.
Every day with you
Was a dream.
Something rooted in intangibility
Something I was astonished to find
happening to me.

It happened again-
We found ourselves in the same place
At the same time.
And after just a few weeks,
You gave me the greatest gift:
The indignity of silence.
And you gave me it
For the most ignoble reason—
You’re afraid.

Honey bun,
We’re all afraid.

It made me think
That maybe  the story of you and I
can only have a happy ending
in a place where it’s not so scary.

So me, Louie and Ella all ask you,
That
In your dreams
Whatever they be
Dream a little dream of me.

[Because that's the only place you'll find me now.]

Inhale. Hold. Submerge.
This is all the grandest illusion
that’s one disappointment away from shattering.
Take a deep breath
feel the pain in your chest.

Every night
I drown in a wine glass
Dive off the ledge with such fever and ferocity,
The splash of a cannonball--
No high marks from the judges.

When you look at me,
I know now it’s irreverent.
We are a lie.
In the deep end, where I can’t touch anymore.

Time to wash away this sin
Hurt doesn't go,
It just lingers
Like our ghosts, lurking behind closed doors.
I can’t be rid of you
Because I don’t want to be.
Go on,
Haunt me until the end.

But I know
You cannot swim
so for now,
I'll sink further and further
into wine so dark
I disappear.

I came to you because I thought you would save me.
You laughed over the John Hughes quote
That now is a seminal classic
But I’m not sure because I don’t believe in it
Because I’ve never known it
or maybe it’s just you I don’t believe in.

I didn't have enough energy to actually make an effort to laugh
and pretend I was having a good time.
I would rather sink into you, slowly, like I would ((in a shipwreck or)) in oversized couch cushions.
and be usurped by ((cold water that wakes you up)) musty fabric
when it swallows us whole
and we sink to the bottom.
I'd only feel
your long arms around me and nothing else

I’d rather strip for you
Not to be naked but to take my layers off.
[You bore me, You shaped me, You taught me]

And then I’d try to not love you so that I could fall into you once more.
let the  overwhelming overwhelm me (again)
until I forget the ongoing drama of the heart and the heart (a purposely neverending story)
[There are no words with which to describe thee:
My darling my love I need you beside me.]

we quote our favorite title page to our favorite epilogue.
An absurd story about love and blowing things up
Because really, (like hospitals and prisons)
it’s the same thing.

what does this night mean in the greater consequence of our lives?
Nothing.
I’m okay with that.
I’m just saying that.
[?]

Opportunity and random occurrence are just a farce
That we use to pretend fate doesn’t exist;
(it doesn’t, does it?)
Everything that matters seems too big to be real.
but I lived long before this, and I will exist ever after
one day I will achieve greatness
you will be forced to know me then
Since you won’t nor never will now.

They came again last night.
The demons.
They morph into everything
We’ve ever been afraid of
And everything
We still are.
The ones that haunt and scream and wail
Until we listen to them.
And hear
Our faults
And remember
Our fears
Until everything gets cold and numb.
And no matter how many people are around,
We still know
We’re hopelessly alone.

Ghastly beings, those demons.
They haunt the halls of our subconscious;
They guard the doors
With the keys still in the locks
Covered with cobwebs
Because we dare not venture
Those again.
And every once in a while
Those demons come back
At one or two or three a.m.
To remind us
Those doors
Are still there.

Sometimes, I’ll open with the King’s Gambit
Because I’m feeling bold
Or saucy
Or generally suicidal
Since I know you’ll just countergambit.

I’ll move my pawn and you’ll move yours.
I’ll take your rook
With a sly move you never saw coming
Only to wave goodbye
To that brave knight of mine
Who gave his life
For my ongoing crusade
To capture you.

Move after move
Feeling victory in a capture
And dejection at a loss
Until we’ve suddenly found
We’ve been playing this game
For years.

I’ll give a little bit
And let you take something
That belongs to me.
And you’ll rejoice and be glad
For the whole world to see.

But darling?
Don’t you know
The number one rule of this game?
You always have to be
One move ahead.

Checkmate, *******.

I would like
for you
to for once
in your life
get angry.
I broke you;
made you
into the so many
pieces
of the man
I used to know
you to be.

I would like
for me
to stop believing
in fairy tales
because I know
first-hand
there is no
happy ending
but I still
dream
about them
anyways.

I would like
for you
to break my heart
(again)
so that
this current state
of self-loathing
would make
some sort
of sense.

I think
I hate myself
more
for ruining you
than I hate you
for ruining me.

Your love is like Guinness.
Black.
Hard to see through.
Heavy.
and tasty.

And if I have too much
really
really
Bad for me.

When I die
my grave will be
surrounded by cherry red wine stains.
That grass,
once green,
will be red, red red.
Have the weight of Cabernet
The dark mystery of Merlot.
I’ll say goodbye
and that wine will drip drop
Through soil
Under rocks
To six feet under
where I will taste it once again.

As I watch
as he
sits in the corner
drinking grain alcohol
that tastes like regret and pain and general unpleasantry

and he weeps
those tears of solid resignation and misery
the scene unfolds before me
of his early days
of being young like me
but having so much passion and commitment to a bigger idea
that he committed
human atrocity
for something bigger
than himself.

As I watch
I cry my own tears
for this man’s lack of youth
because he had no time to squander
and instead
was forced
to live a life
of the worst kind of sacrifice.

And I cry some more
because I
am a self-aggrandizing
*******
if I think my petulant, schoolgirl drama
is ****
compared to this.

For years, we let suffering gnaw away at our hearts
until we got really good at hiding it.
And instead
indulged in silent suffering
at going to pubs and clubs
and getting drunk
making out with random strangers
and being the life of the party
all the while
taking the label of a martyr
but claiming no glory.
We were instead
so completely devoid and empty inside
that our friends would see us as strangers
if they ever knew
how we really felt.

As the booming music
from the crowded
student center
attempts to
beat my heart
right out of my chest
I retreat
into my own quietness.

Writing poetry
on a neon yellow
Post-It note
as the college kids
around me
talk about
that awesome house party
last night.

I think about how
I cannot have
the love that I want
but I know someday
I'll have
the love that wants me.

And now
the booming music
does indeed
make my heart race
as my quest for love
pauses
to rave out
to electronica music.

I pump a metaphorical fist
not to party
but to proclaim
that I
am a hopeless dreamer.
Deal with it.

Maybe dub step isn't so bad.

From the moment that the last moment has passed and is gone
To the moment that has not yet come to pass
There is a long haul,
A varied in-between
A somber hiatus of all things living and dead.
Where my mind wanders into an eternal state of flux
And where everything that could never be
Is.

And as we swim beneath the sea and then above the stars
And watch galaxies give birth to new stars and light and life
And friendly sea creatures wink at us as they pass us by
We stretch out our arms and let freedom take us.

And it’s there we’ll kiss so long
That we never come up for air.
And make love in the blankets of the Milky Way
Bearing our souls for every spec of dust to witness.

And then I blink
And my feet are back firmly on the ground.
While you stand just yards away from me.
We’ll give each other half smiles, half waves
And pass each other by,
Just like that moment is supposed to pass by.

But I know
Somewhere
In an eternal state of flux
We were the good, and the good is the free
And we were free to love each other the way we aren’t allowed here.

Hold on when you get love.
Let go when you give it.

Sometimes I think
you don’t remember
when we held hands.
When we got wasted together
and had the most fun
in a night of debauchery
and fell asleep
fully clothed
side-by-side.

We both woke up
at 6 a.m.
from the sun streaming in
the sunlight windows.
We both stared
bleary-eyed at the light
then at each other.
You took my left hand in yours
gave me a cheeky half smile
and fell back asleep.
I did too.

I woke up
a few minutes before you
and removed my hand
just in case you were embarrassed
or in case it was just because
we were drunk.

Anyways
Sometimes I think you don’t remember
that time we fell asleep
holding hands.
and it was the nicest sleep I’ve ever had.

But anytime you give me
that mischievous half smile
that just screams
“I know something you don’t know”

Then I think you very much remember.

As I breathed in his clean scent of soap and cologne
and the faint smell of mint coming from the gum he chewed,
I realized our knees were a small way away from touching.
A man that many women around me looked at twice
was looking at me.
He shifted on the uncomfortable folding chair
And there it was—
Our legs were touching.
His skin was soft and warm,
like his dark tan skin kept
Latin heat inside to emanate all year round.

I felt no rush of pleasure;
no smirk appeared at the corner of my mouth.
All I felt was a warm knee on my skin.
and nothing more.

It is this moment I realize just how damaged I am.

Who would have thought
When all I wanted
Was for things to be easy.
That you so easy
You so easily read
You so simple
So one dimensional
So realistically there or not there
Would bore me to death.
Who would have thought
That all I thought I wanted
Was nothing more
Than the grandest illusion
The one I had before you.

That instead
I’d crave
The great Perhaps
The great indefinitely maybe
The perhaps not entirely attainable.
That perhaps, in this time and that place and this time around
I’ll finally find it.
Find that which I’ve always been looking for.
That I'll finally see what was always right in front of me.
What was always supposed to be.

That I’d get off my high horse.
And admit
That you stole me the day we met.
That I was inevitably yours from day one.
That we were the perfect mystery,
That unsolvable equation
And tell you that you were the X factor
The spark that starts the fire.
And you were always
The only one.

My only one.

What do you do
when you realize
your life as you know it
is a cardboard cutout,
a dollhouse scene,
Of what your life should be.
Of what it once was.

The people in my life are characters
A backdrop in the place of reality.
Scenery behind my doorstep.
Photographic fire in the fireplace.
Tiny kitchen cutlery that isn’t sharp.
Staged people in my living room
at literally, a lifeless party.
A fantastic picturesque magazine spread in Southern Living.

And I am a part of this falseness.
I am a creator of this un-reality.
I am a willing participant in this stagnant stage of my life.

This life, this love, this truth
Is a figment
Is a dream
Is a scene of a scene.

I remember when green was green
And blue was blue
And I breathed in newness in every breathe.
Reality bowed down in servitude
And I took every step into a setting sun
The world around me, my partner in crime
As I took it by storm.

The tragedy here
Is knowing that life and love and truth barren
Is knowing it naked
As it really is.
As it really was.

And knowing that you’ve settled for the cardboard cutout
is recognizing you’ve given up.
You’ve settled for second best.
You’re taking the doll house route to life.
You’d rather watch the movie than live it out.
It’s cowardice at its best.

Why do we
keep drinking
out of the bottle
with the skull and crossbones
when we've
seen enough
to know
it’ll **** us
sooner or later.

Open your eyes, boy,
I think we are saved.
Took a walk over the bridge above troubled water
Got to the other side
Got to the other side.

Silent Hail Marys over and over again.
Counting beads.
Fingers running over them beads.
Muttering.
Muttering the same thing again.

Mother, I am weak, but I am strong.
I am no longer young;
I am an old man’s daughter.
Who understands less now than when she started.

He’s still walking up and down those streets
Doesn’t know what he’s doing that for.
I asked him why
He said it’s hard living with ghosts
In someone else’s tomorrow.

We are water
We are water
We are water.
I want life to
Give me
what the water gave me.

Take me down to the levy
Take me down to the stream.
I wanna be like old John and
Wash my sins away.
The choir of gospel singers
Moved me down
Down to the river.

Father can you forgive your son?
I’m a fallen apostle
Carrying the sins of Cain.
Take me down to the River Jordan
To take me away.
Gunna wade in the water.
Gunna come home again.
To the house of Gold
Under a dark, deep blue sea.

My classy *** ragtime notes
Can pound yo dub step trippin’ beats any day.

You’re techno,
I’m folk.

You gotta wear neon to be seen.
Man, they can see me from the moon.

You spend two hours getting dressed
I roll out of bed and still look this fly.

Your hat points in a different direction than your nose.
Mine is the same one my grandfather wore.

Your pants are falling off your ***.
Mine are held up with suspenders.

You try so hard.
I kind of feel bad for you.

Girl, you a fraud.
And I’m the real deal.

You tried to hide you’re in love with my guy.
I kind of wanted to **** you.

You kind of did me a favor.
He was just as bad as you.

Thanks for showing me
That I can do better than Dub Step.

Hands shaking
****** burning.
This is how we are today.
Tomorrow, we’re something else.

Body trembling
Heart pounding
We’re in love today
I ******* hate you tomorrow.

Glass emptying
Bar hopping
Broken hearts club gathers today
Tomorrow, we cry alone in bed.

Stars falling
World changing
Today I’m kicking ***.
Tomorrow the sinking feeling returns to my stomach.

Admissions Essay
Studying with wine.
Dreams of yesterday
Are coming back today.

Uncertain future
Forgotten wants
You **** up everything today
And I keep you anyways.

Battered heart
Love warrior
You cannot break me so stop trying
Tomorrow I’ll be better.

I can remember when we used to lie in bed
and make love for hours on Sundays.
Duvet days where
Breakfast in bed
Lunch in bed
*** in bed

I remember taking in every part of you
tracing my finger along your back
committing every curve of your spine to memory
And reminding myself
that this wasn’t a dream.

I can recall those times I’d wake up
at midnight or one or two
And I’d sense your eyes going right through me.
I’d take a peak and there you were,
staring at me long and hard
with those baby blues.

There was a moment I first realized you loved me.
It was in a room full of beautiful women
and all you could do was stare at me
with that ***** smile plastered on your face.
And I knew I was ***** smiling back at you.

I was shocked every time you took my hand
when we were walking down the street
Because the one before you never did that.
He was ashamed of me.
You wanted the world to see us together.

I fantasized having a child with you
Tiny, perfect and beautiful
with my sandy blonde hair
And your tall, lanky body.
We’d give him all the love in the world.

All I can remember are those moments.
But I sleep alone in a Queen with dark, cold sheets
and you’re no longer there.
You’re my own personal ghost
who will follow me until eternity’s end.

All I have left of you
is how we once were.

He came up to me
on the street
Looked at me long and hard
with chocolate brown eyes
that stared right through me
And said

You’re strikingly beautiful.

I gave him a soft smile,
Shook my head.
And said

No I’m not.
I’m a ******* headcase.

His turn to smile softly.
And he said

well you do the ******* headcase thing gloriously.

And he walked away.

I stared at corner where he turned for four hours.
Because it was the most alive I ever felt
and I didn’t want it to end just yet.

Don’t you
Don’t you dare
Don’t you dare give up on me.
I am helpless. I am flawed. I am undeserving.
But I am here.
I am one of us.

Don’t you
Don’t you dare
Don’t you dare push me aside.
I can be a ghost. I can be a fly on the wall.
But I am steadfast.
I am a sphinx who cannot be moved.

Don’t you
Don’t you dare
Don’t you dare ignore me.
I am faceless. I am unwanted. I am forgettable.
But I have presence. I have substance.
I exist.

Don’t you
Don’t you dare
Don’t you dare betray me.
I am shameful. I’ve made mistakes.
But I deserve trust.
I don’t want to turn to resignation.

Don’t you
Don’t you dare
Don’t you dare forget about me.
I am invisible. I fade to black.
But I am a person.
And I want to be remembered.

Don’t you
Don’t you dare
Don’t you dare ever stop loving me.
I am incapable. I have walls. I am scared.
But I don’t want to be empty.

Sad girl rock
Fills the room with hopeless longing.
Rootless dreams take off out of the open 2nd floor window.
Cold Coffee.
Ain’t nothing
To a Cold, Cold heart.

This isn’t how the story ends.
Cryogenic stasis.
A general lack of brain damage.
Neurological bliss.
Goosebumps when it’s 90 degrees.

If a tree falls in the woods….
Questions.

Paralysis in analysis.
I understood more before the literary critique.
Lost.
We’re all lost.
Thematic speeches
and character monologues.
Overbearing landscape descriptions.
It’s all so oppressive.

Characters who walk around and around.
Past street signs. Past Monuments. Past that same newsstand again.
Circles in grids. So squares, then.
The time of Ulysses is near
So we can all be thoroughly confused together.

Absence.
Lack thereof.
Without.
Lost.
Forgotten.

Absence.
An empty bed.
Lonely hearts club.
A party of one.
Quiet house.
Not even a stir.
Miles cracking as he spins and spins
Rain drop drops down the windows,
down walls
down me.

Absence.
Not good enough to be remembered.
Boring, lackluster, too easily surpassed.
A hole in the heart,
Weakness is showing emotion.
Blank face.
Death in Life.
EXILE.

Absence.
Tardiness.
A minute too late.
Detention.
No, absence.
Not here at all
was never really here
was never ever here.

Absence.
Seeing what is wanted
Not what is had.
What is had
is absence.
A lack thereof.
Nothing really at all.

Those eyes.
Those angry, angry eyes.
Those angry eyes are the last thing I see before I sleep.
Inspiring the thought that is there for only just a moment,
and then slips into my subconscious,
Low beneath the surface where it will stay buried and withdrawn
and it is this:

You will always be this way
and I will always have to live with it.
It’s that thing I hate about you and love about you at the same time.
You’re full of passion, you’re zoned in a moment, you let your knobs turn to 11.
Emphatic, impassioned, ****** energy
floats in the spaces between atoms in the world around you.

But when you turn to anger…
I see a madman, with fire in his belly and hate in his heart.
The same man who storms into the flames
and barn burning antics consume his mind.
The switch is on and it won’t turn off,
it is single-handedly the most petrifying disposition you have.
and I know you will always be this way
and I will have to live with it.
and every night as I go to bed,
I hope to God I don’t see
Those angry, angry eyes.

Hey remember that night when we chased the burglars in the front and back yard
and you almost kissed me?
God, I wanted you to.

I submitted a Post Secret of two young French lovers kissing in the rain
and I wrote “This will never be me” over the woman.
******* Parisians.

Once upon a time,
I bought flowers for myself just because I wanted to.
It was the most empowering thing I could have done.
But for the two weeks they sat on my window sill,
I was constantly reminded no one bought them for me.

Long ago, in a land far, far away,
I used to believe in miracles.

This one time, We sat at the Spanish Arch,
the one the Conquistadors built,
comprised of ancient old stone that caught the tears of the heartbroken,
heard the tales of the old salty men coming home from the bar,
and saw the transformation of an old Irish city into a new, artsy town.
We looked up, saw a shooting star, and wished on it I would be with him forever.

I was 19 once, and he sat on the beach with his flicky blonde hair
and a Corona and his oversized tee shirt hanging off his body
and we sat on that beach for hours, in the eye of the storm, soaking it all in.
It was the first time I realized I could love.

We were 22 and he was in love with somebody else and I loved his soul,
but I wasn’t in love with him and we found out we’re in the same boat.
We will always love each other but we can never be together
because we cannot give each other what we need.
He’s the only man who has never let me down.

As a child, I thought I could fly.
Not physically fly, but Peter and Wendy inspired me,
and I knew I could fly as a dreamer, and soar through the skies
like the hawk or the raven or the finch or the ******* pterodactyl if I wanted to.
And I wanted to. And I did.

I wrote a story once about a girl who ran several miles at two am when she couldn’t sleep
and the personal demons kept haunting her and taunting her
and the whiskey wouldn’t shut them up.

Every once in a while, I clean the house naked.
Sometimes, I kinda wish the UPS guy would catch me.

Every day, my life is filled with sullen, sunken, exposed regret.
I wish I did what I didn’t do.

Buttresses flew
too close to the sun.
Icarus repeated.

Monuments based on Ideas.
Prophecies based on Conviction.
Trust in a stated Axiom.


Only last for
as long as
someone believes in them.

She sings and I break.
Flood of unwanted memories.
Waves crashing down.
Here it is—the song—those notes—
Hand clenching the armrest.
Fingers white; knuckles clenched; rings bulging off my fingers,
Squeezing, gripping, relying on that armrest to be rooted in the Earth
so that I am not taken away.

He hums and I squirm.
So nonchalant. Casual. Like it’s nothing.
Like it’s just a song.

It’s NOT just a song.

Lovely.
Lying awake.
Naked in bed.
I refused to take off the leopard print push-up.
For once, no music.
An abnormality in our lives.
Everything is stillness except the beating of our hearts.
Because your head’s on my chest, you can hear mine beating faster,
Beating harder
Beating stronger. Because you give me life.
The black cat purrs by our heads. Her rhythm becomes our rhythm as we lay awake
Lights on
Staring at the ceiling
Breathing each other in.
We’re the only 2 people who exist.

He led me down
To the confines of hell
And there I saw
I was no different than the rest
River Styx
Called me in
To swim its black waters
And I felt seaweed grab at my legs.
The sirens came
And they pull me down to the depths
I would breathe water in
Suffocating on the sea
Awaiting my turn to die
Waiting for eternity.

I saw the voices of a thousand fiendish angels
Take form in the air around me
As wars and battles and fights raged
And the clash of civilizations was among us once more.
Heroes and villains alike re-appeared and shouted noiselessly,
making the entire universe sound like the chaotic mess
that it once was and still is and will probably always be.

I followed Dante as he followed Virgil and we followed nobody down and down further into the depths.

Winged chariots came
And whisked me away
through the halls of fire
I crossed the bridge
Crumbling and tumbling down
To the caverns of stone
Rocks smashing
I’m falling and falling
Never to land.
The acrid smell of flesh burning
Fills my nostrils
the fires singe the hair off my body
and I burn in oblivion.
What deed hath I done
to earn the demons of Lady Macbeth?
Out, **** spot
Get me out
GET ME OUT
I will never breathe free air again.
The villainy you taught me, I executed
and now I am here with them and you.
I am a wanted, haunted man,
As my telltale heart beats louder and louder
Until I see the face of insanity
And realize it’s my own.

Sleeping.
No. Not sleeping.
Hands in the dark.
Arm/Arm.
Next to each other, on top of each other.
Legs. Legs.
Foot. Tracing your leg.
A hand in the dark.
Fingers take my fingers.
Touches my face.
Kissing.
Suddenly.
You’re there.
So am I.
Should we be doing--?
--Kiss.
Never mind.

You’re supposed to be on a plane right now.
You’re not.
You’re on this bed.
Where I am too.
You kiss me again. Hard.
Hello, tongue.
Wait. What?
Doesn’t matter?
Okay.
Keep kissing.
Yes.

I know what this is.
I’m everything she’s not.

You call me beautiful.
No, I’m not.
My, you’re insistent.
I really don’t think I am.
You stare at me:
I’m the only woman in the world.
No one’s ever done that before.
Hands are going places.
I don’t want ***.
Well, I do.

I want *** with love. You love someone else. And I love you.
I am not an Equal Opportunity Provider.
Is that okay?
God, you’re so sweet.

You kiss me again.
I kiss you back.
Stroke my hair.
Scratchy beard,
Rubs my chin.
God you feel good.
Ugh.
My willpower is diminishing.

Stop.
Let’s talk.
Not about…her.
I mean.
About whatever, really.

Your back porch in Atlanta.
Play them blues.
Drink your Manhattans.
You and your gin.
Sounds beautiful.

You want me to know I’m beautiful.
No I’m not.
Why do I think that?
I’m just not.
It seems we’re at an impasse.
I don’t know I’m beautiful.
You don’t know you’re quite a catch.

You’re fanfacking tastic.
How do you not know it?
[It’s a cruel game;
that the universe made you love someone
who just can’t see that.
That the Gods would laugh
at our human folly
seems unfair.
That they gave us love
and then gave us no directions on how to use it.
That this man
is tripping over his own two feet
trekking mountains
traversing deserts
stealing the stars right out of the sky
Trying to re-win the love of his life.
She doesn’t even bat an eye.
She doesn’t know
that he is the rarest form of species.
And she
is a ******* poacher.]

Now I’m falling in love with your soul.
The very depths of you.
The secret rooms.
The inner dialogue.
You just get me like no one else does.

Sleeping.
No.
Getting there.
Pull me in tight.
Body on body.
Safest place in the world
is right here.
My head on your chest.
Arm/Arm.
Hand/Hand.
Tonight you’re mine.
Tomorrow
you were just a dream.

The vibration of the anticipation
of seeing you tonight.
I think I might
put on skirt
not to flirt but to impress
[Oh God]
I must love you,
I’m wearing a dress.
On the sand we’re shoeless
and it’s now I must confess
everything.

I met you three days ago and I love you.

We chase ***** and
Blickah Blickah dance
everything here is all just chance
we walk for miles on the beach
and if we keep going we can reach the pier
the ultimate destination, but
we keep getting caught
in our own procrastination.

We climb on a trampoline
of a de-rigged sailboat
and hope
that we find contentment.
Turns out
we probably could have prevented
all the ******* introductions
and started the production
of us from the start instead
of the part
we’re supposed to play.

A meteor shower,
[How so romantic comedy]
but we’ve created a melody
that’s in harmony with our souls.
We give each other biographies as we
stare to sea
as barriers fade away.
There is just so much to say
but not enough time to say it
don’t deny it
just try to find it
the words to tell me I’m right
or did this night
mean nothing to you?

Can you hear that?
A heart pumping, no thumping,
thump, thump, thumping for you
but you can’t see through
the lines and the walls
you just don’t have the *****.

[I’m too good for you.]

Saturday morning yoga class for moms.
We go anyways.
Tremors in our wavelength, shaky hands, unsteady heartbeats.
Off the Richter,
Ashes to rain, rainy ashes, acid burns through our umbrellas, ellas, ellas, ellas.
Writing stories about the time we danced on the bar
Another drink tonight
Just one more drag; then I quit.
Then, I need another.
Things you promise I know you can’t keep
Bejeweled picture frames and tiny figurines
Heeby jeeby vibes from the hippie couple that freaks every one out
Guitar chords, strumming of my heart
We breathe smog and fog
Shortened breaths for shortened lives
Strange noises emerge from the next room
We emulate our favorite heroes past.
She changes her name to something androgynous
Because that’s how she feels.
And doesn’t want to get a pixie cut.
She won’t shut up from the next cubicle over.
She craves the attention, the validation from her stories
That she is one of us.
Swing the scissors around again, throw them to me.
Nothing makes sense.
I ordered another beer
Even though I didn’t want another.
Indulgence. Liquid indulgence.
Hailing the Porcelain God later.
Routine.
Soft smile
Swiveled me to the ground
Things are never the way you want them to be
So move away
Go home
Keep moving
If you stand still, you’ll start to feel something
Hum hum hum
Everything is Numb numb numb
Here is where the heartache is--
“If you loved me you would…”
No I wouldn’t.
You don’t know me at all.

Cool kid euphoria with our pastel colored pants and our Raybans on is what we all are in the basement of the 50’s house.
Our phones blowing up while we sip whiskey and wine.
Trying to get the attention of the cars on the main road
By handstanding and flashing and cheersing our beers
And we receive our victorious honks.

Guitar clock radio with numbers around the fretboard and Sir Paul smiling and crooked, acid-trippin’ guitarist/violinist/celloist looking product of orange and gold look down upon as our patron saints.
Swingin’ low, Sweet Chariot words stares up at me from the 70’s floral carpet.
Ralph Stanley and Eric Clapton singing solos and duets in my head keep me company as the boys play and figure out key changes.

Painted screen hiding the Etta James microphone stands forgotten in the corner—
As I take in the teals and roses and golds.
Give me a heart shaped box where I can store my love
I fly so high in the world above
I’ll come back down eventually.

Lava lamped water stain engulfs the ceiling. As fingers go up frets
And they go down frets
And they go up frets
And they go down frets.
As you don’t enunciate when you sing.
We all mourn  our fallen brethren, the base of the telecaster with no strings and no head and it weeps silently from its place on the water pipes, hearing his cousins WAAAIIIIILLLLLL.

As Cool kid euphoria is created with our pastel colored pants and our Raybans on in the basement of the 50’s house.

We work all day so we can drink all night
Getting high off the drug that is each other
Chain-smoking Pall Malls like it’s our job
Listening to oldies as we shoot the eight ball in the corner pocket.
Garden tools and Lawn Mower parts as a sweet, creepy décor in the dank basement
As we breathe in mold and dust and cigarette smoke.

We are gloriously young.
So *******.
We still think we can change the world.
Not through politics or through fear or by means of war
But by doing just enough to get by and loving everybody for who they are, even the parts or religions or particular ways of life we don’t like,
Because people aren’t what they do or what they believe
They’re who they are.
We still think we can change the world
And Maybe one day, we will

But for now
We’ll just be here,
In the basement of the 50’s house with our pastel colored pants and our Raybans on.

Rhythm of life
Nails tapping on table tops
Beating of our hearts
spin the world right off its axis.
Momma shot a man in Reno
Just to watch him die.
Atlas shrugged
And we all tripped as we walked
The pace of our mile,
off by 3.6 seconds.

Trust in our stated axioms
Disillusioned Americans in Paris
Judged by the color of our skins
and the shoes on our feet
No one stops to see how blue it is up there today.
Hurrying through the rain
Our cities never sleep.
Going down South
It’s slower down here.
Sunday’s best and
“God Loves You” stickers when you get your oil changed.

Night train whistle blows
Factory steam pipes squeal
Mississippi riverboats tug and chug
Dictionary.com definitions let us down.
Greatest disasters in history
are when thing we take perfectly for granted
stop working.
Mad cow, mad hatter, mad world
Bad boys, bad wine, bad date
Ellipses, dot dot dots, dramatic pause, passing of time passing of time passing of….
……..
………….
…………………….
Time.

Tw—
Twi—
Twitch.                       (tick tick tick)

I believe in the abnormal
And the impossible
And I refuse to believe that fictional characters aren’t real
Animals completely understand me
When I talk to them.

Baby missiles fire
From all parts of the globe
End of the world party
Let’s go down in glorious drunkenness
As the beating of our hearts
Spins the world right off its axis.