set reminders for when I slip
down the steep and forget:

it’s all wretched and beautiful
as is plummeting onto
blue-black knees

it means I’m here—
in the land of breath
and flux leaves

startle cracks
and curtain calls
my eyelids back

diaphanous dropped
and veils up
dewy bloom spotlit

monkeysuit chauffeur
denigrated daily
scratch behind his ears
you're doing OK
just mistook
vehicle for passenger

relax in seat back
let clear and present ever
steer biospheric lit

allow etheric hum
up the bony ladder
to outlook attic
bindi blinds lift

pretty *******'
46-bit binoculars
these holy puppet
hands have got

I love me, but
I could do it with
a bit more

consistency, potency
and wild *******'
abandon-dusted
panache

you know,
how all beings
are born to be loved

the words don't work
unless you put them
under your tongue,
let them dissolve
and become
your new
truth.

you can't just
lick them casually,
heart on lockdown,
guarded by mind,
******* detector
set on high.

the power is in belief.

when you put down skeptical,
suddenly, you make room
for the mystical.

don't tell me
you don't remember
precisely how that goes...

that was the miracle:
it wasn't just what I said to you.
I'm sure you'd heard such things
prior to that luminous transference.

it was how you - trusted - exactly then
to eat the words I put gently
in the palm of your blooming hand.

and just then,
they became true
for me and you
like ****!

and there We were,
making magic, my dear,
with these exquisitely parallel
inversely proportional tongues,
with direct connect to hearts
starting to beat as one.

we shall create as we speak -

but only what
we also believe.

this symposium of somersaults
synaptic rafter vaulting

if only i could swap
mind & body levels

ascendant acrobat
with still insides

without friendship
we have nothing

no substrate sustainable
nest on fire fallout

we play with matches
kindling tilt hips
but these skins chill
so fast

in the absence
of underlying structure:

woodpyre pyramid ascent
pointing at blackdrop
where fractured lights
dance against

contorting shadowsong
upon crooked wings

I was doing one of my
healing ceremonies solo

and I thought
to myself:

maybe he needs me
to go away to feel
his own heart
- alone -

in space

and precisely then,
I felt this

Clydesdale inside my chest
whinny, kick up and surge

like holy hell -
please

don't stop
writing
ever

and I
abide

say yes
to my

hipnotic
invitations

and bury you
in me

alive

not tryna
give myself
scrolliosis

to excavate
some yestertongue
from your fortress
to use against you

it's all in my
Youbrary

at the ready

like I said,
it always just seems
utmost important

so it stains me
and I like it

but it's all
for you

because, what kind
of mirror would I be,
if I didn't

- stubbornly -

use everything
existing
in me

to shake you
into remembering
who you are

and are going to be

pretty white
pages inked

with all I've got
in black, sticky words

I'm here
for you, always

even when I'm not

I know you hear me -
echoing through your
bones plunking
lonely chords

energy works in rising
falling, harmonizing
and we make music
on lips and skin adrift
and I know

we are
one

no matter
how far or
weird

it all
becomes

because I
still feel you
surging inside
my ribbed space

recently, I took a ****
in a metal torpedo
flushed, washed and
checked my hairdo
before siting down
in cranked A/C
Wi-Fi accessing
songs by-the-million
and got solicited
a mid-air cocktail

not long ago
people were dying
on the Oregon Trail
and I could probably DL
that old crApple game
right now - at 34,000 ft -
buy some oxen and ****
before I die of dysentery
while I go from DC to FL
in two ******* hours

you know one day
kids are gonna be playing
21st-century games
wildwildwest replaced with
archaic world wars and
monopolistic rat races
wondering what it was like
to jet through the clouds
when you couldn't just
hop in your portal
to get wherever
whenever

every last bit
of what we take for granted
would seem nothing short
of witchcraftical magic
to eyes from past

because somebody
imagined that ****
and made it
happen

we are fingertips of God
spinning new worlds
on the threads of
our dreams

come spin
with me

please

when you pull away
I hope you breathe
in fertile space
birthing trueyou

however I know
your patterns now:

when it gets hard, you
often coat confusion
rage and anguish
in diversion skin

grabbing angels
(or lost souls)
obscuring view

I may be obtuse
but you upperhand
with blinders

though I like to think
you're going full lotus
you may just be
escapist frolicking
in the park

do what you got to
open all the doors
that beckon you

I did
and will

(when the U co-signs)

their insides brim
invitations to
lessons or
blissings

walk with honor
next to them

just don't forget
the who you knew
beyond skin

the one you love and resist
for the same reason

prismatic eyeing
searing through
Grade A hiding

new school gypsy
alpha span omega
altared fēniks uprising

is side-flip of vivid
awesomely augmented
projection blissings

sated seraphims spin
atop agile toes

but so do
voracious villains

those ******* link arms
and do-si-do

spinning you
wrong 'round

fear dealers
doling out
bunk doses

I keep
throwing up palms
like whoawhoawhoa
not now - got **** to do
inside the ******' zone

ego seen-through
crushmoded

hangs upon my bleak
wall bleached by
disassociation

above a filing cabinet
storing thesis research
from The Trauma Institute
Campus at Stockholm

this is undoubtedly
the spun cycle

I could practically
pen a calendar
of our seasons

marked holidays
and monthly art
animating image-flips
from shimmer grins sprung
gone grinchupsidedown

imagining voiceover
as replays unfold

is the only line I can remember
from the first poem I ever wrote
on my mom's old Smith-Corona

on a thin, cheap piece of paper
with typos and strikethroughs
before that was cool

and when I think about
all the pieces of me
I let him eradicate:

clothes, shoes, makeup
pictures, journals, poetry
friends, family

all those moments
all those pieces of me
just -

gone.

there I am, again
spiraling in magma
equal parts rage
and pain

I bought the ticket
to the worst ride
of my life

and I am so tired
of paying for it

and streaks my heart walls inky
intermittently

I don't want to keep
grieving the passed
it hijacks the now

it's all we have

just a string
of fleeting, fragile moments
with zero guarantees

I feel the fates
tickling my brain

the signs
the fortunes
at the bottom
of my teacup
smiling up

the faceplants
blooming fortuitous

the Verse is up to
something(s)

it always is, but
sometimes I feel it
strong

like yesterday...

and I can't help
thinking of the one
I told you about
so long ago now -

how losing my job
gave me the opp
to find the work
I do and love

I didn't know who
you'd be to me
when I shared
that story

but the truer truth is -
I might never have
found you
either

if I didn't have that
soul-******* endeavor
ripped out from under
my fumbling feet

(but U would have
found a way, I bet)

I was so bummed
at the time, but now
I'm grateful I went back
to serving

it's where I met that
(formerly) mutual friend
of ours

it was a 2-4-1
holy pivotal stone

now I bow to that call
that left me in tears
and led me to two
great loves

that swiftly shifted
my sands

and I'm pretty sure
they have something
to do with each other

each dawn I rouse
increasingly light(er)
like midnight realized
she dosed me improper
siphoned back sludge
in the IV dropper
and daybreak snuck
pre-op biotics
that kick in as
I flutter

I feel
the veil

lift.

and guise of years inside
you’re sanitized from the outside
custom toxin bubble confined

pop
and deflate

I’ve been guarding me
for so long.

after you live in prison
upon your release, you still
put walls around yourself
don’t trust don’t trust don’t
believe

anyone

is.
safe.

your create bars
to stay that way
just like home
penitentiary

that tucked you in
told you howwherewhen
you didn’t get to
make decisions
you didn’t
belong

to you.

then when on your own
you still don’t feel you
belong to anyone

I was so used
to playing small
I kept shrinking me
habitually

but
I. am.

uncontainable
and part always
of the all

as love culture multiplies
in open air beyond
illusory bars

I look up so high
level with my own
open eye

realize I’ve been
sitting under a table
in the broom closet

when I coulda been mingling
in the party just outside
where lights don’t chase, just
reflect iridescent cocktail dress

and there is laughter
with not one nanosecond
false, forced or choreographed

for the bones just know
and move
in song

the scars
and errors

is your name
singed
white

branded by
corona flares

salt slunk
knees hugged
churning fraught
under weighted ribs
and a flickering yellow lamp
locked in this static hallway
between waiting rooms

I am
fistful
scarful
dreadful
mouthful
constellation of burnt
sore spots connected festering

but, also
breathful
dreamful
brainful
blissful
lapful
lifeful
string of lit brights
prismatic as Northern
sky candied neons

and just
being with you
made me glow
in dingiest dim

by you being you
and me being me
in unison

we can cherry bomb
the blackest sky
with your hand
in mine

latent ***** stripped
worldly bearings dizzy
not catching
spiral

then seconds
multiply

not dodge or burn but grow
where it all often slides
and I palm groove

it rolls inside as memoir
with new car smell
epiphanic brushed script
in hallowed blues
& pinstriped opal

my vibration outpaces
the weight of existence
cuts it off around
my bending

center stills enough
to catch glinting dust
before I turn
to it

my heart aches
to exercise itself

to feel
reals

and hands
that hold tight
to me

but my ribbed drawbridge
won't lower

I felt something
pulling me

so I looked, back
over my heavy shoulder
as I lugged that broken seat
down the stairs on casters

it fell apart
when he grabbed it by the arms
and slammed it into the linoleum
with me in it

after I rolled it to the dumpster
and lifted it over the metal edge,
I remember the relief of letting go
of that fractured, useless piece

somehow I was
lighter

as if tossing that moment
and all the things
no longer safe
for me

my palate favors
particular concoctions
over too many pots
and helpings spurned

I don’t need
to taste everything
imported from China
suped-up HFCS and MSG
the first bites are yum
across hungry tongue
but the rest are all meh
instigating regretful churns
and nutrient deficiencies

I just want that
raw, organic, GMO-free
concentrated, satiating
perfected recipe
crafted expertly
on my tongue
daily

x3

preceding primordial
third eye flicked LED

skirt dust swirls
reincarnate tumbleweeds

waltzing slate circles
picking up speed

still hurt
still mad
still shattered

on some level

but I know
none of that matters
under the blazing light
of hearts flung into the fire

and at the end
of this precious life
what's going to count
is how well we stood

with starched spines
back to the black winds
whipping eager at our
worn, forlorn ears
and said

No.

to pain and fear
running the show

and got up
- ever up -

and unlocked
our fractured citadels
with key at center:

compassion -

the bridge to
everything

in moments

where now transcends
inner *******

and we tremble
with life

me back to
the altar of I dunno

from the falter of
I wanna know
nownownownownow

all the things
whisper thier truths
into me

in time

lock up
when anyone
seems

particularly disappointed
or demanding with me
not ideologically, but
in tone intensity,
conversing
forcefully

either I
turn off, go numb, freeze
taken over by survival mode

or I fight err flight it
usually trying to fly
with some fight
as I navigate
the exit

my 18-pound shewolf triggers me:
all barkybarkbark wanting things -
like ******* carrots after dinner,
and if I don't get them at first yip,
she insists, paws, jumps, getting
all super-***** indignant
(kind of adorably)

sometimes, I keep giving in
and get them (repeatedly)
because I'm a pushover

sometimes, I block her out
until she goes full self-righteous
and I feel bullied, get up and go
into the other room to breathe
and stop shaking

sometimes, I can extradite myself
before it gets all fullreactivejacket
like when my brother (drunkenly)
told me he didn't want my son
around his, because I told him
Santa is just a cultural myth
that we pretend for fun
when he asked

apparently, I'm an *******
for making decisions for my kid
that I'm comfortable with, not him,
and thinking there's way more magical
**** in this world to be excited about
than a random fat man breaking and
entering your house to bring presents
as long as you leave him cookies...

I have a mouth on me, but I try
not to use it, because I am
quite accurate in aim
and loaded with
cutting truth

but I
don't wanna fight
anymore

because I lived
in a war zone

in the beginning
the fights would last for
d   a   y   s

or should I say,
the raging lectures
while I tried to reason
how and why
my thoughts
differed

he always had a way
of making me feel
solely responsible
for everything

he'd go onandonandon
until I acquiesced, agreed and
promised to give in to whatever
he believed the solution to be
(usually me cutting someone
out of my life or giving up things
I thought I liked)

and if I disagreed,
or picked holes in his argument,
he would start back at the beginning, because I must not have been listening

it stopping,
and subsequent silence
was such an enormous relief -
when adrenaline stopping pumping
and I could hear myself think
just grateful and happy
to be done
with it

I would disassociate
hard

sometimes
there would be
a traumatic scene
that was quite ******
but then a few days later
I couldn't remember
what happened
but knew
it was

bad

I started writing
some of those episodes down
so I'd know what happened to me -
for future reference, that I wasn't
crazy

so, I
latched onto
the peace and quiet
while it lasted

and as his words
had less and less effect,
the more crazy he'd act
to get me
in line

once when
I did not acquiesce at all, proud
in the face of his domineering storm,
standing firm, calmly disagreeing,
stating my case matter-of-factly,
he cupped his hands over my ear
and screamed as loud as he could
rage rattling me
into tears

I wish the imprints
on my psyche faded
as fast as the bruises

I don't know if I'll ever be
completely normal

but I do know

I will try
to tread lightly
around your triggers
and not take it personally
when they inevitably
detonate

I will learn them
like I know my own
and I will understand why
you do what you do

because when I say yes,
it's going to be
to everything

disbelief suspends
as third eye arrhythmia
drum circles forehead

I know a bit about
learning to dance in the rain
like nobody is watching
but...

I know way more about
dancing like a *****
in the kitchen

despite the warden
standing aghast
eating up his own
billowy firebreath
soliloquy reprimands

I earbud block
shimmy, pivot and pop
raising vibration tornado
toss it a flippant middle
and cheeky smile
without breaking stride

devil dismayed
lips keep on syncing
as if I can hear demeaning
demonic procession

but I already know
what he’s saying

stop dancing like that
in front of our son

you mean…

to the beat of my own pulse
shaking divine creation
diffusing rainbow throes
undulating radiant orbitals
all for my own blissing?

one day that boy
will be a man
who knows

better

than to ever
call a goddess

a ***** in the kitchen

I'm so lonely
for someone I
can be alone with

a million tongue notes
flicked upon a rogue
scale of silence

echoing unsaids
across flesh parallax

seeing you seeing me
is enough, it's so much
I can barely handle it
and it all stays
in mouth
or drips

down the corners
where I lick

don't ever forget
to drop to your knees

and be

grateful
for opportunity
lowered by winged white
into laps lonesome

this chance
this life

yes, free will
is yours as well
but, these moments
the not-so-subtle nudges
and the whispers that surf the wind
after it stands still for - so - long

don't forget
to be grateful
for that

could-be bestowed upon us
marked, holy

we are pocket blooms
of clover fields
lucky

the fates toil not
this hard
unless

sacrosanct potential brims
not just for us - but, to share

there will be so much
it will overflow out of us
and we will laugh, humbly
at scarcity-fraught mentalities

so, thank you
for being exactly who
you are:

beautiful boy
with tarnished halo

(no worries though -
I will lick it till it spit-shines
and polish on my gold-flecked fleece)

and your basketcase
of trinkets blathering
contents crooked
and bizarre

(BTW, I still loves them)

if you were not, precisely
these psyche spatters
and glitch patterns

you would not
have given me
a second glance...

we will make picnics
out of our spastic baskets
finding we can dine on the grist
and feed the eyes
of our hearts

so, I say yes to us -
no matter what
we are:

friends, editors, syntactic twins,
long-distance synaptic co-captains,
creative cohorts rapping across easels,
and perhaps even, angelic mirrors
worshipping at bioluminescent altars,
getting minds, hearts, insides glown
w  i  d  e open by white splatter streaks
blowing phosphor all over this space

that definitely exists
in us

...

I'm cool with whatever
though

:)

satin slats
plumped slick
sepal pearls
Elysium entreats
welcoming warm

to bring your everything
into this charred coal vortex
whirring as we walk through

don't leave behind
one sliver of a shard oxidized
rusted wretches inclusive

bring it all
and toss it in

we'll corset fingers
as our debris mingles
cylindrically

we can't shake
these shambles

but we can
sling it into orbit
rearranging, alleviating
the weight

holding is so heavy

especially
the shame

release
unyou

and feel me?

because
sometimes

I swear
I can feel you

alight

in front
of me

awesome warm
eerieetheraura

out of
nowhere

still

it's my favorite kind
of creepy

between my writhe
venerating milk
whole

300 thread-count tent
stars chart scars in shadow
overlapping bullet hole trends

in here
these wounds feel
something near normal

black rain plummets
drowning out
the outside

every day
I don't pretend
it's not happening

every bruise
I'll never hide
again

every eardrum
not slit
shrill venomous
psychward razors

every day
not backed
into a corner
not choked

every time
I don't wonder
if I'll come to again
as limbs go limp
fading conscious
into black

every chance
for my greatest gift
not to end up like
my biggest mistake

every time
he greets the family
he'd never known

every day
I awake
to possibility
reunited family
rekindled friendships

every reclaimed moment
every shot at bliss
every joytear

is because

of
you

daring to flirt inside
messy, imperfect lines

catalyzing jumpstart
to the rest
of this

precious life

no matter
what happens
wherever you go
whatever you choose

I'll always see some cape
creeping out from under
your blackflak collar

toward Christmas
and I feel you
more

you were
the best present ever

black satin
loops and tendrils

******* magical
despite psychopaths
running the shitshow
egoic stoic will unfold
as origami hearts turn
etheric tissue paper
interdimensional winged
aglow in palm

f this.
and that.
f the soul-******* siphons.
f the **** ******* on all the things.
f the wretched that ravages souls.
f plundering the vast unknown. f the broken that breaks us apart. f the pain that can’t find the exit door. f the non sequiturs that never stop. f all the thinks I'll never get to know. f the desert that evaporates technicolor dreams. f the reams of unsung ink.

f getting up too early. f never enough sleep.
f having no focus because mind is always trying to escape.
f the architects of this unending industrialized violent puppet reality TV.

f not having patience for utmost important because basic survival in this free range slave menagerie is just too overwhelming and chips away daily at already threadbare sanity.

f the aches under these ribs always begging for more.
f the abyss that eats cravings caved in for breakfast.

f the knowing that knows how awesomely amazingly brilliant loving flipping mind-glowingly ecstatic and jovial like a MF this existence could be.

it haunts me:

iridescent reflective ascendant peacocked wings
fluttering phoenixflies burst from ill-fit cocoons
surfing air so ******* fresh
even the Lorax ain’t got **** to say - he’s dancing
with kombucha in one hand and a DMT pipe in the other
at the festival called, I dunno, Just Because it’s ******* Monday

and we could
love and make and dream and play
all day every day every year every life...

and I look over
at this giddy ******
epic little boy version of me
and I think:
****

I have to keep trying
keep believing in the things
because the thought of leaving him
in this world, as-is
without me

is the hardest thing
I’ve ever had to think

my pink orchid sits wilting
next to the kitchen sink

I feared it was thirsty
and starting to die
so I overwatered

now the petals
are definitely
falling

there were times
when I filled my lonely cracks
with whatever sort of fit

though I knew
it wasn't really capable of
meeting me on all my levels -
intensity, emotion, intellect,
oddity, creativity, curiosity,
carnal abandon

I've found matches
but those compounds
burn out quickly
sparklestarts
fading

it's terrible how lonely I am
yet, resist being appeased
with (con)temporaries

it always ends up making me
more lonely

after crave subsides
and short-lived chems exit
the self-loathings start chanting
we ******* told you so

when my heart says nope
which it almost always does,
at some percentage,
my body knows -
I'm there, but not fully
in it:
walled distrustful protection mode
no wide open uninhibited throes
it's aspects of yes, meshed with no

it's why
a majority of my encounters
have involved substances
my addiction is afflicted
with knowing
it won't be
the thing I crave

so I numbed
my persnickety heart
in order to keep
fever down

I can't just
open up for anyone -
unfurl rose spectrum
of precise art and language
that comes from heart
and dictates skeleton
to dance in ecstatic
primal possession

I am flint
crafted for
reciprocal ignition
upon inherent nature
of symmetric material

and you know, my heart
has never been blasted off hinges
with body in tandem, 100%

but I know that it
can and will

heal all the things
burn up the pain,
the unbelonging

wipe the slate free
of tormented cravings
replacing with gratitudinal awe

some days
the internet
won't let me
forget

in a barrage
of quotes
and memes

this one
screamed at me:

you can't break up
with a soul mate

a while back
I changed my
Evernote font

to Palatino Linotype

I know, I know
whogivesafuck
but yeah…

it means a lot
to my insides

learn some UX/UI best practices
and above all the annoyances,
PLEASE STOP trying to be cute
with the perpetual edits
to the HP name

it's annoying
and distracting
from actual things
I want to read

thankyoumkaybuhbye