The bartender says “It’s time to go”
“Because the moon has clamored high
And the sun was banished low.”

They were only speaking to me
I raised my glass, took a swig
belch, “i’m not even empty.”

They grab and toss it in a bin
The crash of glass, the waste of gin
Pollutes the air and that is when

They spoke. It was stern it was cold
“Get out right now! Before I leave
Your chest all gaped. Your chest all holed.”

“I’m a patron,yet you’ve decided
To push me out into the darkness
Lonesome and unguided”

“There are other bars out there,”
“No need to bother us, They said
I bit my tongue so as not to swear.

I made a choice, a simple choice
To sit and stay at the counter.
I cleared my throat and raised my voice:
“Do what you must. Let it occur,
But understand this, we will not be deterred.”

Winter is a pleasantry compared to this blanket upon me.
Despite its harsh remarks against the bulk of humanity,
I'd rather experience that than this constricting blanket.
Winter brings forth frost from its diaphragm and unto earth
But with this blanket, of comfortable coverage there is a dearth.
Must I wait till morning to dispose properly this blanket?

For T. Adams*

Bear with me for another sentence.
I don't mean to make you uncomfortable.
I apologize sincerely for bring it to your attention.
Bear with me for another sentence.

You see my heart is a closet
It beats out dust and dried tears.
My mama told me "Why should I
Accept this when y'all couldn't
Accept Juan" Her boyfriend.
Bear with me for another sentence.

She told me her name was
synonymous to carpet licker
and her body's ****** orientation
was the lockers lined down her school's halls.
Bear with me for another sentence.

His parents deleted his facebook
and banned him from the library
like he was this month's banned book.
Whenever he visits to drop off a book
he randomly chose as an excuse to come
to see the people he is close with,
He finds me and asks me about my day
and I say peachy but underneath his smile
There is a boy who has felt the sting
of isolation. I wonder if his parents know
that the girl from Ohio was forced down the same path
and it didn't lead to a garden of roses and sunflowers.
I hugged him with every fiber of my being
I hope I planted seeds that day
I hope they grow to be roses, sunflowers, the whole ******* Flower Spectrum because there needs to be some beauty in this ****** up world we call life.

Dreams are the royal road to the unconscious.
--Sigmund Freud*

She slams the door.
Refuses to open it.
My fists makes contact,
over, over, over again,
harder, harder, harder again.
"I just wanted you tell me
that everything will be okay.
That's all I ever wanted."*
She remained silent.

We all have that one movie.
The one we re-watch avidly.
The one where the protagonist
reminds us of our underdog selves.
Or at least the struggles
of waking up in the morning
without falling off the bed.

The clock flashes midnight,
reminds us that we have school
or wherever tomorrow. Yet,
we are engrossed spectators
captivated yet fearful
spectators to our hero's moment
of metaphorically hanging
off a metaphorical cliff.

We dismiss the clock and its
fallical midnight sign,
ignore the super-ego--
we have enough on our plates
from our actual parents
who expect too much
of underdeveloped minds
which are latched onto pleasure--
and continue watching our movie,
hoping that our hero
makes it out alive,
or at least does not fall off
the bed in the morning.

In the first grade I proclaimed loyalty to the art of writing.
In the Fifth Grade I inked my hands permanently with poetry.

Soon it became a habit, a habit I could not kick, like being addicted to cigarettes

You order two books off of Barnes and Noble
And perpetually wait by the porch
Every day to glimpse the mail carrier’s hands.
Anxiety settles upon your shoulders
Like the world on Atlas’s but because you believe
Carrying anxiety is not as intense
As carrying the world you shrug it off
But secretly, behind closed doors, your heart is biting its nails
Faster than it can pump blood
Because the world must not know what you are waiting for
Especially your parents for if they caught wind of it
You believe in your very core that they will douse them in gasoline
And ask you “at what temperature do books burn”
Before dropping a lit match onto the only security you have ever known.

Never gaze directly at the sun.
Its beauty will engage your pupils to a conversation,
politely ignore their inadvertent stutters,
before stabbing them with an indifferent attitude
leaving you to blink away the tears.
But the moon no matter how long you stare
will never force you to look away.

A pair of lungs walked into a bar
and inhaled the tobacco smoke.
Moments ago the smoke had risen drunk
before stumbling into the pair.
The bartender snickered, chortled
Which infuriated the lungs.
The lungs coughed up some tar.
They spat on her face then walked out.

During the spring the window in my room is closed and locked.
Some would argue that Spring needs passage to clean
the dust from the book cases lined against the wall
But I reject this thought as ignorance.
I know the price of cleaning the shelves.
If I were to let Spring saunter in it would have no regard and wipe the shelves 'til they're bare.

Mama , the weather outside speaks hunger.
The air whispers in syllabic groans
as it holds my bloated stomach.
I've seen the sun with cheeks full of food
but it wastes the food  by ejecting globs at my face
whenever I gaze upon it.
Perhaps the air can carry me through this winter.
Perhaps I can go to sleep.

Characters: Speaker, Real Estate Agent

Setting: A house for sale

The real estate agent has shown the kitchen and now enters the main bedroom and begins to explain the latest modifications. The speaker is not at the moment aware of the agent’s speech. Instead the speaker’s attention is caught by the closet which is opened.

Speaker: (Interrupting the agent)
You know, save for the musky odor
And dust collecting on the top shelf,
The closet, back in my mom’s house
The one in what was my room,
Is bare.
I always strained to keep the door shut
With all of my belongings pressing ‘gainst it.
Its bare now.
No trace of what once resided in there.
Just bare.

Real Estate Agent: Well, this closet is the biggest in the house so there is no need to worry about an overabundance of belongings.

Speaker: (Smiles)
It might be hard to believe
But I longer need
A closet.

She isn't my sister,
the girl from Ohio.
Biologically we are no kin.
But her blood smeared against asphalt
has shimmering dots
revealing that
We are family.

This is to her and others like her.
The ones from before
and the ones after.

My sister will never hear these words
But as long as its known

I love her.
Even if the world wasn't ready for her.

As I rest this head of mine
I pray that my arms become
Olive branches.
I pray that when extended
they are taken.
And that this world ceases strife.

What is it that we are doing?
The TV murmurs in the background.
Breaths are shallow.
Nothing makes sense anymore.

The world is a painting.
We are merely blots of ink.

At times winter visits early,
Spitting fragments of yesterday’s snow,
To strike an already scarred face.

Yet, at other times the curve of its finger
Interlocks with the conscience’s
As it blabbers on like an infant.

We are all pieces of paper,
Riding the morning breeze.

We ride elegantly,
Without much strife,
Until it halts.

Until we are stranded
Upon the sidewalk
Scraped for the
Flakes of white.

Until someone takes hold
Of our flesh.
Etches their name
Without being told.
Before boldly erasing,
While avidly cursing,
Our blue lines.

It has been said that my mother came from floor cleaners and fruit picking.
It has been said that my father came from chicken coops and lawn mowers.
Would it be said I came from ink stains and sidewalks?

I have found that the skill of peacekeeping with the various parts of yourself is useless.
In the morning it is the strongest that will rise.

How can the heart mend?
When I break it over and over?
How can a heart fend?
When I strike it over and over?

When I look in the mirror I say it was them
They couldn't handle a twisted man
But the mirror is cracked split before me
I am that mirror, The mirror is me.

I'm tired of feeling like I've been misused
Thrown 'cross the surface of "I Love you"
Only to skip ahead into the thickets and overgrown weeds.

It's submerged, its arms are bent, pent up against a blackened wall.
Have some compassion.
Have some compassion.
But it is forced to ****** and cross the threshold
Broken.

As I looked upon the mirror and noticed its mimicking, I found a splotch of dirt where a shirt pocket should have been.
I dabbed a cloth in suds, I'm told its substance is the best
but no amount of vigorous scrubbing
could have removed the splotch.

After the faint grazing of my arm by your unaware fingers,
The candle was lit and it ignited its cage.
Famished, the flames unfettered the bounds
Consumed every fiber of self-doubt
My heart fell into the smoldering ash
Gazed above at the fiery mass
And sighed.

Paint Me a Picture

Paint me a picture
With fiery red clashing with sentimental blue
With groovy orange dancing with golden yellow
With hidden messages etched in the pigment

Paint me a picture
Where lamentation of the ****** is naught
Where trumpets announce the coming of conviviality
Where the background is illuminated with fierce fireworks

Paint me a picture

How has it come to this?
A book once vibrant in cover and fluent in language
Now tattered and dropped into a recycle bin.
I can hear them now,
The many in the landfills and recycle plants
“Judge me not by my remains but by my essence.”
But we discard based on looks and physical holes in plots.
We ignore the beauty of language and character development
For pristine copies of the new
When sometimes
The old would have worked just as well.
A book once vibrant in cover and fluent in being
Now tattered and forgotten.
How has it come to this?

Deep churning of the chords conjure some words
Silence is smothered without much regret
Their eyes are smudged as commotion blurs
Pierced through the heart the other’s bayonet.

Waves clash, splintering the bases of boats
Combustible like flame to hydrogen.
Captains Oh Captains at each other’s throats
Depriving each other of oxygen.

But gusts of statements, drafts of insults cease
As anger takes flight from its creation
Leaving behind ‘reaming white tears of peace
And the nagging feel for quick translation.

And as the sun rises in the morrow
Captains will know the reaping of sorrow

There isn't enough time  in the day to reiterate what I have said before.
My words would be as long as the circumference of the milky way
But like the center of milky way, its too distant so its unheard.
I acknowledge that this poem is a ripple of the former ripple which was a former ripple of the byproduct of heartache but its creation, this reiteration is all I have left.

The orange ambushed the tip of my tongue
my tongue felt the keen sting of acidity.

A flower caught in the wind's bent arms I saw today
I began disputing it's given name.
A Calla Lilly, A rose, a daisy
Perhaps it's -I'm just crazy .
It's a flower with beauty and it offers it in display
I saw a flower today
I saw a flower today.

Letter: To Lone Child

The rivers seem to never stop
There’s a storm a churnin in your heart
And all you have left is your self

Your falling down can’t get up
always thristin with a broken cup
And all you have left is yourself

No, matter what you try to say
You fellow man turns away
They won’t listen to what they don’t understand
But I am here so talk to me.


Wipe the tears slip into night
Follow the internal light
And you’ll see that it’s alright

Rise from your former ash
Resist the urge to look back
Because kid it’s going to be alright


No matter what you try to say
You fellow man turns away
They won’t listen to what they don’t understand
But I am here so talk to me.

Time plays a complex hand
It ponders ‘fore exposing stance
But kid it’s going to be alright.

'tis the morrow yet it has borrowed the remote sorrow harboring within the roots.

The trees are bare while creatures crawl underneath tearing at the skin.

The streets have been skinned of their inhabitants.
The bone glistens as the high moon worships.

I repeat his name until there is a proper place.
I place him neatly and linger just for a moment before I place the next one where he belongs.

An old man whose lungs have felt the smugness of many cigarettes
Looked at me and said, "If you are a poet write a poem about nothing". I took out a piece of paper and handed it to him.

I am a fugitive.
my thoughts are my crimes.
Silence is my punishment.

Poetry is the elixir I drain into the cracks of my broken self
to ensure security in a world where cold indifference is less expensive then a nod of acknowledgement.

A thousand sun's wavered in the wind
hanging on the tips of a tree's arm.

The moon wants solitude tonight.

It tugs the thick vapor layered veil over it's face.
But its tears seep, dampening the hills, trees, and earth.

Collectively, the tears coat the ruins of an ancient home.
Bent from it's foundation it's straining as a contortionist
Battered by neglection, it's body breaths with fluttering doors
but its soul is dead.

My mind is like abstract art tinted in many colors of red,
like my heart blew apart, splintering, puncturing now I am dead,
like horrid lamentation smeared with tears of the barely alive,
like a hungry nation spoon fed to think they can no longer strive,
like a child who attempts jumping the hurdles but ends up hurt,
like a man who repents only to realize he never got burnt.

If meeting your needs was what it took to ensure their safety I would do it. No task, no demand would be too difficult to accomplish. All I ask in return, pass them the salt when they ask for it.

Our strides like deep breaths before confessing love are beautiful.

Dear Humanity,

I want you to look into your enemies and hold their breath in your lungs for one minute and in that minute watch y'alls ideas which were clashing like two stags fighting for the right of the land, halt abruptly.  In that minute I want you to acknowledge that beyond that barrier which you created when you heard the words " I disagree", is a soul who probably felt the calloused hand of life. Perhaps your enemy went to sleep with dried hands after washing dishes for the ******* Last time only to rise at the tolling of the alarm clock, it says Get Ready for School.  In that minute I want you to acknowledge that beyond the wired fence that sends electricity through their bodies when ever they approach, is a soul who might have had to endure the pang of hunger so siblings could do with something, anything so electricity is nothing In that minute, I want you to acknowledge how it feels to hold their breath.
Exhale.

Sincerely,

__

I read the words of your eyes as I turned you over.
They said, "It's a wonder that the world doesn't explode when two people meet for the first time."

He wanted to plant a tree for our anniversary
an oak tree.
I thought it ludicrous being the first year
but his heart was dead set on forever while mine was still unsure ten years ago.