Well, we could tell ghost stories.
Or we could tell the really scary ones.
What makes you?
What broke you and made you?
Can I hold you and feel the scars?

The howling wind.
Through the shrieking trees.
The creaking fence.
The clanging chimes.
Everything I can see, I can hear.
As what I can't wraps around it.
And carries sight to my ear.
It's all an echo. Deja vu.
Meeting again those dull things.
Alive tonight.
The fury of a storm is not in the wind.
It's the ordinary finding new life.
Ghouls on halloween and the trees roam,
In the hurricane.
Don't be afraid of the foreign winds
From far off seas. Now in your yard.
Fear the familiar.
The family dog biting.
A tree house in its jealousy destroys your own.
The still and the quiet are loud in the wind.
Alive again.

No. But we probably have the
Same zip code
One day soon we might
Share an address.

I yelled at my grandmother this morning.
She was knocking on my door.
So worried.
Asking if I was okay.
Afraid every time of what she could find.
I came out howling mad.
I talk so quietly, she hadn't heard me.
With my head as frayed as it is,
All that rattling awake crossed some wires.
I don't feel it was wrong.
I just shouldn't have done it.
This is what insanity must be.

He stands there alone in a forest.
He kneels there. Alone.
"Devil take my soul. If you want it."
No Devil hears.
No God shakes his head.
He lays down alone in the forest.

And the night is as dark as it ever was.

Vertigo. Maybe it's like that.

Like.
going blind.
Like
from that science show
Where a man said he couldn't see,
But walked down a hallway,
With obstacles.

Where. You.
Keep doing whatever you're supposed
To be doing.

But your eyes.
Your real eyes.
That ***** of the intellect.
Slipped right out of your head
Down a curvy,
Sticky, bumpy metal slide.
And he isn't having a good time of it.

I don't think he planned to.
It's just so hard in there.
And you have him running around
So much.
Lately.

And you're sick. But you're fine.

You turn the tap and there it goes.
You hide in this, and where do you go?
I can put together a life.
I can make a hell of a pitch.
And Lie Lie Lie
on a resume.
To a board.
In a suit.
I can lie and not even try.
But what is it?
A lie until you find the right thing?
                                   the right thing?
What's that?
Is it like The One?
Where songs start, "making sense?"
     "Oh you'll know it when-"
                                                     -
      "Make your hobby into your job-"
                                                                    -
     "If you love what you do you'll never
      work a day in
                          your
                          life."
But let me work. Maybe.
Let me do my thing that I'm supposed to,
                                            only I can do,
And let it just be done.
Is it so much to ask?
Like a guy in a suit goes into the office,
And clicks away at keyboards.
And clicks away at pens in meetings.
And clicks away
An click away the day?

And all day he wants to go home.

Because home is better.
             We ALL know that.
He's a working man.
              We ALL know that.
He should want to go home!
              We ALL know that.
               we all want to go home too.

He checked in, and did all the work he was
supposed to do. So go home you're done.
You did your thing.
You were built for it.
You reached it.
                             Take.Some.Time.Man

I want to do it. Whatever I'm here to do.
But I'd like to get it done quickly.
And just, check out.

This might be a new chapter.
I can almost feel,
A growing fire.

Things are awful dark here.
But I can almost see,
A glow on the wall.

It's strange, I know.
But I can almost hear.
Someone coming.

I've been lost here,
A long ******* time.
But I know,
It's almost time to go.

Where there's a light there's a lantern.
A hand to hold it,
A hand to hold mine,
And pull me out.
Not cold like the one that dropped me here,
But warm and strong.
From the light she's carried so long.

A crow lights on a low branch of a bare mesquite tree.

Yesterday a hunter shot a deer. His aim was poor. So was the light. He ran a long time before he remembered he had died.
'Bang.'
"God. I must be dead. But run? I should run?"
A long ways off. Deep in the woods he slid down to his knees. The adrenaline faded fast. When there was so little blood left.
"God... I forgot... It was only... So long ago... A minute... When you're bleeding so much... It's slow."
His big, cold body slept there through the night.
His chest looked to breathe. But it was the swirling, slicing winds tearing the night in all directions. Swaying his short fur.
The morning crept in blue. After a mourning black night. Navy skies swept in.
Coyotes catch his smell as the winds choose a direction and slice that way only.
The Family trickles in.
Drip. From the woods. One. Lonely. Follows the air.
Splash. He finds him. Deep in the woods. But darts away.
"Deer don't fall like that."
He watches crouched behind a cactus. Watches for kicks. Shakes. To see if the fur moves like he's breathing.
The wind made its mind and his chest rests still.
Still as the dog. Nobody else is. So he does.
He rises up and cracks int the morning with short, sharp howls.
And the family drops in. Rains in. On that dry navy morning.
There's eight now. They watch each other.
Not the body. They watch each other.
"It's free." They say.
"Free to me." They say back.
"Howl lucky we are." They laugh and laugh and lust. Lust for the free wet meat on a dry day.
Circled they tear into their free meal. And each other. A little.
When they get in the way. Can't blame them.
There's so many. So hungry. Don't get in the way.

A crow lights on a lights on a low branch of a bare mesquite tree.

The first to see.
The sky shed its navy suit and starts to see.
But first came the crow. The first to see.
The day began. It shines first on his feather. The first they see.
He drops neat to the earth and rips the lid from the eye of a little coyote.
'A test.' He tells us he thinks.
To the family. Blood is blood. From the little nip they rip more. A hole as wide as their hunger has made their lust. For blood. Blood is blood.
It took a little nudge. A nip. To do what's natural.
Little coyote died more naturally than the deer. He was splayed much more quickly. In the dust and the blood and the fur. Who could tell?
'Who can see this but me?'
'What you've done to the least of you, you've done to yourself.'

A crow lights on a low branch of a bare mesquite tree.

This day as the last day. Begins as it ended.
But the night was quiet. Still.
And the crow is quiet. Still. On his branch.
What more is he to do? They can't be taught better than any of the others.

I'm gonna tell you all the little things.
That are keeping me afloat.
"Did those intake forms all by myself today."
"Made a kick *** breakfast today."
"The chef said the funniest **** today."
"Dude I found a sick playlist today."
No they're not that important.
But I'm making a raft out of them.
And it hurts.
And my hands are tired.
And I'm almost out of rope.

If this falls apart.
And it might.
At least I yelled.
And someone knew I was here.
Because I sure can't see anyone.

I'm gonna take you up on that offer. You're
right I have to get out of here. It's a trap
that will hold me forever if I only wait
for rescue.
there's no pain. No screams to draw soft
hearts attached to thick arms to pry me
out.
They told me routine would make it pass
easier. But it passes too far too fast.
Go into work everyday at 3. Off at 10.
Get up at noon. Watch tv until I throw
on a tie and those ugly shoes I hastily shined.
I'm scared.
I'm looking into a well wondering how far to the
bottom. I'm a million and one too many
analogies for falling in too deep. Screaming
in anticipation of the water slapping against me.
It would be deadly if I hadn't died in the air
already. I can't breathe now and I should
know by now why.
Fly or die.

I tried to write out the reasons.
Why it was you.

I couldn't.
It got scrambled.
And lost in itself.
It stopped making sense.

Like us.

And in the middle of it,
The list,
With your name at the top.
I'd write something,
Something I was feeling then.
A reason to give my heart to someone.
Some amazing quality.
Some wild romantic thing.
And in the middle of it.
The sentence,
I'd look up a see different eyes.

I was writing what I was feeling about someone else,
Under your name.

It wasn't a lie I guess,
I was just lost.
And that was for someone else.
I'm still lost.
And maybe it'll get to them eventually.

That is a horrible pen name.
I'm not a Frank.
I'm all thin, and gangly, and erratic.
I came up with that when I was
signing up for this website.
I couldn't put my real name.
I'm not a writer.
In a few years the people I work with
At my real career, won't understand
all this.
I'll keep these months to myself.
Burn this journal. Delete this account.
Put up a bunch of terrible peices.
Get offensive. Trash talk the
Couple of people that followed me.
So in the totally off the wall chance
anybody cared about what I put on here.
They won't look for me.
If anybody asks they won't answer.
Eventually, I'll have to Be as much of a
secret as the ones I keep.

Maybe that's over the top.
This is all about learning about myself.
But from what I know so far I wouldn't
push people away.
Or hide myself.
If somebody finds it.
Asks me, "Holy hell were you crazy?"
"Yeah but I'm better now."
They might not understand it,
But I think that sounds so strong.
If you've totally snapped in half
And you can recover.
Knowing how to put yourself back.
If you did it once,
If you're capable of it
...
I want to say "you can take anything."
End it there.
But that isn't true.
I couldn't take killing a bunch of people.
Or selling out someone I love.
I don't think I could handle prison.
Or staying out of school.
Or not doing something that makes me feel
like my paradise is following me around
Hovering like a cloud.
I have to know my limits.

If you know what went wrong.
And if you know what made it feel so awful.

Wait.

I need to use "I" instead of "You."

You didn't do it.
I did. I did it and if I do one
**** thing differently it's to think
and admit in the first person.
I need to hear the echo in my ears
of my own voice
making the excuses.
I want to start seeing those memories
- Of silencing the alarms
- Skipping classes
- Ignoring textbooks
- Stumbling around drunk.

I want to start seeing them myself.
I write this and I'm starting to.
I'm not living them like I need to.
But there's a lot to come to terms with
Before that.

All these goals and I can't write under
my real name yet.
This isn't finished. I know there's something missing in it.
Like the message isn't complete.
But it's not to anyone.
It's for me.
I feel like after all this rambling I'm
Still not understanding what I wanted to.
I have to end it.
I'm burned out and I'm done for now.

"Bear with me here. I'm no Oscar Wilde.
But when I read your writings I get sad.
Forgive me, but I figure you're sad.
You speak of heroes and villains as if either is a direction.
Not all bad guys are all bad.
And the same the other way.
You have no idea who you are.
But you can't just decide that.

You look like a human Superman.
Clark Kent.
Brilliant. Reserved.
Official in a suit.
Intelligent around everyone.
But you're hiding something.
That's brash. But you aren't being honest.
With yourself or absolutely anyone around you.
And it's forming you into a human brick wall.
You won't find yourself.
Sitting there like a ******* wall.
You gotta form into yourself.
Answer your own questions.
And anyone else's.
I figure you will.
In your own time.
I mean obviously.
But if you want to...
You can start with me.
I can help.
But I can only help if you're honest."

I feel like there's this second life being lived around me.
One of those toys. Where you wind it up. And it
Spins all over. And falls over. Spent.
The other life might be like that. Where a gear gets to winding,
In this standing thing that,
Thought blank I guess. Seems quite not
discontented with all this standing.
And there's this burst. All this flying around
and schools and cars and highways and highways.
All these roads swirling around on, riding
on?
And then I drive up after my morning classes.
And just don't want to leave.
But the winding has to start again.
Some law. Nature.
I get cagey. But mostly I'd rather not leave the cage.
So this other guy with all his motives and ****.
With his resume. And his fantasies of
martyrdom and heroism and political
winningism.
His campaign t-shirts.
His volunteering.
His training.
He stands there and puts up with me.
     Real me.
        The. Me.
        The guy writing to you. Real me.

He puts up with me until all the cranking bit
is finished and he zoom off away.
Sometimes though I think. When he's walking.
Or when all the walking and talking and training
stops.
He thinks about me, and why his chest feels so cold.
He's off with his fire fighting.
       friends, work, homework, campaigns, life.
And I'm just shivering. Waiting for a body again.

How else could I write you this letter?
I have to wait for him to circle back.
To miss this chest full of fear.
To come on home.
To what he should be doing if he could make any money at it.
and if anybody ever saw they'd put
it in a magazine.

But we don't care about money.
I've never wanted anything that badly.
There's no place I'm furious to see.
     (though I like those relaxing ones)

We just want to do that thing we're supposed to do.
The ticket out.
I'll keep on writing.
     (I feel good about it)
And he'll keep on with the life saving.
And the TV show happy face,
Real jobs and everything.

Until it washes over.
Like a cliche preacher would say.
Or warm surf.
But I hate the ocean.
Hot air in a car after all day in the cold
classroom.
It'll come.
And I'll just go.
Warm.

A fish can't see himself in a school.
Throw him out.
Yank his mouth and with terrible pain
Bring him up.
Out of water. Gasping. Stuck. Flopping.
And looking for meaning.
He can finally see himself reflected in the water.
He can finally see himself.

Our workday selves are here.
In collared shirts and typing on a desktop.
Our emotional selves standing nearby.
Silent, carbon see-through copy.
I pause from the spreadsheet
And remember seeing her on an ad yesterday.

The me, standing silent next to me
Lets out a groaning scream
Like someone lost in the woods hysterically
Trying to put a new tire on a truck.
About to break into sobs from the helplessness.
Shrill and extended the scream
Makes the air and the walls and the computer screen
Rattle like they're being throttled.

I stop typing and stare blankly at a
Paint chip on the wall.
Floating on my back in the waves of the
Screams filling the silent room.

"Eh." I shake my head.
And go back to the spreadsheet
As the screams go on
Full force
Without me noticing.

I deserve you.
And you deserve me.
This isn't about time or ***.
Distance and days apart
Can't hold me back.
My heart is raging forward.
My body is just the foam on the wave.
A pretty face,
With no control
On what's below.
But I want to come for you.
I want to be yours.
I don't have a choice.
But I want to ride the wave.

I go there,
I just gotta make my head stop working.
You thrash yourself hard enough.
And it does.
Must be the most sensitive gym rat around.

Or maybe that's why we're all here.

I couldn't come before.
At school when it was all going...
Well it was going.
I tried. But why run when
You aren't running from anything.
All those joggers are being chased
Those guys pushing up heavy bars
Are pushing away something terrible.

It's not the weights that are tearing us apart.
It's the weight you dan't drop.
That's falling so hard.

You can forget it's there.
We're like alcoholics.
And crack heads.

You fall on your ***.

I can write the tired away.
I can out write the anxiety.
I can put down the words faster than my
head can put together, crazy, non-sensical,
yet nonetheless horrifically painful
possible scenarios.
I can beat it.
And be happy.
In the throws of my madness
AC's right
Insanity is painful
But it hurts to fight it.
But you can write it back.
I can put down all the horribleness
So it can't grow and **** me.

Save me.

I am more free now than I've ever been.
Money, time, the horizon stretches out.
But.
If I had wings,
It would feel like they were set on fire.
More than clipped.
I'm not thrashing. Like
A cut bird would be.
I'm frozen here.
The air is bubbling and I can't breathe.
There's barely bone left to walk on.
I could maybe stumble. Get a job
Daze through workdays.
But my head is frozen. Thwacks from
Bats. Shrieking cracks coming through.
I can't think Everything is so
Blurry.
The thwacks aren't rescuers.
They're not breaking me out . They're
Waves crashing on me. Adding to the
Ice.
Every piece of mail,
"Have not met our
Academic Standards."
And I am deeper in the sea.
They're so many whistles to go up.
Friendly porpoises saying I can still go
Up.
But the waves are pulling me
Down

Like all the other stories I want to tell you,
I don't know how to start it.
The hook is that I'm this tall, strong, clean cut, put together looking
Adult.
Last night I screamed and cried.
For the first time in a long ******* time.

I'll start from the day after I guess.
So I was watching this really sad animated movie.
And it.
Somewhere in the weird haze of time after I started it.
It's like my mind fell out the back of my head.
I was sort of sick.
Like how your stomach lurches,
When you skip a stair.
Falling?
H
O
W
L
O
N
G
? I shouldn't be happening like t
                                                         h
                                                            i
 ­                                                             s?
T­hen I hit.
And I was just really lonely.
On the pavement next to that seventy story building.
Rolling around on that **** stained carpet.
With my mind flopping around.
Bleeding thoughts that were getting soaked up and lost.

Then my ******* kept feeling like it wasn't getting enough blood.
Which is ridiculous.
It's a finger.
There's nothing on my wrist or anything.
Like stop you itchy tingling ******* thing.
And all the despair was so ridiculous.
I went and stood in front of a mirror.
And tried to talk myself into feeling
Better.
But the words took so long to bounce back.
Where they'd have any meaning.
They felt so weak.
Like they didn't matter.
Like they were getting whipped up in the wind.

When I started screaming.
And crying.
And begging for God.
And to just die.

But not in New Jersey.
" Just want to ******* die but I ******* can't because then I'll never leave New Jersey.
...
I can't die in New Jersey."
Then I tried to calm myself down.
Talking like there was a mirror there.
"Get a hold of yourself."
Came out.
But the words were weak.
So I cried. Because I was weak.
And screamed. Because I wanted to feel strong again.
And lost myself.
In all this noise that wasn't mine.

Tonight. The movie paused on some stupid scene.
The silence.
Buzzing in the air and lights of passing cars.
I lost myself like I had in the screams.

I oughtta just die.
I oughtta just die.
I oughtta just die.
I oughtta just die.
I oughtta just die.
                 Just kept coming up.
I can't shake it.
Can't even write it away.
God, I was close for a minute.
To just doing it.
**** it.
Just get out of this.
I kept thinking.
While I was staring blankly in the mirror.
...
"I can't die in New Jersey."
And I went to bed.

It's like trying to repaint a Jackson *******.
It's so ******* easy. But you can't.
I tried to do the same thing E.E. Cummings did.
Attack sight with a keyboard.
Drag it onto the page.
Semi-colons for fluttering wings.
But it didn't work.
Of course it didn't.
I'm not him.
I didn't see it like that.
It's not that it's bad to copy something.
It's just a thing.
But **** me for lying through somebody else's words.

For feeling this much from this far.
For not knowing if I'm meeting in the middle.
Or already jumped off the deep end.

Maybe it could have been anybody.
Maybe I just needed somebody to remind myself,
I could feel anything at all.
But maybe,
If it had been anyone else.
I never would have remembered.

Maybe hers was the only one that could,
Drag me out.

Maybe it is something of fate's
Maybe I don't need a reason.

I don't need a reason.
How do you know if you're in a love story?
Wait.

**** that.
**** running off all those amazing people that want to know us but just can't crack the code we're too ******* selfish to give the key to.
And **** "sharing," our art expecting people to figure it out.
"Here let me crack these prescription glasses, smear a little vaseline on them....
Okay. Now tell me what you see.
**** that's all wrong. Why can't you figure it out!
I just need some space right now."
Acting like we're saints.
Off to the monastery.
To figure out God.
All this self exploration and we can't draw a map?

I can't.
I know I shouldn't demand people do things I can't.
Who the hell am I to give orders like that.
But I want so desperately to be able to.
I want you to want it as desperately as I do.

I don't know if I can keep it.
But right now I'm suspended in happiness.
The air is thick with it.

I found that place I was just talking about.
Even my letters look less frantic.
The words still fall out.
But slower now.

The other stuff came out like *****.
I was,
(am but not now)
Sick.
A sick mind has to write like that.
Fast.
Each word running away from the last.
Like they're trying to lift off the page
before they become part of a letter
left to tell why something terrible happened.

It may be the eye of the storm.
But still.
It's so beautiful.
And still.

The wind is blowing gently against me now.
Yeah,
It's still out there.
A storm I mean.
I can almost hear the far off howls over the crickets.
But the crickets,
I like them.
The soft light in here, I like it.
Like the orange glow at dusk.
Night might fall on me soon.
But the orange light is so gentle
and the air is so cool.
It feels like only better things can come.

After she tells me
She can't do this long distance thing again.
I'm too worried, angry, sad.
My heart's getting poked apart by an icepick.
I'm picking up my uniform to start
as a waiter tomorrow.
I didn't finish that letter to Paul.
I know what his reply will be.
Get on a plane. Get out of there.
Pack your ****. We will not lose you.
Get out of there. Get out.
But I can't send it.
So I'm lying there
kicked aside,
the pillow I was pretending was her.
And I just start thinking about
What paradise is.
I'm anxious all the seconds
I'm not something worse.
But I know there's somewhere
Where it'll stop.
It'll feel right. Like this is the
Way ahead.

I'm trying to build a window.
These aren't metaphors.
I'm not calling some empty headed person,
A beautiful vase with nothing to fill it.
I'm trying to say exactly what I see.
Rhymes, alliteration, technique are
Accidents.
These words just spew. I can't
Stop my hand
It's like a dull knife in the middle
Of butchering an animal.
It's barely controllable.
God knows if it'll go up or out,
If soon it'll cut me.
I like all this madness of action though.
It's almost a sport. Your heart
Doesn't race
But your head vibrates like it is.
You quiver and struggle to
Plan faster than instinct.
But are constantly reminded
That the whims of nature
Are so very out of your hands. Like this pen

I think I could handle being without her.
Even in the middle of all this.

I'm standing on a road.
It's late evening, no middle afternoon.
But it's dark.
There's a thick white fog.
There's a little oval,
Of visibility.
Dark green grass on either side.
It could lead to woods, but the fog is
So thick I can't see any trees.
Just, maybe?
A mixing of shadows that turns the fog gray.
It has to be Ireland. I keep telling her we should go.

I'm standing there
With a warped face like I'm dying.
There's a heavy
                 rusty chain.
Wrapped around the tubes on top of my heart.
There's no one pulling it.
But I'm afraid they will.
And the weak tubes will melt
                                            rip apart.
Still.
Nobody's pulling.
But the weight is constant.
I'll get used to it.
Then I move wrongly
                       abruptly
And it swings.
And it aches.
And I remember
The pain of
What's killing me.

I'm standing on this road.
And I don't know what I'm gonna do.
I could walk.
With that swinging chain.
Or wait for a car to come.
I want to tell you that I want it to
Stop. Have someone rush out full of
concern and scoop me up lovingly.
Save me.
But the fog is awful thick.
I know it is,
And I'm standing here waiting.

Oh to hell with you all.
My words will be the wild in the wind.
Wrap them in my sail
And pull this house into the raging blue.
I'll find a home.
On the run.

I'm not a poet.
I don't care if this **** rhymes.
Or if when I deliver it
I keep in time.

If this was a rap battle.
Bet I'd get destroyed.
They'd walk rhymes around me.
Fill fat purses with on the fly verses.
Drop that **** on me.
Thinking they're so ******* cool.

But for all the jumpin around
I see all these people doing on stage,
For all the time they're up,
Standing stooped like a dragons
In fits of rage.
They aren't standing for ****.

You can shout louder.
And talk faster all you want.
But this isn't the O'Reilly Factor.
Those rhymes,
Come from a dictionary.
Arbitrary and praying for cash.

That game's from the streets.
And those mother ******* streets are cold.
Put up the fire.
I don't need you in here with
That ice in your chest.
And flaming head.
Licking and spitting them.
Feet stepping in them.
Stomping around like a kangaroo,
Reading the map all upside down.

You're seeing the world all wrong.
"**** ******* get money?"
******* go home.
Give that **** to a shelter.
Because a lot of people don't have one.

All this:
- sleeping until noon
- going to the gym to forget
- watching Friends for hours
- doing sporradic "educational" ****

Cannot be healthy.
It grabs onto me every once in a while.
Out of nowhere I get paralyzed.
I feel like nothing
Drifting in a sea of everything.
I should be doing.

I need to find what "it" is.
And get it together.

I've got one friend. Ryli. My sort of girlfriend.
I'm getting way too attached. I really feel...
All sorts of crazy ways about her.
But it's starting to show and I'm worried I might just be
Acting crazy.
There's a big difference between
Feeling crazy in love
And acting crazy in love.
There's a fine line between
Thinking about them all day,
And thinking about sacrificing
Goats to them all day.
See?
Just a few words away.
I've got to chill.

Rolling around between extremes.
Convincing myself I'm a sensible guy.
I can wait it out. Hold on loosely, like that 80's song said.
I doesn't bother me. The waiting.
But if there's something better. That bothers me.
I'll go down a checklist.
Obviously it's perfect. Or will be I guess.
But I did that with college. This major, this job.
Well it doesn't work like that. For me.
I've gotta be wild. Maybe, if I "stop chasing the wrong things...
the right things have a chance to catch up" - Lolly Daskal
If I start paying attention to those inspirational quote pictures.
Listening for what I want instead of what I have.
I might be brave enough to chase it. A sky that doesn't end.
Chase it until die happy from running,
Instead of angry I didn't catch anything.

You think the first person to see a tiger,
Stopped and thought about how beautiful it was.
I bet they ran.

The next time I hold her I might have a heart attack.
If I live.
Or as I convulse dying.
I'll know how beautiful she is.

You know when your grandma makes something and you ask why it's so good.
She says some terrible cliche like,
"The secret ingredient is love."
You blow that off and ask for a recipe anyways.
Then you make it and it isn't any good.
You make it again.
You go to work.
Have *** with the girl from class.
Mix a drink by yourself.
And even the weekend baking isn't any good.

Had to stop. The color outside
Drew me.
The air smelled like a lake's.
And I begged for the water again.
That's gotta be the next step.
Find water. Float under it.
I gotta see it. And smell it.
The dying light of rain.
It makes me feel like
Dust floating.
A million different pieces.
Thinking for themselves.
Held together. Happy like that.
The dew makes me see lines,
in the grass blades.
Follow us.
I wrote about those connections
In my little pocketbook.
There were flowers.
Thrashed in the wind.
Didn't care.
Wanted to.
Maybe I can. Floating.
Looking at the water.
Maybe paradise is at the shore.
Atlantis. Happy. Under water. By water.
I can see it.
Lawn chair. This book. Me.
Smiling or too happy to move my face.
Just laying there. Sun. Orange with the evening.
Sunglasses. My grandpa's.
He can see it. I can see it.
Found it.
Paradise.
Fresh water. I'll fish in it.
I can run down and swim.
For. Or float.
Not feel nasty when I walk out.
Let the sun bake the water away.
While I figure myself out. In here.
Paradise. I'll go.

When you're on the ground, I will bring you up.
Break my hand and dislodge my elbow.
I will bring you up.

When we're standing together, get on my shoulders.
I will bring you up.

If I fall and can't stand again.
When I'm gone.
Stand on my corpse.

I will always bring you up.

We don't.
"I don't write to be understood."
Some author or other said once.
Maybe. I want a creative answer.
Write up a Rorschach test.
And hold it up waving until someone sees,
Something worth having.
"Oh that must be...
I understand."
I don't.
But someone does.
That's a start.

It is a beautiful thing that I was born irresponsibly, irrepressibly, psychotic.
Oceans and ponds are just water.
One mile or a thousand can be walked.
It is beautiful that I wake up every morning as crazy and inconsolable as the one I was born on.
I have never thought she was too far.
Or beautiful, or successful for me.
I am a fool but I won.

Remembering a ghost.
A shadow waits in a room now.
While the hollow body walks.
But the body and the shadow,
Remember a ghost they'd rather be.
He died and they're the leftovers.
That ghost really lived.

I wrote about you being guarded.
That you were holding your sword close to your chest.
I said let's start lunging.
Then I looked at mine.
Here next to my face.
In front of my heart.
If someone has to start swinging wildly,
I guess I should be me.

Here's my point.
If we don't start lunging.
And falling.
And getting cut.
And living.
We'll stand here alone.
On opposite corners of the world.
A thousand miles.
Or a foot apart.
So before we turn into stone.
Before the marble smiles start sticking.
Before they start cracking.
And we fall apart before our time.
Let's fall on our own.

Before we we have careers.
And swolAnd swollen joints.
Or get paid to be smart.

Let's be really, really stupid.
And swing wildly.
And run off without any plans,
Or reservations.
Crash parties.
*** joints.
Or get paid to be smart.

Let's be really, really stupid.
And swing wildly.
And run off without any plans,
Or reservations.
Crash parties.

**** it.
I'm trying not to lie.
But sometimes wishes slip out as facts.
"(I wish) This got published."
Silent.
Crickets.
Blank air.
Right here.
Look up.
Nothing there.
Drawing
Breath.
Hiding.

I'm talking to genies all day and it's getting distorted.

What I'm doing here.
It's weird.
It's gotta land heavy. Sharp.
All of it getting thrown at you at once.
But you're so strong.
I can feel it.
I feel like I've gone so long knowing I can really care about someone and just not doing it!
So I'm gonna do it.
If it ******* kills me.
If I never do it again.
I'm jumping in.

This is the part at the ledge.
Where I grind my teeth and teeter.
Bend my knees and straighten them.

Put my cards in my hand.
Squeeze them.
*** them up because there isn't another round.
Throw them all in.
Throw myself in.

It's not about winning
It's about hoping I win.
It's living or dying and feeling alive either way.

So I'm making roots.

I'm giving you everything.
So if I start to worry,
Lose my resolve.
Think about an easy way out.
Cheat my way out.
Go cold.
Sink in again.
Try to run away.
Pretend you're not important.

I'll have to tear them out.

I don't care what happens.
It's not on you.
It's on me.
For the first time I can remember.
I'm growing.

You're like a match at night.
The dusk settled.
It's navy blue out and I can see okay.
I see something on the other side of the little yard.
That must be pretty,
I think.
Then I strike my lighter.
Hold the flame between me and anything.
That pretty thing.
You drown out the world.
Your light. fed by the wind.
Trying to blow you out.

Maybe we think lights are so beautiful,
Because we're just trails through space too.
Maybe what you're made of doesn't matter.
Any more than what you're not made of.

The City. It wants you.
It was this, unrequited love.
But then you're a transient.
With all these dreams
Nobody around you wants as
Much as you do.
Then from somewhere
In the black of the theatre
New York shoots into your head.
You can't shake it.
The City wants you.
Like Jesus on the cross
It says come to me I'll save you.
These people want what you wants.
Come to me I love you.
For all your faults.
For all your hate and
Your cutthroat attitude
I forgive you.
I love you.
Let me help You,
Help You.

...
Did you hear me?"
To myself as a Green Day album blares:
"You know what writing is right?
I talk to paper all day
No way
That's healthy."

Had to stop. The color outside
Drew me.
The air smelled like a lake's.
And I begged for the water again.
That's gotta be the next step.
Find water. Float under it.
I gotta see it. And smell it.
The dying light of the rain.
It makes me feel like
Dust floating.
A million different pieces.
Thinking for themselves.
Held together. Happy like that.
The water makes me see lines.
Connections between things.
I wrote about that in my little pocket book.
Flowers thrashed in the wind.
Didn't care.
Wanted to.
Maybe I can. Floating.
Looking at the water.
Maybe paradise is a the shore.
Atlantis. Happy. Underwater. By water.
I can see it.
Lawn chair. This book. Me.
Smiling or
Too happy to move my face.
Just laying there. Sun. Orange with the evening.
Sunglasses. My granddad's.
He can see it. I can see it.
Found it.
Paradise.
Fresh water. I'll fish in it.
I can run down and swim.
Far. Or float.
Not feel nasty when I walk out.
Let the sun bake the water away.
While I figure myself out. In here.
Paradise I'll go.

I'll have to make it.
I'll find a little cabin by the lake.
Have some animals.
Goats, chickens.
A cat that prowls around.
And a dog that lays down.
I'll have a little gym set-up.
Free weights and places to hang.
There'll be a fishing pole.
With a box of lures.
Every evening I'll pull out
that box.
And pour over it a while.
Loot at all the lures and
dream of enticing new fish.
Then choose the same one as yesterday.
And yesterday's yesterday.

There'll be a little dock.
That's where I'll have my lawn chair.
And a fishing pole holder.
So I can write when I'm not watching
that bobber bob.

I don't know what I'll have to write about.
Everything will be okay.
It'll be a beautiful life.
Lived on a beautiful day.
That's setting.
Bringing a beautiful,
quiet, night.

Maybe, if I can't write,
I'll stumble off the dock
and check on my lure.
Give it a tug so my fishing pole
thinks there are still fish out here.

I'll hold my breath.
And appreciate this other place
that's mine.
The light rumble of windward waves.
The silence of everything living there.
And how like them I'm quiet too.

Not silent. Even in my dreams
my head is full of the trouble
I'm wading through now.
But maybe,
When I'm finally there.
My head will be empty.

Sinking slowly
Then shooting up.
All without a thought
to make a sound.
And spoil the beautiful,
underwater quiet.

I hate it.
For a musician,
Maybe it's fun. The beat.
To keep you alive.

But writing is just like *****.
That sometimes,
Spills out all night
After a terrible day.

All I want is sleep.
All I get is words puking out.
Sharp little hands crawling up my throat.
Scratching on my teeth.

So up I go. Fumbling for the lights.
Again.
In the dark.
To let them out.

Surfing channels on your car radio,
And there’s a great song covered by static.
A few words to know what it is, but oh well.

I closed the book on her a few years ago,
But at dinner yesterday I could almost hear it.
It breaks me like glass every time.