I’m inside whale bones
I’m outside my mind
I have doubts and I have fears
I have thoughts that don’t stop
Thoughts that pierce my chest like a pin cushion
Clenching my stomach in their fists
Thoughts that go round and round in circles
Thoughts that don’t drip
Out from the holes in my head
Like every other word that comes to my lips
Thoughts that don’t die,
No matter how much I wish they were dead

“Throw away logic, if it helps,
Enter abstract, no boundary thought
Grow wild
Return to the earth and think only in
Butterfly dances
Not silken sounds of past and future loves
The harsh realities of the present have deep roots in your skin
And their flowers bloom into
Doubts and fears
And above all else,
Should be ignored
Like bullies on school grounds
For the seeds that are dropped will grow and bloom again
Unfaltering, unwavering
So long as the have sun and water
Fed by confusion, watered and told to grow
Ignore them
For to let your doubts and fears
Grow and bloom again and again
Like never ending waves of soldiers on beaches
With the sun hidden beneath the earth
Is no way to live.”

I’m inside whale bones
I’m outside my mind
Trapped in separation
Trapped in old age’s waiting arms
My body too young to die
So death waits for it to catch up to my mind
And there is no fountain of youth
That my thoughts can drink from
Making them young again
Forcing carefree upon them
Forcing fairytales and irony
Feather headdresses and no shoes
Walking through the mud because it’s cool
And prevents the needles from piercing your skin
And the sun from burning it

“So face the sun
Because you can
Stop with the doubts and fears
Stop the old age from creeping though your mind
You are young but you have thought too much
You have thought too many years ahead of your time!”

I’m inside whale bones
I’m outside my mind

“Break the bones that imprison you
And with your new found freedom,
And your new found arms and legs,
Moving, again, for the first time
Chase your mind
And hold on to it tight
Hold on like it’s the last thing you’ll ever let go
Interlock your fingers
And hold on
Like it’s love,
Something we both know you never want to be without
Something we both know because you said it yourself,
It’s the one thing that reminds you that you’re still young
That your mind hasn’t gone with the dinosaurs,
So hold on like it’s the last penny that you haven’t bet yet
Hold on, and become one, not two
Break the whale bones that imprison you
And with your new found freedom,
Sit still,
Become you, one with yourself, young like your body is.”

ONE
man sits in a pristine state of loneliness
his one heart in perfect singularity
waiting
to be found
not bothering to search
waiting to find himself
as a part
of
TWO
hands held
with two beats, the quiet
lub-dub of each of the
two hearts
slightly out of synchronization
overlapping
just a touch
so the two double beats
become a beat
of
THREE
perfect circles in descending sizes
in each of their
eyes
of which there are
FOUR
lip touches to say goodbye
because the first
would’ve been the last without the second,
the second wasn’t sufficient
and the third wasn’t enough  
and the fourth
would lead to kiss
number
FIVE
fingers locked
around
five
fingers
on the small of her back
and five fingers wrapped up in
his hair
he wishes he had more fingers to make the
hold stronger
he wishes
he had
SIX
syllables spoken between them
the same three words repeated
so they know
that
their hearts beat
a little bit closer
the veins and arteries
wrapping around the other
pulling it in
pulling the beats together
making them a little less
disjointed
but she’s all the nearer comatose,
her slow beats
in this minute
barely reached
SEVEN
sounds
that he counts
in every
minute
that he stands there
unable
to sit
his legs locked, shut
like her eyes
that he wants to stare into
he shakes
she does not stir
even as the sun climbs higher in the morning sky
she does not stir
he counts more sounds
every minute
he counts as they
go from
seven
to
EIGHT
arms and legs
wrapped like tentacles
wrapped so tight
never wanting to release
and show the red
suction marks
from each of their fingers
on the other’s
skin
like an octopus
their eight limbs
holding together
their one heart
it’s dull
lub-dub beat
in perfect synchronization
with itself
in the perfect opposite
of a pristine
state of loneliness

Maybe someday
When I’m sick of imagining my future
I can accept my present
It’s nothing too hard
Except
I imagine like wild rivers run
Never contained
And the dams put up to stop the flow are washed away
Like leaves down storm drains

Maybe someday
When I’m ready to disappear
I will turn invisible
And turn into the forests on the mountain
Except
I have grown fat with society as my drinking buddy
My feet are soft
My ears are trained to hear cars and telephone-ringing
My soul grew civilized and quiet

Maybe someday
When I’m tired of being perfect
I can let someone dote upon me
Treating me as royalty
Except
I’d rather carve the thrones
And build the tombs
Than sit upon them
Or lay beneath them

I will have to deal with the splinters and broken backs that come with the task
It’s just my way
Of remembering you
It’s just my way
Of drawing people into my skin
Like tattoos of personalities and quirks
I try to make them a part of me
I try to make them impossible
To forget
Because I can’t remember most of my past
So if I have all of you drawn onto me
I might one day be able to read my skin
And remember
The sound of every laugh you’ve had and the way you moved when you were happy
And

Maybe someday
When I’m old and tired
I can read the novels that will be drawn on my skin
And remember your words
As they passed from your lips

Maybe someday
When I’m old and tired
I can reread the things you’ve told me
I can reread through the wrinkles
That held my smiles when you were around

Maybe someday
When I’m old and tired
I can lay down peacefully at night
With memories in my head
And disappear into the forests of people
That drew themselves into my life

With worthless words
In his throat
And on his tongue

He sits a thousand miles across
Through earth’s hard calluses atop bent-knuckle mountains
And soft, golden hair growing in the soil
Through lakes full with tears
And forests filled with hands and fingers...

He sits a hundred blinks of the sun
And watches drive-in theaters disappear
Along with the ferris wheels
Spinning into nothing

Dances going mute
Bodies moving soundlessly through the air
He watches lights go out in carnivals
And hands letting go

THE SUN BLINKS

With worthless words
In his throat
And on his tongue

He stands and shuffles
Through undefined shapes of colour
A brilliant array of blurred blues
And greens
And yellows
They move so

Fast

Through his eyes

THE SUN BLINKS

With worthless words
In his throat
And on his tongue

He sits
Through the drone of voices in his ears
And nods
To mask his heart
And smiles
To mask the obvious
Pull

On his soul
Dragging it down
Trying to keep it from being pulled
Out
Through the soles of his feet

A mask on his face
To hide the struggle
To keep it from
Slipping
Away

THE SUN BLINKS

With worthless words
In his throat
And on his tongue

He writes with his thumbs
Words he hopes
Can be felt
Like winds that whisper love
Through ears
And cold water
That reaches through
Skin and freezes bone

And the words return
Like rivers do
Sometimes
Missing
A few drops of water
Sometimes
A little less happy
And a little more

Tainted

With sad things
Like broke down carnivals
And quiet dances...

Ferris wheels that stop turning
And drive in theaters that stop playing movies

It becomes a little more polluted
With sad things
Like closed curtains over the sunset
Through the window
And tea that goes cold

A little more
And a little more
Until the words that return
Like rivers do
Are missing
More drops of water
And
They
Dry
Until
No
Water
Runs
Down
The
River

THE SUN BLINKS

With worthless words
In his throat
And on his tongue

He sits with lips closed
Under the mask of a smile
A mask of calmness over the worry
In his heart

Sadness masked by happiness
Tears masked by laughter
Fears masked by confidence


A mask
For every
Emotion
That his brain triggers



Except one



Because to him



No mask can cover


What she makes him feel



Such pure



Perfection




When she

Holds
His
Hand




THE SUN BLINKS

And no words come to his tongue
Or pass his lips

Silence, masked

My heart
Oh, my heart
Bleeds rainbows through my arteries
Oh, they spill
Out of my body and into the world
Oh, they water
The soil, and grow the shoots and the leaves
Oh, it feeds
The yin-yang skin wrapped around my chest
Oh, it makes
The milk that keeps the future alive
Oh, it left
Unicorns and dinosaurs in the past
Oh, it’s leaving
Me behind, my feet can’t keep up
Oh, it’s cutting
Down the shoots and the leaves
Oh, it’s tilling
The soil and planting cattle
Oh, they fill
The air with death, and heat
Oh, I stop
Walking, there is nowhere left to go
Except to the past
With the unicorns and dinosaurs
To live
As nothing but a memory
Or an imagined, false being
On the edge of a rainbow
Spilling out from
My heart
Oh, my heart

I climb into bed
Waiting for a non-existent sleep
To take me into the dreamworld of my childhood
Where I had
Blindness
And
Quiet in my head

I sleep
Or try to
But my thoughts are loud
And breaks in their conversations
Are few and far between
And never quite long enough
For me
To fall asleep

I wrap the blankets around me
Like tentacles
Forcing the air out of my lungs
Forcing me into
Unconsciousness

I dream
Or something like it
For a minute or two, it seems, upon waking
And the quietness that had enveloped my mind
Awakes
From the trance

I wake
To a thousand thoughts
And headache
All the thoughts that could not be heard as I dreamt
Shout out
To be heard and acknowledged

And then
Then you dance for my hunchbacked heart
And my thoughts stop to watch
They stop to listen
To the sound of your breath
To the sound of your footsteps

And there is quiet in my head, and blindness
Like the dreamworld of my childhood, long since forgotten

“Is it the absence, the distance between us?
That which makes our hearts beat
Stronger
And harder
As if they are trying
To be loud enough
To be heard
Across the country
Across the mountains and the plains...

No, it cannot be
For my heart beat this strong
When you were next to me
The increase in love is due
To the increase of time,
Not of distance
Every passing second I love
You more and more
My love for you is
Exponentially growing
Climbing higher and higher
Up the mountain
Until we meet at it’s peak
And then
My love for you
Will culminate into a kiss
And jump from it’s peak and into the sky
And spread across the clouds
Lighting the fire
Behind the sunset.”