My dad always had a belly
from the back you wouldn’t have thought he was fat
but once he turned around
you noticed he carried boulders in his beer gut
and it made the best pillow a 4-8 year old boy could ask for
I told him that at night before bed
my head on his belly
we used to drink apple tango when we went and walked our dogs together
every weekend morning
Daddy wasn’t a rolling stone
but he was a man of business class transcontinental flights
important Dr. Baxter
he helped with my homework
because his patience ran deeper than most
but he was a volcano of suppressed emotion
one small **** up away from erupting
back when we were kids it was scary for my brothers and me
now we laugh about it
we’re all taller than him now
But I still remember living at the Sheridan for 3 weeks
all of us ganging up on him in the pool
the way he picked us up and tossed us with ease
a 5’6 210 lb man
and I remember all the fights
the last minute flights
me hiding in my bed with my hands covering my ears
him so quiet and rational
my Mum so explosive and passionate
I remember her crying on Christmas eve
when I was sneaking outside for a smoke
I remember anger and numbness
I wrote him a letter once
I never sent it
I remember how friends and family used to tell me how alike we were
how that went from a good thing to a bad thing
I remember meeting his dad for the first time
the other Harry Baxter
and I remember not liking him
I remember when he stole all of our money and left my Dad for a second time
I remember wanting to beat the life out of that old man
I’m still hoping for the chance
I don’t remember the boarding school he went to
or the brothers and sisters he never got to grow up with
or how his mother called me “the boy” until I was old enough to read
I remember being so angry at myself for not being able to be angry enough
but It’s been a while now since all the drama
and I’ve had time to think and cool off
and ******* being a Dad has to be a tough gig
but he was always there for us in some way
maybe not to talk about heartbreak
or life long dreams
but my life has been relatively easy
and I never found myself wanting
He is a strange, quiet man
nobody is harder to shop for
Mum always used to say his hobby was his children
and I get that
I mean, I’m still here
and I think that means he did something right

I wish being a poet made me money. I wish my emotions made people happy. I just wish a lot of things for a lot of outcomes because I just want to be happy.

Inside all of us there lies something to be discovered
and I think the spark you put at the bottom of my lungs might be enough
to remember mine
you are a fire and I am ash
brand new, I feel sorry for eventually suffocating you
I hate cities
I hate people
but I love persons
I would get on a train right now just to watch
people spill like water into the underground
seemingly searching for something within the tunnels
some simply a way out
others a way in
some just to sleep
I saw a man with an airport under his skin once
and a woman next to him with clouds brushing lips with her fingers
they were holding hands
and I swear I heard the boarding call faintly as they exited
I hope he remembers to breathe
sometimes it rains on the subway
and sometimes you can't keep the sun out
people are always rushing to some
unknown endpoint
I'll sit in the corner and ride the blue line until they kick me off
far enough away so they can't touch me
but I can touch them
sometimes I'll close my eyes
imagine that this train is taking me home
imagine going down a snowy hill at 80
looking next to me, there you are
so I put on the brakes
"I only want to **** myself, I don't want to **** you"
I'll open my eyes
and see the life around me

maybe
I can
stay just a little longer

is just a word used
to describe me.
You don’t look
long enough at me to really
see though.

I didn’t laugh when I realized
what I was.
It wasn’t new, I knew
how my mind worked.
The word wasn’t new either.
Just the label of being a
psychopath.

The insanity of my sanity
has long since made me
comfortable relaxed amused by my
wild
untamable
uncaring traits.

Who I am
what I am-
it taunts me so dearly,
never leaving my mind.

Resting in the crooks
corners
nooks
that my mind has available.

I'm going "home" for Thanksgiving break.
But I honestly don't know
where the hell that is.
Home is not the small town
in East Jesus Nowhere
where I went to school,
or the quaint little neighborhood
where I fell off my bike
and never got back on.
It's not the white house with green shutters
that my parents bought when I was two,
where I have technally lived for the past sixteen years.
Yes, I grew up there,
but it's not home.
Not anymore.
I escaped that place three months ago
and found a new place to call "home."
But I suppose it's really hard to feel at home
in a place where you have to leave your flip-flops on to shower.
At this point,
I'm just trying to figure out what counts as "home"
and where I can find it.
I don't know if it's a place
or a person
or a feeling,
but whatever it is,
I crave it like a starving man craves food.

I guess you don't have to be poor
to be homeless.