she came and went
just out of reach
like a dream escaping your mind
as the night escapes the sky
a whiff of perfume from a passing stranger
that takes you back to some memory
you can’t quite remember
unexplainable
I’m tumbling all over myself
fumbling with the words I know
and the language I do not
silly boy
I have some questions for you
and I would have said anything she wanted
so long as I could leave my message
in fingertip cursive in the steam on her mirror
I wish to catch you beneath back porch moons
a lightning bug in my jar
in hues of red passion
and purple contemplation
my hands running through her hair
fingertips gently tracing the arch of her spine
hobos walking alone through the railway dust
she is the claw game toy which fell at the last minute
I’ve been up late at night
scouring every darkened corridor and upturned rock
pebbles to be skipped across the pond
always looking for another taste of that perfume
maybe tonight
as I am resting in deep sanctifying sleep
maybe we will cross paths
and fall atop each other in a heap of love and sweat
and maybe in the morning
I won’t forget her

The city breathes. It sweats and cries and knows of love and strife. The endless grid of connecting streets and alleys are veins which carry the tales of all its inhabitants. Passing them to vital organs and tissues and muscles as needed. The journeys we take - the paths we walk - are all strands of the web of humanity. We all add to it, we all take from it, And we touch each other's lives in some way, even if we don't know it. A girl walks down Broad st until she hits Bowe. She is alone - carrying only what she could fit in her pockets. She gets to the starbucks. Goes in. Orders a coffee or a tea or maybe a bite to eat. She goes outside and, takes a seat, and reads the paper. Two tables away a black family sits discussing their daughter's plans for college. Radford? Longwood? ODU? She just wants to make her break. She sits listening to her parents in her camouflage jacket and black leggings, occasionally nibbling at her sandwich, two tables away from the girl who sits alone. Alone in her wool cardigan and her pinned up red hair. Alone smoking her cigarette.  The old man who lives at the elderly home for the mentally unstable and composes great feats of musical beauty stands off to the side in his worn slate suit beneath his snowball hair. He walks up to the alone girl and asks if he can maybe get one of those cigarettes, please. She hands it over and he lights up. The grey and blue smoke lazily wafting over the grey and brown tops of the city. The only evidence of the intersection of their paths slowly becoming part of the very city air we all breathe. One table away I sit with my notebook and coffee and cigarettes and sunglasses spying on the world. Making my little observations. The stained ink on the page the only evidence that our paths ever crossed slowly being read and recycled. It's the circle of life

The music blares loud enough to shake the car,
loud,
but not clear, because the cable is kinda screwy
so that every time
he hits a pothole
the music melts into
teeth rattling vibrations
and the breeze gushes in through the temporal openings
threatening to blow
the card parking pass
out the window
into the vast pleasant outside world
the sun burns down from space
turning the world warm with childhood nostalgia
and chlorophyll green lampshades
hanging from chocolate brown trees
paint the world with an aura of emeralds
and the spedometer plays Apollo
rising higher on its arc
twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, ect.
the rush of speed becomes deafening
and the hot asphalt road rises,
dips,
meanders,
and he controls its will
with the easy gliding of the leather steering wheel
and an easy smile
driving with the windows down

being honest with yourself
is a feat of great difficulty
but it is the test
that we all must pass,
and I think I'm getting there,
but It's being honest to others
that really tangles me up
I carry my baggage around with me
but never open it up,
never leave it behind,
never talk about it,
I'm an airport's worst nightmare,
when we are alone with ourselves,
nobody around to share the load,
we begin to crack
and crack and crack
until we are riddled with spiderwebs
until we shatter completely
but I can't share
maybe I never learned the difference
between vulnerability
and weakness
but I don't want to burden you
with my life
my life which scares the hell out of me
just thinking about it,
I've been carrying this bowling ball
in my gut
for the better part of a year now
and I hide it behind a smile
a "there's no reason to be alarmed" smile
and I'd love to break open my ribcage
reach on in there
and give you my heart
but I don't have the right tools in my workshop
and I'm too **** proud to ask you
if I could maybe borrow yours
and it's gotten to the point
that solidarity has become the norm
even when I am surrounded by people
I am alone
and the worst part about it all is
I've gotten comfortable with it

I am a lover
not a fighter
a writer
but not a typer
although I type what I write
on occasion
and I fight what I love
almost all the time
if opposites attract
then love is just
one big beautiful contradiction
a clashing of ideals
and I fight for what I love
on occasion
sorry but its like i said
I've never been much of a fighter
but I do fight
every single day
to find a love worth fighting for
and to type something
worth writing about

little poet man
like Robin Williams you can hear them calling
"O Captain my Captain"
but I'm not dead yet
sweating buckets off iced coffee
hiding from this hot American weather
otherwise I'd be nothing but an alcoholic
with a terrible case of sun burn
and a twisted tongue
unwrapping itself slowly
until the winter
when it gets stuck to street lights
curiosity killed the cat
but I introduced the two
all I want for Christmas is to knock out these two front teeth
so maybe then I could whistle at the pretty girls
who don't own designer jeans
or the greatest genes
i have fun with this junk
smiling pitcher with a blown out arm
my eyes open up
and life rushes in all directions
I'm standing still
under the sun
and my personal rain cloud
trying to find the *** of gold chocolate coins
at the end of my streaking color rainbow

Cold in the woods by the mall
Nerves taut
like a deer
ready to flee at any moment
If I perceive danger
I'm out of here

Martin was fumbling around with the bottle
"you have to but a carb in it"
"Shut up Jake,
I know what I'm doing"
He didn't
neither of us did
it was the first time
nothing like it
I hoped my dad wouldn't miss
his socket wrench piece

We passed it around
like the natives that walked this land
under the gaze of oppression
but we were free
for at least that moment
I vibrated like a rocket ship
and when I walked
I felt as if I was on
an airport moving walkway

We went into the sports store
riding around on the skateboards
and punching the punching bags
flipped into a world of upside down terror
when they made me get on
the abs exercise machine
mall security came
and kicked us out
but we didn't care
we had just discovered something
so much better.

Lost out in the summer rain
Lost in a haze of summer gazes
All the fences razed to the ground
Inescapable sounds
Of oh isn't he smart
He will go places
Yeah but not your places
Places full of plastic faces
Hiding behind glass window display cases
Going to the moon
The scent of mediocre doom
Filling the room
Like whiskey *****
Fined for misconduct
Of a conduit into a cliche artist
Talking like tongues twisted off of
Mouth numbing shots of grey goose and jäger
Talking like slick Rick spitters
Who don't long for quick fillers
Of life experiences poured in a pitcher
And I'm talking *******
Pbr bellied fool ****
But rest assured
My inhibitions cured
I talk true ****

I feel it bubbling up inside of me
like bad Mexican food
like that feeling you get
when some unfortunate soul
****** you off
like that feeling you get
when you have a full tank of gas
and an open road ahead of you
spike my veins
and see the beauty which is pumped out
see the filth and **** and hate and love and life and death and desperation and hope
and they boil over
singing the kitchen counter tops
and put the liquid in pill form
to feed to people
who are sure they've lost their minds
let me whisper
what mind?
from the city rooftops
until everybody
runs out into the street
naked
their faces raised to God
looking to be kissed
or cried upon
words can ****
and words can bring life
words are the building blocks of every sky scraper
and every genocide
and every person
and for brief lightning flash moments
I come close to being able to control them
but just for a moment
a moment of control

driving blindly down the turnpike
four guys packed in the back three seats
the two lovely ladies up front
driving,
through the complete blackness
the warm ocean that is the Virginian summer night sky
they were high
and drunk
not the driver
but she still drove like a maniac
taking bends in the road
feeling the pull of their momentum
it would have been a pretty way to die

three days earlier
six young men
sit on the shore
of a picturesque canal
which ran parallel to the James
drinking cheap beer out of a cooler
and taking rips from endless shattered bongs
they swam across to the other side
running and jumping among the rocks and trees
just like they were kids again
when the sun set
and the city put on her make up
they were drunk
and they drove home after some time
speeding through the neon lights
of the wrong part of time

twenty years in the future
a man sits in a leather arm chair
nursing a neat bourbon,
he is tired,
he burns with an ice cold longing
for the days
when kids could be kids
driving blindly down turnpikes
drunk and high at the river
bending through the city like fugitives
before the bitterness
before he was so ****** tired

I dropped out of school after my first semester of freshmen year. My parents had just gotten a divorce. I was in a state of perpetual, adolescent, hopeless confusion.
I've always loved stories. Fiction or nonfiction didn't matter. Just as long as it blew my mind. I, like so many before me, was going to be a writer. Not just any writer either. No, I was going to be part, Hemingway, part Kerouac, part bukowski, and part Thompson.
The decision was made. I only had one problem: I couldn't tell anybody my plans. I am a privately educated kid from England. My path was laid out before me. Hard work to college to minimal success to family life to riches I never knew existed. So I wrote up a fake class schedule. For some reason it contained multiple French classes... I don't know either.
So every week day I would "go to class". Which meant I was walking to the Bowe street starbucks with a pen, a journal, and a laptop. I wrote so much terrible poetry that year you could replace me with any teenage girl suffering from rejection and self-conscious body issues. But you know what? I put the ******* hours in. After a while I found something which I could pretend was my style. I started getting emails from strangers telling me how good my poetry was. I got a lot if reads - 100,000 before I knew it. My head was so big I had a hard time fitting through doors.
Have you ever got so high you forgot your own name? I have. The *** helped me ignore the constant whirring of anxious thinking. The drink helped me shed my politically correct layers of defense. The validation from my poetry ensured my needy feet would never touch the ground. My pride told me everything was fine. Better than fine.
So I started writing less and less. Started staying in more and more. *** fueled day dream benders became a regular thing. Icarus had never came so close to a fake sun.
People started to notice. Aggravating talks about my potential and intelligence. Horrendous awkward dinners with my family. My mum used to tell everybody that I was writing a novel. I didn't have the heart to say I was lucky to get one poem on paper everyday.
Friends stayed distant. Girls came briefly and left as quick as their legs could take them. I became a ghost, haunting the streets of Richmond with bohemian declarations of... "True freedom." Life had lost it's luster. My control was slipping.
The story I would like to tell is that I won. Conquered cultural wilds to paint myself a noble individual. But none of that happened. This isn't a story of my success as a voice of a generation. This is not a story of redemption. This is a story about a confused kid who gave into the temptations of spontaneous decisions. A kid who needed help and advice but was too proud to know how to ask. This is the story of coming to the brink, and not caring if you fall.
So where am I now? I'm back in school, dealing with feeling like I have severely underachieved. I am waiting tables for people I could care less about. I am catching up with my Friends and peers who have already surpassed me. But I am alive. I am still writing. I am here to tell you that life punches in no pattern. Haymakers come with jabs, and the bell always seems to far away. You don't beat life, not even on a technicality. You just give everything you can to try and go the distance.

driving through traffic
knifing back and forth between lanes
flooring it to the end
slamming on the brakes before the cliff eats him
surrounded by other people
he quakes,
vision blurs,
blackens,
then red
with a sweep of his arm
he could remove them all
waiting for the time to come
when the walls they worked so *******
crumble into dust
lost in the sands of time
and the monsters on the outside
come in
and thin the herd
he waits for that moment
in dark apartment bedroom
or in smoking sections
and coffee shops across the land
that smile is the reaper's sickle
gums ******
stomach grumpy
eyes reduced to darkened slits
maybe one day
they'll forget what a day is
and he is patiently waiting
behind a camel and a bottle
he waits for the music of all things
to fade into a warm
comfortable
silence

I was sitting in traffic
From the belvedere 2nd st exit
Through 2nd and Byrd
And cary, main,
Franklin street
The parking garage on my right
On my left:
Buildings anonymous
I see the Wells Fargo bank
Looming over cars
And more cars
This country
It's drowning in concrete and cars
And these people
They drive like cows with no feet
In my car I'm a fuming ball of impatience
I say
**** this ****
And to my left
In building anonymous land
A pretty looking artsy/hipster girl
Says
I know, right?
Connections
Lost in a green light switch
Grace to the alley
Which takes me to 1st
Takes me about 10 minutes
I park illegally
And ask a middle age black couple
'scuse me,
What the hell is going on?
They respond
the two street festival.
thanks.
I go into my apartment
And life goes on.

Inside my head at all times
I slowly begin to believe
that all of these poems
are self-serving servings of selfishness
can I accept that for what it is?
self-acceptance is accepted as the way to go
but improvement sounds just like superficial small talk
I smell like pickles and meat sauce at any given time
but these ink stained fingers
know no bias based on heart beats
Hysteria in the streets
watch the ants swarm over the abandoned picnic
watch the ants lose their **** over mixed chemical signals
Mary is calling me home to her embrace
and I'm too nice to say no
but if I could just get a small lead
I'd open up the highway and discover Eden
regardless of how many times God ***** his teeth
blood is blue until it meets oxygen
and the blues were stolen from a people who truly knew them
but hey - whatever sells, right?
put the bullet in my head
should I ever become one of them

give me a smile
just for a while
I promise not
to take it for granted
but granted
not all of my wishes
have been granted
but I would take a smile
it's a simple thing
but at the same time
means so much
like a loving touch
If i could get in touch
with your feelings for me
maybe then I'd be free
free from this indecision
and worrying visions
free to be free
free to just be me
free from drinking too much
because I saw you talk to some butch guy
am I the apple of your eye?
if not, tell me why,
but if you don't really feel like doing that
like I said
sweet thing
I'd be perfectly happy
if you'd just
give me
a smile

Let's get drunk
not later
I mean right now
let's drink so much
that we wake up hungover
or better yet,
still drunk,
let's get so drunk
that we don't recognize where we wake up
let's get so drunk
that we do really dumb ****
tell people things we shouldn't,
sleep with people we shouldn't
let's get so drunk
that the next morning
the mistakes we made
make our life significantly worse
let's get drunk
because it's better than being sober

They'd tell you to worship
the mannequins which march mechanically
like marionettes making their way
towards the main stage
But you've always been able to tell
Gods from false Idols
you fill these empty halls
with your electric electives
while I watch you
chase away the pigeons
just to see them fly
you said to me once
you're too boring
who wants to be bored?
this creature of habit
habitually picking up bad habits
like you.
I lay in bed all morning
writing my poems
I am a raconteur
you live the words
my hopeless anti-heroine
protagonist
antagonizing the ink from this pen
and no matter what happens
I'm happy to have had
my brief moment of observation

Oh you Americans,
how you have forgotten
the Queen's English
is a tragedy,
nothing describes formal beauty better
than the stiff upper lipped
Englishman in me
I mean seriously
you treasonous Yankees
did you forget *******
and ******
and **** hole
I mean
the English swear
better than anybody else
You should try your best
to remember
the forgotten
English words

Lenny Bruce
herald to the funny man
ground breaking pioneer
of laughter as medicine
only back then
they thought his medicine
was bad juju
they arrested him for speaking
like a fascist pig slaughter house
once you've slept on a feathered bed
you can't go back
to sleeping on the floor
he died after getting some bad H
and they took his clothes off
posed his body
and took shameful
pornographic photos
look what freedom of speech gets you

Bill Hicks
leading audiences
on a funny roller coaster
on the way to enlightenment
he defended those with no voice
"remember America,
you're free to do exactly
what the **** they tell you"
pancreatic cancer took him from us
in the midst of his 30's
his only crime
was burning too brightly

the people who show us
how silly everything is
those are the ones we ****
Jesus
Malcolm X
King
Lenny
Hicks
Wright
and we let the devils run amok
so long as they are pinching pennies
from our pockets
to give to the dark shadow of Moloch
maybe it's time
to laugh our way to freedom

Poets these days
take Bukowski and the Beats
much too seriously
I mean come on
Bukowski is great and all
for a selfish *******
and the if the Beats make your heart beat
well that's just swell
for a group of pretentious purple prosers
and don't point those fingers of outrage at me
my library too is full of them
all I'm saying is
the line between inspiration and imitation
is awfully thin

find beauty in the ugly
when times get hard
and skies darken
billowing thunder
night time harshness
you'll need it
don't let the mind
become too dark to see
that from the rubble of malice
you can build a new greatness
rising and falling and rising and falling
like the ocean front
wave after wave after wave
every sentence has an ending.
but don't let them break you
to stop you from writing the next
find beauty in ugly
for the times
when all you see in the mirror
is hideous tricks of light
assaulting the senses
do it for the times
when you are so high
you kiss the sun
for the times when you fall
for the times when you get up
and for the times when you take off

You painted me an image
Of rolling southern fields
Struggling to stand up right
Beneath the muggy, humid sky
You wrote me song
Called it city living
You never told me
That instead of the ambitious, bohemian dream
I'd cut myself - deep - on the edge of things
You gave me a small taste of your scent
It smelled like good tongue kissing
But it was never groupies with no *******
Only a constant stream of falling into
The hard concrete of an impossible love
With a beautiful angel
Back then -
Where the reds were rosier
And I was so impressionable
You promised me so much
Maybe I deserve these bruises
Which tattoo up my entire body
Weaving a story
Of willing betrayal

We're all sick
just trying to find some medicine
and it comes in all forms
and they are all demons
drink
smoke
pills
powder
*****
violence
pain
God,
if you buy into that sort of jargon
I think God left us
about the time we started talking about profit margins
and gains and losses
and bonuses
and bail outs
but we take these drugs
in an attempt to get high enough
to catch a solitary glimpse of heaven
before we plunge back into hell
The devil,
He's laughing
because he knows we won't escape
we've been given up to damnation
and that's **** fine with me
let the world burn
the people massacred
and all the while
I'll stand on the brink
of the end of all things
laughing
because the only thing I truly know
is that the only way to survive hell
is to out devil the devils
So you go on complaining
and the world will go on not listening
because the world doesn't understand *******
only brute force and steel

It’s a contradiction
you want to be free from it so badly
yet your body and brain screams for more
crossed live wires shooting sparks of tragedy
“Taken from us too soon”
that’s something selfish ******* say
ever been exhausted and not been able to sleep?
tag you’re it
and we don’t play that home base safety *******
soak through your sheets
so you can’t cry in public
you know -
a laugh isn’t always a laugh,
and it sometimes tastes like dirt
but they demand a clown to brighten their day
so cheers to the good life

Will I still be fun
Will my friends still hang out with me
Will they understand
Will they judge
????

People like to talk about wasted potential
as if they know a single ******* thing
I have potential
you have potential
****** had potential
we all have potential
it doesn’t mean a thing
see what we need is an inroad
or maybe just a clear exit
and sometimes Cupid isn’t such a hot shot

Will I wake up one day riddled with regret
Will I make it to forty
Will I ever be able to dismount
Will the light ever find me
????

I’m losing my mind
and I think I’m fine with that
set me free of these silly things
make me a cherub gracefully ascending
take me to Valhalla
take me to green lawns swaying in the gentle summer breeze
take me by the hand and sit me down
don’t tell me it’s all going to be okay
tell me that we shouldn’t take villains for granted
Villains are the leading cause of heroism
so I’m hitting liquid courage like she cheated on me
only to miss the point entirely
A cobra’s venom is useless if it’s caught in a trance
we dance to death and the nights never end
we flash neon smiles and slaughter the mirrored image
so go ahead and convince yourself you feel good
keep on telling yourself your genius is misunderstood
there are no geniuses
just people smart enough to realize how little they really know
and I know nothing about everything
so pay me the big bucks
so I can shoot them from my mouth out the window
like I always do

Will this ever end
Will I ever find the answers
Will I love myself
Will I find the power
????

It’s all just a question of will,
right?

I'm sitting here,
at my regular table
and in through the door,
waddles a stream of gluttony
bodies like melting planets
and a look which falls somewhere
between pride and entitlement
is plastered on their sweaty bovine faces
they come into an area
graze while the grass is good
and slowly meander elsewhere
chewing the cud the whole while
like an old trail hand
chews a thick *** of tobacco
these people
who don't know the meaning
of living a lean life
what do they do?
besides propagating fast food franchises
and big and tall clothing stores
what do they do?
they sit in their cubicles doing the same
mindless
mundane
pointless
task for eight hours
with lunch and breaks
and then they drag themselves back home
to the herd
and sit down in their puffy couches
in front of the T.V.
with a microwaved meal
staining their beat up wife beaters
before they fall asleep
on the couch
their mouths propped open
drooling
with a still half full
can of coors light
balanced precariously
between their cottage cheese thighs

You are a guitar
with strings which
are the slightest bit
off tune
an old acoustic
which is more like an old companion
then an object
varnished to reflective perfection

Me?
I'm more like a grand piano
gathering dust
in the back of a thrift store
accustomed
to telling the tales
of the down and out
empathetic tears shed
leaving water stains
on the ivory keys

I've always had a thing against
people who come across as sappy
but that being said,
you make me the sappiest sap
in all the land,
where do you get off,
acting like that?
so **** cute,
pretty,
****,
beautiful
whichever word you prefer
they're all for you anyway,
you've never read them,
but they're yours
so I'll go on
being sappier than tree blood
and you'll go on
driving me nuts

It was the sort of day
that equates to the last day
December **** it
why is it sixty and humid enough to swim circles through the air?
yet the grey mist suffocates the horizon
and the light mist tastes like a city
the cat standing on driveways of crumbling mansions
running with fur puffed up from wild dogs snarling at choke chain collars
The trees are all hiding their heads in the sand
and each building passed decays in decadence
everybody hungry enough to do something they might regret
men and women taking shelter in zoo enclosures
to avoid the jungle cats which stalk the streets beneath blood red hunters' moons
It was the kind of day to make me want to see the next

shattering walls with great
say it from your chest waves
of vocal vibrations
vibrating down the handle
of aluminum baseball bats
which bounce uselessly off the brick wall
walled in the school building
building up little Timmy's confidence
confident that he will do what they want
wanting to see what's over the hill
hills which rocks only make half way up
downtown a young girl does a wheelie on a bicycle
riding around in circles
"Mommy You're not watching"
so mommy's not watching
the box cutters
and matches
and we make one **** of a mess
messed up on the couch
holding barely to consciousness
conscious of the fact
that it's the combination
of **** and alcohol
that's making the room spin like this
swallow a cup of fire
fire the demons from out the mouth
for each stream of *****
forgotten about
and we'll be happy
when you're happy
to let us be
something but happy

I don't know what happened
somewhere along the way our feet must have slipped
because this place is cold and unfamiliar.
Look at the jester as he dances with all the ugly girls
A poet is a poet is a liar is a liar is a pretentious *******
But I never let you read them
no because if you did
you'd realize that a large chunk of my blathering
is about you
then you'd probably say something like
what the ****. this is odd. no creepy. stop calling me. I don't want to wind up in saran wrapped pieces in your freezer
but I do write them
and that's what counts

At times it might feel as if
you can't do anything right,
like the only thing you're good at
is ******* things up
and every turn you make
leads only to dead ends,
The clocks on the wall
still tick tock their pretty little hearts out
like laughter,
cruel laughter
at how broken you are,
but the important thing
is to never forget
that a broken clock
is right
twice a day

God must have left us
or maybe died
if we are made in his image
does he get Alzheimers
his mind slowly muddling up
so he may have forgot about
his seven billion children
then again maybe we drove him away
or to suicide
because we have been naughty
boys and girls
who don't like sharing their toys
and when others
talk about their perception
of divine beauty
we throw rocks at them
for their endless fibs
because we can't be wrong
and we can't all be right
we devour and suffocate
our children
with our social expectations
and all we really give a **** about
is self betterment
not of the inside
but the external visage of our personage
weight rooms clang with
masturbatory grunts
and a piece of fabric
is more likely to go off the shelves
if it is branded with a corporate signature
or if it's what's in
****, if I was God
I would've left too

He was never afforded the luxury of a fresh start
his religion painted depictions of him
a silhouette entrenched in a thick bank of fog
The earth of his homeland has forgotten the taste of his footfall
left to find his own stake in reason and meaning
he emerged a cultist of jaded
false idol to the yearning masses
a means to an end for the end of meaning
the pounding of feet and fists
an eternal drumming
the call to action
too quiet to not be heard
his movements carried the voices
of birds too feeble to migrate away from icy fingers
he swims upstream until his body
becomes the sediment in which we plant our flag of victory

I want the freedom to be addicted
Just as much
As I want freedom from addiction

I read some writing advice once
It said "Writing isn't a competition"
well I'm sorry to tell you buddy
but you can go right to hell
because If you're words are published
yeah I'd congratulate you
and then I'd be write at my typewriter
notebook or laptop
sharp scrawling and tic tacs
because I love the bottom rungs
of unpublished writers
throwing their entirety against a brick wall
over and over again until it starts to crack
and fall apart brick by brick
until we see that beautiful view behind it
and everybody who makes it
is just another grain of sand in the hour glass
making me nervous and restless
impatient
so everybody who makes it
is about ten new poems
and I'm not rue if I will make it
but I'm going to try
it's all I've got

She is a double dare
Laughing like the air in the room was running low
Eyes like the open road
With hints of a sharp s turn ahead
She said sometimes you have to be spontaneous
She said why don't you?
Waiting in the dark trying to break through the blur of the squint
As faces passed by like mile markers
A hurricane of zebra print sorority crap
I didn't mind dry in the safe eye
Gasping in silence
Eyes closed tight
Nails on flesh
Screeching against the edge
Bedrock shifting in vibrations
As the world carried on outside
Careless but anything other than apathetic
Fire fighting off the inevitable dark
Beating drums
Peace against a chaos of war
And when it was all over
And sleep crept in
I woke up feeling renewed
More than a human being

it takes me in its hand
I don't know what it is
or if it even has hands
but I know it exists
in some ethereal realm
pushing along a corkscrew hallway
which switches it's polarity
with every hard to draw breath
It has a plan for me
or an idea
and all of my other aspects
are thrown out of the window of a moving car
they are useless to this guiding force which has me
and the road ahead is hazy from the heat
and oasis watering holes fill this desert
with signs which read
"happy hour 24 hours a day"
and I've never been religious
so it's strange to have to
put all of my faith in something

Whether you know it or not
you are armed and dangerous
your voice is far more powerful
than the droning of propaganda
being churned out of the register machine
take a roll call of the injustices
spit in the face of men masked in good intentions
take personal gain and **** it
drag its corpse behind you through ***** and Gomorrah
be the vesuvius ready to blow
the secret which they don’t want us to know
is that we hold far more power than they
we are the future of our universe
and that’s worth more than a luxury lexus
be loud
do not allow silence to fall over you like snow
tainted black with the carcinogenic second hand smoke
of what they would call progress
be politically incorrect
take risks
walk along the edge and create something which brings us closer to the divine
we need your voice
because one voice on its own is easily drowned out
but together we form a thunderous monstrosity
capable of bringing destructive earthquakes
to the temple of the holy dollar worshippers
this life has no goal
no end point
life is not a video game
equipped with linear objectives
graduation completed
move on to the family life dream
drilled into your head with vicious screams
of all of those who dared leave the pack and path
and fell short
mutilated by forced silence
they tell you
you are free to do exactly what we tell you
I say
they are only as free to destroy
as we allow them
do not mock the solitary raised fist
we all have fists
brothers and sisters clinging to each other
against an unholy rip tide
you are right
even when you are wrong
Life is a blank canvas
filled with wonders and walking waking nightmares
life is simply just
whatever you choose to make of it
will you survive through fear and cowardly silence
or will your voice rise above the rest
a blinding phoenix which dares to contest the sun
for the center of the universe?

I put a baby tooth in a half empty 2 liter of coke
it was gone in a month
now I put much worse stuff than coke into my body
but I'm still here
how can something which makes me feel so good
be so very bad for me?
I guess the human is nothing
if not adaptable
or maybe I'm just so much of a *******
I mean maybe I hate myself that much
that I'm not happy
unless I am well
and truly
******* myself over

The morning is serene
sober shafts of light
filter through the trees
which were planted
lining the streets
to make the city seem
just a little less man made
and it isn't too hot
and there isn't too much wind
only a light breeze
and a gentle wash of
sunlight

Mornings are holy times
times of reflection
times of rekindling
the spark
of the spirit of humanity
and I'm not a morning person
so I'm graced with these moments
much too rarely
but they are my best moments
and my favorite moments
easy summer mornings
when the birds chirp their loudest
and the sky is the cool blue
of the pacific ocean
morning for the usually dreary
hydrates the brain
better than any cool
perspiring
glass of brita filter water
the morning is the birth
of a new day

Me David and Jake
Jake's guest room
and an Iron Maiden CD
"You've gotta here this David"
"It's going to change your world"
"Whatever Martinez"
It was like that
I always carried my Mexican heritage around
a suitcase filled with stereotypes
I put the CD on
and the music pumped through me
so powerful
so raw
so real
everything everything is not
Even David was hooked
It was music to destroy by
to destroy everything they made
that they thought was so pretty
so perfect
so permanent
It wasn't long before we advanced
to heavier metals
and before long
me and Jake
were burning bibles
and turning my parents's
crucifixes upside down
a society based upon
spitting in societies face
what's not to love?

That being said
we give as good as we get
don't stop at neon red hands
nothing but green go men
across clay and goshen
behind the Siegel center
Don't go to was with rams
a play pen ain't just for the kid
we need playpens for grown men
so I play with my pen
while I wait for my beer to get here
Don't point fingers at me
I cut looser than amateur directors
I cut looser than sad teenagers
never reaching the veins or arteries
with a BAC over 9000
I grew up on the internet
but tonight I throw up in your bathroom
and thank you for keeping the towels laundered
cheers for tonight
may tomorrow never come

“...I have no time for the ignorance of others.”
said the fool
“I know what I’m doing. I can handle my own ****,
thank you very much.”
Said the marked man
“I’ve still got plenty of time to salvage this thing.”
said the wrongful optimist
“okay, smarty-******* - what would you do?”
Said the *******
“I do just fine on my own. Im better off.”
Said the man, too focused on not drowning
to see the land all around him
“I’m better than that guy, why should I have to wait?”
said the novice
“I just need some more time to practice.”
said the wary apprentice
“I just need some free time”
said Mr. Self-deception - Self-appeasement
“I just need to rest my eyes.”
said Mr. I’m going to pass out on this couch
“I love you.”
said the stepping razor
“I’m happy.”
said the drug addled hobo
“I didn’t know she had a boyfriend, I promise.”
said the teenager with a penchant for trouble,
as he stole smokes from his sleeping parents
“I need you to tell me how ******* incredible I am,
so I can tell you how wrong you are
with a real nice feeling in my gut
like a double shot of let it be”
said the silly little wannabe artist
“***** this place. **** all of these
over emotional teenagers
and **** this sanctuary
for circle jerking back patting”
said the sore loser
“Can I start you guys with something to drink?”
said the street corner beggar
as he looked for five dollars
to eclipse the gas light
of the speeding hatchback
“I wish you wouldn’t worry so much about me.”
said the skeleton covered in skin,
tendons,
sinews,
and strained muscles shaking from the nerves
“Want to go out tonight?”
said the bored future adult
running away from the sunset
“I just have no luck.”
said the guy who didn’t spend enough time
breaking walls and knuckles
in the basement of anonymity
“What do you have to say to that?”
Said Harry J. Baxter -
the smart-assed kid
in a 20 year old’s body
with an expensive pen
and dime store poetry
falling out the pockets
of his sagging pants
“What do you have to say?”
Said the empty blank pages
of the happily chaotic universe

Let me tell you about the time I got jumped,
my pumped up heart thumped me apart
it was around three AM
and we were drunk again
drinking flavored ***** in my apartment
somewhere in between boys and men
drinking to our heart's content
we head out and hit the cement
we were going to the Camel
where we thought time would unravel
It was a small venue on broad street
they did ska and jazz and other stuff
and it was never full, not by far
but we were in the mood for drunk ska
and we danced
or more so we thrashed
and kicked and punched and all kinds of other ****,
then the show was over
and we headed back
walking down broad street at 3 AM
can make you superstitious
can make you avoid every crack to avoid a broken back
we turned onto first street
and it was dark out
the sort of dark that is only viewed in a six year old's room
the sort of dark that breeds monsters in closets
or under beds, **** it, it's all in our heads,
but people are monsters that do exist
they kick and twist
vicious spirits of malice and ****
I heard the footsteps
clapclapclapclapclap
and just had time to think
"somebody is running awfully fas-"
blinding lights like fireworks
exploded in front of me
and I was on the pavement
about a  foot away from me
or where I was
what was the cause?
my face hurt, and why all this blood?
my friend Michael
he's a skinny art kid
was on the ground
getting what I can only call
the absolute **** kicked out of him
I mean he just couldn't win
they circled like vultures
these rejects of culture
"What you got? What you got?"
he got
a pair of tight skinny jeans
and a pocket full of artistic dreams
they couldn't squeeze past the seams
and they gave up
when somebody at the bus stop
yelled
"******* SOMEBODY CALL THE COPS!"
they were off
and I've never seen people run so fast
I mean seriously
these guys were hauling ***
these members of the criminal class
not bad
just desperate and lost
and sick of being **** on
so they ******* with us
they didn't even get any money
they just left behind a few bruises
and a cracked lens in Michael's glasses
We went up to my apartment
I knew I wouldn't be pressing charges
those men were indiscriminate targets
and actually finding them seemed far fetched
no instead I put some ***** on a paper towel
and put it on the **** on my arm
I then proceeded to run around the apartment
trying to articulate the burning pain of my arm
but instead it came out something like
"oh **** oh **** ohhh Jesus Christ this really ******* hurts!"
and then we drank more
and I passed out on my bed
fully clothed
my ****** arm exposed
and I fell asleep laughing
because ******* it
I was alive

The clocks were counting down
10
9
8
7
All the way to 1
New Year's Eve
It was a matter of chance
Or was it?
You kissed me on the lips
It was just a peck
Near meaningless
But we were drunk.
Scratch that
i was drunk
You were too drunk
You said
just sit with me
And I did
Until you fell asleep
And I pretended
To not be that uncomfortable
Your body resting gently
Crushing the ever living hell out of my right arm
And I didn't mean to wake you
When I had to take my jacket off
I was hot but
I'm glad you woke up
Even for five minutes
Slightly smiling and very tired
I put my hands on your eyelids
And said
back to sleep
And that's just what we did
And it was great

somebody at work
said who'd want to be normal
her eyes glinting behind
her ray band sunglasses
and her car wash uniform
and her Toms shoes
but she was right to a point
who would
when normal means being the middle six?
**** that I want to be all three of them
an angel of bad taste and baggy clothes
and the best people I've ever met
never met normal
going home on the last bus
with his briefcase
and suit
and his dial tone voice
no the best people I've met
took normal out back
and Old Yeller'd the *******
they are the people who would fly into the sun
if only their wings weren't held together with wax
Me?
I'm the subterranean rodent
taking para-scope Polaroids
hoping to get a glimpse of the good life

I told her
You don’t want any part of this
I’m a promise broken on the cracked surface
of loose lips going down with sinking ships
but I’m the rat fleeing the wreckage
to wash up on your shore
carrying the plague of free thought
and loud voices
she said
you don’t know what I want
and you don’t know what I need
and she was right
but she didn’t need to be my muse
all the others I’ve thrown empty and lifeless
in a ditch on the side of the road
which connects my **** to my gut to my heart to my brain
called the I-90 soul
and she says
yeah you go go ahead and pour another
poor ******* you
so down on yourself
because self-loathing
and low self-esteem
are in
and your calculated mask of apathy
is only to draw the people closer
So I said to her
I’m the spider in the web?
and she said
no you’re the abandoned dog
scavenging the streets
growling at strangers
when all you really want is a nice home and a good petting
Most people wouldn’t advise mistaking dogs for wolves
and she said I’m not the one who’s mistaken
listen to me woman
you might think that on the surface it’s all swagger, ego, and witty cynicism
but on nights spent lonesome
I waltz with my madness beneath the chandelier of the killing moon
I smoke and drink to quiet my mind
because no matter how prolific of a writer I am on a given day
I lose more words than I catch
and it drives me to dark corners of my mind
where razor blades and pills sound appealing
and let’s not get started on the selfishness,
she said who isn’t selfish
and I said you will always come second to the words
the only thing I know how to love
because I know how much I hate them at times
know how much I wish they’d stop
my head is full of drunk six year olds careening bumper cars into my skull
and they never go away
they just grow more quiet
and I go through periods of isolation
where any other human presence is just an obstacle of my test
my quest is never ending
just like the great human tragedy
So you don’t want me?
I do, and I want you to want me
but I need you to know
that you shouldn’t
but I’m selfish
I’m hungry for validation
and I can’t lie
the way you look in that outfit
looks like my next best poem
so sure,
be mine,
but remember that I warned you
the thing is about writers
we are as passionate as they come
but you won’t find a more fickle bunch

the world is wrapped in plastic
and our feelings can be found
through a binary language
in the internet web of deceit
and the only thing we feel strongly about
is our own apathy
and maybe our phones
the culture's obsession with Zombies
makes sense if art mirrors life
we walk around looking through empty glass eyes
and make fake relationships
with people
who barely even exist
we grow up
and fill the shoes
which were left for us
at different points
on our journeys
generations of Russian nesting dolls
the few of us who want to live
are drowned in debt and ***** looks
and Jesus Christ
one day we'll be in charge
of the entire ******* planet
just think about that

On the first Friday of every month
the Arts District of Richmond VA
becomes alive at night with the buzz of artists
local artists of almost every medium
galleries which are only open for ten hours a month
suddenly filled with leather shoes
plaid shirts, skinny jeans, beards, and holes in earlobes
they walk around crowding the streets
coaxing families who made the trip from all the way uptown
to listen to the poets and painters and photographers and sculptors
prattle on about what sets them apart
they all clap each other on the back for being so **** original
I’m walking through the parted sepia sea
avoiding gazes of strangers cast in iron
I marvel at their work
which for this one night is the subject of a city
more or less, anyways
we were high on life. We were high off of too much ***
and all of the local talent
high on validation and pretension
the Mormons accosted us
their attempts to save our souls from damnation
really geeked us out
we took their lemonade, but not their word
“Incarceration: the art of captivity”
an installation by some kid who has never seen a shade of true blue
through the lens of his iPhone
if we all believe really hard -
then maybe when the sky opens up
to **** us all into the hungry sky -
all of this art will save us

I need you
The most beautiful three words I know
in the morning you are my first thought
and I keep you close to me throughout the day
I smell you on my fingers
and feel the urge claw its way through my nerves
and If I go too long without you
I’m nothing but flushed sweats
and anxious nail biting and fidgety hands and feet
If I have to wait any longer
I get cranky
every voice a whip crack of annoyance
I need you
at night I can’t sleep without you
and I am self-aware
hopelessly addicted
it’s always been one of my themes
and I have no interest in the science behind it
just the simple statement of humanity it bares
I need you
and if I can’t reach you
I’m willing to do whatever it takes
just to get another taste
hopelessly addicted