THE DOCTORS SAY
HE'S NOT NEARLY
A MANIC ENOUGH

TO BE BIPOLAR

BUT THEY FEEL
HE'S NOT BEEN
ALTOGETHER PLAIN SPEAKING

STILL DIAGNOSED WITH
SEVERE DEPRESSION AND
A SCHIZOID PERSONALITY

HE ALWAYS THOUGHT
HIM NO ONE
OR LIKE GOD

TELL DEATH I
STOLE HIS OLD
MASK OF HIM

TELL LIFE HE'S
NOT NEARLY BRAVE
ENOUGH TO MAKE

THE SUFFERING END

I've been around
The sun
Twenty-two times

Life's not fun
But Death's one
Long line

Neuroscience is here. Now,
as you read through the piece,
whatever year may be,
consider the poetry
in my child's ignorance
and make beliefs.

It's as if every connection snapped
when my brain said goodbye.
Daily, nightly doses of elsewhere;
wherever the great wave takes me.

Are there new channels I could frequent
to cross the dementias divide
of our biologies?

Shall we grow into Earth
to be songs of gods
and plunder of sinners?

In entropy's defense,
I am not their age of warrior;
I am not this kind of *human;
sabotaging evolution is not my game.

Of drones,
these thoughtless Things,
they've not this network;
these tendrils sapients have made,
They snap when we sleep.

Too few things

Remind me that I'm human:

Yelling lines of poetry,



               begging meaning

               out of chaos,

               finding structure

               in the other.



I find my self crossed

Ready to turn

Out all right



Here I starved

For a world I could shine

Brighter than



I did not see

The beacon between you

And I

To calibrate my rest

I relinquish
where my trauma begins

Unwrap the deadened padding
and speak softly

I grow and wilt
With the season

Causality and forces
at will

Life is movement
I am never settled

I am a person
Trying to write
A letter:

I am just coming to terms
With being
A person

I rebel identity
I've other places
To be

Or not to be a solution
To the question mark
Which birthed us

Can you blame
This mechanism
Of biology

I was born
To play
Defense

And spend myself
Looking up
At the stars

I'm lost in the organization
of a word
tendrils and curvature
and perfect lines, perfect
connections, and unbalanced
connotations
I'm lost
in debilitated thought
and the building of a sentence
each rung faulty frail fractured
all vocabulary considered
complete choice
and complete regret

I must re-mind myself
I've this lousy concept
Of time

Will this tear ever feel
Like yesterday's paper

Will her face shoot me
Forward through space

Like wormholes
Getting us
Where we need to be

It is true, I am discouraged
for man fell stuck, eternal jaunt.
For golden gates we have gone savage
and turned the world to carnal haunt.

A painful purpose pervades my days:
For men to end their babble tower --
A call to brains to reappraise
our hearts and minds before devour.

I have seen the battle for(e)
hearts and minds of men;
A silent front,
the theatre of war: defiled

perception

My uncle was on Facebook
explaining to a friend he did not know
what Periscope was
by posting
you can live feed people
like Andy ****
and John Mayer on it

is this a poem?
only time will tell

I would very much like to jump
off the page
I would like to enjoy anew
perspective,
more depth,





                        if you will
help me off the ground --
these are just words --
help me live in this space
and be a poem.

there are rotted roses
twinged between my teeth --
little prickles
but flowers, god ******
petals in my mouth --
soft and fleshy bubbly
love wings

I wonder what war
might taste like to me --
exploding cures
and frostbite, god ******
cold sores in your cavity --
brittle and hopeful hallow
swallow crowns

Kings of Psyche! Teach us!
How long must we ****! from Mother's vein?
How long must we mine! our memories to pebble?
How long must we take! to build bridges?

        Oh Prestigious Elite! You Diamond People!
Did you see! the mushroom cloud?
Did you see the fall! out from your towers?
How did you sleep? among the rubble?
How did you breathe? in this metal ocean?

Reign on us your wealth
Of Knowledge!
Of Plutonium! and Pennies!
Of Protection! and Principle!
Of People! and Death!
and Death! and Death?
and Death? and Death?
and Death? and Death?
and Death? and Death?

we fear death like a god
but it's more like a Jesus
for the lessons it brings
on the books that he teaches
and the sweet, sweet release
from the world and the streets
that'll quickly forget you
like washing the sheets.
Death, you're a god.

so tell me it's cruel
but that's not the meaning of
life is a ladder
and death is the ceiling.
not too much then,
popcorn and a pen
to sign before you go,
don't fear it in the end.
Death, you're a god.

I see I've grown
a ghost
from time
to time.

morose in the garden
wandering as mist
kissing the lily
watering the ****
sprinkling my cheek
in old flower beds

As I lay
in stated decay,
I could've decided to
be deciduous.

I forgot you yesterday.
A missed X, on
My calendar.

My windy July,
where did you go?

A gust will come and blow
you back into my skin;
September chills my bones.

I try to remember,
there's October, and November,
as my brain bleeds shades of your sanguine
winter coat.

throw me to the willows

under the land tentacles
under the gloom
there is tranquility

melancholy moments
stuck in pockets of our memory
like snow globes

let the ground thaw
let the plants grow before you
smash it

my heart is battered in lipstick stains

porcelain and sleepytime

smeared upon on a chalk wall

messy and temporary

dust out my eyes

grease my elbows

sharpen my edges

ease the onset of her ***** speech

for I think I am addicted

You are all the great words.

I've been hiding
from all the mistakes
I've made
behind brick walls
across
glassy river crossings
and if I weren't
afraid of the other side
I would see
who I am
jumping on a trampoline
head popping
up over the wall
panting
you are less poetic
than you used to be

Dive in
I'm treading water
For as long as I can

I can't swim
But I can float
With the help of your hand

It's a big and scary place to be
I promise you're safe with me
We will be an anchor
Sweetly sinking in the sea

We were the stars
We were the that’s not close enough
We were the dizzy spell when we’d stand up too quick
and our favorite colors were black
and really black

We were the spectrum
We were the prom queen and that guy
We were the that guy is in over his head
We were the balance
We were the tightrope walkers
We were the side walk chalkers
chalking up rain checks and forget me nots

We were the discovery channel
We were the sand between our toes
We were the nose goes
playing finger paints on our hearts
We were the hearts
We were the drums
We were the rat ta tat tat
tickling tattoos on our souls
We were the jazz

We were the good fight
We were the fighter and the lover
but I was neither
We were the my girlfriend will kick your ***
We were the first kiss
We were the forefront
and the afterthought

We were the only thought
We were the world
We were the Garden of the Gods
in Colorado
We were the devil
and we didn’t give a ****

We were the levee overflowing
We were the swim
We were the run through the rain with shoes on our hands
We were the last dance handstands
We were the final countdown

We were the 80’s hairband
We were the rock concert
We were the star spangled banner
We were the left hand of Jimi Hendrix
and his guitar strings
We were the good taste in music

We were the bad taste in our mouths
We were the learn to love and be loved in return
We were the optimist in a depression
We were the depression in art
We were the beauty
We were the science teacher that found proof of God
We were the proof of God
We were the class

We were the past
We were the past
We were the past

To my barren love, there was
much life. Crashing,
yet too callous for grandeur.
Our distant affection became

phantom,
chimerical,
a facade.

Now my heart is a glass
chrysanthemum. Golden light
bends, pours, and
blossoms
from my new love;

A white dress.
A dream catcher.
A smile on the horizon.

Your lantern still flickers
in my fickle heart,
but each of my breaths are killing
the flame.
So, I’ve hung you up
and set out to sea.

Desolated,
you may be,
You’re here to guide someone home.

I'm writing love poems

to a person that doesn't exist

building her up

from the bottom with my words

her skin as soft as half smiles

we'll share after an argument

her arguments as hard as

similes

I know

she's not there

not the one I've imagined

but when I do find someone

She will be poetry

a part
of me
finds it
fitting

a person
looking for anything
to hold them up
can find it
in a noose

I look at you
and the world turns
into flowers

they gut the God from me
with their guns
their knives
their bare hands
carve Him from my corners
every nook and cranny becomes abyss
black as their gunpowder eyes
their void hearts
their charred teeth
they flame my faith away
inside out like
a backwards bullet wound
but their hands
hold newborns
wipe away tears
clasp in prayer
but
no
they’re
digging at my soul
twisting Him out
cutting Him out
clawing Him out
ripping Him out
sawing Him out
slitting Him out
scraping Him out
scooping Him out
****** Him out
shooting Him out
until
I am a shell
I am a chamber
until
I’m relinquished to men
made in His image

The only time I've ever felt hunger
was when I fasted for 48 hours
in the 11th grade
just for attention
After I ate my first pop-****
I pooped so hard I got angry at God
I got angry at God
The boy blessed enough
to be a picky eater

In 19 years of being well fed
the hardest thing I've ever
had to swallow is my own pride

They say if you feed a man a fish
he will eat for a day
Well I've never caught a fish in my life
and half the time I'm too afraid
to order a pizza because I think
I'll mess it up

So tell me why when I go to restaurants
my taste buds feel entitled to slaves
Why do they whip servers into making
my meat medium well

My teeth have never tasted blood
My mouth doesn't know dry
I've never dreamt of food
because I don't know life without it
But at least once a week I get mad
that McDonald's doesn't deliver

I once watched a cow get slaughtered
and I didn't blink an eye
because I could already taste her in my mouth

In the same year my history class
raised money for nine months to buy one goat
to send to a village I've never heard of

The contrast is cruel

I can remember the last sound the cow made
but I can't remember the sounds that made
up the village's name
or its people

So I hope you'll understand that
when I utter the unfathomable phrase
"I'm starving"
all I can taste in my mouth is shame

This is going to be a ******* good poem.
You can tell by the language. ******* good ****.
This poem is going to be deep.
So deep, sometimes, the hardest thing to do is to
think about it, so hard,
you're not even thinking about it.
Not anymore. Because this poem is going to be about love.
And how love is great.
And how love is forever.
And how love is love.
****. (This is a ******* good poem.)

But sometimes love is sad.
Yes. (You should snap here.)
Sometimes love is hard.
**** yes. (You should really snap here.)
Sometimes love just is, because love has to be, and when
love just has to be, well, ****.
You know?

I mean, I don't even have to say anything stimulating,
or thoughtful, right?
You guys get it. You guys
understand.
You guys know what I'm talking about,
so what's the point
in writing something you'll have to
think about. I mean, think about it. You'll just
figure it out eventually.
So, I'll just spell it out for you.

This is a ******* good poem.
And I'll bet you ******* like it.
Whether you ******* get it or
whether you ******* don't.

The last time
I lost myself
I found
My soul

You're changing this cocoon heart
The butterflies are too big for my stomach
so they venture to the ends of my being
I’m growing wingtips for fingertips that flutter when you laugh
And in the moments I make your eyes smile, I fly
All the while, unraveling the most fragile strands of myself
Like string simply because
The only thing holding me is your hands

I am a kite
I ascend to the top of the universe with mirth, unafraid of falling,
And fall, I do
I fall over and over again every time your cheeks blush
And every time you bring me back down to Earth
You bring me in, and you hold me close
And what puts my mind at ease is
Our ribs are starting to fit together like puzzle pieces
Our hearts are fusing like science I can’t comprehend,
But if God was a card dealer, I’d understand, because
God dealt me the very,
Very best hands

Your hands
that shock mine every time I touch them
And when that happens we never fail to search
For the sparks in each other’s eyes
We peer into each other’s souls
Finding atoms that fizz like fireworks
I am finding God in your electricity
We hold still for the Lord
But absolutely nothing about this is static

I am the ocean
There is more life swimming inside of me than anyone’s ever seen
And somehow you are still more astonishing
You are the moon
From dust, God made you to hold me
You push and pull me
Like tides, gently rocking me to sleep
We are standing still
But love is not something we can stop if we squeeze

Like trying to catch rivers in our bare hands
We’re finding it more enchanting to catch each other’s raindrops on our tongues
Because we are water cycles, and some days
We are drenched in this love
Finding it ironic how our torrential downpours only lift us up
So, we hold hands
Run through the rain
And know that no matter how hard we squeeze
It will never stop

I want to go dancing
I want my feet to sing louder than my voice
I want them to sing in tune with the colors your lips make when you sing
Because I’m so close to colorblind that the rest of my senses are heightened
And nothing tastes sweeter than the
Rainbows you whisper on my eardrums

But I want to feel softer than this
I want to touch subtler than two magnets never ever can
But still have the same fervor
I want our ribs to feel less like rickety fences
And more like toy xylophones
Or the color spectrum

So one day we’ll have mapped out each other’s blues
And we can truly say, we’re on the same wavelength
So that one day,
Our hearts will beat lullabies on our skeletons,
Reminding us even the hard things in life can be beautiful
If we let it

I know that fuzzy feels cozy
And change can be crippling
But as I dream stars through the silk sheets
I hold your hand
And pray you won't supernova in the morning

I am nothing
I can no longer think that
There are people who care
A person must accept they are alone
I refuse to believe that
I am loved
I was born imperfect
It does not matter to me that
I will die with hate in my heart
It is impossible for me to conceive that
There is a loving, saving God
The only thing I know to be undeniable is that
Life has taken away every good thing
And it is no longer true that
God is there for me
I'm not sure of much, but I am sure that
I was born broken, with nothing to believe in

Then I met Jesus, and he built me back up from the bottom

we are two
corner pieces

i keep forcing
together
and i don't care if

i can see
the final picture

every day
i grind down my teeth

until a soft bite is what you need
and i shred the
skin off my lips until

you can
sink down in

I try to see God everywhere

For example, I think
Telephone wires look like veins
Carrying electric blood to the fingertips of the world
The world God holds in His fingertips
So what does that make my fingertips?
What does that make me?

Am I God’s creation on a confusing place called Earth, or
Do humans make up an ***** system in God,
Serving Him just to keep Him alive?

When I die
Do I die and go to Heaven, or
Do I end up on God’s bed sheet after a piece of
God’s hair falls out?

And when a piece of God’s hair falls out
Does God cry, or
Does God just wash his sheets on Sunday?
Does God notice at all?

Is God responsible or is God like me?
Does God wash His sheets, or
Does God say, “But, mom, I just don’t like making my bed.”

And if God has a mom does she say,
“Okay,” or,
“God, your sheets are *****, **** it!”

And when that happens
Does God carry me to the laundry room hamper, or
Does God toss me down to His floor?
His floor that’s messy as Hell.

And does God ever get around to cleaning it, or
Does God just need a spot to sleep?

Like love
At first sight
I watched
Eden
bloom in your eyelids.

As my heart beat
Richter scales,
I was afraid the
weight of my breath would sound
earthquake
and break the
snow globes
in your eye sockets.

For the first time,
I wished everything would
freeze
in the moment our eyes met.

When our gaze broke I was
shook
so hard I could see my dreams floating in air,
like snowflakes
looking for a place to come true.

They found a home
on your fingertips
and some you even caught on your tongue.

Now gardens grow
in my cheeks when I sleep,
and every time
our eyes kiss I
drip
into the nooks and crannies of
your lips.

You built me
a snowman
out of blown kisses and
promised it wouldn't melt.

And I built you a cottage in my cornea.

nothing                                    
worries                                    
me
more
and
matters
to
me
less
than
your
past

My life is ruined
I thought haiku was my strength
but I can't count

Every day I run
out of words
to say

I love you
is empty (void
of cruxes)

you hollow
my heart
to mere
muffles (deadened poetry)

I wrap my
hands in the silence (a
peace) of you