ipseity: noun:
holding your breath until you feel it
--the abstraction of it, outside yourself
behind your eyelids, in your tea leaves
clenching fists, curling lips; seeing it on the internet

cartography: noun:
engraving your face onto my retinas
--the angle your jawline cuts into my irises
and burns into a permanent membrane;
roadmapping your freckles, curating my favorite ones

hello : noun -
dreaming of birch, but  bleached
coloring in white with a very faint green
while looking into the sky, not at it.

here's a piece of me
for the world to see

The ebb and flow
The Technicolor let go


I want my life back

Bake yourself a castle
A castle made of cake
Of sugar coated candy
So sweet your teeth will break

they get to eat cornbread together
we don't

I think you can understand why I'm upset about this

I'm waiting for something to shake me
hiding in the meantime,
stalling in my prime time,
omitting perfect rhymes
and waiting for something to make me

the sun sets at 4'oclock central time
it's not right, it's not real

and when I turn off the lights and sit in silence.
I am in a constant state of overstimulation


I want it all

on grassy lawns
and rolling fields
a blanket of flowers
a blanket of ice
florida snow seems so strange

flowers in the middle of december

in the soft glow
on acoustic guitar
carved wood, strumming words
into dim light and tired eyes
easing and breathing
to me, you're warm tea

tell me, tell me

darling, don't get me wrong
I do know the truth
of darkness and blackness, the depth of dark blue
but darling lately I detect only the rosier hues
the sunlight and sun's breath
a kiss on the hand
the pink, sanguine shores of this blossoming land
I see promise and hope
the American Dream
in ten milligrams each day
All appears what it seems

Darling, don't get me wrong
I do know all else
the lull of the silence
of my innermost self

barely wearing sweaters
in the middle of december
florida winter became alien to me
bathing suits under flannel shirts
lawn chairs on driveways
that ******* flamingo has a santa hat
...
he is the most damaged person I know
and I all I can say is
happy holidays

I'm still trying to wrap my head around
why I still can't see in full-color


where's the snow?

I am a black hole
Take all that is told
Twist it to half-truths
Send it somewhere unknown

last night I had the strangest dream
I think you were in it

so I learned to lucid dream

forgetting where the mind goes in the white-washed stills
lapses in the film
writhing in the sheets
in between asleep
and crying on the plane to San Francisco

Hold my hand, he said when the waves got big
The current took him instead

I will not speak sweetly
You must sleep with the cacophony
the guilt growing louder in your mind
and a lingering ringing  in your ears

I will not say goodnight
You must sleep with the bitterness,
The scorn burning your throat
and an acrid taste upon your lips

Humid nights
At six thirty seven p.m.
Over greasy pizza
And the smell of cigarettes
We debate the universe
Gravity, religion, neutrinos
The rain sticks
Dampens our conversation
Sleep clouds my eyes
And I push away the pizza
Breath in cigarette smoke
Einstein was wrong

I like driving at night


indigo nights in the odd hours of the morning
my tired eyes adjust to the rhythm of the traffic
a slow fluid, tempo, melting into soft orange lights
cars slip in and out of my consciousness

the street illuminated in artificial glows
and manufactured air fills my lungs
forming goosebumps on my skin
my eyes are growing weary

the radio static, constant
tuned to 91.3
plays liquid jazz
dewdrops on my weary mind
and my pulse fills the empty spaces in the bassline

the music melts into the rhythm
the soft lull of the engine humming
the crescendo and decrescendo of tires on pavement
a lullaby

the reflectors twinkle on street
like artificial stars
and the highway-- a tangle of progress
unravels before me

my eyes slip into a dream

I like driving at night
but one day I won't

I’m sleeping on raw skin
And fire behind my neck
And swollen eyes
And swollen lies
And lucid dreams melting

I’m sleeping on the prospect of open arms
and warm skin
and caffeine in the morning
so my mind can wonder
and burn itself out
and rehydrate with sleep
and put out the ever embers

But you brought me deep sleep once
And I woke up in time to send you on your way
And  to burn and scald my skin and heart
And sleep amongst the night fires

conversations and conundrums
songs you hum at night
voids we might fill with the words you dangle from your ballpoint pen
imagined, enamored, unreal

Rainy summer day,
storming actually
The kind of day that made you want to crawl under the covers and forget yourself
drift off to sleep

Still
despite the navy skies
It was still summer

summer means peaches
big ones, bursting, dripping
honey nectar and sunshine

so we make a peach pie
cinammon and sugar sticking to our fingers like slow molasses
underscored by the constant drip, slip, flooding
arranging produce like composers

and we waited
we waited for the pie to bake
we waited for the crust to crisp, for the sugars to melt,
for the peaches to ripen, to brown and butter
we waited for the rain to stop
we waited for sunshine, for dry shoes, for beach days, powerlines
we waited for hours
we waited for months
we waited eighteen years
we sat, and we stood, and we waited.

We sat in front of the oven
eyes pressed against the window
we waited
watched the sugars bubble, the scented cloves
we were two years old and one hundred at the same time
we waited for the kind of lives that we saw in movies
the kinds of dreams you wanted so bad it hurt
we waited with stomachs churning
wasting our youth, one rainy afternoon at a time
waiting for life to begin

Rainy summer day,
storming actually
The kind of day that made you want to crawl under the covers and forget yourself
forget about the peaches
forget about summer, about friends,
about anyone and anything
drift off to sleep

Poetry is for the sad
And those who are in love
I qualify both as neither
And all of the above

I'm as transient as pollen today
but yesterday I was just floating like a gossamer
watching the wind blow seeds off of dandelions
and the daylight drum on the daffodils

white water lilies in my bedroom and cool jasmine at my window
the perfumed petals seeping into my psyche
no, I don't love you dearest
I only love the cloudless sky

April , summer chased me
May, you came to stay
June, July adored me
August you went away

I'll play you the set
to the cadence of whispers
on white sheets somewhere