i'm plowing through the crowded plains
all yellow grass & open veins
& belly laughs at better days
because i finally made a clean escape.

& i can pack a MEAN suitcase
stuffed with photos of your ******* face
& i'll abandon you in every state
leaving a polaroid in every place:
an image for each bridge & lake
that gives me visions of your lips & legs.

& by the time i reach those western beaches
my bags have lost a lot of weight
& i've erased all ******* trace
of the comfort of your fake embrace.

all that you want is
to lay with something warm
but i just wanted to
feel normal once more
a broken-down sailboat
that's heading to shore
and a naive young captain
who does not know the course
so they float on the ocean
'til they reach sterile sand
where they'll stop and drop anchor
at the sirens' command
but those angels confused them
when they sang certain words
and as the men tried to listen
misunderstandings occurred
their songs had diseased them,
the men disappeared
those women deceived them
just as the men feared
soon night took the helm
of the masquerade sky
and the men died of loveloss
and so soon shall i
so your wish will be granted
but minus the warmth
tomorrow you'll wake up
next to my corpse

from the perspective of two depressed individuals
when suicide's misdirected its effect is residual
it spreads across the wet tear bed you left
where your pretend weekend friends slept
until they woke up in a cold sweat
blue lips pale skin & visible breath
hell hath frozen over & your hope is dead
while IVs penetrate your veins in a hospital bed
& your mother watches the long-delayed death of her egg

we both had an ocean once
which crashed upon the rocks
& for one salty, open month
we splashed away our thoughts

we danced along the waves
dove down below the reef
explored every darkened cave
& grew new gills to breathe

told our truths through bubbled words
safe here deep beneath the bay
then our every sacred secret burst
& i drowned as you swam away

i took a corpse
to the mall
on SUNDAY
(it was a religious experience)
& the weird thing is
she drove.
& when i got into her
car
or casket
or whatever
we hugged & kissed (like relatives)
but that was it
then she went stiff
again.
a tattooed statue at the wheel
& me
coughing up embalming fluid
amongst the cigarette smoke
i whispered out the window.
& you winced as we wiggled
between winnebagos & station wagons,
sloooooooooooooooowly
like pallbearers
                    balancing
                a box,
or like a mother
                 placing an infant
                                         in a crib,
hand behind its head.
& she understated the overture
so i sort of never understood
we were ending
up as enemies
all before the engine
stopped.
& it was winter but i was overheating
smoky breathing &
the words i couldn't reach &
the heaviness of my chest,
the weight of waiting.
but she never said another word
as we walked through the mall
& i floated next to her
like a ghost
or a balloon she was holding
& she grasped
at something new to try on
& let go of me
& i floated
& floated...

there's a color in my heart that cannot be created
using pastels or pencils
it could never be painted
darker than black
more angry than red
much brighter than white could aspire to have been
more alive than green
but deader than grey
like purple but harder to wash it away
blue with more hurting
brown but more *****
orange with much stronger emotions there burning

i tried to draw your picture once
but my hand & mind
couldn't compromise
on how to portray perfection
with just some simple lines
these colors couldn't illustrate
all the flawless thoughts you think
this paper could not consummate
the happiness your eyes create
my heart swells at the smell
of your beautiful skin
but i could never endeavor
to imitate that with pen

you're so gorgeous
in the morning
the sun can't even
stay away,
spreading itself evenly
across your sleepy skin
in a way i can't even
get peanut butter to...
& i let the sun have you
every morning
& i watch you,
like a pervert wearing sunglasses,
as it kisses
every
inch
of
you.
i mean i knew you were into older men
but Jesus...
he's more aged & damaged
than the planet that we're dancing on,
or drowning on,
& i'm jealous of his yellow fingers
lighting up the white
hairs on your belly
like his mourning dew defeats the dandelions,
but when i scramble
for your eyes' yolks,
you're already gone!
panic-
i'm--rapidly--
building--scaffolding--past--
the--ra­fter--beams--
IN--HOPES--
that--i--can--catch--the--theif---- --- -- -
but he sets ablaze my plastic wings
& i come crashing
                to
         cat
   as
trophy cases that i place you in
because i'm so afraid to touch you
in those moments
you're awake,
so i just whisper
in your ear
when your eyes are put away...

we both set the earth ablaze
from a different place
& the seas of trees
made ashy rain
& right where the equator lays
we licked eachother's flames
until we left the earth a charcoal marble
lost in outer space.

but spinning there
in burning air
& the awkward silence of despair
i think that we both realized
the oceans don't ignite.

you say all the perfect things
i swear to god you practice them
repeating them in quick refrain
& they're lovely once they leave your lips
& i love their ringing resonance
& i whisper the same words in loving pace
because i love the way they sound & taste
but i hate how afterwords my lungs feel clean
& i hate the way my tongue can't speak
unless i use your mouth to breathe

she has tear drops like treetops
& i'm breaking her branches
climbing her limp limbs
as they collapse in small splashes.
her tear ducts grow tree trunks
with roots tangled in eyelashes
& she counts every ring
so she knows when a year passes.
i am her magnifying lens
turning water to ashes
i help forget her forests
with fingers like matchsticks.
i burn her leaves like memories
& heat up all her habits
she hinders hope religiously
while i evaporate the damage.
her trees use words as fertilizer
stretching arms to freckled clouds
her buoyant bark a wet reminder
that gently decorates her mouth.

how i long to lounge upon your lips
be the object of your gaze
you're an extension of my fingertips
as i try to solve your body's maze
but these are purely dreams alone
your beauty's far beyond & clean
so i shift focus to my homely bones
& suffer til structure can be seen

i wondered
if there were others
that submitted to the summer's comfort
smothered in their sunny mother
snuggled under yellow covers
absorbed by that burning orb
of course our skin became golden
& our bones were worn paper thin
by that often hot & rotten oxygen
the air that scarred our hair & hearts
both sun-drenched blonde & clotted dry
by sun spots that dot our blotted eyes
us foster kids got tossed aside
when the rain came in that vacant night
our mom got carried off by clouds!!
persuaded by grey to leave us without...
those sinning cirrus salesmen
stole her with the wailing wind
& convinced us to pray to them
now i am a pardoned pastor
to the precipitation i used to hate
& we don't mention mother's name.

i ride the wave
of brighter days
hoping hard to find a way
to realize & recreate
that blatant stress
        i was so obsessed with,
that violent mess
        to which i made
                a blind investment.
i looked to you for chest compressions
when my veins prayed for resuscitation lessons
but you're a ******* ugly loveless corpse
absorbed in the self-esteem endorsements
i adorned
              & orphaned
                               on your doorstep...
you adopted it but dropped it quick
the first birth on your
                          abortion list
cut the cord legitimate
so i've gained bleeding fetus freedom

i remember winter months
being thinner than the summer ones
fattened with a dumber love
that happened just...because.

we eat this, drink this, breathe this weakness
hoping 2 half-souls can break even
the open hearts of broken people
deleting love they once believed in

we're lonely now that its not cold
troubled with how your eyes got old
while running they're so colorful
but now they're nothing & i'm miserable

in the warmth of winter's afterglow
that humid calm before the storm
our bodies felt the lightning form
& in your eyes a spark absorbed...
i kissed you with the timing of
a kindergartner finding love
& the timid hands
of past romance
that never measured up...
so you became the frightening thunder
& i became the windy breeze
you battled with the lightning's wonder
i fiddled with the spinning leaves
you roared across the blinding tundra
i whistled while spreading seeds...
calm returns with a violent burst
i'm climbing clouds & counting birds
& measuring the mountain's curves
just to watch you mouth the words
my starving ears have never heard.... .. .

i'm in love with
the air inside your lungs
& the taste buds on your tongue
& the redness of your blood
& a ton of other stuff
but your brain just isn't one.

one lonely night in davenport
& i swear i couldn't miss you more
but ill find these lines a lie tomorrow
when i stretch to wretched depths of sorrow
as i follow freight trains through the great plains
& pray things stay the same way

but the future ******* frightens me
cuz life seems such a sight to see
so i'm running from it (rightfully).

slip into misunderstanding
it’s the safest place around
six feet from communication
deep beneath the ground

elaborate tunnels
crawling seasons from reason
cavernous cave-ins
dirt and words to breathe in

sink into mud
skin scraped off by roots
each handful of earth
digs further from truth

skeletal structures
empty vessels abandoned
decaying to marrow
from hazardous habits

shovel your safety
and leave it behind
your dirtclod disinterest
is unsympathized

there was an awkward silence
as i walked the islands
as i tiptoed my dry lips
across the tops of your eyelids
& i got my lips wet in the
depths of your retina

as i stepped along the beach again
my hands dipped in your sea of skin
as i breathed in your summer scent,
carried through air like whispered winds,
my fingers played with every pore
& ill linger here forever more

lets get all our problems dead and buried
but wed still linger for weeks in the cemetery
each tombstone marked with an argument
that will never rise up from the ground again

but we'd still stay there searching for zombies
the walking dead words that still harbor longing
because we're still chained to decaying corpses
of angry verbs that helped push us forward

& once were unbound from those severed limbs
& link our reaching hands together instead
we can leave the graveyard through the iron gates
& step into a love which we cannot escape

sprinting slow & solemnly
from bottom feeding apologies
from breathing rotten memories
that i'd forgotten entirely
or so i repeat habitually
as the days recycle endlessly
like some explicitly persistent dream
but i'm gripping to this slippery sleep
because its better than remembering
its better than wishing that you miss me
& waking up alive but empty
everyday that you're not with me

your heart pumps kerosene
to your matchstick veins,
& maybe i imagined things,
but i remember your eyes as ember rings
& i can't wipe my memory clean
of the dingy debris--
the delicacies of your legs & knees--
this fire's not extinguishing!!
those ashes you disguise as eyelids
won't keep me from the iris
i know i'll find inside them

& i'll skim past your skin grafts
to your smoke-smothered stomach
then plummet to your flame-engraved pancreas
((scarred from swallowed promises)).
these propane x-rays
can't scan the barcodes
on the charcoals
that the holes in your heart hold

i'm always working for the weekend
& weakened from always working
& feeling worthless for returning
every morning
(bright & early)
& i wonder why my ribs are hurting
because my little felon heart
is rioting in his ivory prison
restless with the repetition
of this life that i call "living"

i want to kiss
your blossomed lips
until heaven rips apart
til the angels
have been strangled
by the swelling of my heart
til the ocean flows in
different rhythms
than the moon has given them
trustfully conducting
their obstructed innocence
& floods our love with sins

for years i've churned
through dirt for
the perfect words
but i keep hitting
the same old sacred
volcanoes of phrases:
some molten emotions
long left unspoken
that simmer in soil
til they spurt up like oil
& man's machines toil
to collect every speck
of that liquid that's left.
now there's not a noun for me
just my igneous ignorance.

you took my heart out of my chest
you cleansed the valves then stomped it dead
you took my brain out of my head
you spun it around and dizzied it
you ripped from my body every limb
you beat me with those fleshy sticks
you ripped my eyes from their sockets
you sliced my sight with steady hands
you stole my skull from off my neck
you cracked it like a feeble egg
you stole everything ive ever had
you slaughtered me through carelessness

i dream about you
when i'm standing up
waiting in line at the grocery store
your freckles are there
dancing circles around my pupils
your laugh echoing
down the ethnic food aisle
& when i get to the checkout
i've subconsciously slipped
a small bag of your favorite candy
into my basket

& it's like the other day
when a ladybug landed
on my enormous ugly nose
& the projector in my head
coughed up your windowsill
covered in those tiny spotted
good luck charms
& my drive that morning
was dedicated to other memories of ours...
barreling down the highway
with your singing voice
spilling from the speakers
& driving blind
with your smile stretched
across the windshield,
billboards blasting past
plastered with ads
about your ankles
as i travel through the tunnels
you are flowing through my veins

& work is worse
oh look
this customer's pinky toe
is about the same size as yours
oh & her name!
it starts with the same letter as yours!
wow what are the odds
you've got ahold of my whole heart
each of the four chambers
is labeled with the letters
of your last name

i'm ******* losing it.

i remember
when we were younger
& you'd scrape into your arms
searching for bones or soul or something more
than what you thought you had inside
& i would lie about my life
to get you to look into my eyes
but neither ever worked for us
lost causes in the search for trust
& you used to walk with your arms crossed
to make another layer to your heart
or better yet a barrier to keep the two of us apart
& that barrier you learned to build
worked better than the beer & pills
& **** & coke & ecstasy i put between you & me
because i guess we were just afraid
of the weight behind that sacred phrase:
to be in the heavy hand of love's command
& that ambulance that tried to rinse
the toxins from my coughing valves
as you got a ticket coming quickly
to see the extent of my crippled kidneys
i wonder if you understand
i just wanted you to miss me...
& all those many many arguments
so drunk, frustrated & intense
those glass-punching pancake conflicts
a competition with no confidence
that i laugh about now that things are different
now that you've forgotten my existence
& i've gotten used to this division
but at least now i know it's true
i don't think i'll get over you
until my lips are cold & blue