one time it was two am and i was outside a bar
when the air was just crisping from its summer bake
and naked trees matched shivering girls in micro-dresses
you asked if i lived in the city
i was a pumpkin-beer-drunken, kohl-smeared mess
so i grinned sloppily and fumbling, lit a cigarette
while i replied "for now"
how ******* mysterious am i?
i am patronizing this well-meaning boy in a polo shirt
but thank god for liquor cause luckily
he laughed and snorted smoke out his nostrils
"heading somewhere?"
i took another drag and exhaled
maybe for emphasis?
am i that ******* contrived?
"i'm thinking australia?"
there that felt sincere
did it look sincere?
and he asks why of course he asks why and now
i can laugh and say
"it's very far away"
because jesus christ i need to pretend i have depth i guess
i'm a mirage begging for substance
he taps his cigarette and grins at the ground
"running away from problems?" he asks, suddenly mischievous
i try to match his smile but i have to think fast because
i don't have the kind of problems that make you run away
my family is loving, big, rooted
my friends are devoted, they better me
i could stay in comfort if i had the patience but
my feet just want new pavement
and my eyes are snow-blind by now
so i demure, i think.
if that eyebrow quirk and downcast gaze
is what demurring is
captain morgan chucks my chin and i am
all smiles again
i stick the cigarette in my lips and spread my
arms wide
"i prefer to think of it as running towards different problems."
i smile the way i know shows off my dimples
because i can't help but be a facade
i guess he's charmed because he texted me a few times
for the next few weeks
until my silence
exhausted his interest
he failed the test marx talks about
no not that one
groucho
i don't want anyone who would want me
since i'd rather be a story
sooner a paper-thin memory
than an illusion revealed.

Peace for Christmas
is what I want the most
there are plenty of glasses around here to toast
make wishes for love and light in your life
peace is what I believe Christmas defines

Forget your religion, it matters for nothing
I want to make my Christmas wish matter for something

So whether Christian, Muslim, Buddhist or Sikh
Jewish, atheist, Pagan, Hindu or simply unique
let peace be the binding factor that we humans all seek
for we are all one skeleton, with the potential for peace

"what's that? you can't get out of your bed?
too weak to be alive, too lazy to be dead?
well! take your zoloft effectively
just inhibit reuptake selectively
and soon you'll have the energy
to end your life impulsively
or be rid of feelings entirely
a chipper, cheery half-zombie"

"your panicking fits interfere with your day?
i'll lay out a feast, a benzo-buffet
ativan, klonopin, xanax oh my!
not just for those who are too scared to fly!
pop two and kiss all of your worries goodbye
and your memory, too, if you come to rely
on hours spent watching your life pass by
just try and object through that stubborn tongue-tie"

"your circadian rhythm is not quite right
you're asleep with the sun and awake in the night
so take one of these twice before closing your eyes
and wait for the dreams that will doubtless arise
too vivid and real to know truth from lies
and the nightmares will be an unpleasant  surprise
but stopping abruptly is duly unwise
so just find your stars in trazodone skies"

A truck pulls into the driveway I'd just walked by, and
Three men, bulky, hat brims casting shadows over their watching eyes,
Three men clamber out, boots heavy, lips twisted into snarls -
Three men with meaty fingers, built with rusted screws and gnarled wood,
Warped as their rotted minds, full of parasites feasting on whatever knowledge once was consumed.

Dry wheezing breaths push out beside me from a bench I pass by, and
Two men, fingers cracking, gripping their canes with too much strength,
Two men, wrinkles twisting, grin with rows of yellow-brown teeth and black gaps -
Two men, hunched over, cloudy eyes pinned to my back, and
Wheezing grows faster, uneven, a croaking whisper of a snicker, a laugh, trailing after me.

Footsteps thunder behind me through the bathroom door, and
One man, teapot stout but not so dainty, instead gut bulging, too close,
One man, beady black eyes digging, gorging, his swinging belly gurgles -
One man with a squirming pink worm of a tongue, tracing engorged sausage-fat lips,
Fat as his constant hunger for flesh, full of grumbling cravings as he lumbers through the room, stalking.

I run, I duck, I hide -
Only my asthma chases me.

it comes
when you're reading one of those books
written by pseudo intellectuals buried
in their despondent lookout on life

comes when
       They're writing on human's self-sabotaging nature,
when they're peeling
layers off and off, revealing the
truth of ourself like they're
       gods,
Hermes the messenger, or angels, Michael,
bringing to us thoughts we'd never have grown organically
     that's what they believe,
          what they tell themselves as they prune their feathers with pride
as they impregnate you with the god honest truth
and how did you live before knowing this?
it's been with you all along, kicking and breathing and pushing
     you just didn't know it, yet,
but now you can as
they preach their outlooks like it's a message that
changes everything, that your life will implode as your mind
wakes itself up -
     they try to baptize you
          gripping your throat with their
     carpel tunnel fingers, reading glasses
slipping down their noses as they lean over

you, watching their words pour into
you, their victims' throat, as they will it
and all the while they blame
you, because:

Humans make themselves miserable
     They write
They bury themselves in all they hate and
choose to burn all they love until
they're alone and self-loathing and scarred
unrecognizable
     They write
Of our hatred for humanity
for every single individual that surrounds us and
How we surround ourselves with them
with crowded supermarkets and lanes of traffic because
they fuel our suffering and
That's all we crave
     They write
On our thirst for blood
our lust for ****, ******, war on
How our society is fueled by violence and how
we bathe in it with a grin
stretched across dry  bleeding lips
sharp teeth that rip through our neighbors' flesh
with delight
     They write
that we're alone in suffering and surrounded by hate and
we're wild animals driven to war
out of boredom and
That's human nature in a nutshell
That's the truth revealed
          nasty, gritty, honest
     They write
and that's when

it comes, that gnawing in the
     pit of your stomach, that
scratching in the back of your mind
     that claws its way
          down into your throat where it
     *squeezes

my body is not a temple
it is not some sacred holy place
    commanding respect
    and receiving as much.

it is not a sanctuary
    open and accepting and
warm for those who are welcomed
a quiet home for lost souls.

it is not a shield, or a cage
    or a home, or a journal
    or a dead language
    or a canvas.

my body is nothing,
    feels like nothing,
feels wrong and sad and unwelcoming -
my body is a shack
a wrecked interpretation of a house

my body is a shack in the cold
no heat to provide anyone who passes by
    empty and crooked,
    creaking in the wind,
leaky roof and broken windows,
a wrecked impression of a house
it asks for no visitors, and no visitors ask for it

and it sits, alone, not knowing the warmth of the temple,
    of the sanctuary, of the house
but sometimes it - my body - wonders, craves
not the desire of visitors, but the desire to desire,
a yearning to know a yearning,
    just some spark of familiarity
    just some hint of desire for company
    and the ability to change to the home it is told it can be inside
inside this wrecked imitation of a house.

Diagonal insertion of myself into this room we call the present moment
its never gonna go to collections baby, obviously checked it in for a week
we found static in the interruption caused by your radio towers and traps
and what you say, is not true- i see whose driving the hearse, shotgun
appeal to the old me. satisfy my hungering for those other things please

and tho i told you not to bother to call her, you did and just to say you did
don't blame you because you are a good time, perforated into tiny fragments
its not legal but this pedestal fits me like a glove, too much for the initiation
but our doubts, are all left in yesterday. how i follow you home after ever show
come help me hack off the vines and roots after every night of this spilling myself

skips on the record, please don't forget me, i won't forget you, how could i
youre just a missed cherry ash falling on my leg, burning me holes through
saying what you want to say, sorry that i don't reply, see me in the morning
shuddering on my favorite words, while screaming death to the secretion !
first we go spinning out                  then go smashing painted stained glass !