I don't think you exist
there, it's been said out loud
please don't hate me

I envy nature
that has not yet trapped itself
in the cage of time

I envy those birds
They have not yet trapped themselves
In the cage of time.

Church bells.
That's my first memory.
Waking up to the sound of church bells
with a rawness in my throat
and stiffness in my cheeks
that could only come
from crying myself to sleep the night before

The sun is leaking through the window binds,
painting the entire room this muted sepia
corraling much of the sunlight into a few distilled beams
that spotlight dust and dead skin
waltzing in the air

I haven't the faintest clue about what
or why I'd been crying -
just laying there
overwhelmed with great relief
like a mausoleum was lifted from my chest
and I was taking my first breath in months

I want to say it was a Sunday
I always want to say it with conviction
but that might just be the church bells
which I've heard
ring every day

I killed Jehovah.
Now slay your Jabberwocky
only then - true peace.

In a sharp night light
shaking away a long sleep
the moonflower wakes

The still quiet of the empty apartment
serves to only echo the steady tapping
of rainwater dripping onto the concrete
just outside the window

Everything feels like it should be painted
by Picasso, during his blue period
in various shades of the clam, but icy color

The fact that it isn't
gives the soul a sense of nervous
displacement. All of these commonplace
colors and shapes feel foreign and surreal

The world seems like it should be frozen
in both the sense of stillness and temperature
but it’s not

A warm breeze is moving the bland, beige curtains
and that is more terrifying than any monster
that has never hidden under your bed

The rainwater still drips, and echoes
and nothing is wrong, out of place, or eerie
except that it should be

and so it is

go to sleep
godless heap -
goddess leap
...gotta sleep

It's 2am,
for Siddartha's sake,
you ain't gonna find zen
at the other end of this computer screen.
******, I mean -

No creative dam is gonna break open tonight
(this morning)
you're all stopped up, or drained
so just stop drying.

Seriously, quit diddling with your self
doing that horrid poemry
(po-mory? poor-merry? potpourri? poopoory?)

just fu-cking
go
     to                                     (*******)
         sleep.

Every night I brush my teeth,
I lift up the blankets that hang over the side of my bed
and hesitantly peek underneath.
I sigh with relief.
No monsters tonight. I tell myself.
My finger lingers on the switch that turns the night light on.
Part of me knows I’m being irrational.
There is no good reason for a grown *** man to be afraid of the dark.
I tell myself, in my father’s voice.
But there’s a part of me, much deeper, underneath the fear even,
that enjoys playing this game.
It makes me feel young again.
It reminds me of a time before dorms, term papers,
bosses, deadlines, and death - looming eerily in the distance
Getting closer every year that I look over my shoulder,
before we learned that life wasn’t meant to be enjoyed,
only suffered and survived.
A time before the march toward Oblivion, in funny looking suits,
with high hopes that we can trick someone into thinking that we belong here
In this grotesque parade of strangers in masks.

I hide under my covers with a flashlight and old comic books.
Holding back laughter, with imaginary fear of waking the ghosts of my parents
who I  often thought of sleeping in the other room,
just like they did before they died,
One of old age, the other in a mid-life crisis motorcycle accident,
Leaving me the empty house with her romance novels
and his extensive **** collection.
I remind myself that I have work in the morning
which quickly drags me down from my euphoric nostalgia.

I put Spiderman back in his plastic case
and stick him in the dresser drawer
full of all my guilty pleasures and memories of  yesterday.
I then remove my mask and crawl under the bed,
where no one thinks to look for us anymore,
and drift into fantasies full of all those familiar faces
of my Neverland.

It was found today
The body of a woman
Killed softly by life.

It was found today
An old leather-bound journal
All its pages – blank

It was found today
A leaf, crumbling the sun
Scattered by the wind.

I was immortal once,
believe me, you, I was
invincible.
And back when I was immortal
I used and play hopscotch on the clouds
high above New York City Traffic
and laugh every time I caught myself
on the edge.

I used to play hide and seek
with the truth

I'd hide in the bedroom closet
of this muse
and be there when
she’d come home after a long day's inspiration.
I’d watch her undress
searching her naked self in the mirror
like something was missing
but she never did find it.
I think she knew I was there
yeah, she knew.

I used to race with shooting stars
I won once
but I cheated
so it doesn’t count.

I used to dance with The Moon all night
she moved my waters
and I took her virginity.
Ours was a love of necessity.

I kissed The Sun.
She blushed
and The Moon got jealous.

Then I met God,
the most beautiful of all my conquests.
I knew no one else would quite match up to her.
She and I made man together.
It was parenthood that tore us apart.

Yeah, I was immortal once
but now,  
now I’m just waiting to die
like everybody else.

The first time we met
was on the playground
at Lakeshore Park.
You were six
and I was seven.
You shared your ice-cream cone with me -
Vanilla-Chocolate Swirl.

We met again a decade later
in high school,
neither of us remembered the incident at the park
until our parents showed us pictures
of us covered in the stuff
holding hands.

We stayed best friends for a three years
because I was too chicken-**** to ask you out
but somewhere along the way
our unbreakable bond came undone
you drifted off to some Ivy League school
and I stayed here
convinced I could find another way out.

After that, I pretty much forgot all about you.

That is until today,
I was at the park with my niece,
and I thought about you
I sent you a message on Facebook -
asking if you were back in town.

Then, in anticipation of our reunion,
I read what people were posting on your wall:

“Rest in Peace. You will be missed.”

…****.

Found on the beach this morning
by New Floridian tribesman
were sea-softened pieces
of the torch
the stone lady held
ages ago
before we found out
that freedom was just as imaginary
as any other silly idea we've ever had.

They propped them up
against what was left of the old Mouse-Man monument
their edges touching in a way
so that they may together provide shade
to any passing child of the wasteland.

Sometimes I wish for power to go out.
Be it a down power line, a blackout,
or simply a bill that wasn’t paid on time.
That way we would have an excuse to break out
those scented candles I got you for Christmas last year.
The apartment will fill with its fruity aroma
and I’d know why you never lit them.

We’d laugh, as we re-learn to navigate our living room,
half-arguing over whose idea it was
to put that table there.
I’d knock over that hideous lamp your mother gave you,
insisting that it was an accident, and that you didn’t really like it either,
So now, at least we have an excuse to trash it,
‘Cause I know how much you hate to throw things away.
That’s why I’m still here.
Not that I’m complaining.

We’d make up games to pass the time,
like “Would you ever?”
“Would you ever kiss me in a dark room?” You’d ask.
I’d find your lips in the abyss and show you my answer.
A few hours later we’d play “Where’s my pants?”

Once dressed, we’d stumble our way over furniture
to get outside,
where we’d lay next to each other in the grass
which is a little wet, but we don’t care
and enjoy the stars without the distraction of the city lights.

We’d fall asleep this way,
I’d wake up in the morning next to you,
with my shirt on backwards,
my frown upside down,
and you still sleeping, sideways
with my head on my chest
and your leg wrapped around mine.

Electricity? Who needs it?
We make our own.

She's sitting in a nearby booth
telling her friends a story.
She says

"It was mid-day.
Like, noon.
Like, the sun was, like,
directly above us"

I was on my way out,
so I did not catch the rest
but I secretly imagine it sounded like this:

"We were, like. almost exactly half way through,
like this twenty-four-hour period.
It was the opposite of, like, midnight -
like, the opposite of crickets, gazing at stars
and contemplating the utter insignificance of,
like, all life on this planet."

"It was all, like, birds chirping, and like,
one single star in a blue sky,
so close and so bright that gazing at it would, like,
blind you or something."

"It was like this pure moment,
like, a rush of endorphins, or adrenaline.
like there was nothing
that mattered more
than the two of us,
there,
then,
like, around twelve P-M, to be specific"

"It was, like, you know, lunch time.
So I asked if they, like,
wanted to hang out,
grab something to eat, maybe,
or maybe, like,
you know, do something else
or whatever..."

Nobody knows the boulevards
and back roads of broken hearts
better than he who has been there
too many times and counting.
He loved to get lost in this neighborhood
practically growing up there
seeing his fair share of roads in need of repair
bridges built up and burned down
and train tracks leading everywhere
and nowhere.
Exactly where he was going
before he was distracted
by a pretty girl with a flirtatious smile
in a pink Corvette passing by.
Occasionally he’ll come to his senses
and head for the city exit
but before he’s home free
some dame, with a dangerous name convinces him to stay
and play cat and mouse.
Nobody know the boulevards
and back roads of broken hearts
like he.
and he still gets lost
in familiar territory.

there is a sunken silhouetted imprint
where you used to sleep
you’d spent so much time there in those last days
I don’t think it will ever forget you
things are not going to spring back
to the way they were before
no matter how much we want them to
try as we might not to
when we go
we leave behind residue
your room still smells like you
your fingerprints are still resting on your keyboard
your reading glasses, unfolded, lay on the night stand
beside your bed
next to your half-finished crossword puzzle book
and a pen
everything is just how you left it
but different
heavier maybe
plastic
like an elaborate stage full of props
like there’s no way this is real
but it is
and we can’t stand to look
at the world you left behind
at all of the residue
forced to contemplate the reality
that you are no longer in

Afterward,
I asked “Where to?”
“The beach?” She replied
“Too cold.” I said.
“Fine, whatever. Take me home, I guess.”
She’s too much like you.

Even now, ten years later,
she still swims in my old hoodie.
The pink and blue butterflies on her fingernails
barely escape the sleeves.

We’re sitting in the sand
she is looking at the water
as if searching for something far out in the distance.

Remember when we babysat
all those years ago?
She stole my hoodie
called it her “Cloak of Invincibility”.
She meant Invisibility,
we were watching Harry Potter.
Today, I wish it were the former.

“Are you going to tell my mom?” She asked.
“No.” I said “But you should.”
I wanted to tell her about what happened in ‘92
about her mother’s battle with depression
after a similar thing happened with her
but that’s your sister’s story to tell
so I did what you always say I should
and let the quiet between us be.

I watched the waves roll in
and crash against the shore.
I noticed heavy grey clouds heading toward us
“It’s going to rain” I said
“Let it.” she replied, with a calm acceptance.

She’s grown up so much
since the cancer took you from us.
You wouldn’t even recognize her.

She looks nothing like her mother
Or her father, for that matter
She looks
…well, she looks like you.
The spitting image.

“Why the beach?” I asked
after a long while of listening to the waves.
“This is where it happened.”
I felt an anger rise up through me
and I was already clenching my fists
before I realized there was no direction
for that aggression to go.

I took a deep belly breath,
and refocused.

“Why come back here?”
“to see if it felt different.”
“Does it?”
“…a little.”
More silence.

I watched her writing things in the sand
with a broken stick she found
and then pushing her palm across the words,
wiping the letters into each other,
cleaning the slate,
and again, writing in the sand.

“You know…” She said, finally,
“I was thinking for a while,
about keeping it.
if I had,
if it were a girl,
I would have named it after her."
she didn't have to say your name out loud
for me to know
“I miss her,” she added

"Me too".
The waves kept hitting the shore
and eventually, the rain came.

I drove her home,
she offered to give back my hoodie
“Keep it.” I said, smiling
she shrugged and took it with her.

On the way home,
I drove passed our old house
the new owners are letting the grass grow
too long for my taste.
It seems everything has been growing in your absence.
Except me.

be still - do not blink
I can’t wait to remember
this moment with you

one hundred kids drown -
Community is canceled-
what a sad world!

face lit by the screen
empty head, so full of thought
digging for some truth

aimlessly driving
through a beautiful landscape
made ugly by roads

I find my serenity
On the beach
Swinging alone
Nearly hypnotized
By the rhythmic squeaking
Of the metal chains
That keep my floating in the sky
Of my mind’s eye
I try and listen past it
For the sounds of the lake
Although I cannot hear them
Over the machines
Tearing down a nearby building
That used to be my school
I find the racket soothing
Interesting
The way the sounds clash
With the chain’s music

I open my eyes
It’s not a sunny day
Dark clouds are rolling in
Over the horizon
It’s going to rain
I don’t mind too much
As long as it’s a warm rain
I’d like that
If it’s not
I won’t complain
This moment
Won’t be any less perfect

17/30
long walk through a park
an abandoned swing set sits
waiting just for you

18/30
thump-thump-thump-thump
woosh-click-click-beep-thump-woosh-thu­mp
broken radio

Man, I'm just like so totally, like -
you know what I mean, man?
Like, everything is like, just so....
Ya'know man?
And everyone else is like,
Totally just like -
PSHHHH-
ya know what I mean man?
You know what I mean.

I dreamt I was visiting Heaven

There was a riot going on.
The entire city in an uproar.
Glass shattered all over the Golden streets.
Children, hiding under their mother's wings.

Nobody knew where God was.

In the middle of the city,
In an otherwise empty park
stood a large monument
to the Son and his chariot.

It was there,
at the feet of our savior,
I watched this angel
set their wings on fire.

The sign by their feet
in crudely written black marker, read:

“In solidarity with my brothers:
Who will burn forever for sins
I didn't have the freedom to commit.”

O death, I see you
walking slowly to my door
humming a sweet song

Sitting a corner booth by herself,
sipping on a Long Island Iced Tea
and reading Keats.
Hands down, she's the most
captivating person in this bar.

Fingertips calloused, and hands nicked and scraped
like she'd been in a fight with experience
and went down swinging.
Eased into her seat like slipping naked into a hot bath.
Smiled with all her teeth
like no one was looking.

Left her phone at home,
in pieces on the kitchen floor.
Tonight was the night she was going to forget all about the custody battle
the bill collectors
the late night fights about who was right
and who was left in the room with all this shattered glass to clean  up
the long sobbing nights with her pillow and her secret shame
the regret for time poorly spent looking for love in bars and cold blue eyes
the years that separated her from twenty-two –  when she was young and delusionally happy.

With her body language, she unknowingly spoke to me:
Tonight, I came to drink and dance.
Don't bother me with pick up lines.
Pick up artists, go find another canvas.
Mine's been painted over plenty.
I don't have the time to save anymore white knights from their mother's ***.
That fairytale story always ends in Shakespearean tragedy.
Plus, the **** horse leaves scuff marks on the dance floor.

I take one last sip
and slip the bartender an extra twenty-
tonight the nightingale drinks for free.

I leave before she can thank me.

On cement pillows
resting for revolution
nearby, the grass grows

He sat there behind the table,
with his glasses sitting on his nose,
and his skin sitting on his bones - both loosely,
the way you’d expect someone to sit
after 75 years of good, but hard, living.

“The trick is-” he said
deliberately pausing to shift the weight of the sentence
toward the upcoming words
“you have to wipe away all the things you don't want to see."
He said this as he scribbled his name
inside my new copy of his old book
smiling in that gentle old man way.

I scampered away like a schoolboy
feeling like an idiot
having rambled at him
in my best impression of a scholar
- like a kid wearing his dad’s oversized suit.

I talked at him about
how well he captures a moment in poetry
like this former US Poet Laureate
wasn’t aware of his talent
and I was somehow the first
delivering the good news.

As I wander the campus,
having escaped my embarrassment
I think back to a poem he read tonight
about watching an old couple sharing a sandwich.
It was an ode to love,
an image you can see in any sit down restaurant,
literally anywhere in America.
He focused in on this couple,
in this diner
at this moment
apart from time, like a moving still life
forever framed by his words.

He wiped away the screaming kid
and its overwhelmed mother in the booth to the left,
the table of teenagers playing hooky to their right,
and the underpaid twnetysomething waitress
who clearly didn’t want to be there anyway.

He wiped away all of that distraction
and unearthed this beautiful moment
this pure example of true love-
A sandwich cut from corner to corner
by the shaking hands of a man
whose glasses sit upon his face
and skin upon his bones
all the way you expect a man to
with woman he’s loved for forty years
with whom he shares everything.

I think about the moments I have missed
the poems never writ
because I was staring at the waitress,
who clearly didn’t want to be there anyway.

I once heard this somewhere;
that there are only two stories:
A boy leaves home
and a stranger comes to town.

Sometimes I lie
in my bed and think about the strangers.
I think about how terrifying some strangers are.
How we tell our children to run and hide
from what they don’t know;
to stay where it’s safe
here, at home
with their stories untold.

I think of how lost those strangers must feel
with no one who will talk to them.
I think about the darkest villains of childhood lore.
How they all started out as children
afraid of reaching out and changing anything.

I think of how hard is must have been for them
as young adults, to built up the courage
and tell their parents they were leaving
against their wishes
to explore the world
and find the role they were meant to play.

I think
of the stories
hiding in between the boy
and the stranger.
The conversations they wished they could have
if only time weren’t so stubborn
and bent over backwards sometimes
for special cases,
like true love or some karmic mistake.

I think of all of the heroes and their journeys
and that how inevitably, at some point
they are going to be the stranger coming to town.

I think about where I live.
How many stories I’ve heard and told
that are heavy on one side.
I both envy and pity those who live the stories.
Those little boys leaving home;
they know how strange the world really is
and what it’s like
to strike fear in the townsfolk of some distant village;

Where it’s probably nicer this time of year.

My first memory is of dying.
I felt like I'd lived a full life
And now I was gladly fading away.
My first last words were
"Tell Elizabeth I love her"
I don't remember knowing Elizabeth.
I love her though, or at least I did in that moment.

The next thing I recall is being twelve
Sitting on the toilet in the girls' room,
thinking to myself:
"It looks like there was a war in my ******"
I sat in there by myself until the last bell
Too embarrassed to face the classroom of sharks
With their hungry eyes fixed on me - bleeding in the water.

Which makes me think of another first -
I was eighteen, never smoked **** or even drank ***** before.
"Son, there's a time and place for everything - and that's college"
my dad always said. So I took his advice.
I ate like 3 of those mushrooms.
I saw music, like music notes, coming out out the stereo.
They tasted like stars - like longing and hope.

Like how felt outside of that reststop in North Dakota.
When I ran away from the boarding school with Sofia.
We sat there on that bench in the rain.
Hand in hand - a truest love we would let no adult tell us wasn't real.
We were whole in that moment.
A wholeness I'd never know again.
One time, after going down on me
She told me I tasted like music.
I laughed out loud
I didn't know why.

She broke my heart.
I was a business tycoon,
A man of great wealth
I could have anyone I wanted,
but not her.  
She didn't know what she wanted. She needed guidance.
So I found her, and we both got what we really wanted.
I always get what I want...
...I don't like this memory.

I was one hundred and thirty seven
Days sober.
When I got the news.
My only daughter -
Barely a woman.
My fragile little doll -
Was ripped to pieces  by monsters.
No reason.
Just evil being evil
No one can deny who they really are for too long.
Some people are serial killers,
Some are heroes,  
Some are alcoholics.

I don't remember much about that night.
I woke up the next day,
and I was 21 - officially.
I'd probably have felt better if I wasn't so hungover.

I'd puked in the store's bathroom.
My nerves were shot.
My body was shaking.
I couldn't believe what just happened
- this was just a part time job to pay off student loans.
This Is not the **** I signed up for-
The guy came in - skimask and all, like out of a ******* movie -
His gun pointed directly at my head.
demanding all of the money in the register.
I reached for the panic button, all subtle like they taught us in that half hour seminar...

"You press threat button kid, you die today - now give me the money and this will all be over soon -"
I recall saying in the most macho voice I could muster.
I didn't want to shoot her. Hell, she looked cute, I'd rather date her.
But that would be another life.
One I can't afford to ponder.
This was the reality.
I had to do this -
She had what I wanted - what I needed.
It's dog eat dog out here.

"Good girl"
Shadow dropped the bone at my feet.
I picked it up and tossed it back into the endless grass
As it spun like boomerang in the air -
For some reason, couldn't tell you why,  I thought about Frankenstein's Monster.

Some parts are really fuzzy,
I hold it close to me - the fuzzy parts against my skin.
It's a quilt blanket, stitched together of pieces and parts of found cloth.
My father made it for me.
My very last first birthday gift.
I cocoon myself in it like a womb.

A black and white film
About an old man and his dog.
There is no dialogue.
Just ambient sounds -

First, of the alarm clock’s
monotonous song.
Followed by an abrupt
cutting silence as his hand slams
down on the snooze button

Then, the sound of a coffeemaker
spitting and burbling.
The coffee, pouring into a chipped mug.
Sugar, then milk,
the clink of the spoon against the ceramic
as he stirs
the long first sip

As the man looks curiously
at something on the fridge,
just out of frame.
A bag of dogfood opening.

hard kibble ringing against the metal dish.
The dog grumbling - impatiently waiting.
Tupperware  opening
The hum of a microwave, and the beep.
Last night’s stew poured into a bowl
the rest, over the kibble.

The closed caption reads:
[Enthusiastic, sloppy eating noises]

The sound of water running
as the bowls are scrubbed clean.

The door closing as the two leave
for their morning walk.
The old man and the dog
are now sitting on a park bench.

The grass, still wet from the morning dew.
There is a beautiful sunrise
over the nearby lake.

The camera pulls away,
as music overtakes the diegetic sounds
of nearby parkgoers, birds and runners,
and teens playing hooky.

The camera cuts back to for a beat
to the kitchen
in the empty house.

The camera zooms in on a weathered
and well loved piece of paper
held up by a rainbow magnet
on the refrigerator door.

Fade to a black screen,
with white letters:
Fin.

She squishes the pill bug
with the tip of her shoe
giving it a nice twist at the end
to be sure the deed was done.

She stares for a long while
at what must have looked like a Rorschach test
speckled with bits of recognizable body parts -
legs and guts as such-
as if searching for the bigger picture
it must have been hiding.

She jumps back into her self
when she recognizes the voice of a little boy
calling from the swing set nearby.

She looks exhausted
like she's spent all day carrying the world
and this is a rare moment
when the universe allows her to sit down.

She reluctantly rises from her semi-comfortable bench.
and shuffles toward the impatient child
who is now screaming wordlessly for her.

She's been dealing with this behavior for a long time
you can tell because the pterodactyl screeches he's emitting
that send the nearby blind man's dog into fits
don't phase her at all.

She grabs the metal ropes of the swing,
pulling him back to the highest point of the pendulum,
and lets go.

The little siren boy falls immediately silent
his eyes slowly shut
His face melts into what can only be described
as the untarnished bliss we all misplaced,
or packed away somewhere in the attic
with all those old picturebooks,
long ago.

He's flying.
For the first time all day,
she doesn't have to fake a smile.

Her forehead is planted against the glass
window of her school bus
her curly black hair
tied to false extensions, and pulled back into a pony-tail

The rain beats against the bus window
there's almost a rhythm to it
the chatter of the bus populace being almost lyrics
and the engine being almost the passionate guitar
this morning is almost a song

Bright pink ear-buds separate her
from the almost music

She looks like she's staring at something
that dimly glows off in the distance
it's something she knows she can never have

He pairs kinds of rain with kinds of jazz
like some folks do with wine and cheese.

He says a thunderstorm goes best with bebop
Especially if you can time the record just right
for the drums to explode just as the sky does

He says free jazz is for those unpredictable days,
where the rain keeps coming,
but will ebb and flow at it's own pace

He says a light Sunday drizzle is the perfect time
to pull out Miles Davis' Birth of the Cool,
and sip slowly on the moment

I think he may be a synesthete.

Mist in the morning air
collects heavy on the neck
of a blade of grass

Remember that chick
who pulled her hair back in a ponytail
had glasses
and wore ripped jeans
that she Sharpied murals on
out of boredom.

You’d see her in class sometimes
mumbling to herself
and doodling
while the teacher droned on
about the scientific method
and she always made you curious
but you could never get close enough
to hear what she was saying
or see what she was writing.

She promised herself that one day
she’d keep a diary
to keep track of the truth
but every time she tried
it turned into a collection of
half-thought-poems
and half-drawings of half-things
half-human and half-something else.

Never autobiographical
never the truth.

She seemed like the kind of girl
who is a self proclaimed vegan
scrawny little thing
with ex-hippie parents
like if you ever talked to her
she would be all in for face
about “going green man.”

So she took you by surprise
when she beat the fattest kid in the class
at that hot-dog eating contest
that chubby ******* didn’t stand a chance.

She told me one day
that she thinks
the truth is just the lie
that you tell yourself the most often.

People called her “book-smart”
because she wore glasses
and was bad at math.
But she wasn’t really.

She was people-smart
in the way a scientist is rat-smart.

She’d sit on the swings at recess
and watch people
her eyes were concerned
like there was something they had
that she lacked.

Her locker was always empty
she took everything home
every night
she left
no residue
no aftermath
no memory behind.

She dreamed of living out of her car
and opening a coffeeshop
and being free.

She knew she was destined
to prove there was no such thing as destiny.
That we make our own reality.

And all of this you found
endearing and admirable.

Remember that chick?

...of course you don't.

Remember that chick
who pulled her hair back in a ponytail
had glasses
and wore ripped jeans
that she Sharpied murals on
out of boredom?

You’d see her in class sometimes
mumbling to herself
and doodling
while the teacher droned on
about the scientific method.

She always made you curious
but you could never get close enough
to hear what she was saying
or see what she was writing.

She promised herself that one day
she’d keep a diary
to keep track of the truth
but every time she tried
it turned into a collection of
half-thought-poems
and half-drawings of half-things
half-human and half-something else.

Never autobiographical
never the truth.

She seemed like the kind of girl
who is a self proclaimed vegan
scrawny little thing
with ex-hippie parents
like if you ever talked to her
she would be all in for face
about “going green man.”

So she took you by surprise
when she beat the fattest kid in the class
at that hot-dog eating contest
that chubby ******* didn’t stand a chance.

She thinks
the truth is just the lie
that you tell yourself the most often.

People called her “book-smart”
because she wore glasses
and was bad at math.
But she wasn’t really,
she was people-smart
in the way a scientist is rat-smart.

She’d sit on the swings at recess
and watch people
her eyes were concerned
like there was something they had
that she lacked.

Her locker was always empty
she took everything home
every night
she left
no residue
no aftermath
no memory behind.

She dreamed of living out of her car
and opening a coffeeshop
and being free.

She knew she was destined
to prove there was no such thing as destiny.
That we make our own reality.

And all of this you found
endearing and admirable.

Remember her?

…of course you wouldn’t.

You would have her more like this:

That weird nerd who doesn’t talk to anyone.
has long hair and draws on his pants,
is awkward in every conceivable way
- and possibly gay.

He spends all day in his notebook,
writing who-knows-what.
Who cares -

- about what his dreams were?
He was just another background character in your life.

There was one time you cheered him on,
at the hot-dog eating contest.
The only time you ever touched his hand
was to give him a high five for that.

You always pitted him.
silently.
Never out loud.

She was there.
Hiding behind his eyes.
And she loved you.
As much as one could love someone in seventh grade.

But you never loved her.
You couldn’t have.

She didn’t even know she existed yet.

Meet me, once again, at the breakwall
where we will spend time sitting
reminiscing about times we spent wishing
on a sinking star for more time to spend.

Let’s go fishing for our selves
in snapshots of past lives
and see if we can find,
in this murky water of nostalgia,
some kind of definition.

We will quest forth, finding more questions
than answers, and accepting them
with a peaceful resignation
we could never have in our raging youth.

I’d talk about how
we used to debate
with our words
carved into primitive weapons
for savage discussion -

To win arguments with each other
doing battle for days
not realizing that language
was not evolved for the purpose of combat
but rather, the opposite.

We’d watch the waves wash ashore
all the places and people we’d been
all the bits and pieces of past tragedies
will lay before us
like a thousand-year-old shipwreck.

We will laugh together
the way you do,
when you see the heavy black clouds
storming off toward a distant somewhere
and they seem smaller somehow
less frightening.

You’d say something about how
we were the most obsessed with our mortality
when we were furthest from ever facing it.

And we’ll sit there for a while
just thinking about that.

Once upon a time
This was known as "the river of many fish"
We are told this as children
like it's a fairytale
our parents, trying not to laugh
as they tell us of a time
long before their own
when this was the place to be
If you wanted to be somebody
you came to the town with the name you can't pronounce
and you could have your American Dream
Newly free men and women
arrived early and bright at our train station
their sleeves rolled up and heads held high
ready to kickstart their lives.
The gears of industry were turning here
in the land of wine and covered bridges.
Once upon a time
there was a trainwreck here
a lot of people lost their lives
even more lost their way
as time rusted over the wheels of progress
and our water
once so full of hope and prosperity
caught fire and burned for miles in all directions
scorching the water, and suffocating the fish
Today
this is "the river of much pollution"
We have always known it as such
A town were depression is both
a hereditary emotional and economic condition
Where pessimism is our only tradition
The train station no longer operates
The free man's grandchildren's children are up before the birds
trying to find a way to kickstart their high
chasing the American Delusion
"Ashtabula does not have a drug problem"
The police told a friend of mine
as her two year old daughter looked on curiously
at a strung out stranger who wandered into their home
and took their bathroom hostage for two hours
He shook uncontrollably
His eyes overflowing with emptiness
By the time the cops showed up, he was long gone
tossed back into the river
The fish in this water have nothing to lose
If evolution is true, we can sprout legs and lungs
crawl onto dry land and breathe
but the current prevents it here
It's hard to see the glass as half full
when you can't drink the water
I suppose we could drink the wine instead
and stumble inside of a bridge
seeking shelter from the toxic rain

Sometimes I look through snapshots of my past lives.
The edges of each photograph tinged yellow by time.
I barely recognize myself.
A stranger with my blue eyes.

There's no use in wondering what he'd think of me today.
He will never have to face my decisions.
He will never stand trial for them.
I couldn't care less what he thinks.
He's long since died.
Replaced by several incarnations who also have passed
on the road to becoming me.

These relics, tokens of breath taken,
remind me to keep in mind the person I will become.

What will I happen across in an attic box
someday, lifetimes from now?
Will what I leave for the future me
be enough to bridge the gap?
Will he remember me?
Or will I be a faint ghost in the back of his mind?

I guess only he can answer those questions,
and when I become him, I will.

Until then,
I linger too long on an old picture of myself -
This boy, he has promise.
I think he's going somewhere.

Old gentle vague dark sea
stars uncoffined above
my drummer grave
blind of age,
meet Mr. Numb Feelgood
he is dying - chasing smoke,  
following a blind parade
wanderin’ anywhere forked like Yes
at every dusty, homely, strange-eyed landmark
until driven deep down dead

Dear old diamonds,
my sleepy southern song spell fades ,
my past was a young clown
dancing, swingin' my magic heels
raging and cursing death’s grip on time

Now, I feel that morning’s fierce burn
vanishing into a tambourine memory
and I’m caught madly dreaming
against the ragged anywhere
to return green tomorrow

She is
faded blue jeans
with holes in the knees
a ***** white t-shirt
covered in mustard stains and engine grease
on any given Saturday

She is
black fingernail polish on a Tuesday
because she wants people to wonder
short skirts in church
to make the choir boys’ minds wander

She is
jealous of the girl who has
the boy she didn’t want
the lies she tells her friends
about the guy she hasn’t slept with yet
misplaced like lost money
unexpected, but refreshingly so

She is
a tongue piercing that she got when she was ******
that she takes out around authority figures
‘cause her parents do not know
the mistakes she will evidently make
as she will learn and grow
eventually going to tell them the truth
maybe

She is
trying to make you uncomfortable
just to see you squirm

She is
intelligent, and strong in her demeanor
throwing off the curve in all her classes
expelled for kicking some cheerleaders’ *****
in love with her history teacher

She is
poetry that breaks all the rules
the girl all the bad guys want
but won’t admit to
a guilty pleasure

She is
all of the above
none of it
and more

Beauty deep like
Mother Earth's
takes more than seven days

Thumbing through yellowed
crumbling pages of schoolbooks
meeting ghosts in the margins

Across the court yard
The amorous twentysomethings
Open their window for the first time

They let the sun shine in -
They do not believe in curtains -
They let the sunshine in

He is Adonis
She is Mona Lisa
I hate them so much

It’s five in the morning
Our child screams us awake
Meanwhile, they sleep until noon

Passing by the window
I glimpse at the lovers entwined
“Not tonight” you yawn

Our friends are laughing
About what, we cannot tell
All we see is their love

He brings her breakfast in bed
Maybe it’s a birthday present? I suggest
Or he ******* up, bigtime - you reply cynically

They’ve become background noise
Only witnessed in passing
Or referenced in our idle conversation

A few weeks have passed
Their room is empty and still
We almost forget they were ever there

She sits on her bed and stares at nothing
She has not moved for hours –
A lonely still life

Adonis is waning
His eyes are sinking, and he’s losing hair
He’s become a walking skeleton

He does not move much these days
All of the time, she waits by his side
For whatever comes next

I keep telling you
That he will soon recover
I have to believe this

He's sitting up today
Telling jokes and laughing,
She's cracking that famous smile

The room is now full
With what must be family and friends
Saying their goodbyes

She is being cradled
by, I think, her mother – or aunt
We weep along

The guests are now long gone
The silence settles like dust
She holds his hand while he fades

Soon, it will be just her (and us)
Left in this quiet room
Alone

Autopoiesis.
Autocorrect: Autopsies?
Such a pessimist.

The sensitive arch of her soul
tickles with longing
for reunion with fresh cut Spring grass

The dark and humid trappings of unnatural comfort,
man-made warmth for a bitter season,
makes her free-sprinting spirit claustrophobic

And although she can see the gleaming snow for miles
and can appreciate the appeal of a nice blanket
She hates shoes,
how heavy they can become on long walks -
a soggy burden in the name of convenience

She sees the grass peaking out form under it's Winter covers
and her Nike wings twitch with anticipation
for a sweet chance to shed superfluous layers

Until then
She blues dances in the dark
looking for a faint spark
and in her dreams, she runs
through wild fires

Snake-boy’s arrival
has ****** everything up.

People are in a frenzy
some curious to see how their personalities
are going to dramatically change.
Some just curious to see what the tabloids will say about them now.

Others are forming an angry mob
in defense of nostalgia.
They haven’t been this ******* since
Pluto stopped being a planet.

These are the great injustices people get riled up about.
Nothing is more important to man
than the talk of gods and destiny.

We will **** for the things we cannot touch.
It’s in our worse nature
to look up at the sky and make meaning from the emptiness.
Just as it is in our worse nature to fight about what that meaning is.

So, here we are,
In midst of the ever changing chaos of the universe,
which far more interesting than what they may have to say
about our terribly insignificant lives,
caught up in our own imaginations.

Like children,
we make up our own games
and we don’t like it
when other kids change the rules.

Despite the fact that other children are starving
and other children are sleeping and dying in the cold
and real things,
horrible things, tragic little things
still happen.

We don’t think about them nearly as much.
They aren’t intangible gods, or destiny
yet, they affect the us more
and they are not
beyond our reach.

Summer death lingers
in the air, corpse leaves fall - still
soon to be buried