I am not yet in the country,
But I have seen beauty
In the skies above the sea,
Miles from the borders
That split the earth in two.

The meager plane window
Explodes in gold pigments,
Framed by oceans and jagged,
Deep charcoal clouds
Burnt by the sun's shadow:
An illusory eclipse so large
I mistook it for the Andes.

The plane's asleep
Except for the wide-eyed
And sleep-deprived
Like myself who impart on colors
The novelty of new perspective.

It is so beautiful I rock
My body and head and legs
And want to capture for
The one I loved and left
How I saw the same sun
Painted in startling beauty
That reminds me of her smile.

(Does she think of me
When she sees the sun
And cannot sleep?
Does she wish she could
Show me the wonders
Of her life like I do?)

For now I must alone
Clutch tightly this sight
As my haven while hurtling
Through waking skies
Towards and away
Love and home.

But I have seen beauty
That splits the earth in two.

When through flooded roads we drove,
You passed over a lime green snake.
You missed the piercing glow
Of its body curled up safe.

When through flooded roads we drove,
We passed by the drowning trees.
I told you and I did not flinch,
I told you how you hurt me.

When through flooded roads we drove,
You wished my memories gave proof
Of what I'd seen those rainy nights,
But I held the curled up truth

|content warning for mysophobia|

I scrub away charcoal lifeforms
Rooted into undead surfaces
Which festered while I was away.
I feel sweat bead on my dewey skin
From redemptive exertion
In sterile chemical air
My home is not surrendered
To fungal colonies of neglect.

Fingers against our cheeks
Looking off at what
I know not but I feel safe
Swaddled in body warmth
Newfound intimate constellations
Soft light traces our skin
From the skirt over my lamp
And the overcast window light
Echoed laughter with the nectar
Of the present

Two a.m., a man plays
kaleidoscopic xylophones
in the floral night park.
I feared him moments ago,
but now he shares his art.

|content warnings in notes|

refuge in the maze
i hide within
bushes and brambles

Mother, why did you pursue?
i've seen you stabbed
and bleeding
sweaty crouched within
bushes and brambles
you never made me bleed
why do you make me run?

911 phone calls
hiding in the closet
save me - God!
my annual prayer
intercede

Mother, why did you track me down?
i leave my life and love
behind
abandoned maze
save me - God!

sleeping in your sheets
homes has changed
the waking world
betrays my memories
pleated in my breaths are
cut off silent screams

overlayed with reality
are dreams
chased shoved
falling from family
i hide within
painful realities
as they become my dreams

|content warnings in notes|

I could choose the music,
but a stranger wanted more.

I lost my thoughts in melodies,
and I left my body stored
in the sunlit parking lot
with a man's lustful stare.

I left with him the music,
And kept what's mine to share.

There's an art to dodging riptides
-Toes against street cracks-
My body contorts to every push
Of water against my back.

In dancing streams that rule the streets,
My chest expands in lust.
Breathing, holding, sinking deep,
Equanimity in flowing rush

The way to dance with riptides
Is to kiss it on its cheek,
To feel not see in murky grey
Its grasp sweeping my feet.

My body twitches at every touch
Of water against my skin.
Then swiftly I leave its yearning pull,
And wait to start again.

Fingers heartbound
Knotted up in air
Gaze darting lost
Watching dancing
Frozen in movement
Desire for desire
Masked by panic
Intoxicate
Lost in descent
Bodies complement
Space absent touch
Concern ego lust
Parting hesitate
Yearn

The corner
over there, masked in dark,
-right there (?), nestled between
the book case and the paint?
That corner shadow cast behind
is the home of seven hobgoblins,
I swear!, I've seen them run
and bounce from wood to wall
shrouded in the shade of that wedge!
Bouncing gaze dragged by them,
I count : one two seven stop!!!
Breathe less and hear that stuttering
small sound! The goblins(?),
Little guests run their feetpaws around
- Like kids, I swear they giggle
When it's so late they shouldn't play
And yet (!) those goblins alight the corner

Psychodynamic Catalyses commencing in 3... 2... 1...

Trial I:
Subject A's standing still, a perfect vacuous slate-
Oh wait - time: 10 - the twitching has begun
Something's been boiling beneath its skin:
Repressed, internalized emotions
Pleading - please - to leave the mind,
But no! It forgets, ignore the fractured bleeds
Inside,
Wipes clean the bursting mind anew.

Trial II;
Both Subjects have stumbled in, eyes met,
I reckon just one second left until the first
Wipes grimy doubts from seeping pores
And slathers some on its wincing guest.
Oh yes!
The most perfect Projection of self yet!
Proceed.

Trial III;,
Already introduced - the love pheromones -
And Subject A is completely induced
In love.
Distance, deliberations, and anguished moans
Hearken in the Pyrrhic self-preservation:
Subject A has maimed B in love-hate!
Reaction Formation a huge success.

Trial IV,
Gaslight interrogations have rendered
Subject A blind to all its repercussions,
For now the whole world's wrong if time
Can't prove its Rationalizations right,
No, not right, but fundamental to its very
Life!

Trial V
Hourly pedal electric shocks have Displaced
All the color of passion from the Subject's eyes -
Pale white!
And now in pathetic ploy to gain some joy
Leads it to bite, and gnaw, and destroy!
Everything!

Trial VI.
An injection of liquid memories
Of torment and trauma and rejected
Dreams,
And now the Subject has curled up
And shrunken backwards in time!
A little Regressed, teetering toddler,  
And now a suckling infant safe
By its mothers side.

Trial VII...
Something... unusual has occurred,
But do not fret or pull the funds!
Nothing but a standard deviation from the norm:
Our Subject has taken all its desires and cries
And transformed it into a radiant
Cloud.
Now, this Sublimation of the mind
Has left no pain, no suffering!
The Subject - I regret to inform - is fine.

Like a stumbling toddler,
I skate across the ice.
Smiling, flailing, windmills:
I’m frozen still in time.

Hardly moving, I think
I’m speeding by at last.
Now to show off my skills,
I fall (‿|‿)-first and laugh.

|content warning in notes|

i never met the little one
they flushed away that night
a fleeting dreamt up fantasy
miscarried out of sight.

i never even thought not once
a fate where they survived
but all i think about them now
is that fleeting dreamt up night.

i never met the little one
whose name i wouldn't hear
for losing more than fantasy
was too dangerous a fear.

It must've been that odd mushroom:
Its pungent spewed spores have made me
A fungal all-fours beast of gloom.

It couldn't have been my own brain:
So toxic, rotten, and seeping
Out meanness, spreading all the same.

Infected, that's why I'm absolved
From sinful guilty reflections,
It was them, not me, that mushroom.

If I fail this test... well I don't know...
Perhaps I'll drop out of school and walk
Thousands of miles to start a new life
Where things are easy and nice and sweet
Like spoonfuls of sugar for mouth-bleeds.

Or maybe I'll tug my hoodie tight
And hibernate in my mobile cave,
Soundproof from the shuffling strangers there,
Because behind the walls of my mind
All I need are daydreams of springtime.

Or I might borrow a better brain
From a friend who knows a lot of things
Like how to laugh right or calculate
The speed as Train A, Train B collide.
Yeah, I think that plan would work out fine.

Unless... unless I manage to pass.
But that's just a silly thought to have.

Laying under the feather tree,
Breathing scents of serenity,
Soft down feathers come falling down
And swaddle me on fuzzy ground.
I'm fast asleep in memories
Of all the things I haven't seen,
As I stay by the feather tree.

((view horizontally on the phone))

I                        graph,                        s­ighs
    was      cosine          up         down,        and
             a                              and                            lau­ghs.


Intervals                              and
              s­lowing        peaks       troughs
                             fast,                              past
                         ­                                                  the
                                                             ­                     floor,
                                     ­                                               couldn't
         ­                                                                 ­               take
                                                            ­                             any
                                                             ­                            more
                                                            ­                                 !

                                              
                                         instantly
falling                                up
       through                swings
             infinity,     curve
                           the

So we found some green pine cones
with black spindles poking out
and a funny, fuzzy fur.

When we pulled apart the scales,  
a pungent Christmas smell
wafted from its fruity core.

Speculations ran amok
until we recognized an
unblossomed magnolia

“AHHHH!”
It softly responds, “No need to yell.”

One knee,
Ring pop
I thought
A lot

From tone
To pitch
To how
To dress

Half joke
Proposed
Let’s hope
The best

I am a revolutionary who lies in bed!
Leading the abused within my head,
I smelt their shackles into gleaming swords
The sort you see in dreams of course.

But why stop there? I am a philosopher
Taught the finest shadows in Plato’s cave,
A misanthrope who loves to post all the ways
I’d change the world if I were awake.
An artist who only writes self-deprecation
Instead of showing an ounce of creative dedication.

I am an arsonist who lights my own home
Just to keep warm and the night well shone
And with everything ablaze I always feel like I’m alone.

Perhaps, I should admit it could be, just maybe,
I hide the same problems everyone else has behind a fantasy
And instead I should accept I am just a boy lying in bed.

There was a man masquerading as me,
But I caught him by the collar
And wrenched him out!

No wrongs to right, no lost love to mourn,
I must concoct an awful lot of falsified accounts.
But why should I neglect my life,
For self-burnt homes and hidden doubts?

I found company in my solitude.
Madame Silence gives the best kisses,
Even when I hear muffled melodies.

if i kissed you soft enough
would you share with me your love?

if I fall in love again
will you stay and do the same?

Look here! No here!
Buy me! Want me! Use me!
Don’t you see? I make you happy!

Post. Scroll. Feed.
Dig. Carve. Feast!

Smiles. *******. Wealth. ***.
For you we only want the best!

Watch your friends. Watch your fans.
Watch someone you’ll never know.

No! Here! COME AND SEE!

I am a poem etched onto pulped-up trees,
Or did wandering taps on keyboard keys release me?
Or had it been rushed, late night confessions
That tore my shackles off and torched inhibitions?

Regardless, I’ll hold you. Down hallways or in bed,
I’ll shield your burnt soul from the fire in your head,
And if you’re out of breath—beaten, bruised, tossed aside—
You can find reprieve in between my lines.

I am the poem you press against your chest,
And to your scrawled thoughts and poured dreams I attest.

My neck aches from testing
And staying up all night
To brand numbers on my skin
Calloused from pens held tight

It's when you blush, my heart explodes
Maybe because, the things I know
Like how I love to hear your laugh
Or how I want to make this last.

Maybe it's how you look at me
Or how you sound when you're sleepy
Could be our laughs laying in bed
Or just the way your nose turns red.

I missed your voice and sharing songs
And looking at the calm blue dawn
Or it might be - I'm glad to say -
How this feels right in every way.

I am writing these words in an empty notebook
On a warm, humid, mid-summer morning,
Masked by the speckled shade of my tree's canopy.

My dog stands beside me
His paws among the crisp grass
Covered by dew and red fallen petals.

From across the lake in front of me,
there are birds sending eloquent songs
On a journey across the placid waters;

Above me is a juvenile blue-jay,
Still without its royal blue crest,
which has made this its home.

This beautiful scene I am immersed in,
Gorgeous like a painting still drying,
Its wet paint glistening,
Has become my home.

I dropped your heart
That night it fell.
Please pick it up
And say you’re well.

Green, black
This day lacks
A flower surrounded by mud
Dirt, meet Flower
Grow, love

Kissing you
Staring back
Feeling safe
Breathing fast

Sun hot touch
Angel's skin
Sugar sweet
Free of sin

Young love is
Passion still.