Laying here on the cusp of sleep
I am visited by visions of the young man I once was
What happened to that beautiful boy?
I miss that overwhelming positivity
the naive idealism
the undying spirituality
he was fearless in many ways
I am not that old but that boy is
a million miles away
and all that's left is me
in my body's shell that has gone hard and stale.  
I could learn from his example
But I survive better now...

Thank you Beckett.
Thank you Richard Lange.
I will fail better, next time.

The water recedes again
Nonchalantly walking back to it's home
The smell remains in Old Town
The sewage scent hitchhikes the breeze
To make it's way up the street named for kings
The water will return
and I cannot afford to live here

Sometimes people need to be rescued
Well,
here I come.

Careful, careful now
Step lively and often
Beware because
Crave
Is awfully close
to craven

It's hard to crawl out of a bar
     When everyone keeps
    Stomping on your hands

The trick is to make that first beautiful
hot sip of coffee last the whole day.

Scratch out a little something
a honed blade
a sharpened pencil
paint thinner creates a subdued hue
hands ache
and fingers bleed
What once was nothing,
exists
Now, you are lighter
a surface scratched
You
have left pieces of yourself
exposed

A sculpture
A canvas
Raw Nerves
A poem

Do I act what I feel
or act how I am supposed to?

A Toast
Holding up a ***** gimlet
Told the bartender how to make it
Most will give you a look before rifling
Through the book

Their are really just two points of view
External Influence
And reality as you see it
I know a balance of both is closer to true
But sometimes the external leaves you
with a horrible feeling deep in your personal hells
You don't feel the way you should
Some people waste their time absorbing Everyone Else
I will take my chances and be more like Ed Wood

I will take another ***** Gimlet please.

The country music plays at a low tinny volume
I never much cared for it
But thinking back now I enjoyed it then
From the back seat of a love's family car
Stopping at small town after town
Country meals and light on conversation
Our favorite was finding
everyday treasures of times long past.
How appropriate then as I scour my mind doing the same
thing

I had a three hour layover so I ordered a bartender's handshake
She smiled at me and said "welcome home"
I smiled at her mistake and
told her I was only a visitor
She placed two glasses down and poured the fernet and ginger
The strong solvant dissolved the feeling of being alone
She poured another at half price
For the next three hours
I sipped the heart out of a perfect San Francisco night

I wasn't looking
for it
I did find it
Down
Down in the recesses of our Earth
My lamp shown enough light for us both

Glove in Glove
Rock by Rock

A love that is born in the absence of light is a mighty
Love after all.

Pulling her into the light of day
I knew we would be together

Leaning back in my chair to give the crowd a scan
Outside the bar window up pulls a van
He came in with guns drawn, hands in the air!
Wallets and money liberated told not to stare
Gone now, reach into my sock for a 20 to pay for another dram

It dropped upon all of us like
the cold dough of a drop biscuit
The baking is up to you

build a fire, soup on the stove,
sipping the steam off of a mug
of coffee,
hot shower
The shovel waits in quiet reserve near
the front door

Winter is not supposed to be here
But someone forgot to tell her
I pull out the cookie sheet
The cold dough
Transformed
Into the golden brown
Moments of my day

I remember that summer
He covered everything
Windows
Walls
Buildings
Phone Booths (when they were just about extinct)
The sign above constitution avenue
Water fountains
He could be found next to **** Smoothie and
Cool "Disco" Dan on the red line near Takoma
Bush hates BORF

He was caught though

July 29

BORF covered everything
Adulthood
Consumerism
Hip Hop
Suicide
Laws
Politics
Obama hates BORF

Borf loved to write on people's stuff
A lot
Grown ups are obsolete
Sorry about your wall
BORFs friends live on
BORF was here
And left after writing this...

They are everywhere
Came to the party uninvited
and stayed well past "?"
I caught one, my last night
in Florida
It didn't want to let go
An ornament on my finger
I said
"Nice to meet you."

A smile that tastes like
Burt's Bees
You are welcome

They stare
Too many of them do it
They look at you with their sideways
face.
They don't peer
They arn't peers
Lack all intuition
And empathy
"What?"
"Huh?"
With a plastered on smile
On their sideways face
I am done trying to explain
to the people frozen in their
permenant Dutch Angles
"Wait, what?"
You can stick your sideways face
up your sideways ***

Open when closed
Closed when open
I am a drawbridge

Why count sheep
when you can count shoes
Think about it
Next time you are having
trouble falling into the abyss of the night
Try to go back and think about
every pair of shoes you ever owned
maybe even in chronological order
The good sleep will come

Where the **** were you
when the page was blank?

Sometimes it feels like leaving home
wearing mismatched shoes
I will make my way in this
world if it's the last thing I do

My phone has been drinking,
not me.

There is something wrong
I don't know why but when
I find a mirror it becomes clear
as I become distorted
My face slowly falls apart
blood oozes out as my nose falls off
My cheek is gone and exposes
Damaged teeth held together by roofing
nails and plaster of Paris
The blood is heavier now
and my deterioration excellerates
Where did these wires and transisters
in my head come from?
I am pretty sure they were not there
before I went to bed.
I hang my mechanical zombie head
to the side...and bleed.
I wait patiently to be awake again.

Doc
I wish I could be half the man you are
The first day I met you
You suffered a stroke.
Drove yourself to the hospital
and still felt bad for breaking our appointment


Doc
You taught me so much
in such short time
You showed me the acorn
That is inside of us all
You taught me how to care for it
And how to help others as well

Doc
You taught me about being
kind and selfless
The we and not the me
You taught me about
Stewardship
Crazyhorse
And other ways of seeing.
About the kids that need a chance
Not to mention a rest
I learned about when you pulled a live grenade
from a soldier's chest

Doc
All I can say is thank you
for sharing your spirit with me

Has it been so long?
Since the days Crack Music and Gold Digger played
on the radio
The best of time with two
of the best I know

Arguments of Art
Night drives and cab fares
Late Registration was our soundtrack
Creeping by the exorcist stairs

Some days something can hit me just right
and I remember those nights
Clove Cigarettes
Tom Collins
A case of beer
and I am brought back to senior year
Drive Slow

Imagine a castle in the middle of a city
It sticks out to say the least
A sentinel of the city
The Kingdom of Fairmount
Steve Buscemi says it is
a prison of:
Silence
Cats
Ghosts
Tourists
Filmmakers
Gangsters
I crane my neck and take one last look
before heading to the Trestle Inn
for a drink and dancers.

The greatest cure for depression
I have ever witnessed
Is a tiny little
cat named
Lil Bub

The chilly air has settled in
Fall has clocked in and everyone
knows it.
We make the appropriate
changes and continue

Everyone's favortie thing
In the mirror
Drunk
Sober
Cracked grins and halfway smiles
It's how we walk
or
lean against that wall
Photos
Job Interviews
Time with friends
or family dinners
it's how we hold our drink
or
Drive our car
Clutch that cigarette with fingertips
or
two knuckles down
We all love to pose

Blank
Blank Yellow Pages
more than one
Green Lines of Loss
Blank
a message to the right
Duel-Pad
It is a duel pad
every step of the way
An internal fight that will only end when I finally pick up my pen

Morning thoughts swirl under the last night's char
Slowly body comes alive from the coffee dark as tar
An exercise I do for my self
A creative act I do for my health
My heart I keep in a Five Star

Do not blink your eyes
Sitting up, scratching your head
I just lost an hour

Seeing you is my vacation
Unlocking the door to my room
Dim yellow bulbs will
Illuminate your tunic of
caribbean blue
Who needs a trip to the islands
When I have you?

Can this adult life be more absurd?
Ghostman on third!

Every night I die
And
Every morning I am born again
But after my shower
I am reanimated

Been cooped up too long
Need to get back to what is good
Do it for others but also for self
Like Timmy Sommers said
"What do we know about partying
Or anything else?"

I have a feeling
We will all be hacked
In the near future
It will be like the
Burn Book scene in
Mean Girls
But of epic proportion

Few things feel better than
being able to get people who
are regarded by others as shy or introverted
to open up to you

Those others are missing out
on beautiful conversation

A tiny army
armed with tiny knives
slowly cut away at me
They cut away my skin
leaving behind wrinkles
they cut away memories
and tastebuds,
hair, color, and sensations
Every day steady chip, chipping
away on me.
The bravest move I make
is to get up every morning
The hot water of the shower
hitting my spine is the jolt
I need, to keep the army away
Steady now, hold together,
here they come again.

Emotions and negative feelings
people's poisonous barbs
attacks and regret
Shame and anger
become bottled up
into a prescription bottle
or better yet
one of those old
medicine cabinets that you drop your razors
into the slot it the back
more and more the rusty razors pile
up into the pit of unseen darkness

One day soon it will be
time to renovate and you will have to
deal with those razors in the wall

It's the end of a long hard week
Nothing to do for the rest of this rainy evening
Sitting there I relax
My kitten decides to join
Sitting there,
purring
She expresses how I feel better than I can

I found an ember earlier
this morning.
It survived.
Everything that this
numb winter could throw.
Add some kindling, here
oxygen, there.
My hands, there we go...
I am starting to feel like
myself,
again.

I used to be able to forgot who I was
The easiest way was to stare at my hand
I was young
Nine or ten was the last time
After a while I would look away from my hand
and I would not know where I was or who I was
I would be fearful and magnetized
And question where I was,
Who I was.
I remember asking
"Is this real?"
"Whose eyes are these?"
Yes...eyes,
It was through rapid blinking that would bring me back
to life as I know it
I never knew what I was experiencing;
A seizure
A mystical experience
A temporary return
Whatever it was
I cannot go back
No matter how hard I try.

Existential Detective
Hanging from my neck
an inherited Saint Anthony
I find lost people
even when they are me

I fell in love with the whole Bay Area
SF
Monterey
Santa Cruz
Napa
Sonoma
Big Sur
I sit here still and I am stunned by it's beauty
It might be my favorite place on earth.

"Why don't you move there"
They ask.

For the same reason I keep certain people that interest me
at a distance.

Sometimes you don't want your illusion to be replaced
with the truth.

Sometimes it's better to let it live inside you and just visit.

Also never meet your heroes.


...just kidding. Try to meet them all.

A panic attack has a way of creeping up on you
At the start of one, you always think to yourself
"No this can't be happening"
Much like the feeling you get before you
Throw Up
The heat comes on so strong and forceful
Your internal fire, dead set on burning you
from the core out
You hadn't noticed because your knees just buckled
and you went numb
The tremors
you feel them in your fingers
To your shoulders
To your tounge
Hyperventilating
The extra oxygen
Feeds the flames

Once,
With the help from a Brittle Lake
I was able to prevent this state

Seven bucks to rent a kayak
I sliced into the lake
I paddled and paddled and paddled
My arms were introduced to a new kind of fire
A blue cleansing flame
Take a break and drift
Listen
Breath
Lament
Paddle
Feel the warmth of the sun on your face
Paddling again, now it's the breeze and spray
A smile creeped upon my face
At Lake Brittle I was able to keep the panic at bay

Lately I feel a lot like Lew Welch
In more ways than one
Thinking about it depresses me
The Beats seemingly forgotten son
But I know once you read his poetry
In your soul forever it will seep
You can take it with you
And from with in find your strength
So that one day you won't be gone
With out a trace...
Leaving only your jeep
Loved ones forever left to wonder

Tonight when I get home
I think I will read Ring of Bone