3/18/2016
rockefeller college, princeton university

i was staring down the
barrel, the bottom of it
petting my past, an ewe

men looked at us
found nervous excuses:
"sorry," putting down coffee next to us

we scoffed,
made 'em nervous
i forgot what we were discussing

but white noticed a
stare and swiftly turning,
said "i'll be dead in three years anyway,"

that turned him around!
neck snap
"this is just like last year," she spoke

"yea, that's stupid isn't it"
i stepped over a wrapper
recalled i haven't been to princeton

since the summer
she told me that night
she wished she felt that way every day

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

3/10/2016

"It was rumored that Lucrezia Borgia was in possession of a hollow ring that she used frequently to poison drinks..."

i 'oughta honour my posterity, namesake
i'm just the plainer version of the papess
nightshade? what's that?

i am the bad assassin.
either I let them live too long
or i don't know when to empty the hollow ring into the silver chalice

so i empty into my own.
here i am: lying in a gurney, which holds
my pooled throwup.

it seeped into my soft cloths, my white sheets,
it sought a purpose, removed from a place it held so dearly-
that held it...

i find we are similar
i never once thought of myself as *****
in the past

i smoked a cigarette i picked
up by the side of the highway on a dare.
"oh god, stop!" my friends laughed. "disgusting!"

they didn't know i
inwardly agreed.
i hit the flint.

if i keep the receipts i can pretend
that we’re still going out to lunch together,
that your phantom arm is around me at night,
that you’re still here.

i can pretend that you’re not in new york,
and me, i’m not here.
i hoard the receipts and the tickets and
the programs and the take out menus.

i sleep with your sweatshirt under my body
and i, i remember each breath we took in unison.
i imagine that you’re not away
because we are both universal, anyway.

i never cried at the bus stop,
or the train station.
instead i hoarded the tears until i was so full
of water that i broke.

because we can pretend that this is easy
and worth it, it will be,
but at the end of the night
i’m still clutching papers and cloth

with all of my might.

there's protests and colors on flags and I miss
someone but I think it's in my head
and I love the oranges here
and the tea as it slides down my neck
"mint" "menthe" "nyah nyah"
it's all the same meaning

There were many things I wanted to ask when I held you in my hands. Things I know now you were waiting for me to ask. But it wasn't in me to bring those shadows to light in that ****** room after I had proved myself to be no better than those that wounded you so deeply. I had thought myself inviolate, apart, above temptations aside from those I actively hurled myself after. You offered me that needle and I thought I had to, in order to prove myself somehow I guess, but I also wanted to get ******, so I traded love for solidarity. Ironically, since then I've not craved opiates, and the one night I got ****** up enough to query a spike I was too drunk to manage. I guess I have you to thank for getting that out of me. But the expectation and the surprise in your eyes when I let you shoot me up, and then many hours later nearly **** us, are things I'll take to my grave with me. I loved you. I loved you those years ago when we were teenagers, and I loved you the second time you hit me, like some kind of beautiful horror out of the past. We didn't do a very good job of loving each other my dear, but **** it if we didn't try. You never set out to hurt me, and I didn't wanna cause you pain either. But it we did hurt each other, in ways I don't have the words to explain. I put my hope in you, my love, but I guess didn't have enough left of a heart. And it was indeed stupid of me to bring you back to the heart of your pain expecting a miracle. But you in your turn did the same to me. You took my last hope in a happy ending, in terrible beginnings turning out okay. Never again will I let someone just as broken as me in, never again will my walls fall. I'm sorry your father did what he did to you, but nothing I could have ever done would have taken that away. I told Rachael the same thing about her brother....I don't have enough love in my heart to overcome what happened. I'm not angry at you anymore, because I know that we're all just doing the best we can. I can't forget though, can't forget you sitting naked on the bed demanding more than my ****. You cried out for more than I could give.

I'm coming back from the hole I put myself in I suppose. You were the last ***** in outdated armour I've tossed away. The last of many things. For quite a few months I fought hard to be normal, like all the rest, but thanks to you I can finally accept that I never will be anything but a freak, anachronistic and feared. I have to look on a world that I don't like and don't want to be a part of now. Before I failed at loving you, I could accept that circumstances changed, but I remained essentially a good guy, misunderstood but whole. Now, I know better. The whole world changed without me understanding how or why.

I'm going away. Far, far away. It's the best I can do for myself and I think the best I can do for you. I'm sure there'll be a good man standing next to you in those pictures of you picking berries in white one day...one day soon. I'm looking forward to that day, the day I see images of you happy. With any luck, I'll be somewhere in nowhere.

I.

and I galumphed
to the rock salt
shore and
collapsed
waiting for
you
to run over
the dune’s
*****

II.

it had only been
a few minutes
but I could see
the rhino cloud
coming
full
steam
and spitting
fire
if only I had
the strength
but you stole that
from me
too

III.

the steam was
fresh against
my cracked
skin
I could feel the
salt melt off
into the
sand
crane swinging
jaws engulfing
my twisted
body

IV.

I did not find you
inside
only an
unbreakable bottle
with an
unreachable
note and a skeleton
with rings
on its
fingers

V.

my last dreams
were ones
of us
on a mountain
hot air balloon
shadow
specked against
the sunset
everything was so
big
the wind blew
your hair
everywhere
as I drank
in the
storm
this was the last
time I remembered
smiling

VI.

black expanse
with a little
white dot
popping from
corner to
corner
life always played games
with me
death was no
different

VII.

this creature
feared you
this creature
was a long visit
with fire burning
and love notes
this creature was
spit out by
your mouth
this creature
was loud by
your breath
this creature
spackled and
magnetized
never reborn
boat stench and
teeth
mashed
and mashed
again
raining on
your body as
the desert breaks from
its last
drought

VIII.

we will meet
again
I’m sure of
it.