It's true that I'm lost
through a dark and lonely cave
and it's true that I have myself
stuck deep inside of its misery
I'll admit that I love it and want
to be there for as long as possible
my friends say that it is unhealthy,
that I'm ruining my happiness
but what could be more happier
than being ten thousand feet away
from the troubles of the world?

You are too young to die, they say
But now my friend is there dying
And here I am, healthy, alive
And I know they have been lying
For she is just my age, "too young"
With an ovarian cancer.
Her wedding and graduation
All in May-why?-give me answers!
Is this now some sick joke to life?
Where we all dream of full futures
And then when our dreams are brimming
Some win, the rest see raw torture?
It is a twisted circus act
Where the parents tell their babies
They will one day find love and age,
When that promise is a maybe?
We trust our mothers and fathers
To tell us the ways of the world
But here I am, too young to die--
Then there's my friend, a dying girl.

Oh, she’s a killer
A knife-shaped *****
She’ll rip through your guts
In the rain-stained
Metro station
Down-town east-end
Blood spills on the bathroom floor
And she just smiles
Beautiful
And familiar
Walking along
Coffee in hand
Going to work
When she hits you fast
Black arrow to the eye-brow without warning
Stamped in the carpet
Cigarette-**** burned and bruised
And just when you thought you could be ok
**** you, Nostalgia!
You know just how to play me
Just where to slice me
All the right words
At all the wrong times
I’m a sucker for your curved blade
I wear your scars and curse your name
Nostalgia
**** me quietly
I am always, only, ever yours.

Four old friends
Dead of winter small town
Germany.
Smoke rising from chimneys
From cigarettes, and pipes
From trains riding the rural rails
From city spires
And factories
From airplanes
Airplanes
and Airplanes,
From Airplanes.
Smoke dancing and laughing
Stinging and coughing
Smoke in my hair and jacket
In the pores of my skin
Smoke in my eyes,
Up the hill
And through the woods
Dead of winter
Small town Germany
Four old friends
Walk two by two
Three by one
Four and four.
Walk by the church,
Down the creek,
Up the hills, the hills
And through the woods
Small town
Germany four old friends
Dead of winter
Cigar smoke and beer
Cigarillos in a chain
Smoke from crystalizing breath
And fireworks
Smoke from bonfires
And tailpipes
Smoke from airplanes
Airplanes and airplanes
Smoke from airplanes.
Smoke stains and cigarette burns
Little circles in my jacket
Germany
Four old friends dead of winter
Small town
Smoke tears
Smoke promises
Smoke memories that linger
Like the faint nausea
Of what-the-hell-has-happened.
I watch the **** end of your last cigarette
Crumpled and fading
In the ashtray of that Badischer bar
And your eyebrow twitched
The heart-wrenching shiver
Of what-the-hell-has-happened.
And I whispered:
(airplanes)
airplanes and airplanes
I whispered airplanes.
That’s what the hell.

Have you known the winter days?
Late February falls like frigid snow
Merciless undertow
Of evergreen and alpenglow
And grey ground pavement walking
Like Grocery shopping
and weak chai tea
Moonlengths from all family
And surrounded like strawbury temptation,
Late night lamp light contemplation
And drowsy-dampened mornings
Grey glaze of diluted boring
Spattered over every orifice
Charcoal eyes, platonic kiss.
Pull your bow to shoot and miss
Tell me all this is is what it is
And I will tell you, “okay”
(but you know this isn’t what I wanted)

Hide the roadsigns
Blur the guidelines
This is how I love you

Have you known the winter days?
Late February fell like fire on hell
And shook me from my sleep
Ashes cover snow-banked heaps of rubble
I slice my wrist on the sharpened stubble
Of your half-assed beard
(this is how I bleed my dear)
This is how I bear my soul
******* smile
And dominoes
Carnation cults
And buried bones
(This is how I build your throne)

Hide the gravestones
Burn the rainbows
This is how I love you.

And have you known the winter days?
Late February fallen like Lucifer to the underworld
We both knew I wasn’t altogether that typeof girl
But we pretended anyways
Alcoholic halo haze
And foreign intervention
Of somewhat insidious intention
And the legitimate logistical question
That defined our discourse on fear
(this is how I think my dear)
This is how I speak my mind
All that grey
Those missing roadsigns
Smoke and soot and
Blurry guidelines
And Gravestones gone
And rainbows ash
(and we are never coming back)

This.
This is how I love you.

oh see,
i will take this outlet
[this two pronged outlet
one of you and one of me]
to reply because
i picked up the phone today
and called someone else
thinking
"oh hell i'll warm up a bit
before i dive into this-
i mean, i want to get
my personality right
don't i?
I MEAN DON'T I?!?!?!?
WHO THE HELL AM I ANYMORE?!?!?!?!"
panic set in.
i called my dad.
he's always calming.
we talked about christmas ****.
what he wants. what mom wants.
it calmed me down.
i figured out who i am:
i'm just a dude playing a dude disguised as another dude,
not breaking character til we're done the DVD commentary.
[paraphrased of course cuz I don't plagiarize.]

i'll call you
but how late will you be awake?
i'll call you
but what are you doing right now?
i'll call you
but why am i nervous?
i'll call you
but aren't we all one Being?
i'll call you
but but but but but but burt but but but but but but but but but
don't you have home work
or something better to do
than listen to me preach
and flap flap flap flap
and not hug me again
and not listen to me
or are you listening to me
or am i neurotic
or is it all smoke and mirrors
and seriously i'm coughing uncontrollably
and you'd think i'm crazy
but it's that holiday season
and for the next handful of weeks
i've got a handful of excuses
of why and how and what and how
but burdens only stack up
and i've released literally every single one
except i'm still replaying josh ritter in my head
and the car ride home from that purple chair
and the walk around the duck.

[not stopping for breathing
or trimming my toe nails,
which started growing again.]

and LA and Delaware and pencilwania and where we met on that pier at that show in socal and house of blues and mini golf and lists and names and places and "there's no hell when you die, so don't look so worried."

and i'll call you
but will you answer?

to my darling who feels she's not:
our separation is mere illusion.
truly, your pain strikes me as i write this;
your sensations of abandonment,
and the decisiveness they have caused,
bleed from my skin into the fibers of my clothes.
i am no longer clean.
i do not feel pure.

to my severed arm and shortened tendons:
destruction is merely another side of life.
out of disappearance comes all things-
without space, there would be nothing to contain us,
nothing to allow and enfold our beings' spirits,
and they would sputter and cease like my love's flame.
i am no longer yours.
i do not feel full.

to the farthest star that my eyes can see:
your light reaches me- i glimpse you!
in the perceived emptiness between us
there is no distance to be found;
around us exists the infinite potential for
further connection and deeper growth in closeness.
i am no longer alone.
i do not feel sorrow.

You are not my children,
tender as you are.
You are not my lover,
though you cause my heart to yearn.
You are not my sun,
or my moon,
or my star.

I set you on this rock;
you will not make me burn.

You are simply sticks,
arranged upon the pyre.
You are clever tricks,
though you flaunt my clear desire.
You are not the match,
or the wick,
or the fire.

I set you on this rock;
To see what might transpire.

You will never be a pheasant's egg to be coddled.
You are only this: a calf led to the slaughter.