Transcendence and unity was always my friend
I know,
Something that doesn't exist yet always lingers
  a man in black, everywhere, always filling cups
  and know I'm staring into the face of that man though he no longer exists
There's an undiscovered idea or concept, nobody sees it but it's here
  with me over my shoulder always
Do you hear those voices on the mainline when the shore is out
why do you see today, when not yesterday, was blind
a certain sense of paranoia, uplifting
Behind the lamp post on the corner there's the man in a black overcoat
  and on the roof, over there
  and in trees behind brick houses
  everywhere
  I see him
How can you escape these walls when captive men's lives linger on
Sighing again, it's morning, did you cry today?

Those headphones passive pass no mas but moreover we're dying
cerebral disconnect
everything changes
creativity dies when the keyboard intervenes
and the blackness of one turns into itself and everything dies before being reborn again somewhere else
  somewhere different
Erratic thoughts but these are dying words when they come each night, the terrors
Is there anybody or anything anymore?
Resistance to life now is dull and over. Done.
  heavy lungs still breathing but detached
Where the ghosts of Saturday night roam in pilfered streets
and numbed limbs crawling
re-percussive Robitussin and gushing percussion, oh the jazz-hall bells
swing la
swing
oh its yellow in nightlife fever fervor forever
Gábor!
Tell me these sweet dreams again
great white flags on the shoreline as the ships arrive home
and the war is done
Did I import the brown in past lives?
Jeer jazz man jeer!
and this wild hair is the sea, swim with  me forever
the guiding hand on my wrist is not my own
the door slams shut in echo chamber corridors and the tension in the neck is incredible
but the end is never that, it's only the beginning in disguise
I am constantly haunted by my psychosis
Amphetamine dreams
and Sunday dawns
the hazy yawns

- to sleep

When we met inside a Dunkin Donuts on the corner of two busy streets, I ordered a small coffee. I said I had a lot to get done tonight, so I can't be out too long. If you knew how well I can lie, you wouldn't recognize me on a crowded street. I always ordered a medium before, because it took longer to cool, so we spent more time taking cautious sips through the small opening of a plastic lid protecting a styrofoam cup. But I dreaded seeing you again, because it'd be so long since I remembered the angles of your face, and the deep darkness of your swirling brown eyes, and the straight sharpness of your thick locks of black hair. Because when I'm not lying, I can say I don't miss you anymore. A busy street full of strangers is plenty company for me, and I don't mind my right hand catching a cold November breeze, instead of warming up inside your left. You said you're doing better, that the emptiness of your studio apartment isn't as lonely as it used to be. You said sleeping on your full-sized bed was okay now, that only one side warmed by a breathing body wasn't sad anymore. But you still missed me, my scruffy, uneven beard, the boots I look my best in and your head on my chest. We walked outside so you could smoke a cigarette, and I left quickly. I lied and said we should see each other again. But I hoped you'd lose sight of me on that busy street, becoming ambiguously shaped inside a scrambling river of cold winter bodies, all with cold hands clenched or covered in gloves, not holding any others.

The bed is cold when you turn in at night
   because the frigid winter winds have settled in too
   and like a fool you left the window open all day
You take a dab of speed as the lamp goes dim
   its the only thing to keep tumescence
   when you make love to a lover you no longer love
******* is no longer sport, only a chore
   and the night birds at the window sing a song of sadness
   beady eyes keeping tabs on the city boy's blues
When the day is done the television screeches, unreality television
   you're so depressed and you have nothing, not even sleep
   and the cold body beside you snores through the night
Even on rare occasions of sleep, you only dream of dying
   fiery bus brought with peasant's tokens is burning
   as it flies over some cliff face and you remain stoic
Waking only in afternoon sunsets with a sore head and dry mouth
   stumble down the stairs to an empty kitchen and the cat has **** again
   you clean the mess and make a sandwich, no topping just butter
How many days can pass before you crawl to the shop to buy food
   and you contemplate suicide as you scrape the tub of butter again
   falling upstairs in a somber stupor, vomiting after eating
She comes home from work and calls it off, packing her bags
   you roll another joint without words being spoken
   she closes the door and the already broken window breaks more
Smoking on your herbal solitude and preparing the last hit
   that sweet tender brown in a spoon you found
   it hits the vein and you feel happiness, first and final time
Sitting in some trash-found chair and reading Camus
   these are the final moments, surely you cannot hold on
   Abner Jay is playing and you fall asleep forever

He wakes up with teeth grinding, lightening bolts in his jaw
Crooked smile, broken as his home is and lonely in suffering
Each day when the cruel sun streaks in through cracked curtains
and he is reminded of a unique affliction, the asymmetrical torso
moreover, the scabrous flesh that adorns the arms and inner thigh
He feels morose and grotesque, as a woman could never be
Reflective avoidance, the mirror always covered when he stands to ****
Rheum still covers delicate eyes so accuracy goes out the window
and grumbling, stooping over, wiping the mess he sighs and makes wishes

How painful these days are to a man that prays for femininity
Stature and girth like a real man, though dreaming as a schoolgirl
Bristling stubble, adoration for his thick hair from envious men
Appeasing some latent homosexual desire,
but not enough to reciprocate adoration
The pain in his worn teeth is a constant reminder of ineffectual existence
and his shoulders ache every day, whilst legs are jelly and lose balance constantly
How cruel the lethargy can be, that some days he alters anatomy
at least in his own psyche, that ever fruitful imagination

So in lonely doledrum evenings when the mists set on cityscapes
the petty escape is worn, vibrant black ladies-wear, evening gowns
and wild high heels, posturing female attire for a tender soul
Corsets and tapes hiding unseemly masculine traits,
figurine madness, the make-up set meticulous and dynamic
Ruby red lips that eschew gender conformity and mascara mirrors the sky
She feels that warm embrace, spiritual in deep ****** chasms
Grasping for the apparently unattainable; magazine littered pictures on the tabletop
and her coarse fingers glide on silken garments, moonlight serenade on the speaker

How elegant the movie star madame, in this depression taken hold
A temporary release she clinches on to some beautiful image, forever in love
To be beautiful is to be happy and all women are beautiful, experience as a teacher
Funny how fatigue disappears once embellished in womanly garb
and funnier still that the aching head and rotting mouth are nil under blusher
Those nights can be liberating for a man of ennui and illness
Confusing though it may be, that such a man can attain such joy
and still feel devotion for every woman he loved, the fact still remains that
In the mirror she saw herself smiling and so she reasoned to turn the mirror the correct way up

What is a poet?

A poet is able to capture a feeling with words.
To adeptly potray one. single. instance.
with words.
With scribbled, illegible
Or cleansingly, typed
clear, crystal, words.

I,
am not a poet.

I am a monkey,
deftly punching on a typewriter,
finger smashing keys,
expecting Shakespeare
to appear on a backlit screen
or a pure white notepad.

I am,
not a poet.

I am the grouch,
in a trash can.
Yellow moss on a rock,
pointing south. South.

I am not,
a poet.

I thought I dripped words
like blood out of my veins.
I thought my muse,
was darkness.
Then the sun came out.

So,
I am not a,
poet.

I am a high school English paper.
I am the run-ons,
too many ands,
too many commas.
Not even a proper sentence.
I am the red-marked essay.


I am not a poet.

And I have nothing else to say.

They forgot to tell you it's not always easy,
that just because the ocean seems so
calm at night
doesn't mean it doesn't ache
for morning.
They forgot to tell you it takes time,
that weeks may feel like hours
and months may feel like years.
That it only grows deeper in patience
and stronger in absence.
They forgot to tell you it speaks louder
in silence than it ever could in words,
that it listens closer when my hands
talk to yours,
that it lives inside your bones,
and not inside your heart.
They forgot to tell you it makes you
weak at the knees,
and strong in the head.
That it can fill every broken crack,
and heal every open wound.
They forgot to tell you it will leave scars.
They forgot to tell you that you can
give it all away without ever having
it given back to you.
They forgot to tell you that is okay.
They forgot to tell you that memories
don't fade away.
They forgot to tell you that it hurts.
They forgot to tell you what it means.
I'm here to tell you that it's worth it.
I'm here to tell you that you're worth it.

Under these lights I'm honest.
Every flaw, every imperfection
shows true, like raw footage of a plane
crashing into the ground,
showing everything that went wrong.

They show me who I really am,
and what everyone sees:
Chipped, coffee-stained teeth,
frayed, wiry brown hair,
small, deep brown eyes,
every scratch, every scar
every razor-burned pore,
everything I try to ignore
in other rooms of the house.

It explains why I buy lamps
with dimming shades and
warm, dark-yellow bulbs:
The less you can see of me,
the longer it'll be before
you go on rushing out,
jingling keys, clutching a cocktail dress.

In school I was taught to love
Jesus because he died for me,
so I could be forgiven and
see him in Heaven.

But I never learned what Heaven was,
or Hell, and what the difference
was between the two of them:

Hell, with its flames and sorrow mixing
like red and blue paint, blood under the skin.
The wounds we witness but can't do anything about.

Heaven, white without temptation,
clouds that never rain or clash with lower pressure,
and offer no decision to do good.

Eternity is a prison, whether a rigid valley of burning faces,
or an endless celebration of our sacrifices and charity.