Altered by the winds laced with a threnody tune,
life in the northern woods will never be the same without its bloom.
The deceased puppet master continues to pull the strings of the dehiscence heart,
one of this game is forced to take part.
The ears of an indecisive mind take in the plaintive sound,
which provides an ongoing reminder of how these feet are forever bound to this ground.
With the chances of escaping  this monochromatic box slims,
one might begin to take a swim.
The ideal way of living becomes a compromise,
the old personality leaves only the eyes.
Shed away in a abscission fashion,
and along with that goes all the passion.
Sitting down to confabulate with a higher knowledge,
carry  on the dreams of going to college.
Storybook barriers leave no saltant mood.
Being passed by society is quite rude.
A misnomer indeed,
being labeled wrong because of greed.
Hunger of such has taken a life,
of one upon a lake that was never a wife.
Letters that hold such wicked silence,
that can never be undone even with science.
This blue body surrounded by an invisible malediction,
or maybe that is all just fiction.
He has nothing left from his unmanly lies,
upon keeping secrets he thinks he is wise.
Knowing it all is never enough,
but with an abecedarian brain on might just call it a bluff.
Eventually farewells must be given without hate,
and one might hope to return as if all was in a somniferous state.

Out of habit
I sleep at the edge of the bed,
still unused to the
space you left behind.


(I still wake
                 reaching
for you in the dark;
finding only memories
           of the remnants
           of your
                warmth.)

there is this boy
and he is
very black
and very muscular
and
he could easily
overpower me
and he thinks my
legs
are
nice
and my dad would
crap his pants
if he ever saw him near me
because dad is still scared
of black people

there is this boy
he is very white
and a little dorky
but i like the way
his face
makes funny eyebrow smiles
he never
leaves
me
alone
and dad wouldn't care
if he was with me
because this boy is too scared
to do
anything

there is this boy
that is really more like a man
and he drives a jeep
and fishes a lot
and takes pictures
and draws on his ipad
and he's kind of a ****
but he told me i'm spunky
and that i make him smile
and that he
likes me
i was glad
to make him
smile
dad would probably
be
his best
friend

there is this boy
who i thought was really big on jesus
but it turns out he wanted to take me into a walk in freezer
pour chocolate on me
and lick it off
i liked him because i thought he was nice
but he wanted me
to
lick
his
fingers
and other things
too
i said
no
dad would
shoot him

there is this boy
that plays the trumpet
and has a receding hairline
but he's only like
twenty two
and he
likes to find my face
and smile at me
because he wants to know
if i'll smile
back
he wanted to give me
a massage
and a long hug
i wish he would
tell me
he liked me
so maybe we could be
together
dad would
think he was
the marrying type

there is this boy
who likes to tell me what he's wearing
which is usually silky underwear
blue ones
red ones
sometimes
none
the first night i knew him
he sent me a picture
of his ***
it was really
white
he wants to
draw a bath for me
and watch me
in the bubbles
he tells me
i can touch him
anywhere
i want
he'll touch me
too
dad would skin him
after
he shot him

there is this boy
who is high
or drunk
24/7
he makes me watch awful scary movies
he is silly
playful
he
loves
me
but he is in
california
and he only loves me
as a friend
he wants a blonde
not a redhead
and that is ok
we would be too much for this world
if we were together
anyway
dad would
hate
him

The drunk chanting of "chug" has faded away. The liter of jäger is at war with my liver as I take another long drag of a Seneca Red.
Embers in the grill still smolder away, the taste of pork chops linger on my tongue. My stomach feels empty, although we've only just eaten. The hot dogs are gone. So are the hamburgers and chops. I can't just throw some food in the grill anymore. I must journey to the main campus and sate my hunger for heated meat, perhaps some wings.

I check my phone and see the time is eleven. Now is as good a time as any. I flick the **** into the cool spring night and cross the parking lot towards my Toyota. I grab the wallet from the glove compartment and place my headphones around my ears. Roger asks me if I've heard the news. I tell him I haven't. He says the Dogs are dead. I say that must be good news for the Sheep. My walk, or should I say incoherent stumble, from the town houses is accompanied by the sounds of Animals, a truly relaxing atmosphere.

As I progress down the road from town houses to the main campus, flanked on either by side by wooded areas, memories start coming to me through the darkness. I've walked this path almost daily for close to three years now. Sophomore year I'd walk to Francis from Doyle to get dinner, or hang out with friends who lived there. Junior year, it was from the Phase Twos to my classes and back. This year, it's from the coveted Phase Ones, which I don't truly understand. Phase Two and Three are so much better. Why does everyone want to live in Phase One?

These semi-joyful, or at least not totally depressing, memories flood my consciousness, and bring me back to easier, simpler times. I lack liquor, so I drink these memories down, savoring the sweet scents and full flavors my mind is so adept at bringing back to life. I smash the bottles which held them as I finish them, watching the drunken starlight shimmer and dance over the bits of shattered glass.

As I pass by Doyle and enter the main campus, the memories begin to change and shift. Instead of days which were laden with friendly laughter, I now begin to remember my freshman year, living in Shay Hall and having a whole new campus to discover. When I was forced from my shell and began to meet new people. One of those people would become my first real relationship, and would last all of nine months in my life. Her name was Gabby, and despite her undeniable insanity, was one of the most beautiful women I'd ever seen.

We did everything together, from eating and sleeping to going to our pals parties. She loved me, I loved her, and life was wonderful. Until it all, just, wasn't anymore. She grew demanding and distant, while at the same time requiring more and more attention from me, until one day the dam failed under pressure and let the reservoir flood the lands we'd been cultivating for nine months.

She cheated on me. While this was no new fact for me to deal with, looking back on my history with women, it was nonetheless still quite hard to face. She had the good grace to break it off face to face, but there was still a great deal I couldn't forgive her for. The constant demand she placed on every thing I did, no matter how minor or minuscule. The night she struck me for not putting my cell phone on vibrate. The words she would say, layered with condescension whenever I should fall short.

So I cursed her. Not in the typical sense one associates with curses, but more of a silent prayer that she would one day feel the pain that she subjected me to. I didn't have to wait long, though. The following year, she made her way to New Orleans to celebrate for Mardi Gras. Her new beau, the one she had left me for, stayed behind in New York, and put her rightly on the receiving end of the pain she brought me. While she enjoyed the festivities of Fat Tuesday, he enjoyed the carnal company of three seperate women. When she returned, she was heartbroken.

I never received a phone call. No apologies for what she did. No offer of kind words to soothe a soul which still had yet to recover from the blows it had been dealt. No lesson had been learned. No insight into her own actions taken away. No moment of clarity in which she realized the mistake she had made, or the pain she had caused with her selfish actions. The curse remains, hanging over her head like an everlasting storm cloud, dissipating only when she realizes what she has done to one man who enjoys nothing more than holding a well founded grudge.

You're a beautiful mystery clad in gorgeous enigma.
You're poetry that looks good in a skirt.

There's an orchestra on your tongue, playing the sound of your voice like a melody I can't forget,
matching the tempo of the drums in my heart
and the broken strings of my violin compliments.

You are a notebook, a yearbook, a sketchbook, a burn book,
every facet of you written in swirling cursive,
rhymes and famous signatures snaking between cinnamon hair and cleverness.

You are a pen running out of ink,
bleeding dry in Barnes and  Noble Moleskin journals,
but that's okay because I have more ink,
and you can borrow whatever you want from me--
store it in the heart you stole if you're bored enough to hunt my words for the pieces.
You have the key already.

You're the first dream of the boy too scared of nightmares to sleep again.

You are the taste of honey and cigarettes on the lips of the first girl that boy ever kissed,
because she was a rebel and he needed a hero
who wore boots instead of Mary-Janes
and band t-shirts instead of blouses.

You are the rose he drew when he was bored,
an outline with potential,
mysterious, entrancing, incomplete,
not yet ablaze with the red of desire
because he was never good at finishing things.
You are a dictionary. Your picture isn't just under "beautiful."
It's under "dangerous" and "witty" and "myth"
because Medusa bowed at your feet next to James Bond and Edgar Allan Poe,
and you're too good to be true anyways.

You are a poem, a telltale heart beating inside a lesson in vengeance,
temporary only because nothing gold can stay.
You've walked past where the sidewalk ends (certainly the road less traveled by)
and come back far more darling than any buds of May.

(You are the paperback novel he read under the covers,
the flashlight only bright enough to show paragraphs,
and every new page unique in shape and form
while the text remains the same.

You are the raw words read aloud by the daring poet,
standing beneath midnight moon,
the power of the throne,
the breath of a whispered promise falling upon the ear,
the warmth of kisses on the cheek,
the passion of all hope there ever was in trust and truth.

You are the fire in lightning,
the sparkle in the snow and the glitter in the rain,
the fierceness of the wind and the gentle, soothing peace,
the blazing chill of winter and the roar of summer's heat.)

But you're still a mystery.
A beautiful,
beautiful
mystery.

Warmed by her hand and shadowed by her hair
As close she leaned and poured her heart through thee,
Whereof the articulate throbs accompany
The smooth black stream that makes thy whiteness fair,—
Sweet fluttering sheet, even of her breath aware,—
Oh let thy silent song disclose to me
That soul wherewith her lips and eyes agree
Like married music in Love’s answering air.

Fain had I watched her when, at some fond thought,
Her ***** to the writing closelier press’d,
And her breast’s secrets peered into her breast;
When, through eyes raised an instant, her soul sought
My soul, and from the sudden confluence caught
The words that made her love the loveliest.

I want my name tattooed on your lips
stars tattooed across my back
my name to be a star
I want you to hold me on your tongue
to leave stars in your hair
when I run my fingers through
I want you so bad it’s driving me mad
playing on our radio
I want your lips so bad on my stars
-want stars when you taste me
your fingers to ******* tattoos
the stars to taste our fingers
when they wander through our lips
I want our fingers touching lips
by the stars that bathe our tattooed names
in the music of the madness twixt our hips
I want our ink all over our skin
A stellar map to lead us in