Tomorrow’s sausage rolled along the road
And just beyond my hasty, tasty want for a drink.

Amidst giggle and sigh, my cohorts,
my companions and others
Muddle the horror, or meal at ends, most likely

Come this little pigs jump from the truck
Leading butcher.

In silence, I admire the –

Entrails on the highway;  jump opposed shank,
Surpassing my seventh mile for a
Seventh heaven,
Leaving me simply seconds prior Shenzhen.

Sure, little piggy’d never made it,
To the market, to the feast of it all,
But he’d met his end, and on his own terms.

He’d met his end and frolicked upon the
Fields lacking pans and bacon grease,
In opposition the role, the role we force, enforce
And devour time and again;

In silence, I admired the escape.

Sewer stained,
The street, the pavement an so to
Soak the shoes
Born torment twice and a recurring
Tap upon back;
This slipper, a signature
Succumbed suicide,
Slaughter,
An only sorrow
But lash shared millions,
To tread paths beyond barbed
And a sooner return to my
Land, or its maker –
Wards and shop,
Sweat under, sweat atop
And browed, be the animosity
As I swagger my way through
Haizhu's faceless crowd.

This is the assumption of Arcadia.

Or so she’s said and she’s right
As I witness the
Hunched backs, sea pearls
Stained-bowl rice, bow-legged dreams,
The denizens
And if only to stagger,
Come 12 more hours to shelter,
Simply shelter
And a dread named, “day,” come ‘morrow.
It’s real, as real as the sun’s rising,
As real the sun’s sweating
And as real as the sun’s setting.
So onward they go, meager and dollar
Driven, under whip and promised avarice
So that as guilty as I may be;
I’ll still buy, you will too,
He will too and she will too;
We’ll buy and assume our “Arcadia.”

I’d kissed neon once before;
It scolded when it shouldn’t
And took half of what I
Owned.

I’d kissed neon again;
Come a night with, “Dylan,”
And ***** when the beer
Went dry.

And I’d kiss neon forever;
Come a’grayed hair’s gossip,
Words ‘bout our first night,
And, “we,”

We’d cackle on our backs, jubilant.

I died the night my son became,
Come his cry,
And my promises wept;

     For the whiskey bottle’d pass,
     And now over one empty seat.

I died the night my son became,
Come his grin,
And a mother now exhausted;

     Held was her hand, held was his,
     Before the brothers who now hold spades.

I’d earn life the night my son became,
Come his whimper,
And our eternity now in wait;

     Such neon! Were the hours, so howl,
     Would and could –

          Minus I and newest day we’d become.

I feel oil burn my
Belly; If I could hug the
World, I'd never let go.

The moon behind palm
Smiles, now,
Like the first time I’d met my
Second wife;

My second life,
My second shot at something,
And in seconds, like lightning,
Lost to dawn.

Ushered came the day that’d drag
When – The sun could burn,
The sun would burn;
The thirst, always there to remind.

So I’d wait on the lawn,
Under that same palm,
Smile; later,
To wed come dimpled stars.

So as the temple with now triple gods
Cracked an only manacle, left,
Further awry became her wrongful right gaze
And even sooner, her sense of self unraveled,
If just before “undone.”
I could smell it, I could smile it and I’d share it,
As I’d been there before, so I pitch her this –
Come next time, hold my hand like a lily atop water,
Bring fruit, lots of fruit,
And never forget our wish,
Never let our wish built atop fortune’s aroma
Hinder what tomorrow could never be.

Dedicated to the one who'd turned the table.*

I spent two hours
Trying to make you savor me,
When I can’t stomach myself.
I can abuse myself though
And refuse myself, recuse myself,
But all I’d ask is that you
Hold my hand, ensued the chaos,
I promise – I won’t let go.

I spent the entire next day,
Apologetic…embarrassed,
And a little more lost –
Faded further, from the night before,
The now-embedded moments,
Slivers broken skin,
In increments,
And never quite whole.

So I spend tomorrow today,
Anxious, afraid, eye on door,
An ear for the phone, and all for you,
Entirely, when you’d forgotten me,
And I’d hoped to forget me too;
So ensues the conundrum,
A wish that it’s all in my head,
And that you really do care.

Truths be told, I’m usually the fog
That lifts and later leaves come morning.
Off-scripted, you’d beaten me to the punch.
You were the one gone far before dawn,
No name, no number, no, “nothing,”
Yet more, “bountiful,”  than ever,
And maybe it because, the “empty’s,”
Actually me, the awkward, “other.”

I'd wanted to see the moon again –
Pockmarked and ivory, entering and
Innuendo, like crisp leaves under foot;
“Crunch, crunch, crunch,” and so went
The cereal before sog. Parallel, the same
Suffering’s smeared come my bones
Under foot, under cloud and ‘ever as I’d
wander empty if even with you. You've
Turned back and continue to study,
“Away.”

I'd wanted to see the moon again -
Come the scent of fried wantons and
Neon glance; “Crackle, crackle,
Crackle,” like hot dogs over fires, only
Hindered, the hiss of a boy’s tears atop
Flame, so long as I'd understand empty,
If only with you. But your two’s atop
His lips, a smear upon the line we call,
“Horizon,” and so continues, this study
Of, “away.”

And I'd never see the moon again – So
Silence became the sun, a blight, a
Bright, the, “shiny,” I'd wish banned;
Like the eerie, like the day dad’d packed
His bags or day he'd finally died; If only
To accept this solitude, miasma
Subtracted you, with everything else,
But emptied you. An impasse atop
Endeared eidetic, as I’ll try and I’ll
Recall and I’ll fail, this test to finally
Forget.

So I’d rest with an, “F,” he’d rest in
An urn and you’d rest, simply rest, at the
Top of your class, without fault, and a
Graduate, your study of, “away.”

An hour might as well be a year,
A life, a night lacking sleep,
Something sweet but just outta reach,
Or song, one line, that one line,
With memories sweeter than ice cream,
And crescendo akin to broken mirrors.

Long gone, would be the “clickety-clack,”
The coming and going of a train;
Meaning to stop, but only to pass you by,
Offering the slightest dust, hints to where
You should have been come ‘morrow;
Left would be an only, lonely to posit –

Why can the gulls go when I can’t?

The fly on my finger says, “it’s gonna rain.”
So the spy ‘round the bend screams, “RUN!”

I try, but I step on a nail; therefore – I cease, I die,
And am born once more, Come the dead been before.

That’s when those days became a “pitter-patter,”
So let it sink, and I’m not so innocent anymore.

I’d blame the cat that crossed my path, it wasn’t black,
I’d blame the hat that drew her eye, but I wouldn’t;

I’d only run, flee, I’d heed the call of “Lawrence,”
So that bells could ring and wings be granted.

The smoke circled halo,
Bent smiles and summoned demons,
Brimstone come a reverent silent
And obeyed sort of way.

I let my left eye avoid.

I’d let my right dream,
As I munched skewered calf,
Innocent, slaughtered, salivated
And my only excuse – Survival.

Toe-to-toe with
Home-field advantage
I nodded from shadows
To the one who scented venom;

Lace tucked slightly thigh,
She’d wink and hours later,
The demon would meet the Devil
And she’d devour –

All I’d known,
All I’d ever know
And all we’d ever be.

The world ended last night.

I’m sure it did.

And while I squeezed souls
From pillows,
Soiled stars
Wrought one tip of my brow
And bled every last liter,
For tomorrow’s star.
Atop melody,
I imagined a piano,
The nail-less fingers a’rapping,’
Opposed my battered knuckles,
Awry atop ivory
And concluding chorus,
A not so sad one, a not so bad one
But the last one;
Certitude and
Without encore in earshot.

The world ended last night;

I know now, beyond doubt, it really did.

I was the, “Monster,”
With all but one
Concern
Upon my tongue –
Her and imagination wrought
Honey.

I was the, “Monster,”

Who’d only one
Plight
Come 5:00 A.M. –
Flight and ensuing chasm christened,
“Regret.”

I was the, “Monster,”

Where all but one
Finger’d
Grasp my throat –
Phantasms of someone she’d met once
Before.

I was the, “Monster,”

When it wouldn’t work
Again
And again and again –
Sacred and scared, I’d never answer,
Faint and, “knock.”

I am the, “Monster.”

If each and every grain were a
Year,
Than every knock would be an
Episode,
So came the story that is my
Door.

And,

One – was the loudest pound,
“Authority,”
When the P.D.’d nearly warped
Hinge,
So came my first night in the
Clink.

Two, three, and four – Love, only
Love,
And one of two later;
SLAM!
Or one silent escape, fled and
Sundered.

Five – was the knock that never came.

Six – “tap, tap, tap,”
Mom,
It must have been my mom, or rather,
Obligation
And she’d swear to my sisters, “he’s
Ok.”

Seven, eight, and nine – Deliveries,
Disguise,
Pizza, Chinese, pizza and not so
Famished
Anymore; fuel for the guts, guzzle for the
Words.

Ten – came a' “gamechanger,”
Tear-smeared-mascara,
And two hands atop your
Abdomen;
I knew atop the water your freckles,
You’d never need knock again.

So if each and every grain were a
Year,
Than every knock would be an
Episode,
And this would be the story, that’d ever
Be our door.

Old Lincoln's creek comes to mind
when a dog's on my lap, a certain
song's a'whisper, a whimper, with
willows, and so much so, that the
once and promised immortality
evades, ever more than certainly,
more than certainty, when he'd said,
“hurry,” and I’d arrived too late.
And so I’d enter an empty home and
all that waits.

A ship hued red comes to heart
when the memories seem to spill of
only him. My legs were quite
weaker then, one plight, forgotten
and another one, my flailing hand,
with an only respite, offered rail,
and more frail, “hurry ******!” –
He'd said, “HURRY!” and I’d
encounter again, an empty home
and all that waits.

And so, the house regressed, if only
earlier, so too, the boy, with his,
“once-again,” first steps home;
weakened toe after bloodied toenail,
foot after foot, inch after inch, but a
reminder to the hunters that in time,
they too, can become the prey when
switches sundered touch and
tomorrow's maw’d gape, “forget;”
That was when, “hurry,” could be
assumed, would be assumed and at
ends, we’d never meet.

And so I entered the empty home
and all that waits.

She had the moon atop palm,
and “righty” in her pocket,
leaving me to wonder which
heavenly body she’d present
next.

This goddess, “gravity,” if
she’d a name, played physics
with my parts, and persuaded
thrice an orbit, circles wherein
the same hopes quantized –

“We’re we born of the same
star? Please? And when again,
can we burn brightly?  Soon?”
She’d reply, and echo come
frigid a comet’s tail, leaving.

So you’d know tonight as
you’d twice before; I’d sip my
beer before you. I’d cry before
you. And a’parallel, tease your
moon atop my very own palm.

The *** stood stars on end, so to,
whispered, “play with me,” and in
haste we fled. We explored,
discovered, and devised something
bright, half something else sinister,
notarized – black roots pinned a
pink-scorched Mohawk, and
reciprocated, my wild “Mao-Mao,”
or so she’d named the hair on my
arms. The moon endured whilst we
knifed each other with each and
every gasp and sutured wounds left
prior lovers. I’d only come across
her name near the end, “Xiaolian,”
though the tattoo ‘top her leg, told
me, “Lola.” Come what mothers
christen us innocent would be a
poems in and of themselves,
addendum, the delirium aged and the
dance of neon atop our waterfall
soaked bodies - epic.

I’d ‘ever be your tree,
     Come the pull of your arm.
I’d ‘ever be your tree,
     Come the push, two gentle feet.
I’d ‘ever be your tree,
     Come the wind, come the rain.
And’d ‘ever be your tree,
     Come beginning, come the end.
Son, I promise, I’d ‘ever be your tree.
     So roots spoke, “the leaves never die.”

Kisses, killed, and mementos –
The years prior – remain as lipstick
Atop fossilized paper, archived eras,
And stuffed in drawers that
Still bedevil
Whilst I seek –

One last pluck, one last taste,
Or one more, "good night,"
From lips never more,
Never to be tender, nor tended,
Never to taunt again.
And it was “then,”
That something was stolen.

I stumble atop subliminal,
     One bourbon
     For – Her,
     One bourbon
     For – Me.
     Over and over,
     If only and later
To saunter before granite.

Sure, she’d have been my bride,
Someday –
Promised and carved in oak.
And sure, I’d have been her groom,
Someday –
But epochs come and go,
Papyrus fades and presses fail;

All and parallel the coma wished for –
Prisons beholden broken records
That make the memories hurt;
Agony, like a shard of something,
Not in my brain,
But in my everything.

We cannot
Talk
Because we seldom share
Language,
The token tongue,
But still,
We conquer –
Communicate.
We transmit
Smiles and fingers
Pointing towards
Needs,
Wants
And what’s, “next,”
Egg cakes, soy and tea
For the son she’d never
Expected –
He who’d lose a tooth,
He who’d hold her daughter,
He who'd love
Eternity.