there's more than you
sure, we're all at the center of our own spiderwebs
pulling and grasping at each other,
and we all think we're the center of everyone elses' as well
the sun to their globes, but as stars, we
twinkle through the atmosphere and fade again,
leaving nothing, no lasting mark on our orbits
you think your star is the brightest in my sky
but honey, I'm the brightest.
I am my own star.

And I won't say a thing
if you don't want.
And I will close my eyes
just this once.
And if you asked me to, I'd walk away
and you'll never hear me say
that I don't love you,
that's the way it's gonna stay.

tired of the same track on replay
in blown out speakers pulsing
electric signals calling and commanding
and one motion after the other-
I can't wait for a short in the signal
you'd think all the rain would've done the job
but the song still plays, still plays.

God is still calling
but how can he be the God
that they say He is
how can he be
the God that he says He is
if I am already ******?

There was a boat in a sea I knew
Couldn't believe what I saw was true
I swam out through the waves
I caught it as it moved away

I said I'd stole you away
I said I'd stole you away
Next time I'll steal you away
Next time I'll steal you, darling, you stay

There was a change
In the way you breathe
I couldn't believe
You would change for me

And if you hear the sound
Of shooting stars
Protect your heart 'cause it burns back
And turns back around

I said I'd stole you away
I said I'd stole you away
Next time I'll steal you away
Next time I'll steal you, darling, you stay

High strung your soul
It's uncovered by believing
And the things you see

You spent too long running
But there's nothing coming
Turn around and run into me

I said I'd stole you away
I said I'd stole you away
Next time I'll steal you away
Next time I'll steal you, darling, you stay

something is broken inside of me, and
I know it is broken and I know it is cracked
but I don't know what broke it
so I don't know how to get back
glue my pieces back together and walk on a clear track
because lost is the way and confused is the path.

think of how much love that's been wasted
people always trying to escape it
move on to stop their heart breaking
but there's nothing I'm running from
you make me strong.

**** your bukowskisms
pick yourself up because
no one else can- they'll try and they'll reach out
and you can take their hand
but until you pull your *** off the ground
you're stuck there.

I hate myself for loving you- because
by all rights, I shouldn't,
There's no reason to,
You don't even like me, much less love me
you don't see the point in overt displays of affection
but I want to kiss you until eternity-
I love you desperately and forever,
and there's no particular reason why-
It just is.

please, don't tell me you can't breathe without me
because I'm afraid, my dear, that you'll just have to suffocate

"taking away hope slow like that,
that's like giving somebody a little less air to breathe
every day, until they die."
I have always measured the goodness of things
by three scales: suffocation, nausea, and pain
there are some that are just suffocating,
those are the 'numbing evils',
some that are just painful,
those are the 'agonizing evils',
those that are just nauseating,
those are the 'sinful evils'
there are some things that are
suffocating and nauseating that don't induce pain
those are the 'unsettling evils'
there are some that are nauseating and painful
that do not suffocate
those are the 'violent evils'
and there are some
that are suffocating and painful, but
for some reason, have never felt anything but right-
that is called 'love'.

Sun is up, expansive, out, and enveloping
Moon is down, within, internal, and intuitive
These two inside you are constantly connecting
It's impossible to be just one or the other, but if you're not, then punitive
measures will be taken to ensure we're protecting
that God-**** marriage covenant, a twinning of sun
and moon; a ******* that's worth correcting:
those couples that are neither, or only one-
Women are 'supposed to be' moon,
Men are 'supposed to be' sun,
But femininity and masculinity into our genders aren't hewn
There's some that are neither and none.
This isn't just one culture, not just one idea
The yin-yang is Chinese, the Word God's favorite son.
Within the human soul is the forbidden black María
we all know within us what is true and to be done.
Although I'm not of that culture, 'Two-Spirits' were a boon,
To hold a special place, set apart, but the white men have begun
A regime of 'this is it, this is you, you cannot sing your own tune,'
But lately, the real ones, the humans, we've won.
Hey, guess what? I'll break it.
Not sorry. I'm sun.

all this life is learning your place
and all next life is living there

You know how that quote goes, everyone does.
"If I was a drizzle, she was a hurricane"
When we're all just our own kinds of rainstorms
Magically not working with each other
Just trying to drench whatever we can
But I'd rather spend time with you than anyone in the world.
People used to tell me they looked up to me
and the same people barely talk to me anymore
because what they saw was a figurehead instead of
a friend who is on their level,
and they like people who have flaws (not that I don't),
but tell us to strive to be perfect.
And I've worked so hard to learn how to love
flawlessly, but the more I love, the more I
bleed, with every breath you don't appreciate
and every love poem you don't read
And they keep beating me and beating me down
expecting this priceless gold mountain of positivity
and crushing me. It's like they're looking for flaws
in the statue I'm hiding within, and they seek to
destroy it because even tarnished gold is too bright
in their losing eyes. Maybe I'm the flaw in the statue,
my pink flesh and pale blood can't stand
these attacks and violent words, creating
holes in my heart where before there was none. I'm on my knees,
begging because I don't think I can do this anymore.
The blood I give is torn out of me from the passion I have for
you, I've had my suffering and death,
where's the resurrection?
I'm driving my head into the ground trying to
whip up the storm that will make me unique, beautiful, and valuable,
trying to gather little tornadoes around me,
while they're destroying me from the inside out;
standing for these things that are greater than me, and
watching in vain for an equal partner, since
no one can come too close to these whirlwinds
and mountain-high clouds.
It's lonely being a hurricane, too, because
none of the lovely drizzles think they're worth your time.

at what point in a man's life does he begin to stand?

"why do you talk so much"
"I have so much to share"
and maybe I've been talking so much
that I forgot how to listen-
because other people,
they have 'so much to share' too.

I've been talking to myself a lot recently
I'll invent characters to converse with
demons to battle
antagonistic villains who pose opposing points
I like the thrill of having someone other than myself to talk to
even when I'm alone,
other people do exactly what I imagine them to do-
that is, if I'm imagining them.
they are the back to my forth
make me find and close loopholes I subconsciously noticed
but it wasn't in character for me to acknowledge their presence.
that's what the others are for!
and it's not like I'm schizophrenic- I'm not,
I don't become these other people for moments;
I invented them for the pleasure of their conversation
because they see things I couldn't see, otherwise.
my character is not all-encompassing
and it's nice to have other views than mine, sometimes...

am I really talking to only myself?

I'm entertained by the thought of talking to myself
I haven't yet met a mind as perfect for me
as, well, me
and maybe an imaginary friend wouldn't go amiss
in this whirlwind of loneliness and
mindless stimuli.
I'm busy constantly, on my phone,
studying,
sleeping,
playing an instrument,
'quiet time' is only when I'm with other people
because I can go on autopilot
and alone is when I think too fast for speaking or writing
alone is when my mind fades into white noise
alone is when the walls don't feel like walls.
I'm entertained by the thought of talking to myself
because I need someone with me,
especially when there's no one there,
because that's the worst time for proper thinking;
-I'm always distracted, never-focused-
other people focus me.
other people are the magnifying lens, the bounce-off,
alone is terrifying so I avoid it by stimulating my mind
with pointless ****,
while talking to myself would
probably be more productive.
I'm entertained by the thought of talking to myself,
because that way,
I'd never have to be alone.

"kisses are a better fate than wisdom"- front  of right shoulder
"we do not stand alone"- inside of foot
"timshel"- right heel
"agape"- left heel
"and the tree was happy"- under chest, on right side
"+)"- behind the heart on back
"fiat"- the back of my right shoulder
"ut prosim"- the back of my left shoulder
"I have wept for love of them"- under chest, on left side
"that"- one letter each on feet and hands
and a cross, on my left ring finger

when they ask me, "Why would you want anything on your body forever?"
I can't help but think, "Don't you realize that it has already marked you?"
(forever and ever, always, big or small, no matter what way.)

imagine believing in something so wholeheartedly
that you dedicate your life to sharing
whatever joy you receive from that: you want them to know
because there is nothing more important to you
and you teach them, you teach them, you teach them
and then you reach the ****** of your lesson,
at the end of the year- this is the single most important thing
that you yourself have ever learned- this is it,
they must know this, they must
you finish saying it and you look around and ask if they understand
half are looking down, some are sleeping, one makes eye contact with you
but none are filled with zeal, and you know
that another group of people has slipped through your fingers
a piece of you dies with every student that loses their faith because
you have failed, you have not expressed what you wanted
and they have not absorbed
and you realize the true destitution of experience:
they can never share in what you have, no one can
you are alone, and they do not understand.

I don't cry often. I don't.
I cry mostly at weddings and rarely at funerals
I cry at beautiful, touching things
only sometimes at heart-wrenching things
I hardly ever cry. I've cried many times over you.
I'm not sure what category you fit into.

the one constant in your life is you.
I am the tectonic plates, shifting and burying and grinding
changing against myself with little cares for trees and bushes,
I do not mind that my earthquakes destroy sheep
I do not lose sleep over my sinkholes, nor does the
fresh breeze disturb my actions- you
might think your life changes when someone leaves
or someone dies, or someone new comes
and maybe yes, it does, but you are really far beyond the scope
of one meteorite, one blast of destruction or creation-
this is no apocalypse. The world is different, now, but not really-
it still exists, and it still is called by the same name-
no matter what physical shifts occur, it's made of the same mass
of **** and dirt and rock and pure lava tossing in the celestial laundry.
What do you find there?
You are more unchangeable than you know
and yet, once you are changing- there is no stopping
the earth from folding in on itself and unearthing your new truth.

your body is no less of a temple
merely because more people worship it

and it seems as though there is nothing wrong with my own precious heart- it has been blessed and made sacred, I have been tested and reviewed and through all my examinations I have processed
I have been consecrated without my knowledge, baptised without consent and without an idea of destiny- I did not know where I was going and I thought my shattered heart was on its shattered road and my broken soul was headed to brokenness but God has been mending me and melding me all at once. I have been made whole, for I am whole. He has planned out my life for my best good but I could not see it, my eyes skipped over the road and forgot where I was headed, without the grand picture in front of me I lost who I was and could not see a clear image-
after all
a poet believes their whole life that they are broken
and finds, at the very end,
that they were flawless all along.

in the arms of the ocean, deliver me
and I haven't forgotten that I am yours and you are mine
we're all sinking

I cannot get detached
that is why that is why that is why
I stopped reading
because I forgot what reality was and how to get there
because I get detached too easily, I focus on one thing
and the galaxies take the shape of it
and the stars align along the arc of someone's nose or the
irregular beat of my heart
and that is it, that is what the world looks like,
there is no reality
that is why that is why that is why that is why that is why
a fantasy world is so dangerous and people say
you used to read so much why did you change
because I lack the distinction between the book and the world
and I must change because
I used to be depressed why did I change
I used to be anxious why did I change
that is why
I changed because I must and I have to and I cannot go back
I cannot return to the meadows and mystical fields of sickness and confusion
I am less than that but I must
constantly think of quantity rather than quality
and keep myself flitting from subject to subject
else I delve too deep
and lose grips on myself
again.

I don't exactly know how to phrase it when we've been told
romantic love is the be-all, end-all of it all. I don't exactly know
how to say what I feel without sounding shallow and emotionless
but what I have learned, in my heart, is this:
that love isn't love that takes.
that me needing love to survive,
wanting it at the cost of all else,
and seeing it as the end goal of my life-
is setting me up to love for the sake of love by itself
and love for the sake of having it. By definition,
if romantic love is my life goal, any love I have
is taking. I have learned that
I don't need another person to fulfill my life
and it's foolish to act as though it's all pointless without love.
I have learned that to be poor and with the love of your life
is nice, and a beautiful happy life, but to be rich and single allows you
to give your riches to charity and spend your career changing the world
maybe at the cost of your own happiness, maybe not.
I have learned that even if it costs my own happiness, it is
better for me and anyone to sacrifice being with someone you love
for the sake of other people. I don't deserve that happiness
if it means it's going to forbid me from
changing the world in a positive way. I don't deserve that happiness
if it means I am alone with the one I love and have selfishly decided
my love is more important than anything else.
I have learned that there are many examples of people
who have lived their lives without love and have had wonderful lives.
I have learned that mere happiness is not the goal of the eternal soul.
I have learned that it's not boring or pointless or heartbreaking when one
doesn't end up with someone- I have learned that to sacrifice
my whole life for the sake of another person doesn't mean to give up
everything to be with them, either romantically or sexually.
I have learned that we must sacrifice ourselves, our wants, our needs
for the sake of God's kingdom- that whatever I want is nothing to His wants,
and that He does not want what I want. His ways are higher than mine.
I might want to be married, I might want to have kids
but what I've learned has told me that's not the point. That's not the end.
A man hath no greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends.
Friends. I can, and will, give up everything for my friends,
everything for God. That's what love is. Self-sacrifice, not self-fulfillment
not "who I can be", but "who I can help you to be"-
not the light at the end of the tunnel, but the person willing to die.
I have been asking and looking for a perfect person
that understands me, is willing to be my partner and crime,
and loves me just as much or more as I love them. I found Him.
His name is Jesus Christ. And I know that I wouldn't give up Him
to be with anyone in the world. That's why. That's why. That's why.

"I can have relationships with all women because my body and heart belongs to one of them."

right now, my life is inscribed
on ten pieces of paper,
inside my backpack
vulnerable, visible, and destructible
all I would have to do is light a match
and my world would go up in flames.

" "Why?" asked her companion. "Why do you love him when you ought not to?"

Edna, with a motion or two, dragged herself on her knees before Mademoiselle Reisz, who took the glowing face between her two hands.
"Why? Because his hair is brown and grows away from his temples; because he opens and shuts his eyes, and his nose is a little out of drawing; because he has two lips and a square chin, and a little finger which he can't straighten from having played baseball too energetically in his youth. Because - "

"Because you do, in short," laughed Mademoiselle.” "

It's always not-quite-enough
or, can't-quite-touch
this imaginary cinema screen
hurts us so much.
You and me, we see the sky like
it's meant to be seen,
but we observe people from a distance.

the best poetry is full of joy
unashamed of its tired clichés
because tasteful, articulate things
have been weighed in the balance and found wanting
and 'good music taste' is not really good
when the music has no real melody
and doesn't get your heart pumping
the best poetry gets your heart pumping
and your soul throbbing, yearning for more.
it is not pretentious,
it does not tell itself 'you are not good enough'
even though it is fashionable to have low self-esteem
it dances and refuses to abstain from its own glory
the best poetry is shining
and does its best to polish off its tarnished spots
rather than glorifying them
the best poetry admits its own repetition
but history is not a bad thing
tradition is not bad merely because it is traditional
the best poetry breathes life into the heart of everyone who reads it
spreads light
gives air to that which had been oppressed-
the best poetry does not wallow, complain, or remain stagnant-
the best poetry is beautiful,
and the best poetry resembles
the truth of the beautiful people who wrote it.

We're talking about evolution in biology
makes you think a little about things like
cause-and-effect, or the-natural-flow-of-events
and it makes people like me think about summer,
how the fires of our hearts have been numbed
for a little too long,
and they're just now getting rekindled.
The grass pokes through the matted sheets of brown,
and the world's pulse goes dun, dundun, dundundun,
dundundundundundundun;
I wake up in the morning and it's a brave kind of day.
I've never felt the awakening as much as I am this year, but then,
I've never felt the winter as hard as I have this year;
so my blood, was frozen, now finally pumps with the coming of spring.

Some folks don't like workin' hard
Some folks don't like rain
Some folks love to tell you
All about their aches and pains
Me, I take the hand I'm dealt
And I play it as it lays
It's the cost of living
And everyone pays

You can't live in memories
Of all your golden yesterdays
Or spend your whole life grieving
For the one that got away
Common sense says "let her go"
But your heart disobeys
It's the cost of living
And everyone pays

Blue shadows falling all around me
Still I don't regret a single day

I look in the mirror now
I see that time can be unkind
But I know every wrinkle
And I earned every line
So, wear it like a royal crown
When you get old and gray
It's the cost of living
And everyone pays
It's the cost of living
And everyone pays.

Shouting through the desert
and there's no one to hear
because my poems about love aren't
accurate, or good enough, when
words cannot describe what they are meant to describe. I like grass between my toes
and wind in your hair
and how it feels to wake up
and the way you look when you wake up
that smile that you only just started having
I can't write it down because
the spark in your eye has never been visible before, and no one has seen it but me
I like hugs and kisses and late night talks and
breakfast food and blue skies and gray skies
green skies red skies
and shouting through the desert is all I can do.

slow down, we've got time left to be lazy,
all the kids have bloomed from babies
into flowers in our eyes
we've got fifty good years left to spend out in the garden
I don't care, to beg your pardon
we should live until we die.

I'm measuring the gap.
last month, it was four:
you swear if it gets closer, it's weird
the month before that was five:
this time we'd crack up and avoid eye contact
I don't think we even touched each
other in September.
But this month it's three.
and maybe, just maybe: your lips
will close the gap, and
touch


mine.

You gave me a giving tree
ironic, a little.
I gave you a poem.
ironic, a lot. there's so many about you that
you have never read.
You seemed to know exactly what I needed
In order to stay in love with you, I
needed to know why,
and that's why.
He said it's impossible to love without understanding;
we are lonely creatures who cannot
dream each others' dreams.
How can we love?
we give.
we give until it hurts and then some
until we gave it all away without even understanding
WHY we are in love, or
WHY we even started giving.
Is that love? is it love if we don't
understand
what we're even getting into?
How could someone like you fall for a
girl(?)
who dedicates her life to figuring out why she's
beautifully in love with you
all she knows is to live, she has to give
and she doesn't even know if that's true.

I am at war with the boundaries that divide us
I urge with every muscle to strike them down
though the muscles themselves build the divisions
(my mind can never be in yours because
my body is separate and I will never be inside of you
as far as I desire to go)
there will always be tense heirarchies and lines-that-are-forbidden-to-cross and things
that you musn't say to a teacher, say, or a priest
and these invented boxes line our hearts and claim
that we are not created equal, all men and women are
endowed with certain unalienable rights
like the right to honesty, liberty,  and the pursuit of expression
that though I speak to you I may be fully me
but this can never be- you will always be you
so we must divide, now and stand on opposite sides
of the wall, look at each other through a glass
and though it seems we touch, we never can,
putting our hands up to a window, kissing through it
and my lips shall never meet yours-
and for that, I am at war with the glass;
I long for the warmth and the gentleness of your lips
but cannot, it is cold in between us, it is hell
to divide us and a damning cruelty
unites us beyond time, eternity, my heart beats divine
and you cannot feel it, and for that,
I am at war with the glass.

I thrive in the heat-
I've waited so long for this.
everyone complains when it's cold and complains when it's hot
but I'm glad now- I'm finally in my favorite element: fire.
well, maybe not fire. but sweat
and scorching distances to run
and shout and break my voice
at last, the air feels like there's too much
not like there's not enough
at last, I'm choking, not gasping
it's a beautiful feeling when you have to turn your AC on
for the first time in six months.
the flowers are blooming
the grass is green
and the leaves on the trees are back.
The dead of winter is only a nightmare dream.
My limbs are on fire- I could race all the way around the track.
The burn within my heart is finally reunited
with its home in the summer heat;
the blaze is about to be ignited
and the flames will soon be free.

you can only be in one room at once.
a forest glade might look like the whole world from afar, but inside it is not
all those journeys you speak of must take place in a car. with other people.
and you'll be cold and wet and tired
and smelly, probably. and your experience
won't be the sweeping hills with background music
or dances or tambourines or crazy nights.
and flashing movie scenes aren't the reality of things.
it'll just be you and me.
and we can only be in one room at once.

you matter to me- and since you matter to me,
you hold power over my heart
that you can't abdicate unless I fire you.
Because it is I that bestows the crown and you
physically do not have the power to remove it-
and if you try, all it does is rip my heart out,
because you're trying to take it with you
and I want to keep it;
my rootstrings are yours to do with as you please
and maybe you don't want the burden but I'm sorry,
it's too late, I can't stop now,
this has been going on for too long;
you could tell me to abandon my family and I would,
for you,
and without agenda, and
declarations of love do not require returns,
for it is like gift-giving- mindless social
conventions, and my darling, you are not conventional.
You can't let someone else carry the yoke, you
have me at your will,
and just as much as I can't make you love me,
you can't make me stop loving you.
If you must, you can let me down easy-
but my heart is in your hands.
So please, please, please, darling,
be gentle.

I was heading for the door, torn between anger and a fierce excitement, hearing the phone click down as I started past and feeling her swirl against me and I was lost, for the conflict between the ideological and the biological, duty and desire, had become too subtly confused. I went to her, thinking,

Let them break down the door, whosoever will, let them come.

who is the kind of person that
sees the kind of person and knows
the kind of person that lives within
the kind of person who breathes the kind
of person that loves the kind of person
that is worth loving?

the mind is not an engine- the fuller, the more smoothly it runs
the mind is a bottle. The emptier, the easier it is to bend and crumple
but when it is too full- it explodes.

my heart bleeds a hell of a lot
as hearts do
as one does.

burning alive inside my own skin, I feel,
I am suffocated into a kind of peace, a peace that says
do not stand or sit, this is good enough
a peace that is to emulate the earth,
eternal, unmoving, in accordance with being changed,
molding into the world around it
but my Lord, I hear him calling, he says that true peace is
not to stay like the earth, he says that it is
rather, to wreak a change so vast in the passion of the heart
that it can only have been caused by a vision of self
that is based in unity, to force and break something in the world
you must exist in the violence of feeling and stay true
and though the world might roll and thunder around you
your soul is stronger and has the power to gather and clench
the tendons wrapped around the galaxies
burning and writhing the masses of hurricanes
bending the will of tempests
for your soul is unconquerable, your peace shall not come from
lying down and accepting, your peace is in your core, while you are
driven irresistibly forward, like the tide of the greatest ocean,
your depths, unprobed, crevasses and mountains stretched
like continents displayed across, a nobility of design
your might, unknown, your eyes burn with a hesitancy and trust
that you cannot hide, and you shall reach your hand up
into the annals of history and tear and vandalize pages at will,
no one is going to stop you, no one can stand in your way,
for the wisest and bravest of all men will fear what you are capable of.

as we told each other the greatest things we could think to share
we could all tell
the greatest things we held within ourselves,
strength
attitude
illness
recovery
friends
mom
loss
li­fe
grandma
love-
we know, now, what word the center of our being holds-
we had thought of each other as creatures that spun with the world
around the point that is our own being
everyone else a nameless, faceless being that turns and leaves in orbit
with no center of gravity, no word inscribed on their hearts
that kept them grounded to this earth
but we were wrong.
the world spun,
and we were all still there together.

Let me breathe
I'm choking
Drowning in my own iniquities
Softly, gently
Suffocating
Am I the only one who walks the halls?
Do you ever wonder-
Are they all automatons there for you and there's no real company, you're alone, you are the only conscious mind there and they're trying to brainwash you with every line so your free will is gone just like theirs. And since they're all just responsive mindless creatures, you have no real friends, they're figments of your imagination, I want to be like them, anything is better than feeling this lonely all the time;
There's no one like me,
no one with me,
I'm lost, I feel as though
there's a brand on my forehead that
they can only see sometimes
and I have no idea what it says
but I'm marked as not one of them
am I the only self aware person here?
I don't like it. Take away whatever it is that makes me special,
I give up.
I'll walk in lines, fine,
resisting hurts when there's no brother soldiers on either side,
Why is it that none of us feel like we belong here?
Can we just all be the same, finally?
I'm so tired.
I'd rather be mindless and hopeless than on fire in a world of ice.