Our relationship is smoke and mirrors
It looks good but doesn't feel right
It's perfect for a magic act
But doesn't work well in real life

You can pull a rabbit out of your hat
But you can't pull out our love
You roll up your sleeves for your very next trick
When rolling up your sleeves isn't enough

It's become a fact that this magic act
Is sawing our relationship in two
Please put away your wand so we can move on
From where I sit, fooled without a clue

I really don't care how it is you do your tricks
There's no need for you to revel
If you'll just take off your cape before our love escapes
And perhaps that love will magically heal

I am guilty of projecting. I will turn you into a goddess
in my mind to deal with the anxiety of
the fact that you might actually like me. I will like you back,
to an extreme; to the point where it's scary,
so that you'll stay away from me.
"Oh yea, watch out for that one. He's crazy."

Vain girls are attracted to it.
They like the way I paint them in my dreams.
As if fulfilling their own of becoming some sort of
Aphrodite. They build their confidence off of my idolatry.
I've seen it go to their heads.
It makes me kind of sick.

I will use you. The fantastical female;
my muse. You inspire my more neurotically infused
writings, and give fire to my self-abuse.

A few times, I've gotten the one I desired. Always through my words.
Forced to deal with discrepancies between fantasies and the truth, I fall apart.
Invariably, they were emotionally damaged;
prone to crying. I'd give them my shoulder and wrestle with the thoughts
that I'd fallen for a girl so much like my mother.
**** you, Freud.

Now I know better, but I can't fight my nature.
So I've embraced it. Taken it to new heights. Turned it into an art form.
Mentally magnified mistress, watch this:
I will take everything you've ever said (which I cannot forget)
and reflect it back at you through my poetic psychotic lens
Freaky, is it not?

But it's also kind of fun.
If you can appreciate the irony,
then I think you might be the one.

Are "things I'll always remember"
same as "things I shall never forget"?
what's the difference, or matter,
to each and the same
I haven't forgotten them yet.

I recall with vivid intensity
the taste of salt on your skin
through the membrane of years
and the veil of distance
such thoughts are absolved of their sin.

I shall never forget, nor abstain from
recollecting the shape you once made
as you moved through my world
in effortless sweetness
and next to me quietly laid.

I shall never forget hearing my name said
by your fathomless, deepening tone
but, I shall always remember
an embrace that felt something like home.

I remember the weight of your kisses
roses burdened with raindrops, and then
a release of all meaningful reason
****, I wish I could kiss you again.

We are a little distant with the ones we love
Lying to ourselves to hide from the truth
We are a little twisted and broken and bent
Lacking the honesty we so desperately need
We are all fighting battles of burdens and shame
Suffocated by the enemy and the hurting and sorrow
Do we know how to see the through our own dark ****** up lies?
Do we know how to know how to smile and laugh at the good?
Is there hope for us, is there nothing but rain?
Are we capable of love? Or shall we dig our own grave and lay in the pain?
Am I hopeless? Are you worth it?
Deciding is hard
Are we just enough?
Or is it too little too late?

I'm so alone now in this shelter as a cocoon
Empty and unholy
Insecure and maybe moody
I'm so unafraid now I've turned my guilt into a blaze
As I rage against the enemies I create
Its the path of freedom in this miserable escape towards happiness

I wasn't particular about the things that I expected from you
Just obvious with the what and when and where and how but never with the why
I knew the secret rules of boundaries and respect
Silence is a way to watch it all or twist it all, or hide it all
Silence was the one time you fell apart when all the other times you weren't too far from Hercules
I am angry with you, patient with you
I can't lose sleep over it
I'll just cry in terror
You can just sit there careless
I guess its times like these when you realize the things you want
And the things you don't

I'm unhappy
At this  very instant
But even most days I can muscle up the energy
I can focus on whats right and whats now and what can be
You can sit there drown in your solitude
because if you can't let it out and you won't let me in
Eventually the guilt from your kisses will be swallowed in acid
And the reaction of which will eat you alive

but with a liquor tongue & sober head
drafting and redrafting the words stuttering
on my teeth to keep you here
falling backwards on my *** will
prove nothing but that i’m not content
to be anything but in the table of contents
not a side character
in your favorite book
but god i can’t stop tripping
over air and chalked-up asphalt
am i first?
am i the only one? i growl
apologies & maybe’s
but honest to hell i am
filled with vice
glittering with ill-intent
dented craniums
punctured fists
bitten up pen caps
oh sure, you’re inked up pal
but those tattoos for the weak
aren’t going to lift any skirts
her lipstick ain’t gonna paint your mouth
for you
“rosebud”
hah
we walked with ghosts that one time
kicking trash, dodging dead squirrels, singing
punk rock---betting quarters & Arizona cans
to run fast against traffic
looking for words to cause earthquakes
and fault lines in lungs
timestop: graffiti
          i fear the human condition
don’t look at me or i’ll shatter
a powder touch would ****.