I don't know what's crossed your
Brain tonight but I know that
You shouldn't think I want you to
Know that I think highly of you

So please,
Kiss me and get it over with

there are knives and
daggers in my skull that spin about
with great fury and fervor

when will the bone give way?

To cause a man as much pain as possible
without quickly killing him, drive a plastic
knife into his gut and twist the handle so
the blade splits evenly, distributing shards of
polymer that will ache each time he moves

to split needs intertwined
and watch them unravel
within others
lit flames in shut eyes
mouths move and
make no sound but
lay bare the speech
of the heart

to be so honest
with you that i
am desperate to
create new secrets
but i cannot come up
with anything you
don't already
know

You've got a lot of nerve,
Coming back here after
What you've done

Let it all out
Let it breathe

If the sky can draw a breath
Then so can (*******) you

They're telling us to calm down
But it doesn't make me any more sane

Let it run like hot blood
In the snow, cutting like knives
In a soldier's soft skin

Red on white,
Stark, hands in my hair
Breath on my brow

Let your words run down
My back like oil on sand
Black and slick underfoot

You're a perfect poison
On which everything thrives
But me, but trust me,
It's a good death

i look at you and hear guitars strumming in my head
a thousand at once, you know, rising up like the
crashing of atlantic waves

violent, silver, dark as blood but not the right color
at all, they don't care what you think

but they can tell what you're feeling so when the
storm recedes and the sea grows suddenly calm,
you are forced to look it in the eye and
say that you're okay

i will be on the sand and i will
know that you are not

Each time you look at me
I see eyes that have never
met mine

Each time you speak I watch
lips move that have never
tasted mine

Each time you walk I see muscles
tense that I have never felt roll
in days past

Your eyes say we never kissed and
I can only agree

That's the one I was talking about
When he broke your heart and your only escape was the keyboard?
I was listening
I'm being the best brother I can
But we've all got hiccups
And the choppy waters never end

The best we can do is to wait for
Landfall and hold onto hope until the world swallows us
Again and makes us into something new
But I see an awakening for you
In these coming months
So please, don't let go

Three-syllable words

the act of being alone
the act of being a lone
person
without
others
nearby

the act of being depressed
d e p r e s s e d
it's crawling and then running and
then my skull is split on paper and
the blood is ink and people
are dipping their quills in it
as if my body is not there
and there is not a casket big enough
to hold everything i have touched
and created and not a scroll long enough
to encompass all that i have destroyed

Three-syllable words

some things can't be fixed

I'm an inconvenience
And time is short no matter the hour

I believe I am
meant to be alone

when doubt seizes fast
and waves slide out
allowing mountains to fall
and the earth to shake
felling buildings
breaking knees
there is no buffer to
prevent the slip into
a long, dark night

when the light rises red
like the sunrise
but not from the sky
but rather from the stone
flowing orange
liquid fire
a brief reminder to
always be moving
lest you fall prey to
false hope

I told my friend that
you're the past

Because you're everything
aging and terrible and ashy
about years gone by

I've got a million other names for
you like cowardly, disloyal,
traitorous

But speaking to you would be a
manner of giving in, going after your
lure, and I knew you as a man of strength
and honesty

And you were, once upon a time,
So what happened?

my hair grows long
wheat grass under
the sun

so do our conversations
meandering and young
with no intent

i feel this chapter in our story
coming to an end

Endlessly entangled in bloodred twine
Torn from the hearts of dead lovers
I need a means of escape
From this magic pair

I can feel it in my chest
A dig site in flesh and soul
Spades cutting bone, I know
Your promises never last

Let's plunge into delirium
lost in our own suffering
bathed in blood and oil,
I want to lose any illusion
of purity

Of soul and body I want
you to consume me,
and I you but only this
skin-deep terror holds us back

I miss the touch of candlelight on my skin
Faces pressed together without discretion
Thoughts projected onto cluttered walls
Littered with forced memories of years past

I'm confused by nostalgia
and conflicting desires
and the will to make it all right
when it's not my place to do so

I remember years ago when I looked in my wall-wide mirror
and realized that I'm not who I think I am
and I never will be
and I'm different by every sunrise

Reborn in a new light
singing new songs
humming old tunes
reclaiming lyrics from scrapyards

This is my destiny, I realized;
to be ever-changing

Each night I find myself clawing
the skin off my face

I find myself singing along to love songs
that I'll never relate to
not because I won't find love
but because I won't let myself

Each conversation blocked by doubt;
this is my curse
and my blessing

I'm forever safe, guarded by gates that
will never open

we are drinking in the light
that filters through the trees
and i feel her tug on my shoulder
i turn to the right
meet the gaze of another man
far away

i am feeling the rush of caffeine
leaning on the counter
and i feel her behind my back
in white drapes and vines around
her shoulders as a scarf
here to give another warning

i am far away from here
moving faster than any man has
before but she is there
beside me
light as a feather but
heavy as my heart

Suede shying from raindrops,
I think;
How long until the dawn?

I'm lost in a forest
The sun is hiding
I seek to do the same

Reading lines off cue cards,
I'm singing
I love you
But the words aren't mine

A boy can love on a blue moon
or when the sun sets in the east,
and I'm wondering if this is a curse
or a blessing

As I'm working up the strength to tell you
I can't do this anymore

we died just after the start of march
and the sun was rising
spring was born

i found beauty in loss
i'm still in your heart and
you in mine

i'm ashamed to say i feel weakness
when you cross my mind but i
wouldn't have it any other way

Our boots shake the earth and a thousand suns beyond,
stars shine afar, of which we are so fond

Burning voices tear the air,
hunting parties are rife with the knife,
a blade drawing black blood,
our boots soaked in black mud

No time to play, you'll waste away the day
Face the sun's shallow ray and tell me you'll stay

It's okay if you lie, dear,
but it's my wish to keep you near

we got married under wreaths of roses
wilted and wrapped in white lace
spinning in the dark
no gravity to pull us down
no force to slow us
no air end the roll

wed in false names
signed in ****** blood
sealed in false vows
caught in a trance

we lived so happily
for years on end
in a beautiful white house
with beautiful white walls
and bleached grass in the yard
and bones in the garden

the sun's in the sky but
someone sealed the moon
in the floorboards

I want to see the sun
Blinking through empty space
Unaltered by our atmosphere

I want to feel your skin
And your warmth on
A rainy Saturday

I don't know who you are
But I'll sing to the dark
And wait for you to answer

I can't help my itching despair
Tugging at me like an river
I'll deal with it someday

I want to hear your voice
When you talk in your sleep
Maybe later

i don't know where to begin
and you'd then say, sarcastically -
at the beginning

time is a lie but
emotions are not

defining
memories
shaping me gradually
i am a sculpture
made of stone

often i feel brittle but i
know i am strong

in four years i have
grown tremendously
become better
happier
bolder

not perfect but getting there

in the summer heat i will
grow again
turn into my better self
welcome a future full of
hope

thank you for nine months
four times
of self-inflicted horror
and i am sorry i have
not fully appreciated the gifts
you have given me

these warmer months will give
me time to ruminate

I dream of dark nights
when the moon hangs high
when the wind is crisp

that we sit on roofs
wrapped in each other's arms
breath the silent warmth

I dream of dark nights
that we sit on roofs
and watch the stars in silence
that our eyes be as silver as the moon

Minimus lux,
with little light

I dream of dark nights
when we would not see each other
so the form means nothing and
we are bound by mind and
soul

I dream of long days
when we sip tea or coffee
free of stress of social things or school
that we can enjoy each other's company
and not worry about deadlines or evenings

So excited but so cold
Haunted by the icy lakes outside
And my thoughts are muffled by
My insatiable hunger, I cry for a
Release from this pain

Send them my regards and I'll
Seal the deal with a kiss as I
Wish Minneapolis goodbye

I hope to return here one day since
My visit was brief, you frigid
*******

Do you have any idea
How much I love your
Purple sunsets and your
Old baby blue guitar?

The way you play for me
On the beach late Wednesday
Night before the cops bust us
For breaking curfew

Bury my feet in the sand and
Hold my head down beneath the
Waves like you hate my guts
But I know you love me

Only you will sing to me when the clock
Strikes midnight or pour out your
Heart to a stranger

I love nothing more than sensationalized
Love stories, since I must admit that I'm
Only really romancing the idea of you
Since I think you're missing in action

And that's okay

We could be monsters
If we tried hard enough

Drive up on the curb and hit the horn
Throw chunks of turf up at the
Park rangers with their sirens blaring
Behind you

Your music taste is **** but
It catalyzed mine and threw me into
Another world entirely, changed my
World view entirely

I was an ace, once upon a time,
And then a mountain, and maybe
One day I'll be the beloved of God
And change based on my vicinity

You helped me to realize that
Paths cross and it's okay when they split
Again, so to honor your unspoken wish
I will never again speak to you

GONE WITH THE SUN ON MY BACK AND THE MOONLIGHT IN MY HAIR, I proclaimed, and I left with a trace in the form of six footsteps perfectly aligned in the soil post-storm.

I PROMISE THAT ONE DAY YOU WILL FIND ME, I bade them farewell, my message scratched in stone with a knife that if it were any sharper then I swear to God time would've bent to it and not the other way around.

I LEFT YOUR MONEY IN THE FREEZER WITH THE WINE YOUR MOTHER STOLE AT HER FINAL MASS, I called back, the words rolling off my tongue like an afterthought, and this fleeting carelessness is all I wanted in life and I was ecstatic to finally achieve it.

Rock and roll on the radio;
forsake me

Mud between my toes and teeth on my tongue;
they hate me

Laugh with me,
leave them behind,
don't let me get away

It's our day, Friday,
forsake me and
never forget me

Mud between my toes and teeth on my tongue,
they hate me

Laugh for me and relish in that song,
I said,
"Are you gonna leave me behind?"

And you said,
"Only if you can't catch up."

Clouds abound and far
Glittering emerald heights
Smokestacks at the base

I was born from snow and glacier
meltwater from the lands the sun
doesn't touch

I was born from blood and the ink
on the writs for a million ancient
creeds, lost to time

I was born on broken promises and
the dream that one day, California
will be mine

It's my American destiny to be haunted
by roadside attractions and to drink water
poisoned by my dog's dying howls

I dream of porcelain snowfall and moonlight
on your upper lip as we kiss for the last time
before you lay me to rest

I sing of a legacy forged in steel and stone, set for
our children to gaze upon, a great mausoleum
destined to fall to our greatest adversaries

But if my dreams don't come true?

Breathe me back to life

Eyes like headlights over every rise of the road

You were a sound I'd never heard before;
loud where others stayed quiet

Now I'm remembering what I fell for, why
I let you crawl inside my heart, and who I
left buried beneath my skin

This isn't you. I wish it was.

You arrived like snowfall,
Silent and white

You left like a storm,
In anger and spite

Your voice carries on the wind
And I wish you well in the
Ruin you sowed back home

You're a house in black,
Lit by a dying sun

You're a song written by
A woman long dead

*******

At the time, I was passionate
I was adamant
Our love moved mountains and
Your eyes were like twin gods

I don't miss it anymore, no
But I get flashes to the past sometimes
And my mind makes little rhymes
Trying to put the pieces together
To find out why I left

And the mysteries never solve themselves,
It's why they're called mysteries and
It's why it's best to leave them alone

There's no bad blood between us, no
Only stale words and promises I
Made and never kept and I knew that
One day I'd pull the plug on you

I can't tell if you're more alive now but
I know that I'm becoming something new
Something better
Someone better than who I was before

Because I'm adamant
That my love will persist through this
Storm and that I will rise to face the
Challenges that lie ahead and these are
Things that I can do alone

I don't need another part to complete me
I'm all I have left and I'm all I'll ever want
Beyond the sunlight and the trees and other
Little permanent things

It's crazy how the world shifts around us and
Sometimes we're the ones doing the shifting,
And how the leaves look different in the spring
Than they do in the winter

Dead things never truly go away, I've learned.
Like the rain in the summer, old things come back
To bite you and like the leaves in the winter, lost
Beauty will never truly desert you

I'll keep these words inside,
prompted by the fear that
you'll see not me but rather
the trees at my back, and
the forest will greet you, and
that my arrogance will come to
light and I'll get nothing
I was hoping for

I can't tell you what I feel because
we're not that close

I can't tell you what I fear but
maybe my taste in music can do
the talking instead

I'm writing this on my phone and by now
I'm hoping you can pick up on my mythos
Like how my number is my name
And how skies and geometry are closely intertwined

I love and
I live
And that is my resolution
For this year and every
One that comes after it

like a river rushing crushing stones beneath our feet
we will burst from the soil green vines tangling
leaves spreading petals drinking in the light of our
mother the sun above she watches over us primal
raw loving our tribe will never die

we will never die

we are buried but we are seeds of flame of locked
potential and our oppressors are the key

we will open at their command and we will
consume them

i want to hang all your
art on my walls so
when i'm home it's
all i can ever see

I'll start with the first line of
A song I'm listening to and
It all rolls out from there

Knowing you act like you love
But I know you don't -
It's the purest form of torture

Snow makes midnight look timeless
You make me feel weightless
These days don't end like they used to

I feel time drag on and night fades to day
and the morning glow is indistinguishable
from the light that leaks from behind your eyes

You've convinced yourself that you're a monster and
while you might be as beautiful as the snow I know
you're nowhere near as cold

One thing I love about
Music is the way I might get
Burnt out on an artist but
At the tail end of it all, I might
Listen to their first song I ever
Heard and get pulled right back
In again

Tag my posts with LGBT
so you know I'm gay,
but if you knew me better you'd
know it anyway

No different now than it was before,
You thought I was mad at you but a
Resting face isn't under my control

And empty words are the same as
No words at all and I can't figure
Which one I prefer

Because they're both ******* aggravating

Slaves to pain,
We're all addicts to
That which compels us to
Destroy ourselves

I can't lay the blame on
Anyone but myself since
It's me who gave in

Inaction is a form of action
And holding back has more
Power than I ever imagined

I've likely written about you before;
I can't remember

I can't figure you out,
but I know it's simpler than I
want to believe

It's been more than a year and I
still miss you, I want to
sing with you and sit in the dust
awaiting your arrival

Promise you'll never notice what
I've done to bring us together, because
putting so much work into this is either
romantic or depressing and I'm afraid
you'll choose the latter

how you still think of me
is beyond the moon
and all the sky's stars
but i am thankful

sitting at dinner and feeling
the warmth on my face and
seeing the love in your eyes
makes me yearn for this week
to end so we can be free again