i have no idea how to feel free
my skin is a cage and my mind is a
whip around my throat

the pain is numbing, but i tell myself to love it anyway

everything is boring
and nothing is the same,

but this awful feeling of
a dead man living in my brain

i have learned to breathe under holy water -
grew gills so strong they are
lined with celestial gold.

the ocean is a puddle to me now.

and i ***** pearls of pain,
lick them clean with my acetylene
tongue.

my acids will heal what the world cannot.

pills and love potions  
can't take away
my virginity.

i am clean, so clean.

the devil watches me and
cringes at my radioactive light.

for i am dead and alive all at once.
poison, poison.

the radium drips from my lips like
babyspit and i am too pure
for god himself

so i offer my golden blood
to a higher power

that would take the pureness of it all
and make it an ounce
of what i could have been

The glimmer of light
skimming upon ripples
is so bright
I squint
trying to capture
its sparkling life,
to absorb its nature
and bare witness
while it yet exist,
before it slips
away
like a passing love
you would die to save.

tonight, breeze
of rose,

tide, sweet
river brightened,
falling into the dark,

our love, the
breeze's ghost,
running from
the sun that
slipped away,

leaves in
flight on the
trees, tireless
and wordless,
murmuring
of summer
dreams and
crazy love,

high tide,
the sea's breath
lowering
the sky,
silver cloud
and moon-onyx,

our love,
tonight,
where the night is....

where the night is
a sweetened breeze,

where the night is
the dark, daring
us to go on,

to wait forever....
for the silvery
whispers of the
night to
sigh
for love.

He bounced around
from town to town,
never becoming whole.
'Cause in his parents' eyes,
he was a parasite, hiding in
a hole.

And he let his friends down,
with promises and hopes
that deluded and destroyed
him.  Throwing his words a-
-round, never slowing down
to enjoy the beer and bodies.

He bounced around
from heart to heart,
gathering sympathy
like gold coins; hoping
that he could, if they
really would, stay and
cope a little.

And he let them down,
like his friends and his
parents. He thought a-
-bout dying and writing.
He thought about his
brother and every girl
he thought he loved,
trying to understand
if he could love if he
could not love himself.

He bounced around
from key to key,
writing about nonsense.
Or maybe it was important
and he minimized it, because
that's how he coped; or that's
how his father talked about
his son's accomplishments.
I guess his son would have
to ask himself if he ever
accomplished anything worth
making his dad proud.

And when he went to
the ward, Chestnut Ridge,
that was three years ago.
I guess he's still around,
working hard, New Yorker
something, something, something.
Dad is proud, likes Bojack Horseman
and The Walking Dead; all of this stuff
is so ******* irrelevant.

My dad is proud.