i was raised
by the greatest
generation.
at least,
that's what we
were told.

we were raised
at your knee,
told stories
of the American
Dream. "work hard,"
you told us, "obey,
consume, and god
will provide
for your every need."

you neglected
to mention
you'd borrowed
our only home,
a loan
you've since
squandered.

like the parable
of old,
you buried
your talent
in the sand—
along with your head.
dormant, you twiddled
your thumbs,
ignored the warning
signs of sky-rocketing
carbon emissions.

when you die
alone
you'll leave
behind a footprint
larger than your
tiny mind
could fathom.
it will echo
in the hallways
of your vacant,
dilapidated mansions.

you stood upon
the shoulders
of gods and giants,
but you gave us
a globe
unbalanced,
off-axis.

now, like Atlas,
we're left to carry
your burdens.
this yoke is heavy
and we are slight.

there's
no future
now, thanks
to you.
only prophecies
of nuclear holocaust,
economic collapse,
and the inevitable
heat-death
of the universe.

there's a stranger sleeping on my shoulder
on this lonely overnight bus ride
to Atlanta

***** blond hair pulled back
into a loose and messy bun
cheeks obscured by the faux fur
of an oversized white-as-snow winter coat

i've given up on sleep

i can't help but wish you were here instead
that you drifted to sleep while we shared
earbuds and listened to rambling songs
as our fingers traced calligraphy tattoos
across each other's knuckles and we
huddled together for warmth

i'd glance over as you smiled in your sleep
and press my lips to the crest of your head
and as the sun rose and cast its gaze on our
little band of troubadours and
you gave out a warbling yawn i'd say
let me be the first to
cordially welcome you to Georgia

bumper-stickers of crosses
commemorating a Jewish hippie anarchist
are flanked by mantras of violence the hallmarks
of ambivalent compliance celebrating
barbarism the State’s chief contrivance

my fill-in-the-blank is an American serviceman
note here that it doesn’t matter if the individual in
question identifies as male female or non-conforming
they are a service man as if the
erasure of gendered complexities somehow
appeases the intricacies of humanity
beneath a blanket statement of hyper-masculinity but
i digress

my fill-in-the-blank is an American serviceman
reinforcing the spiritualization of militarization
in syncophantic intontations of
god bless our soldiers
and only ours
forget about all the other men and women
and children cursed by the pox of
foreign aggression and endless war
they are not our concern
on the contrary
they are just an obstacle in our path
a minor speed-bump we must summit by summoning
chauvinism and stepping on the throats of our enemies

dominance is our souls’ sole objective
we don’t have time for notions that might
challenge our hallowed perspectives or our
holy war in the most sacred spot in all
the world we cannot be deterred by the images of
broken bloodied babies on Mediterranean shores
‘cause the decimated dead with decapitated heads
only fan the flames of conquest
cultivated by the corrupt

i suppose i shouldn’t be so surprised
after all you did adopt an
instrument of torture to remember your
savior by when a dove of peace and
fraternity would’ve sufficed

your distinctly American Jesus stands shirtless
with a chiseled six-pack in camouflage cargo shorts
wielding a double-barreled sawed-off
shotgun in each hand he’s
white and rich and arrogant
as he trades blows with ISIS and
sits in consternate judgement over godless atheists
barking out damnation from the right-hand of
the lord our god the king of kings
salvation reserved for the predestined elect
necessarily limited to Americans his
chosen elite in their promised land

if only he could see you now
that same martyr you bless with one breath
before spewing vitriolic hatred with the next
what would the prince of peace
riding on a donkey
have to say to
bigots racists and homophobes

would he find the
stones you spew and shove
them back down your throat
the way i’d like to

no i somehow imagine that if your Christ returned
he’d interpose himself between you and the LGBTQ
and suffer the brunt of your bitterness
turning black and blue beneath the blows
willing to die for the least of these crying
abba father
why have you forsaken me

if the Nazarene came back he’d
overturn ballot-boxes in houses of worship
masquerading as venues for the 2016 election
he’d realize Sanders is no socialist
that Clinton is grotesquely hawkish and
i like to think he’d tell that fascist Trump
to *******

he would stand instead with the poor
and oppressed with men and women
of color at Black Lives Matter protests
smoke some quality kush with the dejected rejects
and comfort the back-alley addicts with
a soft word or warm hug to serve
as a reminder that the Kingdom of
Heaven is not above but is
built brick-by-brick in the day-to-day
interactions of compassion between ordinary
humans with an extraordinary capacity to
counteract the lethargy of apathy that
pacifies the populace and turns us into
cowed wage-slaves bowing in acquiescence

the rabbi would march to the gates
of the white house
and occupy the front lawn
to triumphant shouts that
rendered unto American Caesars
precisely what they deserve

a non-violent mass resistance of
leaderless and highly coordinated
civilly disobedient dissidents who
value dissent and populist movements to
voice their disillusionment at abject
apparatuses consolidating dominance
in order to remind the 99% that
in the words of one romantic

we will rise like lions after slumber
in unvanquishable number
we’ll shake our chains to earth like dew
for we are many and they are few

yet as much as i am loathe to admit it
Jesus of Nazareth was executed two
thousand some odd years ago
your god is dead and he cannot save us

if we intend to contend with the forces of
depravity that inculcate humanity with
putrescent fantasies of self-aggrandized zealotry
we cannot sit on our hands or
bury our heads in the sand and
wait for someone else to lead us to redemption

salvation keeps us looking down and shuffling
along suffering chained to our lack of imagination
rather than looking straight ahead
into the eyes of our taskmasters
and irrevocably declaring
we will lead ourselves

we have it in us to build a better world in
the shell of the old and raise a
culture of equality and liberty
provided we don’t buy into
all we’re told but
if such a dream could ever
triumph we must find the courage to
brave the cold winters of repression
that surely lay ahead and pour gasoline
on this ugly specter haunting our planet
before lighting the torch and tossing it
onto the detritus of misanthropy

watch it burn

come
huddle close now
gather ‘round
keep warm
if we stick together
we can brave the storm gathering
even now to purge our
peaceful non-compliance

as we carry the conflagration
to every nation to
each corner of the globe
we will overthrow the
ghost of governance

Prometheus stole fire from the gods
and gave it to us: clumsy humanity,
fumbling fools trapped in our own darkness.

for his crimes against Olympus, Zeus
had the titan bound to a rock, cursed
to suffer daily anguish.

•••

the celosia plant burnt bright orange
in the porcelain fist on my windowsill, fragile and stalwart
all at once: a brilliant symbol of our resistance.

now its leaves fade to a dull pallor, sick
from a lack of oxygen, wilting in absence
of the sun's warmth, starved for photosynthesis.

•••

i used to watch Bob Ross to fall asleep.
but now every stroke of his paintbrush
reminds me of your magenta aura—

an enigmatic glow that permeates your presence.
now i read The Sandman: Omnibus to stave off insomnia,
wondering when and where i first ****** up.

there is a glacier
partially concealed
melting from a climactic
climate shift revealing a
reality congealed by revolt

rebels burdened with
a philosophy that
elevates humanity
insisting we will not grovel
before a vain messiah
espousing erroneous
iterations of ideology

will the human race permit
the iceberg to dissolve
as vapid reformist
rhetoric inundates our
political consciousness with
pragmatic progressivism

or will we rise in resistance
with the radicals
fists clenched in protest and
hands outstretched to one
another rather than
lifted high in praise to a savior as we
witness the glacier solidify once more

as CO2 perforates our atmosphere
with heady highs and noxious toxins
will we succumb like dumbfounded
addicts intoxicated by inoculation
consuming the opiated semantics
of charismatic personas or will we

challenge the corrupt
with our wits about us
facing the sobering corporate
corporeality with the pride
of lions facing a den of thieves

abandon the chosen champion
of the vanguard party
we stand hand-in-hand
7 billion
sisters and brothers
in an anthemic chorus of

solidarity that shakes the
bastions of the enthroned
with the resounding shouts of
perseverance in our
non-compliant defiance

our manifestos are written
in the blood sweat and tears
we've shed for this
dream deferred
and we will not be the
silent majority anymore

the masque of anarchy
is ours to share
will we wear its visage
or will hell freeze over
before we choose
freedom
over happiness

there's a residue of wheat-paste
stuck to our fingers. each time we part
to adorn the concrete walls
with antifa posters, the molecules grasp
for one another, suctioned together, desperate
to hold each other
just a moment longer.

absently, i remember
the last time my fingers were glued
to your contours. you grasped my hand
then, as well. only tighter. held me firm
by the wrist as we eclipsed and i slipped inside
you, both body and mind. between clenched teeth,
a gasp of bliss traipsed
like a brushstroke across your tongue.
you ripened, sticky as a pomegranate
split wide open, slick and sweet and pink.

i will never again be your lover—at least,
not in this lifetime. but tonight
you were my partner in crime
and i like to think that maybe
that counts for something.

my day  
begins
at 3:00am
with hip-hop
thundering,
rain splattering
my window pane.
the witching hour:
my own, private
Galgotha. i forsook
god, now i'm ******
to hum the dirge
of doom, hushed
and out of tune.

this week in the news,
Sean Spicer swore
****** didn't gas
the Jews. apparently,
the irony of Passover
was lost on the fool.
if Pepsi truly held the key
to ending police
brutality, i'd be the first
to shake the Invisible Hand,
but that spectral fist
is too busy choking
the life out of refugees
to make time for a paltry
teacher like me.

as gas prices
sky-rocketed
and approval ratings
plummeted,
the *******
of all bombs
fell in Afghanistan
while tomahawk missiles
pummeled Syria
and predator drones
zoomed over
Yemen and Pakistan.

where do we stand, hands
stained red with the blood
of those we've martyred?
will we idly abide
an Empire crucifying
its imaginary enemy
on this insane crusade
of endless war?
our silent compliance
rings louder than the hammer
nailing our victims' limbs
to the cross of our indifference.

if there's one thing
i know for sure,
it's that art
makes this whole *******
joke a bit more bearable.
but how could we portend
to outlast this tragedy
when even ****.
and the Last Jedi
are only temporary reprieves
from suffering perpetually?

what's so good
about this Friday
anyway?

we left early
couldn't've been half-past
6 o'clock in the morning
the dawn gray left dew-dripped
melancholy on the foggy front lawn
beyond your mother's portable home
we drove down I-4 singing Anberlin's "A
Day Late" and took the back route down
A1A to the secret place where

the waves whispered languid lullabies
as heat rays traced your skin and harmonized
with the ancient anthems of the Atlantic
as it hummed its gentle cadences

beams of light filtered through sandy
tresses on that solitary beach in the
middle of April
lens flares immortalizing sly grins in ways
i thought only celluloid could deliver
yet you were corporeal and immediate
a fragment of an inch from me

film clumped in loose spools around us
wasted shots used and then discarded
we lay on our sides
exchanging joy in silence
and mirth in sideward glances

barefoot along the boardwalk
beneath the shadows of mangroves
trespassing in the backyards of the bourgeoisie
feet kicking toes dipping minnows nibbling
in the brackish Indian River

J.B.'s Fish Camp was slow
that time of year
we gave manatees fresh water
watched the dolphins' distant dance as
i debated whether or not  
i should try to hold your hand

you drank lukewarm beer as our star
sank over your sunburnt shoulders
and a blues musician played
somber tunes of lust and loss that
carried us away as we ate coconut shrimp
and the breeze blew in from the bay

you wore a baseball cap with
the Atlanta Braves' crimson A and
sported a matching jersey of your
little league softball team and though i may
not quite remember every little thing you said i
can't shake the way you caught
my eye and blushed before turning your head

boats drifted past and
the sun tucked itself to sleep
and you made me promise
to let you read every ****** poem i'd ever
breathe into existence

you said you'd value them more than gold
prize them always cherish the memories
even when you grew older but
the sun had already set
its absence left a chill in my bones

the marks of abandoned faith
are etched into her flesh
a sheep beneath a lonely flag
a crescent moon hidden under her arm
tattooed remnants of a dead deity
neither of us believe in anymore

with each declaration
of secularization anointing
scarlet lips
i yearn to reach out
with fingertips and rhetoric
to more intimately understand
a dizzying intellect
she shares willingly

a life plagued by faith
scarred by family
trying their best
and failing
miserably

she glances at me furtively
eyes as green as the foliage
of ancient trees
standing watch
over whispering rivers
in silent summers
long forgotten

she holds my gaze

we recognize
ourselves
in one another
there is trust
and intimacy
solidarity in suffering

she smiles
when she thinks
i'm no longer looking

i went for a drive today
the rain pitter-patterned as rubber
tires hydroplaned across the concrete and i
pressed play and sang to the mix tape

i couldn't see the moon or the stars or
you. i couldn't see more than 20 ft. in any
given direction. i listened to the cadence
as thunder crashed and thrashed H2O
across my dashboard

and for a moment there the whole
world froze, a hundred million raindrops
posed in suspension and i wondered if
this might be the way that i die—out too late
on a Wednesday night drive—and i thought
if i crashed and burned if the rain would douse
my charred corpse in time to leave a body
for them to put in the ground. would you
fly non-stop to Orlando just to see me lowered
down? what is the dollar
amount that's just too much? could i even say
i'd do the same for you?

then time resumed and rick-rocked me back
to reality and i felt a grim smile tug
me away from the brink as i passed an abandoned
church flooded out in the boonies. lightning flashed
above a lake in the distance and i realized i'd spent
almost 3 years god-free. so why was i
so worried about you?

have i been pulled apart in a 1,000 different directions
criss-crossed like stretch marks
a demon's clawed across my stomach?
i try every day to meet the eyes of
the man in the rear-view mirror but
i can't even remember their color anymore

the survivors of Auschwitz
put god on trial in absentia
and sentenced him to death.
a fitting end
for a supposedly
omnipotent deity
that couldn’t be bothered
to lift a finger.

if the cross was god’s
critique of power
then why is fascism
on the rise once more?
if Jesus died
for the lost sheep,
then why are politicians
evoking his name
while banishing refugees?

where was the love of god
when our cluster-bombs fell
on kids playing soccer
in Palestine
and U.S. drone strikes
stole the lives
of a wedding party
in Yemen?

if god is not surely dead
then he was never real
in the first place.
Stendhal had it right all along:
god's only excuse
is that he does not exist.

but i met a girl
who so loved the world
that she’d give her life
for a stranger in an instant.  
her name means “helper.”
she is fragile as bone
and sturdy as ancient oak.
she is the only tangible reality
in a world henceforth
without gods or masters.

and i’m watching her wither away.

so i petition
the nebulae
watching over
this pale blue dot
not to avert their eyes.
this heroine of mine,
made in the heart
of a dying star,
would sacrifice her life
for the least of these.
but i am selfish.
i want her to stay,
to stand up and fight,
poison-free.

and if the universe conspires
to take her life, then i will find
the tomb of god and bring
him back from the dead
just to strangle him again.

stay with me, always,
through the long night.
help me heal this silent planet.
if god will not love this earth,
then we will.
heal us of our war, our hate,
our addiction.
i cannot abide a world without you.

you keep your lighter
sandwiched in a niche amidst
the Spirit cigarettes
you carry, a spark
hidden in the breast-pocket
of the jacket you borrowed
from me several months ago
and neglected to give back.
like Prometheus, pilfering fire
from the gods, you stole
the warmth from the stars
and built a hearth
in my chest, a warmth
nurtured by the mirth
that tugs at the corners
of your mouth every time
you laugh at my expense.
i'll cherish your candle close
to my heart, even when life
inevitably tears us apart.
everything ends eventually,
but at least we lived
as if we'd never burn out.

we held hands behind the Black Lives Matter banner.
we took to the streets in solidarity with Heather Heyer
opposing white supremacy and every vestige of bigotry.

the cops stood idle while racists circled
the park like sharks to shake our resolve.
but we carry a new world in our head and hearts.

we marched down Kennedy and Ashley
no badge or gun could hope to stop us hundreds.
we mourned and wept and rose like lions.

no justice, no peace! no racist police!
1-2-3-4, this is ******* class war!
5-6-7-8, organize to smash the State!

i cannot find the rhythm and beat amidst this misery.
but, in her memory, we will drive the fascists out.
from Tampa Bay, FL to Charlottesville, VA: *¡No pasaran!

when i was seven
i asked my mother if all dogs went to heaven
because i wanted to be sure that
i’d see old Buddy up in the clouds
once he’d passed on

she told me that i would
she said in fact
all dogs do go to heaven
but my mother had a
penchant for canines
so i secretly wondered
whether or not that was true

then i asked her if my friend Adam would be there too
since he was Jewish and Jews aren’t allowed
to go to heaven

for this had left me so confused
how could god
let dogs into heaven
but abandon all
my friends

she told me in no uncertain terms that
there was only one way
one truth and
one life
and that one way
one truth
one life came through Christ

which was funny
considering Jesus
was Jewish too

they say the road to hell
is paved with golden intentions
and they are not mistaken i
see it's latent
hidden within psychosocial declarations
of everlasting love from a narcissistic god
i don’t give much credence to
the insistent proclamations of eternal
damnation in a metaphysical realm
of torment and brimstone but

don’t get me wrong
i’ve seen hell in the
wolfish grins of pilfering preachers
in the glassy eyes of opiated masses
i was careful when i stared
into that dark abyss
knowing it glared right back at me
emphatically declaring that i
was the lost sheep
a fallen brother separated
from the good shepherd’s flock
a prodigal son isolated in
alienating atheism but

i’ve come to love my
outcast status i’d rather
rot in the dirt after
raising hell on Earth
than suffer rebirth in ethereal bliss
espousing endless reiterations
of worship for a
fictitious megalomaniac

god is dead we killed him
deicide stains these hands
in shades of scarlet and crimson
the triumph of humanity will not
fade once again to the putrid
obeisance and ridiculous reverence
or religious references to divinity

salvation lies within

two decades of dedication
to the Christian ideal
left me dejected rejecting the
shallow lies and overt
misconceptions of religion
chose to begin again in the
reclamation of self-determination
i found a dignity independent from
a deity perpetuating guilt and regret
and though i will never forget the
progressive lessons of a radical rabbi
offering a message of hope and forgiveness
i’ve found that those same tenants
are seriously lacking in the
contemporary Christian church

if your god is
omnipotent and not
merely impotent
than tell me why he
needs you to
defend him

come on coward
if you’re real
show yourself
here’s the chance to
prove me wrong
sling lightning from the skies
and take my life i’m
not afraid i’m ready to die
and part from the suffering
that inundates this existence

strike me down and remove
all doubt of your majestic malevolence
a malfeascent adolescent prone
to fits of jealous rage and
temporal temper tantrums

that’s what i thought

i only hear the sounds of
a theological clown show
self-styled scholars enumerating  
passages of mercy and compassion
in the same holy text that condones
**** and slavery and child abuse
which would be ironic if it
hadn't been slapped together over
centuries of violence and bloodshed
and used to justify two millennia's worth of
repressive oppression a
putrescent obsession with control

it's true what Sartre said
hell is other people
and we have No Exit
from the depravity that
obfuscates critical inquiry
in the immortal words of
Shakespeare the nether-realms
are emptied all the devils are here

your god maybe a figment of
fantastic imagination but so
much horror has been wrought
with his name as the justification

so forgive me if i seem hyperbolic
but it is no exaggeration  
when i declare that religion itself
is a hell from which we're still
trying desperately to wake up

if the gods were real
they would've given her
ten thousand arms to
uplift and empower
the poor and oppressed
twenty thousand hands
to hold her lovers close
and trace the tattoos
on their wrists with
a hundred thousand
fingertips at once
as gentle and exhilarating as
a million year long trip
through the boundless cosmos
compassion as timeless
and infinite as a blissful
kiss exchanged between two
best friends entwined on a rooftop
while distant stars kept watch
any deity masquerading beneath
the pretense of benevolence could
stand to emulate Alexis

like the period at the conclusion
of a sentence, i just want to end.
hemorrhaging anxiety, bereft
of comfort’s tourniquet.
bend back my fingers till they snap
and distract me from the stress—
a constant threat
of white-hot pinched-nerves.

torch me alive like a burnt sacrifice.
sew my eyelids open so i never forget
perspectives that shift my world
like Atlas, adjusting his weary load.
grind down my bones, scatter me
to the furthest reaches of the cosmos.
i cannot bear another moment
in this lonely corner of the universe.

cut my throat, let me bleed out
and seep back into the dust
from whence i came. humor me:
we all nurse fantasies of death
from time to time. let me cope
in peace so i can make it
through another dead-end day
in one piece.

a needle brushes pink flesh
slips beneath fragile skin
an endorphin-rush
feeding sweet addiction

adrenaline thunders in eardrums
a gallop of wild stallions
stampeding past neurological valleys
shuddering eternally within

an itch
that must be
scratched

a thirst
that can't be
sated

a lust
always
anticipated

i'll suffice
to be sedated
with self-hatred
isolated from my muse
in snow-swathed Iowa

a heroine in her own story
and ****** in mine

Dostoevsky espoused
the eloquent adage
to live without hope
is to cease to live
and it rings true
i've been a shell
of my former self
ever since we kissed
on that frigid rooftop

leave my carcass for the vultures
i'll give up the ghost
relinquish the illusion of control
once and for all

hang me from a rope until i'm dead
the visions of a fraud lying
in your bed are  
a noose i'll loop
over my head

i am a slave
my enmity
masks a
melancholy reality

i'd part the seas
just to see you
walk on water
if i could only believe
that you'd reach out for me
but these concrete limbs
leave me sinking
interminably

the sun raises its weary head
above the distant horizon
i'll daydream of growing old with you
attending protests and fighting injustice
making love on a beach beneath a new moon

but when our star
tucks itself to sleep
each night
i can't erase the reminder
that you choose
to lie with a different lover
and deny the flame of this
never-ending romance
while i toss and turn
misery my only company

hope is a hoax

occasionally, i wander aimlessly
into the forests of your irises,
a cartographer
mapping every detail.
here, time flows differently.
somehow milliseconds stretch
to eternities, but it's still
never enough.

rapt, i dwell beneath the trees
and picnic as the leaves dance
and shift in the breeze.
i read Nietzsche, listening  
to the pleas of mahogany branches
stretching out overhead,
desperate to catch hold
of each other's hands
just a moment longer.
coffee streams sing
next to me. i am lost
in your eyes and don't want
to be found.

then you speak,
"what're you looking at?"
the epiphany springs:
i've known more houses
than i can count, but
you feel like home.

have you ever
been homesick
for another
human being?
for the doors
that open
like her arms
to admit you,
for the secret place
where you alone play
between her legs?
what’s a man to do
when a house
is no longer
a home
and the pangs
remain the same?

there are scars
that cut too deep
to stitch
back together,

hurts that dull,
but never
truly
lose the ache.

some wounds
never heal
and can only
be mourned

alone.

there's something serene
about waking up
at the beach.
the heady drone
of the waves' ebb and flow
induces a gentle hypnosis.
the Atlantic
pulled back
and forth
by the moon
flirting with the Earth,
two lovers
who never quite touch.

saturated cumulus clouds cling
to the ocean's surface
as far as the eye can see,
a downy duvet
laid across the planet
for warmth and comfort.
as the salt breeze butterfly-kisses
sunburnt skin, a hazy lethargy
invites you to sink
beneath, an anchor
lost at sea, and forget,
if only for a moment,
the world's weariness.

it's an age-old quandary
posed in introductory
classes on physics and philosophy
pray tell
what happens when
an unstoppable force
meets an immovable object

at first
such inquiries struck me as
existential exercises on the
paradoxical nature of language
and the circumstantial limits
of our reality which i found
to be little more than petty frivolities
after all
this existence is comprised of
nothing less and nothing more
than subjective perceptions catalyzed
by our own eyes and

while i've since come to realize that
there are no black and white solutions
only grade shades that obfuscate
manichean and simplistic versions
of the truth
i must admit
i think i've found an answer
to this question that might
just be foolproof

because i've already met an unstoppable force
it's personified in her twin twilight eyes
that rotate like intertwined galaxies
in a nocturnal dance of evanescent starlight
manifest in the mischief that burns
as white-hot and bright as hydrogen fusion
every time she smirks at me

and if she epitomizes the
extravagant intensity of a
runaway train that refuses to be stopped
or a knockout punch that cannot be blocked
then i myself am her counterpart
an immovable object
solemn and sober at a standstill
withstanding an onslaught of elemental
cacophanies that shake this very
planet to its molten iron core

still i remain the silent sentinel
a giving tree
ancient
ageless
vigilantly awaiting her impending earthquake
which will shake and shatter this forest
of fools and frauds about me who reach
outstretched limbs like thieves and liars
she is a hurricane uprooting craven mentalities
and when all the barren woodchips are
spread about the vicinity i shall stand strong
on the mountain peak with those alliterative words
carved into my wooden feet

i'm "bent
but not broken
hanging on by a thread"
and while we might invent
a trillion reasons to steel
our resolve and refuse this
addiction once and for all
i can think of one monosyllabic
four-letter word that gives us
an excuse to do just the opposite
one that is as rare as it as pure
at once precious and effervescent
it is the cousin of faith and hope
but greater still and it gives us a
reason to fight when we cannot seem
to cope with a world tightening
nooses of rope around our throats

so kick the chair
my neck won't snap
and when they come to cut me
down they'll ask me
"after all this time"
i will conjure my
patronus in your image
as the word "always"
anoints on my lips like your kiss

like evolution or the Big Bang
this eternal question must have
an answer buried deep
waiting to be unearthed
and it begins
as always
with a simple hypothesis

were we to meet again beneath
the moonlight the way we did
three hundred and sixty-five days ago
on a rooftop in a distant neighborhood
i wager it would be a bad idea
dangerous and reckless
but our affection would become unbreakable
as we coalesced in ethereal bliss

so
while i do not yet know
what happens when an unstoppable force
crashes into an immovable object
try asking me again tomorrow
so i have time to conduct
some experiments
and i just might have
a more scientific answer

but
then again
it is only a
hypothesis

who holds the leash
of the pigs in the streets?  
follow the paper trail:
dead presidents
never fail to be the culprit.

it's not who
but what.
the police always
serve and protect
capital and property.
why else would they block
off a jewel store
during a peaceful rally?

they may not be
our enemy,
but they
certainly
aren't our friends.

they are the strong-arm
of the State,
fodder on a frontline
devised by fascist elite.
the boys in blue
with low IQs
are oligarchs' favorite tools
for bludgeoning
dissent and pummeling
free expression.
useful idiots—
truncheons designed
with punishing dissidents
in mind.

we may well be
the 99%, but they have badges,
guns, and a license to ****
emblazoned on the blue shield
slapped on their chests,
stoking overzealous
racists to respond violently,
a cacophony of bloodshed
seems to be the only language
they know how to speak.

smash the fraternity
that acquiesces to criminality.
white men in pressed suits—
who's speculative spending
lead to economic catastrophe—
get off scott-free
while black men are imprisoned
for possessing an ounce of ****.
not even the blind would fail to see
the "just us" system excludes
the majority of humanity.

all lives matter?
only ignorance could present
such a fictitious narrative,
a self-congratulatory hyperbole
disregarding contemporary reality.
private prisons designed for profit,
institutionalized bigotry instigating
a new form of slavery.
when mass incarceration
lacerates our communities
and exacerbates the conditions
of the working class,
the only dignified response
is to stand up, fight back.

we no longer
have a need
for this blatant idiocracy.
if we truly want to call this country
"the land of the free,"
then we must say,
loudly and clearly:
abolish the police.

it's true
the revolution will not be televised
but the fascist revival premiered
on all the major networks' corporate channels
in 1080p HD at prime-time hours

with perfect clarity
viewers could see
an oompa loompa
with an orange toupee
a xenophobe
spewing violence and vitriol
peddling snake oil while spitting venom
stirring a bubbling cauldron
spilling over in fear-mongering demagoguery
served like crack candy to the Republican elite
reveling in their privilege
cheering white supremacy

a tyrant
tirading behind a polished wooden podium
flanked by hues of red white blue and gilded gold
like some comic strip super-villain
but this obtuse excuse for human refuse
is not some Saturday morning cartoon
defeated by the heroes after 30 minutes
of selfless feats and epic deeds
a death dirge plays on repeat in the background

you can't always get what you want

meanwhile
we're holding silent vigils back home
carving the sigil of Orlando's skyline into our skin
while a snake slithers into a City Beautiful
bedecked in her $3k pressed pant-suit
leering wolfishly at a local club for LGBTQ+ youth
the downtown heartbeat
of outcasts and misfits
a Pulse
that bigotry and self-hatred couldn't *****

but tragedies are converted to cheap currencies
in the clawed hands of dynastic oligarchs
sporting the support of billionaires and super-PACs
she knows the Establishment has got her back
she'll shed crocodile tears
just in time for the photo-ops

violence begets violence begets violence
humanity's universal language
a tongue shared by despots and presidents
in the wake of stolen sanctuaries
she'll justify razing Syrian children
beneath a barrage of hellfire missiles
and predator drones targeting cell-phone signals
under the pretense of bringing the terrorists
to some sycophantic mirage of justice

we're manufacturing new soldiers
for the Caliphate to brainwash with promises
of dead gods and seventy-two virgins
machine-fed by automatic weapons
to the toothy jaws
that bottomless maw
of endless ******* war
which always vaunts
profit over people

the conceptual construct of gender binarism
becomes an imperceptible selling point
in the incomprehensible and reprehensible rhetoric
issuing from either side of the political aisle
but what will it matter
either way
an egoistic megalomaniac
has his or her finger poised over the trigger
a neoliberal warmonger and hypocritical fraud
or a reality TV star who lauds the KKK on Twitter

our only hope is found in the streets
unchained by compassion's transformative capacity
freed to utilize our minds
humanity's indomitable faculty
nurturing a community that seizes life
in anthems of liberty equality and solidarity
anarchic manifestoes penned in lines
of red and black ink

progressives will insist otherwise
they'll declare emphatically that our only choice
lies in selecting the lesser of two evils
to lead us to the brink of oblivion
but Orwell wrote the future of humanity
looked like a boot crushing our heads
that either way we'd all be dead
and the harsh reality is that the soot-stained sole
curb-stomping this country
fits both the left and right foot

she has eyes like ice
and a mohawk the shade
of bubblegum

she's an artist
and a misfit
outfitted in
ethereal attire
the flows off her
alabaster skin
like wisps of shadow
or tuffs of smoke

she chews on her lower
lip when she thinks you
aren't looking and has
a nervous habit of
biting her nails
the polish is chipped
and cracked in some
places and sorely
needs a new coat

at first glance you
might think her fragile
but the subtle smirk
that tugs at either side
of her mouth belies a
quiet confidence
a take-no-prisoners
sensibility
a ****-it-all
attitude

not grounded in apathy
but nurtured in non-compliance
her lack of conformity is more
than some youthful
stage of defiance

she is disobedient and
everyone says they're afraid of her
that she scares them senseless
but i kissed her once and
we stayed friends after
i think she knows me better
than i know myself

she stands in the corner
of seedy concert halls as
cigarettes leave a haze above
the heads of pre-teens and
old metal-heads nurse their
alcoholic beverages
everyone pretends she is
somewhere—or even
someone—else

but not me
we stand together
sometimes we hold hands
and i catch her smiling
out of the corner of my eye
from time to time

count each and every grain i
cherish them all the same
they're the only friends i have
across this endless plane of
granular particles kicked up
every so often by a storm
that shifts this desert from one
spectrum to the next like
filtering time through the sieve
of some infinite hourglass

i will drive this lumbering beast
across theses seas of sand
reclaim what they stole through duplicity
coax this hunk of junk to life
if need be to outrun the
lingering fear of inadequacy
i don't know god but i met the devil
i've been his captive for 7,000 days
a hostage of hellions obsessed
with a decadent religion of misanthropy

the shifting wind-swept dunes
my only markers on this winding road
a roguish rebel defying hegemony
manifest in maleficent misogyny
i'll strive to live not just survive in this
endless wasteland hope may yet arise

now don't get me wrong
i love wordsmiths
semiotic story-tellers
rhapsodists rhythmically reciting
love languages from memory
connecting disparate lines
between discordant thoughts like
gods breathing life into dust

for these steel swords we've
conjured up do not rust
nor do they cut flesh

with mouths like ink fountains
we espouse words at the whims
of pens that often seem possessed
of their own volition and
we are their mere harbingers

they slice to the quick
past bone and marrow to
the human spirit and
tap into sentience through
sophisticated sentence structure
measured meter catalyzing cadences
of consonance in confidence

so by all means
spit rhymes and chime in
on current events
i love the rally cries
that seek to stymy injustice
ridicule bigotry and
foment dissent

but don't preach at me
your words of salvation
fall on deaf ears
you cannot save me
because i'm already divine
one-of-a-kind
just like you

i don't fancy myself above
satirizing fictitious and megalomaniacal
depictions of godhood
i've found that humor
helps us navigate the
half-truths and veiled threats
that inundate our daily existence
regardless of whether
they originate from
preachers politicians pundits
or poets

****-shaming and victim-blaming
are pathetic attempts to cull dull minds
no thanks mine's full to the bursting
you think you're clever for slapping
together a couple of words brewed
for maximum effect but you haven't
got the faintest clue do you no

you're nothing but a bully with a pulpit
fearmongering and shouting damnation
mixing Church and State and business
in a trifecta of tyranny
an orgastic oligarchy
of eternal enmity

when we die we pass
into the black abyss of nothingness
each of us a blip on the spectrum of
life under constant duress
before we ultimately perish
a meaningless speck of dust on
an endless shore of who was
who is and who will come to be

this is not a nihilistic proclamation
nor an atheistic defamation of
human beings but a rational
refutation of misanthropy
masquerading as community

your love looks a lot like hatred

i seek to offer an alternative
to the endless cycles of
condemnation that sprout from
the pages of holy books
like gnarled trees bequeathed
unto us by the seeds
of false prophecies

let's face the music
we will all die alone
and there is nothing
and no one
waiting for us
no white light or
loved ones on
the other side
no arbiter of fate
waiting at the gate
to permit us entrance
to a heavenly place

if we could only muster the courage
to divorce ourselves from fatalistic
fantasies of the afterlife
that keep us bent-kneed
we might find within us the strength
to seize the day and
live life so brilliantly that

we'd create a heaven on earth
if merely we departed from the
hellish impulses that divide us
into despondent collections of
self-righteous hypocrites and
simply admit the only thing we
know for certain is that we
know nothing for certain at all

perhaps then we could salvage
a modicum of freedom from
the wreckage of shattered
egos and emaciated lies
that plague this planet
with circumstantial evidence
while relegating our liberty
and inhibiting conscience

in the spirit of free inquiry
then let us question
everyone and everything
starting with yours truly

she rests her chin on my chest
as we lay naked
beneath sheets
knotted by affection.

the moonlight filters like silver tresses
through the blinds
on this cloudless night,
illuminating tears quivering
in the corners of cold brew nitro eyes.

as her fingers twirl
in the brambles of my beard,
she whispers, “the scars i wear
are the wounds
i carry inside.”

i push my lips against the angry stripes
in the crook of her elbow. she winces.
grits her teeth. the scars have hardly healed.
i brush my hand across her cheek
and speak truth—meager as candlelight,
but maybe enough to swallow the shadows
playing tricks inside her mind.

in forgotten eons long before
our sun was forged,
the molecules that would conspire
to give you form were born in the cores
of super giants. those same cells
floated through chasms of space-time—
billions of years—to this very moment:
with you and i entwined beneath the gaze
of a cosmos lightyears beyond.

nebulae watched, powerless,
as you suffered in a black hole
of oppression, desperate to aid,
but paralyzed by distance
and the entropy of time.

but they did not stay idle.
like some whisper of the divine,
i find some solace in the fact that somehow
dying stars put us on this planet
at the same time, almost
as if we were two photons
in perfect orbit.

for, while dying gods
couldnʼt reach out to save you,
the stars have converged
and our paths overlap.

some wounds may never heal, Beloved.
old hurts often refuse to lose their ache.
i cannot save you from the inhumanity
youʼve suffered. i cannot erase your pain.

but i can lie by your side
and ease your anxiety,
hold your body close to mine
solidarity, forever—
endlessly intertwined.

i have stood amidst the stacks
in the Library of Congress, stared
up at all the books flanking the walls.
i tried to count, once. too many,
the more’s the pity. still,
at least i found a metaphor
for the way your mind unfurls
like the pages of my favorite book—
spine cracked, annotated notes
crowding the margins, dog-eared
corners creased to mark
the contours where i stopped
to linger.

splay my gaze across the parchment,
chasing consonants left and right
and back again. encyclopedic psyche,
blossoming as i play my fingertips
across the periphery of your philosophy.
a hundred-hundred questions spill
from me like a Rube Goldberg Machine,
one inquiry triggering the other
in an endless cascade of mystery.

if i cannot shrink myself down
and lead your white blood cells
into the fray, i will remain
to stitch your battle-scars.
watch as i spin
words like thread
weaving polysyllabic,
kaleidoscopic tapestries
if only to grant you
some measure of comfort.
and if these lines
can make your heavy heart
light, then they will tumble
like waterfalls from my lips
buoy you in their expanse
until you float upon the surface
light as air, iridescent.

the memories play on shuffle in
the back of my cerebral cortex
drifting like a drug up
and down my spine
intoxicating
stop-and-go
out of touch
intermittent illusions and
misrememberances

pomegranate lingers
on my tongue
sandpaper tiles rest
beneath knobby knees
soft flesh against my palms
glasses askew in passion
the stickiness of sweat
fingers still soaked from
forays into your wet warmth

inhabiting a cluster of moments from a
dozen different angles to dizzying
effect until i lose track of reality and
spiral into some intermediate realm of
consciousness where fact and fiction
are permanently merged into
one irreversible entity

wake up every morning with a jackhammer in my head.
think about you.
read the news.
whose kids did we bomb today?
what terror occurred half-a-world away?
or did another racist bigot stab someone in Portland?
gun shows at concert halls, schools.
protesters jailed, surveilled, beaten ******
on concrete streets we laid
after generations of genocide.
i struggle to find the poetry
in a world that's gone to ****.
wake up mourning, hoping today the world will do me in.

i wonder how many sons
and how many daughters
passed on
before the phrase,
“Only the good die young”
became cliché.

how many had to grieve
before the phrase
lost its sting?
surely, i still feel
the potent scream
of its veracity.

“only the good die young.”
like all axioms,
we could unpackage and dissect,
trim away the fat
and try to understand,
but at the end of the day
it seems to me that we’d only be
helplessly clutching at straws
in vain attempts to try and make sense
of a reality that our human brains—
try as they might—could never fathom.

i cannot say
if the aphorism is true,
if only the good die young,
but i know that Jakin Murray Foster,
beyond a shadow of a doubt,
was one of the good ones.

to try and select
a single story
as exemplary
of Jakin’s life
would be akin
to plucking a star
from a constellation.

surely, that story
would shine like a sun
unto itself.
people would rotate
about that story,
anchored like planets
by the gravitational force
of Jakin’s compassion.
but to do so,
to focus on solely one story,
would be a great disservice
to the cosmos of Jakin’s existence,
all the lives he’s touched
and changed over the years.

instead, i will try to tell you
about the man, my best friend,
my brother: Jakin Murray Foster.
i will try to capture a portrait,
one that will, admittedly,
be woefully incomplete.
i will leave you to fill in the blanks,
the empty spaces
between the disparate stars
of his constellation.
the gaps in my description
can be filled by the memories
of his cheer, his integrity,
his profound humanity,
solid as steel beams
buttressing and bracing
in these moments of grief.

so, let’s reminisce:

Jakin was stubborn as an ox.
this quality stands out to me
in perfect clarity
because he was one of the only people
who had the strength of personality
required to challenge me
to become a better human being.

to check me when i grew cruel or aggressive or inconsiderate.
to encourage me when i became callous and cynical and unkind.
to love me when my heart was hateful
and wanted nothing more than to spread my own misery like a poison
before putting a permanent end to everything.

Jakin was silly.
take a gander at any number of the photos collected in his memory.
they paint a clearer picture than i ever could
of a man who laughed loud and laughed often,
but never at the expense of others.
who could lift your spirits
like a steaming cup of coffee
in even the most frigid winters.

Jakin was a geek,
a home-school kid,
a Jesus freak.
his personality was refined
by the teachings of a radical rabbi
executed by the state
for standing in love and solidarity
with the weak,
a man who’d change the course of history.

in brief, Jakin gave a ****.
until the end, he stood up for what he believed in,
convinced by the clarity of his conscience
and the fire that burned like a burgeoning nebulae in his heart.
i can think of no better way to honor his memory
than to hate what is evil
and love what is good,
to fight for a world that is in such desperate need
of the grace, charity, and fraternity
Jakin exhibited every day.

Memento mori.
be mindful of death.
i think of the end of all things daily.
for many, the end of a life is the beginning of something new.
to me, death makes life invaluable.
death is choiceless.
death is a cruelty, an injustice no one should ever suffer.
like a mirror, death shows us our own fragility,
it gives truth to the reality that our time here is fleeting.
death makes life more precious than any commodity ever wrought by humanity.
death reminds us that we are owed nothing,
that all we can do is seize every moment of love and joy afforded us
and build a new world in the shell of the old.

i do not know if only the good die young.
i know that my best friend, my brother, is gone.
i know with certainty that I will never see him again.
we will never laugh together,
bicker over philosophy,
or drive around listening to music ever again.
that reality fills me with so much misery
i can hardly stand or breathe or even think.
but i will do all i can to be a good man
so that when i too meet Death like an old friend,
i can say, “i lived like Jakin.”

you're wrenching teeth out of
your own skull with the mangled claw
of a rusty hammer and drinking pints of
blood until you puke

in Sunday School they teach you
your body is a temple but neglect
to inform you that the temple is also
a prime spot to place a gun before
you give the walls a crimson paint-job

at point-blank
range it's
a target you
can't miss

it'll all be over soon

you drive splints beneath your fingernails
and pry off the keratin cell by cell
savoring the agonizing reminder

you are a human
you aren't dead
yet

gossamers of golden silk
enriched with salt-water luster
sea-foam pebbles nestled between
warm sand freckles
gracing sunset skin

with a jolt
i wake and wish
silently to myself
for someone to just
put me out of my misery
there's no serenity in sleep
only an endless barrage of shifting
mirages half-glimpsed through
a looking-glass awaiting
my every whimsical
fear

consciousness is a hoax
a self-sustaining delusion
premised on confusing anecdotes
and misrepresented by inadequate
synecdoches that fail to convey
intended meaning

it is not difficult to trace the illustration
of truths that prove
at once illusory and immediate
deliberate attempts to assuage sentiment
before it returns in full force
terminate without consequence
since affection drowned in ambivalence

yet i somehow still
lack the cognizance to
be fully aware of my
own subconscious

i. you are at once absent and present

mourning dew on tobacco leaves
transgressive pleasure simultaneously
deluding and eluding me
i remain an equation incapable
of comprehending infinity

tantalizing fantasies splashed
like water across a stovetop
simmering on contact before evaporating
with my unconscious thoughts
trapped within half-forgotten dreams
restless in unending nightmares

a cosmic drift of psychological
rifts in a psyche sundered by
the fault-line ruptures
of cognitive dissonance earthquakes

there's no stitching up
the severed seams
or recovering the effervescence
of innocence lost in our ascent to a rooftop
to treat with bliss in the midst
of the moon's ambivalence

ii. you are at once absent and present

i thought the stars danced for only us
that you put them in the sky
so i could study nebulae
with the same five senses
i'd use to explore you

the stars looked on
voyeurs surveying
the crush of our bodies
listening to the rush of lust
leaking past flesh flushed
with explicit elixirs

we found the philosopher's stone
became ageless in those moments
drunk on alchemical toxins
poisoning our blood-streams
souring the precious draught  
of friendship we'd cherished
for half a decade

the taste of your alcohol-breath
still taints my tongue
lungs billowing like corpses
pierced by carrion
a larynx choked with regret
while you smoke your cigarettes
incapable of going back
yet returning
ad infinitum

iii. you are at once absent and present

your hair sprawled out
across my bed
as if it swam
upon the surface
of the sea.

you looked up
with coffee-colored irises
and asked me,
"how on earth
do you fly?"

you giggled breathlessly,
as if your mirth
were a brook,
bubbling eternally.

we both looked back
up at the screen.
a tiny figure
in a red cloak
and hijab danced
aimlessly, flitting
across the sand.

a scarf twisted
over her shoulder
in the wind, drifting
with the twisting koi fish,
glowing. her journey
was only beginning.

a hooded figure,
all in white,
came alongside her.
his scarf seemed
to stretch as far
as the eye could see.

he'd been here before.
fallen down an abyss
of his own design.
died and rose again.
he returned
to lead a friend,
hoping she'd find
her own way out alive.

as they soared
wordlessly, they seemed
to skip across the skyline,
their scarves intermingling.
alone, they'd remain
trapped in a daze,
lost in a maze of dunes,
trudging endlessly.
but, together,
struggling—surviving—
they somehow made it out
in one piece.

it's like jumping
a short fall
at first
and then it ends
as quickly as it started

if only i knew
how they pieced me
back together again
stitched at the seams
until it seems like i
never died at all

then back to a building
a different skyscraper
crafted from durasteel
taller than the one that
came before

i don't even hesitate
one foot after the other
right over the ledge
only the fall eats up
more time and i
have a moment to think
of your eyes while the
meters flash by

splat

back to the lab again
to be reassembled from
the remnants of my
desiccated carcass

only there's less of me
bits of brain that could not
survive a second meeting
with the concrete
chipped finger-bones
missing teeth and
no heartbeat

up again
higher still
and again
and again
only to plummet
of my own volition

i fall further each
and every time
and they scrape
less of me off
the pavement

the light above
the snowy keys
shines bright, almost
harsh

i can feel the
pain
in her voice
it’s as tangible as

the way her fingers
slightly
almost imperceptibly
tremble
once so confident
now painfully unsure

melodies used to be so
simple, beauty singing through
the strings of a
1940’s piano built of

wood
iron
and ivory

but now caustically
discordant harmonies
of harmonies
are catalyzed by
our recent brush with
ugly memory

i say, “Grandma” when
i see the tear drop to
the surface of
those pristine
yet grievous
keys

it balances there, precipitously, beside
her wedding ring
as she tells me, “i think
that’ll be all for today, my sweet.”

why is time so much harder to ****
when a collection of moments are brought to a standstill?
lie in bed and study the popcorn ceiling.
perforations of personality
erasing all semblance of meaning.

rain runs her languid fingers over my windowsill
leaving lingering fingerprints that smudge the glass.
a ******
tapping intermittently
waiting to be invited in.

"open up your window,"
every droplet whispers, "let me slip
into something more comfortable."
the rain has grown sick of the endless cycles
exasperated by precipitation and evaporation.

the fan spins in rhythm overhead.
the blades drone like a time-bomb
ticking down the moments i wasted
stumbling through vertigo horizons
fleeing endlessly without taking a single step.

i curse the rain and pull the shades.
i wish i was dead
and that's perfectly okay.
maybe tomorrow
i won't feel this way.

Katniss
chased catnip
across the carpet
of your Lamoni home

each precious pounce
sent you
into fresh
waves of giggles

left you
clutching
a paisley-patterned pillow
tightly as a life preserver

you were
transfixed
by a kitten's glee
until i met your irises

our fingertips
brushed
and we both felt
a chasm grow between us

in silent agreement
we looked our separate ways
lost in fractured
reminiscence

languid waves
lap at the shoreline
as the wind
scoops up handfuls
of sea foam
to scatter
across sun-baked sand,
rolling lazily along
before disintegrating
into open air.
the faint hum
of the breeze
is whipping
past our ears
and the yawning
breathing of the ocean’s
gentle sheen
refracts sunlight
across white-crested
saltwater.

i can feel callouses
forming on the soles
of my feet
as i make my way
barefoot across the boardwalk.
little reeds sway
in the sand
and salt-eroded shells
are tiny lumps,
half-buried treasure chests.
a storm is brewing
on the horizon,
but the dark clouds
can’t quite cut down
the sun
from the heavens.

i am wandering
back and forth,
tugged along
by the ebb and flow
of the ocean.
oscillating
between the highs
and lows.
look
and see
the old watchtower,
the lighthouse
fallen into disrepair,
standing silent,
a sentinel
securing the shore.
witness the erosion of water.
know that
for a time
the tower stood tall and proud
an insulting finger
stretching towards
an apathetic sky—
defiant, to the end.

i've gone through
hell and back again
to chart the skies of a
divine entity twinkling
intermittently against
the black abyss
of outer-space

fragments of life
light years away
effervescently evanescent
reminders of a faction
still vying for
truth and hope and love
in an apathetic galaxy of
snakes and liars and frauds

a meteoric rise that shatters the
atmosphere at just the sight of
hair dyed black as the darkest
corners of our infinite cosmos

pardon me if my breath catches
on the lip i bit subconsciously
if you think these cheeks have
flushed with pink you should
hear the heart that shudders
beneath my chest at
the manifestation of
beauty exquisitely expressed
in that solitary photograph  

more than a mere
image of memory frozen
momentarily in time
this snapshot simultaneously
sets you free and captivates me
a symphony of liberty marching
1,096 miles away to
the sure and steady beat
of your own drum

you look like a thunderstorm
and i am almost afraid of how
much i want your rain to fall
on me and your electricity to
tumble down my spine until
i'm deaf and dumb and blind but
even still
i'll chase the lightning

all my life, i was told 
to be as timid 
as a sheep.
my black wool 
may have offended the 

snowy white facade of my

former friends and family, 

but at least i shared their form.

all this time,
i didn’t realize 

the lion prowling

outside the gates 
had
more honesty 
than the
crooked shepherd 

keeping watch 
over me.

and the false security 

these walls they built around me 

could never hold a light
to the 
life outside
this hideous city 

they dared to say was 

beautiful.

lured by dreams of eternity, 

i bought into the 
story of a god 

who loved me more than 

anyone or anything.

but i saw a fire burning beyond 

these walls of hypocrisy

and chose to 
carry it instead.

i sold my soul for a rational mind, 

recognizing infinity 

was nothing
but 
a pipe dream.

i’ll carry the fire 
of humanity

in my chest,

‘cause i don’t need 

a savior who’ll 
lead my soul to rest.

i reject the greener pastures
of 
an afterlife and
embrace the 
life that i 
was
taught 
to abhor.

and while i still get sad

from time to time, 

at least i can say that
i 
don’t hate who i am 
anymore.

i spent twenty years
yearning for 
a god
who isn’t even there 

to show me the 
slightest bit 

of affection

and didn’t realize that i’m 

better off alone since, 

after all,

that’s where i’ve always been.

so i’ll start 

side-stepping 
the road of
fear and faith 
for
the great unknown 
and
all the pain that it’s 
bound to bring.

i’ll stomach every 

single second of suffering 

without the vagrant hope of a 

second life in the heavens.

it’s funny how life can be so 

******* beautiful

if we keep in mind
just how 

finite 

it really is, 

how precious every 

moment has the potential to be.

at least i can say
i 
did my best to cherish 
the
Time that i’m alive,

rather than living with
the 
expectation of an afterlife, 

biding my time 
‘till i die.

when they put what’s left of me

into the ground, 

don’t look for me in the clouds—

i’ll be decomposing 

beneath your feet.


and, honestly, 

the thought of becoming

absolutely nothing 

is far more comforting
than the 
notion of worshipping that

murderer 

they preach about in church.

i have no god, i have no king.
i don't believe in fate or even destiny.

i’ve given up on 

certainty in things i cannot see

in lieu of questioning 

everyone and 

everything.

i’m secure in only one thing: 

and that’s me.

i’ve spent far too much time 

hiding from the things that i
was taught were 
evil.

i was told to trust
an 
ambiguity

for every single thing

and, thus far,
it’s been pretty

******* ineffective.

they told me that
believing in myself 

was an insult to my 

invisible creator.

so here’s a ******* to 

my mythological maker: 

i don’t need you. 

i don’t need anyone. 

i’ve got two feet 

planted firmly 

beneath me.

and though my family might be ashamed of me, 

i can say i’ve never been this happy.

the day that i turned my back on 

Christianity,

i realized i didn’t need 
anyone’s approval
to be 
myself.

i don’t live in fear anymore.

i don’t hate myself ‘cause i quit
searching for a love 

that was never even there 
to begin with.

i won’t follow the instructions
written in a book 
millennia ago
by 
misogynistic homophobes 
and

war criminals.

i’m better off standing up 
for what i believe

than i ever was 
in
some sanctuary

begging on my knees.

human detritus deaf to empathy
misanthropes bound by apathy
just above the dotted line we
signed our own death warrants
guilty as charged
existential and intellectual suicide

we'd rather gouge out our eyes
bury our heads in the sand
than give a moment's pause to
consider our own arrogance
**** sapiens
we carved our legacy into the globe
and we will rest in the husk
of a massive unmarked grave
a solitary chunk of floating rock
adrift in outerspace

"the fate of every successful species
is to wipe itself out"

can we harness the courage to turn away
from our vapid lives before it's too late
can we unplug our minds from the machine
extricate ourselves and learn to breathe
with lungs instilled through millennia of
evolution before we suffocate in ennui

humanity is on life-support
it's tempting to pull the plug
let Mother Nature reclaim her earth
from an entitled race of
self-destructive fools
coddled from childbirth but

there is a nascent impulse that
echoes in every heartbeat
living within our blood
to regard one another with the new eyes
science has built each of us
no longer can we trust self-styled
leaders of the free world
the impetus rests within the crux
of self-acceptance

anarchy is the litmus test

some 4.5 billion years ago
the atoms that would coalesce
to ***** your evanescent features
detoured to a lonely chunk of
rock aimlessly adrift in the
Milky Way Galaxy

you stayed alive by pure instinct
fight or flight
you could not thrive
yet you survived nature's
attempts to crush you in
her fearsome jaws

bits of you walked with dinosaurs
bone fragments ground to dust and
reformed over eons of evolution until
you stood upright and found a
tongue to describe planet Earth

remnants of those dead languages
live on to this very day
they inhabit the ink stains i
leave upon this yellowed page
while folk tunes croon over
my shoulder and Dallas Green
breathes a city in multicolor

a map of the universe is etched
across your face and i cannot escape
the smirk that spread with mirth
nor erase the memory of eyes
like interstellar space staring
back at me
unblinking
for 4 minutes that felt
simultaneously like a lifetime
and the space between
2 fractions of a millisecond

you came from the Big Bang
when the cells that would form
our bodies were forged in the
cores of supernovas exploding
across the cosmos and we've
been on a collision course ever since
an unstoppable force and
an immovable object
for matter
can neither be created
nor destroyed

they sentenced anarchy to death in 1887.
in the wake of the Haymarket Affair,
they tried in vain to hang a fifth figure
on a chilly November day,
attempted to fit a noose
on an idea that's bullet-proof.

solidarity.
liberty.
equality.

a refrain that remains in remembrance
of Engel, Fischer, Parsons, Spies,
and every man, woman, and child
whose life was robbed by the State
before his or her time.

a mantra celebrating the universal
qualities capable of unifying humanity
even in the face of an apparatus arraigned
to divide
and segregate.

we march in Chicago and Seattle,
in Toronto and NYC,
continuing the fight they began
for dignity and a living wage—
our burning rage growing to a conflagration
as we wave black flags and reclaim
the city streets from killer cops
and corporate oligarchs.

authority an illusion we will shed  
in the tides of black and red, united
against injustice.

an interminable illness
strands us in this terminal.
outcries echo throughout
MCO, a call-and-response chorus
encouraging us, “no hate, no fear!
refugees are welcome here!”

iron bars drop down
caging the tax-free stores
and those left inside.
swine in blue stand guard,
serving the specter of capital,
protecting private property,
leaving us to fend
for ourselves.

we march, a thousand strong,
in solidarity with those across
this divided State,
climb on their tables
and roar into our megaphones
a twenty-first century update
to Pastor Niemöller’s poem:

first they came
for the Muslims
and we said,
“not today,
*******!”

your lipstick stains the mug
sitting in my kitchen sink.
it still smells faintly
of cheap red wine.
i can’t quite
find the heart
to wash it off
just yet.

i stutter, punch-drunk
and slurring syllables.
you left me
tongue-tied
in more ways than one.
i’d hoped to twist
disparate thoughts
like twine
to form a rope
to tether us
tightly together
but, instead,
i formed a noose
to fit over my head.

i knew
right from the start
that i could never
measure up,
but i brushed
the thought aside
when you quaked
with bliss
at the furtive slip
of my fingertips.
disbelief suspended,
if only temporarily.

somewhere
along the line
we lost touch.
infinitely returning
to snap-shot
memories—
reminding me
eternally
i will never
be enough.