At night there are sounds of a thunderstorm
rising like white steam from my father’s driveway
fills the room with the prickling fever of August

sheets groping

the pillow screams until the Ringing comes Ringing through arms and legs and down lungs fog reflecting green and bells are muffled into drums slowing into hidden groans behind leaves

chest as sharp as my mother’s heirlooms shrieks are quiet And sound more like silence
don’t forget that it’s all the same
the same wiring through cell membranes

all the same water to the clean morning grass
that water weighs about a ton a ton too little for some
God holds you down when you are still
with his face to your face

breaking your heart into stain-glass shingles
because it is all the same black crusted coals left on the skin hardening like scabs

the man with the black book with the golden edged pages was right
about uncontrollable inhalations
and spiritual navigations
but wooden pews are the thorns of the rose
and the gift of revelation never came with that body and blood of our savior

if you were to look under the carpet
where all the cracked windows are swept
you will see yourself sleeping with arms tucked into your knees
and the shrieking won’t make a sound
when it tells you
that the only pathway to God is through Satan

How rude
to interrupt the pleasantries
serving up raw meat
heavy like a plague on the plate
clanking silverware
an orchestra of failing rhythm

marsupials take cover
safe from the evening’s lonesome glare
mechanical eyes flickering
burning each other like a heated rod on a calf’s hide
each face frozen like glass

“yes, more water please.”
“Yes, you may take my plate.”
“Thank you, it was very nice.”

How rude
To eat these naked bodies in front of others
Blushing *******
Fleshy, white thighs
Thick, like elephants

Sparrows  swarming around the room
Shattering china
Frenzied silence

An overbearing window
Encompassing
Like a fever

Lava folds
Roll in

A stranger whispers, “poor thing”.
A cacophony of uttering
Intertwining
Seeping out the door-frames
Deep into the shivers of an restless evening

frothed innards left unfolded and spilling out-brain slightly bulging
Petals peeling back-unwilling
Souring slowly in the cold fluorescents
Sticky fingers grabbing at the carpet
Crinkling and screaming as I drag it
It keeps company like a booted dog


So many quick hands have pushed
This sad little egg to me feet
Stuffed and stacked into oblong spaces
Why did you come all this way?

Soft, ripening fruit
Borrowed deeper; waiting
like a mad man in alleyways

next to me you sit
tarred edges split
I dug through your filling and I didn’t find a thing worth having
I clutched your heart like a spoon
Red between my fingers

Heard the faint whisper of a destination unseen
One that could never be realized
Because there is no land in a flying dream.

I was once a puzzle piece that found my place atop a mountain
let my outline cut into the horizon

Time finally moved on without me
I watched it float away, following the clouds

I stood there like a stoic tree
looking out for miles and miles
at the rolling waves of hills before me and behind me and beside me
the urge to inhale the view like a flame-eater filled me
to see things for what I could paint them to be
to point out which mountains stood tallest by the new snow that decorated them like tablecloths

why is it that I am allowed to see these mountains distant as migrating geese
far enough that I would I would starve before reaching their shores
their womanly curves peppered by trees like the fur of an animal
I knew I was meant to stand on mountains and look out until the world bent
to fit into it like a flea on the warm back of a dog
to have my splintered fleshy feet hold onto its back
how lucky those feet are to be so near it
as to never forget it is real

Many have looked out at these same mountains and believed they had surely conquered them
Staked poles amongst the rolling faces because they had crawled out of their underbelly
those same people are withering gently back into the womb
as these mountains dig their heel deeper into time

I did not feel infantile or brief when I realized that my presence was unnoticed
I knew I was watching a hibernating bear sleep
I had crept into an onyx cave and gazed at my tormentor
as its chest rose and fell like a ticking clock
I saw all that was before me and beside me and behind me
with these hazel leaves I knew one day would dry up
when my October comes