Christmas Presents
by Ryan Kinney

For those I know and know I have some special gifts. Call it poetic materialism, or even selfish regifting.
I will give you what you don't want and take what I want, because such is the spirit of the season.

For my mother...
This old bird no longer caged, she gets to look on the other side of the bars this time.
Her freedom, so precious, that she will be as far removed from those who incarcerate her soul as possible.

Dad...
He gets another stumble in the hallway.
A head first dive into a bottle of pills.

My brother...
He gets a brief reprieve from alcoholic rage and abandonment issues.
His fiancé gets to bear the weight of these sins. It's a package bought with her dignity and sold with her respect.

The half-brother...
He gets mothered and smothered,
coddled and cooed,
held and supported, so much...
That he's unable to stand on his own.

My half sister...
She gets ___.
It's not like I'd know what to get her.

Grandma...
She reaps what she has sown in the cold, barren winter of her life.
Her years of hate finally cashed in
for an empty house.
The gift receipt bears the inscription,
"Wish you were here, (but not really)."

The murderous, ****** cousin...
He gets cold, prison justice.
A gouged eye for an eye.

The ******-addict cousin...
She gets undeserved sympathy..
As she drops another burden on this family.
Her seven deadly sins, rosy cheeked and innocent, get to ask,
"Where's Mommy?"

What of the countless other cousins, aunts, and uncles...
They get silent nothings.
A commodity given with the sentiment of fruitcake.
Every year I get it,
I give it away.


Now let's move on from family,
As they have moved on from me.

The ex-wife gets to unwrap another year of her inner rot.
It's a flamboyantly gorgeous package,
adorned with crisp $100 bills.
What about the outlaws?
Who used to be the "in" thing.
They get my absence.
Another alien transmission expelled from their bubble.

And how about my best friend...
Well, him, I like.
He gets new family, new hope, and new dreams.
His son...
gets life, our collective legacy.
A promise of future triumphs and heartaches.
His fiancée...
She gets domestic bliss.
All the joys of diapers and laundry and feedings.
These gifts,
paid for with each of her child's smiles.

The techie, my shy secret agent...
She gets her first year as Mrs...
And unemployment.
But, at least they are together in their poverty.

Now, what does one get a Love Toy?
She gets all my unrequited love..
The bulk of my desperation and loneliness,
packaged as an ******.
It's an awfully cheap thing.

My gay friends...
They get an epic dance party,
The likes of which only those from the "other" side of the rainbow could throw.
While the mundane from the dark side hurtle their sticks and stones.

The pseudo-grandma...
She gets my respect and admiration.
And gives, always gives,
Wisdom.

What of my new college friends...
They get finals and stress and hunger and house fires and...
Kinship in the academic struggle.

Finally, Me...
What do I get?
Because that's all this is about.
You didn't think I'd give without expecting something in return?

Well...
I get to ***** about why I hate Christmas.

And Then There Was None
by Ryan Kinney

First they came for my things.
And I did not speak out.
Because I had so very little anyways.

Then they came for my mind.
And I did not speak out.
Because I had no thoughts to give.

Then they came for my heart.
And I did not speak out.
Because it was already broken.

Then they came for my body.
And I did not speak out.
Because it was already worn beyond use.

Then they came for my soul.
And I did not speak out.
Because I was empty inside.

Then they came for me.
And there
Was nothing left
For them to take.

The AntiChild
by Ryan P. Kinney

Happy Birthday, my AntiChild.
What will be my gift to you?
Life.
A random slice of all that came before you.
With the wisdom of a madman.

I will twist, and shape, and encourage,
Oh yes, you will be corrupted.
I will teach you,
That the world is not as you’ve been told.

I will tell you,
What it means to be a man,
And a woman.
And the difference is all in your head

No one is right or wrong.
Only what’s right for you.
Adults lie.
Juvenile records are not permanent.
Kids were made for fun.

While we’re at it…
Santa Claus is a zombie,
The Easter Bunny is a mutant,
Unicorns are a government conspiracy…

Then I will tell you,
I could be lying.
But, think for yourself.
I bet you could come up with a better story.
And, know,
That the sanest man in the room is probably the most insane.

Life will hurt,
And often ****.
But don’t give up.
Women will break your heart.
Growing up is a sin,
But, be responsible for yourself.

Never take anything too seriously,
And do everything with absolute sincerity.
Question everything.
Take nothing for granted.
Seek the answers yourself.
Answer Who am I?
Then go out with Nerf guns blazing.

I will teach you to create,
To turn garbage into gold.
To give your thoughts form.
And your hands their due.
To see potential and possibility,
Where others only see trash and hopelessness.
Everything is art.

You will write on paper bags,
And doodle on receipts.
Grab the nearest object,
And give way to your soul.

My little taint will ensure,
That your thoughts MUST bolt
With the spasmodic urgency of adolescence.
Or you WILL combust.
And sometimes,
I will tell you to do just that.

Life will be your creation.
Therein lies the truest art.
The finest work of man,
Is to make something out of themselves.

Why, the AntiChild?
Because you will be the antithesis of every other kid,
You will be better,
You are our legacy.
A universe of your own making awaits you.
Built on a family of love, life, experience…
And more than a few comic books.

Free Kittens
by Ryan P. Kinney

Whenever I see one of those signs
Advertising cheap, easy love
I am reminded of my darkest hours
When I fed my addiction to affection
To a love, a life I could control.
To something that needed me.

Surely they’ll love me
And quell the devouring loneliness and disconnection

Like little furry ******
Without the ***.
Wrong kinda *****
Wrong kinda love

When I had a full harem
I discovered, there is such a thing as too many
They were infested with parasites and ailments
Without constant attention
They’d **** on and defile
My every possession

My childish and selfish delight
Turned into an overwhelming nightmare
I didn’t know how to handle them
I never did
Never her
Never myself

Each time I put one down
I’d see their scared faces
Pleading “Why don’t you love me?”
“Because,” I’d say, “She didn’t love me.”
“None of them do.”
“They won’t keep me.”
“I can’t keep you.”

Unable to understand why
As I snuffed the life out of each little creature

Pushed to the brink
They became souvenirs of desperation
If this horrifies you,
Then you are right.
It horrifies me too

I cared more for those cats than my grandmother that year
At her funeral, I said prayers for them
Her entire 77 years more worthless than several weeks with each cat
Grandma- Dead in my heart by her own callousness
The kittens-By my own hand for their innocence

Who Am I?

I am a boy and a man.
I am a son, a brother, a cousin, a nephew, and a grand child.
I was a boyfriend, a fiancé, a husband, and an in-law.
I am a bachelor.
I am surrounded and abandoned.
I am a family man and a loner.

I am a homemaker and a handyman.
I wear the apron and the tool belt.
I am a neat freak and a slob.
I am an amateur contractor and a contracted amateur.
I am a dumpster diver, a recycler, and a decadent waste.
I am a glutton, a scavenger, and a scrapper.

I am a friend and an enemy.
I am fun and an annoyance.
I am a lover and a hater.
I am creepy, cruel, and harsh.
I am tender, loving, and inviting.
I have a foul mouth and tender lips,
Drenched in jagged, soft-serve words.

I am a painter, sculptor, draftsman, sketcher, character designer, photographer, graphic designer, fashion designer, kitbasher, customizer, and crafter.
I am a reader, a writer, and a poet.
I am the Jail Baby, Ryan & Lisa, The Phoenix, The AntiFather, and The HEYMAN!
I compose symphonies of visual and intangible imagery.
I bring form to thought.
I destroy,
I create.
I am an artist.

I am a geek, nerd, freak, and otaku.
I have been punk, goth, prep, white trash, and metrosexual.
I wear glasses,
But only as a sick joke.
I am beautiful and ugly,
Clean and *****.
I am unique.
I am predictable.
I have changed, but am still the same.

I am a techie,
An electronic ******.
I am cutting edge and old school.
Digitally signed and sealed.
I am analog and obsolete.

I am an adrenaline addict.
I can chill, maybe slow,
But never relax.

I am blue collar, tradesman, and service industry.
I am peon and ****** on.
Oh, but I have done the ******* too!
I have been hired and fired,
Bought and sold.
I have worn the uniform,
I have said, “**** the man!”
I am the proletariat,
I am in charge.

I am a student, dropout, and teacher.
I am class clown and teacher’s pet.
I have learned, forgotten, and taught,
But never learned my lesson.
I don’t listen to what I’m told,
But always do what I tell.

I am a genius,
I am an idiot.
I have intelligence, but often lack the intel.
I am naïve, but wise.
I am right and wrong.

I have philosophies and ideas,
But no religion.
I have desecrated and blasphemed,
Prayed and praised.
I have lusted, envied, and coveted.
I am guilty and innocent,
Pure and soiled,
Good and bad.

I am a driver and a passenger.
I am an explorer and a shut-in.
I am wild and free,
Caged and stifled.
I was warmly wrapped in my blanket,
But burned through it.

I have rode, climbed, and conquered.
I  stood still.
I jumped in.
I have fallen and been defeated.

I have been abroad,
I have been nowhere.
I have drifted.
I have settled.
I have led and been led.
I have been in and out,
Here and there,
Around and AWOL,
On the run and trapped.
But, not everywhere.

I have applied,
I have procrastinated.
I have worked my fingers to the bone,
I have slept it off.

I have fought and fled.
I have quit.
I have endured.
I am a winner and a loser,
A champ and a chump.

I am fake,
I am real.
I have lied, cheated, and stole.
I have been honest, fair, and generous.

I am selfish and selfless.
I am a gift giver, gift wrapper, and gift taker.
I am a thief and a philanthropist.

I am insecure and confident,
Confused and absolutely sure.
I am proud and ashamed.
I am complicated and convoluted,
But simple to please.

I have blind faith and guarded suspicion
I have secrets,
But lie rarely.
I accept everyone,
I trust nothing.

I have pointed the finger,
Only to turn it on myself.
I have held grudges and forgiven.
I have trusted and misguided.
I have been Judas and Jesus.

I am a maniac,
I am sane.
I have been strong and weak.
I can keep it together,
But prefer to break it apart.

I have bled.
I have healed.
I have been abused and neglected,
Coddled and protected.

I have been kissed and punched;
Hunted, wanted, and arrested,
Ignored, overlooked, and invisible.

I have loved and lost,
Lived and learned.
I am a soldier of misfortune and opportunity.

I have blended in.
I have stood out.
I have stood up.
I have backed down.
I have been backed into a corner.
I have all the space in the world.

I have seen, interpreted, and perceived,
I have ignored, dismissed, and been blind.
I hunger, want, and need…
I am satiated and content,
But never at peace.

I have been misunderstood and underestimated.
I have been put down, put up, pushed away, and let in.
I have been known,
But never entirely.

I have raged, cried, smiled, trembled, and laughed.
I have been depressed.
I have been happy.
I have been suicidal. I have felt death.
I have been lost and found.
I have been broken, then fixed,
Stitched, yet glitched,
Scarred, but whole.
I am alive.


I took the chance,
I let the moment slip.
I walked the straight and narrow,
I ran down the road not taken.
I dream; some whole, some shattered.
I go with the flow, but don’t let the waves take me.

I am shards and reflections,
Machinations and reactions.
I am translucent pieces and parts,
Assembled and disheveled.
I am the big picture still focused on the details.

I am the sum total of heredity and experience.
I am not,
I am more.
I am everything and nothing.
I am a walking contradiction.
I am human.

I tried to be you,
But didn’t know what that meant.
I am me,
It’s all I know.

Who are you?

The Moment
by Ryan P. Kinney

The Japanese girl sits quietly on the pier
Gazing out over the water
Her silence and knowing glance says more
Than either of our languages could ever comprehend
She is beautiful in her hopelessness
And I, dumbstruck in awe of a peace I will never know

She sits behind me squawking with an adolescent banter that must seem dire
Her intensity of voice speaks the same thing I had secretly wished for years, but been too afraid to say
“Please pay attention to me.”
Speak, I did, for the very first time
This awkward message of youthful adoration is not exactly communicated articulately
Her only response is, “God, I hate you. Please shut up.”
If I am already taking risks with my life, then I will not be silenced
For once, I will not back down
“You love me. You just don’t know it yet.”

We are inexplicably sat on the very edge of the river
The smell of Texas BBQ intensifying our hunger
Half of our small group is exhausted proving their technical prowess
When I declare that this most manly of feasts
Must be a competition to prove our testosterone
Why simply dine in San Antonio
When you can challenge your friends to a banquet of sauce laden meats
I declare that he who finishes least or last
Must surrender his manhood
The ***** are on the table this night

I awoke early this morning
And slipped quietly out of my bunk.
My compatriots were still sleeping off a hangover
I push open the door hundreds of years my senior
And witness the burgundy sunset of French wine country
Just think, right now I could be mindlessly staring at rolling machinery

I place another valve on the pump and
WHIRRR...
Hypnotically tighten it down
The sound has become a meditation now
The zen is broken when my radio squeals
The producer has just jumped on the air
“The World Trade Center is on fire.”
I place my wrench slowly down on the table... Confused
We all do.
We all are.
In a half hour we will all be sitting around the table
Listening to Howard Stern speculate on a horror
We are blinded to the true terror, what this really means...
Until hours later.

Snow continues to flood my windshield as I wind precariously around the bespeckled Allegheny’s
The city below, shrouded in the early winter night
Looks as though the heavens have finally released the weight of the stars to the ground
As I marvel at this, a twinge of fear arises
I may not find shelter tonight
Nonetheless, the roads level out and an exit is offered as salvation
In the midst of planned itineraries, sightseeing, and tourist attractions I had lost track of time
I am resigned to sleep the night in a Wal-Mart parking lot
When I pull off the exit, however,
I am pleased to see the welcoming glow of a mall
There I discover an establishment long since lost to the ether of my youth
As I sit there, eating the 10,000 calorie hot dog I ponder,
“This is what life was like when it was simpler, when I thought I knew what it was all about,
Before I was proven horribly wrong.”

In the midst of the audacious and elaborate splendor of Florence
I see a sight a sight so simple
And yet so much more a monument to man’s unfathomable capacity for love and compassion
A rose, brown and dead, is stuck in a chain link fence
Attached to it is a small hand-written note that reads,
“Kiss her now”

I am in her arms
Having been told, “No”
And resigned to rejection so many times
So many times I told myself that this would never happen
As my lips touch hers
I laugh inside my head
“Is this really happening?”
This is really happening

I hold my breathe
I can see him through the window
As I have seen him through the electronic window of my TV for years
As I get closer this feels less and less real
This is my hero
My God
He has accomplished amazing things
And pushed the limits of the human body
Suddenly, I am in front of him
He looks up, and smiles, as he says hello
All the nervousness, the anxiety disappears
When I realize that my God is a man
A man like me

I am terrified
Before me is a discolored, screaming, clawing, misshapen alien creature
My son takes his first breathes of real air
We are all exhausted
His mother looks at me with a look that practically screams,
“We did it.”
I plead, “But, we’re not done doing it yet...
Are we?”
His gurgles turn into cries
And I know...
I know that this,
This is the moment that matters more than any in my life
I will never have a single instant matter anymore than this ever will...

And while I stare into his bed
I hope he proves me wrong.

Things
by Ryan P. Kinney

I don’t have people. I have things.

I suppose that is not completely true.
As one of those “things” is so apt to say,
“It’s a shade of gray.”

There are exceptions to that rule.
As I, myself, am quite exceptional.
There are a chosen few I let in
And allow to peer into the darkness
And through my unblinking, unwavering eyes
Let the darkness stare back at them

However, for most people,
They are a thing to me
Something to be used, with a specific purpose and function
Whose value is not based on mutual respect
Atleast not more so than I give any of my personal belongings
Perhaps that is the core of the issue
I personify my inanimate accumulations
And dehumanize my sentient gatherings

What good can you do for me?
What good can you do for yourself,
That I can then, vicariously, take credit for?
And justify my use of you
While I put you on reserve for my future megalomaniac endeavors

Some philosopher in an old book I have long since forgotten
Once suggested that true altruism is not possible
That no matter how seemingly unselfish your motives were
There was always some selfish desire in all actions
Even if it was the need to feed on the “warm and fuzzies” of convincing yourself that you are a good person

Another of my “things” has also suggested that my view makes me a sociopath
I can agree with that
My conscience lacks a separation between the human and the inert
Most sociopaths have a certain charm
That makes them appear as if they care and are part of social, collective conscience
Which is often very thinly veiled,
Behind their complete disdain for any others

It’s not something that I want to be.
It’s just a realization that I am coming upon
I wish I was more human
I struggle against dehumanizing these mystifying creatures
But the years of my life, my decisions and actions, and mere circumstance
Has left me less and less desire to trust and care for less and less people

Now things…
Things I can control, warp, bend to my will
I can use things;
They have a reason for being
They are typically where I put them and only let me down when they break
And even then, they are usually easily replaced or subverted.
They don’t leave me, lie to me, or betray me
I won’t say that a thing has never broken my heart
Because, let’s face it,
I put more of a face on object than a person
But even the chips in my core from a seized engine or a shredded shirt
Do not leave half the **** that someone clawing their way out of the depths of my darkness,
That I have allowed them to nestle into, does

To be honest, I do not even know what a person is
I can define an object;
My senses give it form, function, and purpose
A person, however, is like a flowing river
While always the same in name
It is constantly changing, shifting, and flowing
Leaving me no reference point
No straws to grasp onto
If I cannot even understand my own ebbs and rapids
How can I even begin to know this thing that is a person?

No,
Better, or rather easier, that I freeze that river at a particular point
Or even simultaneously at multiple points
Then I can lift it, move it, have some indication with which to know what it is and what I can do with it
Then toss that piece back into the torrents, until I have need of it again

Now, if we really want to get down to it…
I have spent a large portion of my life in introspection
As a selfish being, I constantly try to figure out what and who I am
Do you know what I found out?

I’m not really a person either;
Just another thing.