If people were like books, I think that you
Would be among the best. Not ****** life,
But instead loving like sweet honeydew.
Your brown coffee stains, ripped pages, and strife
Give you attraction; black letters give depth.
Your cover is deep brown freckle covered --
Not strained stripped blond, but color wide of breadth.
Your words are full of thoughts rediscovered,
Once old, now part of a new kind of youth.
My minds palate savours each of your words,
Every one full of grace and Christ and couth:
The sounds they make from a beautiful bird.

I am the sieve and your love is the sand
               and you'll try, oh you'll succeed,
To fill me with many deserts by your hand.

Three years ago
I kisses the first lips I
Ever fell in love with,
And the last lips
I would kiss forever.

We sat around waiting for the end
To come,
Watching the edges of clouds and ridges
Of the mountains burn like paper
Glowing and retreating into themselves,
And behind them the sky glowed with
Fire undiscernable from the sunset.

As it came, I sat by you, my last person and
I closed my eyes;
I was glad to end it
With you.

When I press your ***** clothes to
My face, and your aroma fills my lungs,
It's like I can feel your lips and flesh
In my mouth;
I can taste your skin on my tongue
And it's as if you're a part of me
Again.

Awake again, another day
Coffee as brown as her eyes meet me from
The mug she made me.
The heater keeps the cold away
But not as well as her breath
Or her skin against mine,
The shower head begins to spray
Steaming water that I ever wish were
Her fingers, streaming down my back.
Our frustrated feelings start to fray
As we play witness to others begin life together
As we've worked so hard to achieve.
But I will be the ceramic and not the clay,
Steadfast and unyielding until mine is mine
And hers is hers because by god --

Awake I will be in the suns first rays,
Wrapped in arms and light and soft brown hair
And eyes like coffee that will beg me back to bed.

I'm sorry, I'm not like
You all.
Not in the way that I'm special, or set apart,
Just different, for some reason
A difficult different.

I'm sorry my conversations
Are ****, and
I can't find the right things to say. I wish I
Could talk about Narnia, and give
Up space forever.

I'm sorry I haven't always
Been here,
One of your core memebers; I'm just
"More comfortable" on my own
On the benches.

I'm sorry I'm trying to steal her,
Your youngest love;
If I could give up these dreams of being
My own, our own, our own something
Great, I would.

I'm sorry I can't be banal, with a
Simple job in a simple town,
Content with what I know and doing just
Enough to get by on these broken
Parts of mine.

I'm sorry I can't love TV and video
Games the way you do,
To know them and talk about them as
Your friend is something I may
Never know.

I'm sorry I can't be a bonus son
Like the other.
But I love what I do, and though it may seem
Useless it's mine, and I'll do it for
Me, for her, for us.

I know none of you don't mean it, I know
Somehow it's in my head -- but
It's an uphill battle, and you're
Throwing boulders.

When doubts and fears are like an ocean,
I clamor to the sand -
A billion tiny grains of  deafaning voices.
I use them as soap and bleach
Against my skin to wash away the waves
Which crash against my soul.
I dig the sand with dirtied palms as far as I can go,
Deeper into the liars pit
Until I reach what lies underneath, of
Which I find regret.
So I lock my fingers into a cage and press
Into the regret, and choke it
At the bottom of the pit I dug myself,
But like spit through teeth
It shoots on through my grasp defiant and proud,
Where it buries me in its place.

I am a fire.
A son of Prometheus, perhaps.
I burn and eat and distill and
Warm and give life.

But there has been a wrong.

My smoke is black.
I suffocate and choke and blind and
hurt. Because what I am burning,
Is alive.

It's supple with the liquid of life.

The clear gold filled in leaves.
It's in her too, and my chemistry
Is off. This chemo, the kerosene.
In me, doused on her.

It burns her and hurts and I am no longer a fire.

I am afraid.

Orange juice rays that spray down from the sky
through the tight drawn curtains
lands as one smooth strip bisecting the room
softly illuminating the morning.
He grabs tufts of blankets with his toes and tucks
them down beneath his feet
to keep them from cold, or whatever else lurks
in a fresh morning room.
His ears so blue only the Axis could tell,
hear Funkadelic through the soft navy dark
of a room not quite so woken up as to
be a part of the day.
The clock radiates euphoria in soft whispers
of hours more to sleep.
He hears Hazel like on a walnut and lets it
relax every muscle.
Soon he'll decide to colour his own sound,
which stirs under the pulled-up covers
that hide him from a reality spilling in through the curtains
that don't agree with his fields of Blue.

In these short dark days
Where the fireplace is ablaze,
I lay with you under the blanket frays
And into your eyes I often gaze
As we break our fast on a donuts glaze,

And in the kitchen we lightly graze,
As I play a little of Martin Gaye's
Songs to which my body sways
With yours on our linoleum.

Days with
Out you
Shouldn't even
Be counted
On the
Calendar --
Try(ing to
live the
days with
out the
sun) to
Find me
A reason
Why.

I've got bloodshot vision obstructed
By ash and smoke,
Grit and smog and ember.
The heat is always there, in the flame,
In the smoke, in the air --
In your hands,
Tickling the edges of my face and
Licking at my hair.
And even as the water level
Passes over my eyes, wetting my
Cheeks and jeans, I can
Still see you as
Clearly as the future we've etched
In the streets we've walked,
Down to the black robins that
Will settle on your face in the
Light of the campfire.

The Hiker reaches the foot of the mountain
And pulls out his map,
Laden with a golden path in lemniscates  
Knowing where he is to go
For he had known this since he set foot out
His door.

Day by day he scales a piece of the mountain
Face, lacking not skill, but
Having patience, knowing the safe and
Prosperous journey is the
Patient one, the one whose tree of meaning
Is rooted in passion, the passion
To wait.

The Hiker fears not the delay of the summit
For the summit is already his,
Her hand his bride, for it is known in the
Hikers name who he is meant for:
The Summit, forever and for always.

Sometimes our models of the
Universe don't quite work out;

Sometimes it's just a simple cause
And effect, micro like macro.

Now that my model of us is shattered
On the ground, a glass cookie jar subject

To the tantrum of a child, the electron
Moves forward in time once again;

Our entropy increases,
And we decay.

At this point it may not even
Be a poem,
Just too many intends in a too
Wordy sentence,
But it doesnt matter what it
Is, because all I
Want to get across is that

I love you.

I've never been able to write
Well about you
Because before any words even begin to form,
I've already drifted,
Beginning to dream about you.
Your smell;
Eyes;
Nose;
Laugh;
Smile - your downright perfect smile,
And as my mind wanders and
My heart goes outright supernova,
I haven't even the time to pick up a pen.

Being as self conscious and
Insecure as I
Means fixing your hair before
Climbing into an empty
Bed
And sleeping alone,
Discontent with myself
In the dark.

She goes to lay down
To try and give up
Tries to let go
But it holds on

She sees the mirror
But inside's not her
It's someone from tomorrow
Cause she's only today

She's heavy-hearted
But feeling empty
A raging furnace
Made of paper

She's got a life-vest
For the first train
Draws a quick bath
To get her first crutch

She's got her emotions
Stored in her right leg
Lets them all out
After the locks on

She's heading home now
On the sidewalk
Laying longways
In the stars above

As children, most all of us
Exclusively listen to short, soft songs,
In G major with endings that
Resolve.

They have a chorus, and
A verse, and they are pleasant to hear,
And we laugh and giggle and sing
Along.

But as we grow up, we listen
To the dissonance. We appreciate the
Disharmony and the
Unresolved.

We appreciate the disharmony
In the sounds, in each other, in around us;
We learn to love the dysfunction between
Us.

Because the world, nor anything
Of it, will ever be perfect. But we have to
Learn to appreciate it, and be ****** up by
It.

And though it wont always sound
Like magic, because sometimes we are
An E chromatic seventh, I still choose to love
You.

Swords and secrets slice the
Air like dragons wings, and
Meat and mead are split
Through thick beards and
Fair maiden faces, and
The songs and words pour
Out fantastically as my eyes
Soak up each page. But nothing
Will ever be as wonderful, or
Fantastic, or so awe inspiring, or
Purely powerful or magical
As those Oaken eyes that keep
Sentinel on my face, that perch
In a cream face of radiating
Beauty, a captivating to
Rival any story.

Like the carpet and our bed,
After so many years we've
Memorized each other --
Becoming permamently imprinted.

My eyes shift back
Into focus after staring
For so long

I blink as I wipe the drool
Off and look around

I sit in the comfortable recliner

As I notice the room, the chair,

The clock tells me how many years
I've been sitting here,
content to

Watch the dancing lights from
The T.V.

But all that's there is static

From the moment the keys hit the table,
I knew I wanted to go back
And kiss you like I should have.

Sometimes I just have to leave
To where my coat isn't wet
Gone like seasons rotating
In a merry-go-round
Before I get stuck in one myself and

Get sad, on the bench
On the train
Go insane
From the strain
Gone like seconds slipped
From your grip

I'll knock on the door and ring the bell
But it wont open, and that's okay
I really had nothing to say anyway
At least the sidewalks dry for now

Two days gone and one left unseen
My feet hit the ground, because
Sometimes I have to be the one
I'm leaning on

But back I always came
To the same
Not from shame or the blame
But because my heart never really
Left her room
So I knock on the door and
It opens up wide
With a smile inside and for that
The rain outside can
Stay on my coat

My mind is swaddled tightly
In wool by your look;
Your smell is the cotton ball crammed
Over my tongue.
Your laugh is what ties my laces
Together, conspiring
      to trip me.
The way your chest heaves with breath
Is the dampness in my palms,
And the elegance of your brilliance
Is the torrent to
      extinguish the fires of my
            mind. A spark; a sizzle.

Hands.
***** and brown they reach up
From the mud. Opening their hands,
Releasing butterflies of death
From their clutches. The grass,
Is still green. The trees, are still alive.
Where life is around me it is also
In the hands where it shouldn't.
They grasp ankles and drag them down.
Some, fall easy. Some not so.
They turn the beautiful skin
Into deep brown ****, muddied
Brown, thick with biomasses of
******* maggots and soil and pebbles.

The sunrise is gorgeous.
It slips into your eyes and enlightens
Your vision with dazzling colours.
The world is alive. Everything is wonderful.
But the hands are relentlessness.  
It's all so pristine,
Even as the mud
Encases your nose, and
Cakes your eyes.

This house is haunted.
Not like black, running with blood haunted,
But like a grey tinge, a missing of something ---
Important.

The walls are dead trees,
The lights are like white lifeless faces.
The world is a colourless kind of beautiful,
The black bough the red petal faces appear on
At the metro.

This house is haunted.
Not with ghosts or spirits. Not with creaks, but silence;
Not cold shivers, but an utter lack of; Not
Full of things that shouldn't be but
Instead lacking, missing what should
Be in the space you don't occupy.

This house is haunted,
By the silence your footsteps
Don't create.

Brown from African dust
My feet are weary with
Home so far behind --
Burning with wrath
Parching my lips till cracked
The sun beats down

Through clouds it now shows
With shimmers of raindrops
Littering the overcast sky --
Puddles in the parking lot
I have to skip over, a familiar
Hand in mine

Which was once smooth and lonely
Before subject to string
By the darkness lingering
Between the spaces in the stars --
The wood table centered so sweetly
By the lanterns

Which here never die
Long into the night
Burning by filament so strong --
They flow, but don't flicker
You can see, but never truly
What it really is.

Here and there,
So different but so melded.
Home is with you.
It will never else be.

I love to use words and write
About her. There's so much.

How her lips curl and dance up
Into her smile, or how --
The deep brown in her curls drips
Onto her cheeks in soft freckles -- and
Her deep brown eyes pour into thick
Eyelashes and beneath them --
All her real beauty blossoms

But she can't be captured in words;
Angels were never meant for them.
But I try anyways.

Love inspires stupid things.

The feelings you convey with the
Sharpness of your gaze

Are as startling as glass shattering on pavement;
As soft as trees shedding on the sidewalk.

A kiss of the eyes,
A stab of the lips.

I shed my shell
Too cramped and ***** --
Just to find my new one
Is just as suffocating,
And maybe more
Disgusting.

I'm told that this is home, where I'm
Ignored and feel locked out;
Where I'm marginalized, I don't fit
In, a new culture -
A new generation.

Yet even the me of many yesterdays
Would disapprove of me now:

The opinionated academic who still
Says all the wrong things to all
Whom he loves.

So tell me,
What is one to do

When you don't fit in

Even with yourself?

We saw ourselves ten years from now,
In the people that you sat for;
Their house was full of things we like
And lots of punk and rock lore.
They both had tats and funny hair, and
Loved all the stupid movies,
At three and one he was young,
And she was still a beauty.

The best part though wasn't that
We saw what we'll most be into,
But that you assumed that ten
Years from now, I'll still be allowed
      to love you.

The only thing I want any more,
Isn't for me, or for anyone else,
But for you to be happy

Because when that happens,
Nothing else matters, even if it means
Being a little more alone, on a weekend
Meant to be so together.

I love it, the magic.
How the words, the ******* words --
have a rhythm of their own.
It's like the syllables, have dots and stems;
the punctuation, a rest marker. Beats
and sounds and music but not
quite music. 'Cause if it was music
it wouldn't be called a poem.

It's why I write. Her, yes. But the Words?
Oh the words. Just pause, for every comma.
Stop, for every period. Read it. Hear it
and let it breathe in your ear like
I let Her do. It doesn't always have to
be raw emotion.
Sometimes. Just -- sometimes.
It's enough to let the words,
be all the subject,
we ever need.

I touched the stone
On the statue
And it melted into
Drops of milk and vanilla
A year gone by
And a new river flows
With bone and sugar and ash
The dewlets accumulated
From what once was
Stone.

Standing up on stage,
While I'm sitting in the back on a
Rack of Bibles, you'll never
See the watery eyes accompanying
My smile plastered face
From being so ridiculously proud
Of who you've become,
And what you can accomplish
With your magical voice
And marvelous talent,
All from a girl, who I get the
Privilege to love.

I am of no use, is what it tells me.
That I have nothing special, and that
I am nothing compared to those around
me is the truest lie I was ever told.
It allows me to be soluble
in the lives and achievements of  others.
The individual pieces of me dissolve
into insignificant, infinitesimal specks
that serve no purpose, and amount to nothing.
Anything I do - any talents I have - will be surmounted by those
who are more than I could ever wish to be.
Alone I am whole, where the love I keep under my
sheets and between my arms tells me
she values me.
But out there - out there in the world
I am of no importance and
infinite expendability.

The sun rises. . .

But not yellow this time.
A deep, wonderful brown
so beautiful it's a crime.
It's rays fill the sky and clouds
With colours I would gladly drown
In. Morning grass crowds
The ground glittering with dew
From the rays of the deep brown sun
Which is a colour to which the sky is new.
****, the sky is so cute.
All it's rays reach and run
Into long arms that squeeze my air out till I'm mute.
The sun reaches in my cuts
All the way down to the bare bone
Where not even pain obstructs
Injecting warm happiness cure.
The brown of the sun is like none ever known
To the sky, a light so pure.  

. . .and is only eight days away.

Tonight I lay in bed, with a few extra blankets,
To keep your spot warm for the next
Coming years.

They wake up
To each other. Warm
Beside, arm in arm.

I wake up to my
Pool of blood, surgical gauze
Drenched, pills in hand.

Train cars clack by me on tracks,
A steady rhythm
Each one a crashing indecision.

I'd like to ride up on those cars,
With a backpack
And my one special jazzy guitar;

I want to live like the homeless do,
See the world;
Gain amazing outside experience.

But that's a little out there, eh,
Lets get back
To something better:

I want to end up with this one girl,
A Kindergarten teacher
Waking up to her every morning.

I want to be something like a writer,
Something worth life
Not just problems and equations:

I love to read and process words with
Her head resting
Softly, safely, in my lap.

But I'm tied down by deep blue veins,
Needles sticking out;
Tied down by pills taken all the time. . .

I don't want to rely on medications just
To simply live,
To have them be the death of me.

I want to live the life I want, and not worry
About just living.

Let's take our pants off and eat
Dripping pancakes in underwear and
Flannel --
Let's have bookshelves full of
Heller and Hemingway next to
Seuss and Silverstein --
Let's criticize cartoons like their
Animated contents of all the
Louvre --
Let's get bent out of ******* shape
Over light pollution and not
Seeing the stars --
Let's lay on the couch head to foot in
Checkered socks and Five Iron tour
Shirts and play ska all day --
Let's let the living room be the
Ballroom full of nothing but you and
Me and the radio --
Let's drive my PT Cruiser like it's
A classic car that all the kids
Envy --
Let's play swing music like we're
The Squirrel Nut Zippers re
Incarnate--


Let's be friends, oh you,
My favourite person.