The scrape of the
Shower curtain’s slide is
Music to my ears.
This old cliché
Comes true when I
Hear the sound sampled in some
New song today. Every
Other up-beat makes
My speakers buzz, I
Spin the dial and
Breathe static.

Oh, manifold incomparable dress,
O couvercle covering cowering flesh
Flap and fight and fly, oh
Imitate her soon-to-sigh.
Oh flowers patterned on
Some fabric thin to
The billow breeze, oh
Bumps on her knees.
My hand is well aware, don’t stop,
I love them there.

For a moment
I thought my cigarette
had somehow set the tree ablaze (it
was actually the light picking out
the last bud red
with never-bloom). I
reached out with
licked finger tips,
foot on one branch arm
hooked around another,
to extinguish her but
didn't hear the
soft sizzle I expected.
I drew my hand back
sticky now with sweat
and a little sap.

I smoked the rest
then threw the **** to the roots below,
listend to it fizzle out
in the snow.

My swing was still tied to
the arm of the
tree when they
put it through the cruncher that
made mulch.

It fell because it
was dead
for a long time, like
dad said
whenever he thought so.

I asked mom if Spot
got scared and
ran away and
she cried
and at night
told me everything dies,
but she was wrong
because I went to sleep
and dreamt he was alive.

[page 1] I'm a narcissist. I'm self-aggrandizing. I'm self-centered. I'm selfish. I'm ungrateful. I'm ugly. I'm emaciated. I'm neither here nor there. I'm almost androgynous. I'm awake at odd times. I'm asleep too often. I'm always on something. I'm always off-the-wagon. I'm incomprehensible. I'm rarely belligerent. I'm out of control. I'm out of cigarettes. I'm awful with money. I'm awful with your money. I'm spending all your money. I'm smoking all your ****. I'm not coming out today. I'm trying for tomorrow. I'm not really trying. I'm really sorry. I'm always sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm sorry. I'm not letting that get out-of-hand too. I'm lying to myself. I'm trying to catch myself, dozed-off. I'm trying to convince myself I'm better. I'm convincing a lot of people I'm better. I'm better. I'm lying to 

[page 2] myself. I'm trying to catch myself, dozed-off. I'm trying to catch myself, before I fall into another loop of mundane infinities. I'm often repeating myself. I'm okay with repeating myself. I'm pretty sure you've heard me say this before. I'm saying it again, anyway. I'm so glad you'd listen. I'm so glad you still call on Sundays, and some Thursdays. I'm working this Thursday. I'm sorry. I'm dreaming of breaking hearts. I'm the one breaking my heart. I'm heavy-hearted, but barely broken. I'm buried in a journal of mine, from 2009. I'm disgusted by its contents. I'm not that person anymore. I'm not capable of describing the totality of my purpose with sentences, so blank-yet-still-slovenly as: "I have no other motivation for anything. I just love, want, and respect you." I'm not okay with having meant

[page 3] those words sincerely, and without even the tip of a tongue grazing the closest part to the teeth, of the inner cheek. I'm disappointed in my past selves. I'm motivated by my mission to make memories of them. I'm not letting them take that away from me.  I'm not angry. I'm better. I'm trying to catch myself, dozed-off, in the big-leather-recliner. I'm just wondering what time you all left last night. I'm not sure of when I passed out exactly. I'm not as embarrassed as I should be. I'm making it part of my routine. I'm not sure Dad would like that, though. I'm, either way, etching my own aphorisms into the infrastructure of the eternity. I'm attempting prose. I'm, admittedly, copping-out. I'm lying to myself. I'm trying to catch Myself, not paying attention to Itself. I'm failing, up to this point. I'm

[page 4] aware of my "exacerbating the issues." I'm aware this means I "don't want to get better." I'm a lot more aware of what I want, than you've been. I'm unable to catch myself, dozed-off, tranquil-for-once. I'm decided upon a signal of my impending arrival. I'm banging pots and pans, on the stoop, outside. I'm only a few minutes late. I'm not sure it'll make "a huge difference." (I'm sure it won't make any difference.) I'm finished, arguing about it. I'm proud. I'm light-footed, but proud. I'm lucky, beyond only the extent of my imagination's furthest limit. I'm in-flight, towards that boundary, searching for clues. I'm too close to the sun, considering my wax wings. I'm falling. I'm trying to catch

[page 5] myself, nose-dove. I'm amazed by the enormity of the earth below me. I'm running out of air underneath me. I'm evolving my opinions on God. I'm looking up at another-Icarus-ending. I'm staring down, at Salvation Incarnate. I'm calculating the time it'd take. I'm not-trustworthy. I'm awake. I'm not strong enough. I'm wide-awake. I'm not gonna survive this. I'm sick of being awoken by That Unmistakable Whistle. I'm out-of-breath. I'm all-out-of-breath. I'm lost in my lungs, and the Earth only grows. I'm telling lies to myself. I'm sure, I'll catch myself. I'm the only help I'm gonna get. I'm content now, in freefall. I'm watching the wax melt, onto my face. I'm wiping the wax off my face, while I laugh.

[page 6] I'm holding my own forearms, in a tight circle, tangential to my shoulders, too small to cradle a falling seagull, and motioning, as if I mean to help myself catch myself.

Hey kid, I woke up buzzing, here
In the future ruins of ancient America. 
Staring, after the imperial sunrise,
Listening to Los Angeles on repeat.
Insistent and purple, only 
Sediment left in the
Bottles of night. 

This third-world way
Causes Third World War
So I'm drinking at a 
Tavern on the End.
The bus goes by, and
"Baseball's the worst sport."

Alliteration, allusion,
Colors, characters,
And metaphors.
Sobriety sending me 
Searching for smoke. 
Rehash, re-up, and "read the ****** thing." My world-view,
Out-maneuvering your
Upbringing.

(The memories I have are white and yellow.
Fogged, not angry, if even confused.
You'd call me, after finishing your nightly readings, to cry about the characters you'd loved, and castigate my inability to care.
Remember when you used "undermined" to describe the adaptation?
You meant that it was "assuming too much.")

"Brenda and Eddie," over here,
"Couldn't go back to the greasers" so they
Wound up at your family's tavern. 
"You look like the fat kid,
On whom the popular girl was 
Forced to settle."

Dear Man,
Woman's found you out. Or 
Are we, justly, doomed to be 
More juvenile?

Worn sole, soul-open, "so long,
Kid, I don't know you, but,
I can't help myself from
Destroying you."
(My upbringing: out-maneuvering
Your world-view.)

"You've always been the caretaker, Flagstaff."
The bait's in your brain. 
You've simply been 
Overlooking the barkeep.

(Dear Diary, could I just die already?
The Price is Life, and purgatory's a game show.
Anger, the color of your mother.
Skin, the shade of yard-work.
Staring at road maps of Virginia, stoic.
Trying to divine the diners we'd die in.)

It's so gratifying to realize that
I don't care what you're up to
Post-deluge-of-Dilaudid. Or
Adder-all-outta-luck
Where the beige meets the blue, and
The cat's smelling flowers, and
We're squished in this chair, here,
But you don't give a ****.

This was supposed to be the
Maiden voyage of
The S.S. Dog-Staying-Home-Alone
But, instead, familiar
Anxious chills, and shaky
Hands, and aching bones...

Hell, Baltimore is burning, whilst
Nepal just falls apart.
Sun beams, young, and up-and-coming,
Never getting called to start.

Does the wind smell
So sickly, did it die?
With the rest of me?
Is this that "long-count to thirty?"
Am I being too wordy?

"Stop rhyming, we need to drink."