Google someone
on the Good Internet
it could make you smile.

Like your shy neighbor
the one who doesn’t talk much
not a lot of eye contact
at the mailbox
the one who practices his violin
at the oddest hours.
Google him and you discover

he has a glass eye
result of his heroism
in the Na Trang Valley Massacre in Nam

he has an M.A. degree in divinity

his wife and children died in a housefire
when he was away on a business trip
some years ago

and all you can do
in your shameful paranoid way
is google him
to find the dirt

but there isn’t any
and you wish
there was something
sweet about you
on the Good internet.

smoke gets in my eyes
wetness watering the ashes
I rub it between my fingers
there's nothing left
it dissolves into my skin
everything I had, gone
the fireman's hose
waters the flames
fires do as they must
from ashes to ashes
and dust to dust
life will reemerge
they say,
a small green shoot
bending towards
the morning sun
and my tears
will make it grow
it will become a tree
and I will become me again.

We live in this cruel cold soap opera,
You name the drama and I'll play the part,
So when I hurt you, don't take it to heart,
Booming drums of ****** for our mantra.

When first I let you inside of my arms,
I didn't think you'd stay inside my head,
Or between the creased white sheets on the bed,
Laying under the broken the smoke-alarm.

Pulled out across like piano wire,
I dragged you from the room and all its blaze,
You slept deeply and sweetly for eight days,
You're the first breath after a housefire.

-Jamie F. Nugent

My dad tells me he is proud of me
somehow it makes the knife
he stuck into my back as a child
dig in deep enough to hit a vain-
I cannot feel my backbone anymore.

The animosity I felt towards my father
was always my fuel to this housefire he lit himself
burning all of our confidence down with it.
The resentment was always the extra leg I needed
in order to stand up to other men who shoved me down-
The strong arm I needed so I could push myself
further and further just to prove him wrong
looks like I did.

The house has been rebuilt
with no intention of being burned down
but somehow I'm still waiting for the match to strike,
for the flick of the lighter or the pouring of gasoline.
I'm waiting for everything to go up in flames-

When I get comfortable or consistent
I start to smell the fumes
and before I even have a chance to run away
I am consumed.
It's been too long since I've felt the warmth
starting to like the cold a little too much now.
The worry is worse than the outcome
and the possibility is worse than the actuality.

My dad told me he was proud of me
words I've been waiting to hear since I was four.
Makes me wonder if people actually do change-
makes me wonder if you can too.
Waiting around for the smoke to clear
is something I was never good at
couldn't take the lack of breath.

Loving you is void of the fire
but still breathing in the fumes
I hope it will end soon
but I like the way it tastes.
When it's done and the smoke clears
I can still smell it on my clothes.
A small reminder that I was once
so buried beneath a sheet of insecurity
it kept me from thinking clearly
seeing clearly
and everything just ended up ash.

All we have ever been is ash
a gust of wind away from oblivion.
Burn me down to build me up again.