a creeping vine
of lonely ache
reaches out from
the ever whispering
pit
that sits behind my left ear.

fed by cold
desperate waters.
it reaches for me,
tripping,
grabbing,
begging.

what if they
were the only one?
and you,
just
had
to be
miserable...

"...tell me what you're gunna do now?/you get everything you wanted and you're still let down./ tell me what you're gunna do now..."

the voice on the radio sings my thoughts back to me,
the universe asking me to
pay attention.

i etch assuredness into
the stone of my face,
and remember that i'm driving,
even if i can't recall where i'm going.

the song plays,
the vines tighten their hold,
i scrape the last fight out of me,
and do
the only thing
i know how to do.

it's so cliche
so stupid falling out of my mouth,
but,
i died after the choice.

the world's edge dulled
light grew dim.
colors merely exist,
not meaning the same thing anymore.

nothing feels good
it doesn't fit.
watching the story doesn't mean understanding the nuisance.
it's gray.
its barren.
it's never ending.

i died that day.
like so many people do.
i linger,
only out of habit now.

this neverending monotony,
is the only thing I have now.
the only thing that reminds me
that anything is wrong at all.

it's cruel of you to show.
populating a dream
in the same careless way you
hung around all those years ago.

your arm found my waist,
gravity pulling my head down
to that trusting place between your head and heart.

it was easy.
horribly easy.
the world shifted into place
around us
and i knew
the waking world
wasn't for me.

the past year,
and the boy that occupied
your old space
was nothing compared
to this one moment,
this memory,
this ache.

plush captivity
where you too can lay you're weary brow in the wanting lap of lady luxury.

work in our store and buy exclusively our things,
step on the wheel to eat, and drink, and **** out new wallets with dull, lifeless, photogenic, joy.

dont ask where it came from,
or what the cost was.
it's all within your grasp if you just work a bit harder.
that new flavor experience,
a shimmering glow,
the look, the depth, the higher ground,
jealousy, worship,
confidence,
that aching hole,
finally filled,
for the small, small, price of
acquiescence.

let the hands of the master's
worry about the big things.
we know what's best and
knowing what you can't help but want is our job.
we haven't been you in ages,
if we ever were,
but the image is nice so
we'll wear the face you need us to,
at any given moment.

you need us, we know, and we'll make sure to remind you every day.
dont think about the inverse.
you're tired, hungry, poor and over worked, ashamed, scared, or just plain unconcerned; death comes
to us all, you're just waiting out your turn.

plug in awhile,
who has time to raise their heads?
we firmly have the wheel.
we know exactly what's coming up ahead.

there is no enslavement,
no punishment,
just no where else to go,
and no other way to do it.
deeds done in the dark
are done for you, in your name,
who cares about the rest?
you and yours are ok,
and really,
what else
could you
ever
really
need?

gray sky warns of sun soon to come
and the slow hum of a world waking
accents the quiet.

you're heavy next to me,
anxious thoughts
tumble to the floor,
streaming steady,
like draining sand.

yesterday is fading
and i can't bring myself to look into a tomorrow becoming today.

you're gone already,
the tickets tucked away in your purse.
i'm holding a promise,
prolonging memory.

the sun is quick and persistent.
i **** myself for not closing
the ******* curtains
when you asked me to.

the crab bakes it's salt
on a rock littered shore.
bashed through,
cracked, and bleeding brine.

waves roll and guts run before
eyes that are having
their first taste of either.

those baby blues watching
something die for the first time
feel nothing.

they look to the sea,
bored with life and death.

there are empires to build.

cold wind in blonde hair,
dew like rain on light lashes,
a different kind of water
than the tears standing there.

i should have picked a better day,
one with sun,
warmth.

she is strong,
but water always wears down stone.

it rains,
she breaks.

christopher find me.

sweat runs
and salt lingers
in seed and spit
in the moment just ended.

i retreat to the only place I can.
she waits for me patiently
outside

she has all the time in the world.

i was treed.
naked, right next to her
no where to go,

she and the words waited.

if pain is my reality
let me drink it straight.
i'll rely on the toughest parts of me
to hold me up
the bone, the sinew, the gristle.
stiff raw material
indifferent to the soft language of
the heart, the soul, the guts.

when they look at me
i imagine i can read the script that scrolls behind their eyes.

it tells tales of devastating devotion
and a love that's close to madness.

they turn away from me
and i am left to suffer the rewrite of their blank indifference.

she was done.
i was not.

she wanted out,
but i held the door.

frantically i watched the last
grains of our time together
pass through the twist of an hourglass
and everything i ever wanted to say
rushed toward my teeth.

my mouth went dumb
in the burn of her heatless fire.
that cold dimming light that told me
she would listen,
but her heart could no longer hear.

all i could choke out was a feeble

"...please..."

it passed through her, bouncing
off the wall and rolling back
to my feet.

she turned to leave,
and i was left with my
single pathetic word
still begging
from the floor.

it's night
and there are only
two sounds
in the room.

a staggered, humming,
wipe
of running cars,
and a plastic fan
who's chipped blades
struggle for breath
in a wall facing window.

thoughts echo,
take your hand, and
lead you places
you know you don't want to go.

it's quiet
but at times
overwhelming.
night rushes in on all sides
only to stop at the window,
held back by a single shaded bulb.
the childhood nightmares that
hold the sill
drool, grind their teeth,
wait for the inevitable dark.

a train passes
somewhere far off.
blowing a lonly note,
proving to the world
that it still exists and
is hard at work.

it sparks the mind
to chew nervously on
bitter retellings
of histories half remebered.

the bed,
blood,
and heart have run cold,
while the two beers by the bedside
have gone warm.

time stretches out into forever,
yet somehow still maintains
the very real threat
of swallowing things whole,
and coughing everything up into
a dreadful tomorrow.

i can't.

i want to say that i won't
but it wouldn't be true.

if i, instead, say i can't,
i can easily conjure up a choir of whys.

can't pull at you.
can't bust things up.
can't promise greener grass.
can't promise to stay or
that you won't regret
decisions made.

i want to.
so badly.
but i know with you
i am wont to want
so, i'll stay with can't.

i'll turn cold,
i'll steele, and i'll
remember the multitude of whys.

hurry home sad blue eyes;
before a storm brought on by
why not
whips you free and throws us
both
into unpredictable winds.

the first thing i did
when i got a new car
was drive past your place.
muttering that there was
no other way to go,
no route better,
to get me where i want to go.

i refused to look to the side,
keeping my eyes on the road,
and a lie in my throat.
but i felt your apartment slide by.
like a blade of a finger sliding down
a long stretch of thigh.

you haven't lived there in ages
and i haven't sat on that balcony in twice the number,
but driving by brings you closer somehow.
brings your blurred memory into focus.

you're happy with a someone,
i'm content with a whomever,
and we haven't been us in ages,
but,
despite all,
i tell myself,
there is no better way to go,
no better route to take,
to get me where i want to go.

its four a.m. and the old man's ghost is with me as i pour through his work and he paws at my hem.

his phlegmy gravel whispers at me and i hear,  "cool down baby, the ink on the page is dead as a squirrel on the highway."

i read on and i feel his hand on my thigh and his warm beer dribbling on my dress as he promises verse that's all kinds of alive, if i want it.

he is old and slouched, used to younger women dazzled by words or of age ****** who will pay him mind in exchange for his last wrinkled ones,
but i am neither.

i leave his ghost where it lays
and i don't bother asking him to read my work.
it will live with or without him
even if it never sees the sun,
because sooner or later one of them will rise,
and i will have no time for the ghosts of old men.

the woman.
she is no more than
a lump of formless clay,
pure, vast, and unfiltered potential.

he was a songwriter.
promising to sand, shape, and polish.
skimming through her journal and jotting down
shorthand versions of a heart.

he was a stressed money maker
who wanted practical usefulness.
a pillar of support that got only the pleasure
of being part of a palace.

he was a writer.
who got her drunk and scribbled notes as she talked
and called it writing together
after the fact.

he was a teacher.
who only wanted to show her what she could be,
if only
she let him...

from cup,
to vase,
to ashtray,
to bust.

the clay cracks and varnish is sometimes chipped away
fire and tempered shell crushed to dust
only to be reused again,
as flour on a forming table.

the he in these landscapes is not to blame
for readily available medium
calling out for artists hands.

sometimes clay just wants to be clay,
and it has the right to decide,
when it feels like
being something more.

the saddest part of what i'm feeling
is knowing that it has very little to do with you.

you are simply the catalyst.
and no one can blame
a single raindrop
for the floods.

i didn't like you as much as i told myself i would one day,
and my heartbreak is not at the loss of you,
but more so,
the monotonous trend you find yourself a part of.

you are one of many
who say that they are
in for penny and pound alike;
only to get cold feet,
and decide,
from that pale blue that **** keeps falling from,
that the individuals in the royal we
are probably better off
not becoming a unified
us.

the heady wine blushes
pink rose splashes,
spilling from their fluted glasses as they laugh.
they, the shrieking, squealing, piglets of youth personified,
staining their dresses, making the skin of their necks sticky sweet.

girls of their prime,
strolling nonchalantly into woman,
laughing loud and unafraid of the
scowling, folded, creased faces of
old men having coffee
shaking heads and papers
grumbling about peace and quiet.

"Peace! Yes we too seek a little piece grandfather!" the tall blonde of the three trumpets

"Or perhaps, not such a little piece sister." a moon eyed brunette grins.

they let out another deafening ring of laughter,
pulling at each other,
gripping tight to their youth
in the face of
disapproval.

i can't help but smile.
and root them on silently.
be loud,
we've all had plenty of peaceful mornings.
you remind us of the we that we were
when we were you.

the only reason i kept up
with the sport at all,
was to prove a point
to the one who got away.

I walk around heartbroken most of the time.
A sticky glob of pitch resting in my chest,
warm enough to slowly spread,
but cooling fast and cementing.

Everyone seems to walk around so smoothly,
and it hurts to know most of them feel the same.
But,
they're silent like me,
and I'm silent like them,
and we all walk around with big, dumb smiles on our faces.

My heartache will **** me one day,
and I've accepted that fact.
Love of any kind is not guaranteed or owed
and even if you die surrounded by loved ones,
you still end up dying
alone.

i console myself by repeating...
he would have been a good choice made for all the wrong reasons.

you are bad for me.
a hazardous object in the hands of a child.
when you call i come running
before i even know what i'm doing.
i pick at pocked skin for your fix and i can't help but wonder
if you'll come around
while, at the same second,
in the same shaky breath,
begging you to stay away.

let me be.
leave this weary frame alone.
there are others out there
hurting for what your selling.
my pockets are empty
and i can't stand the cost of
yet another
free ride.

my fear is that
you know exactly how i beg
and hear every conflicted wish.
my fear is that,
you stay away only long enough
to let the fever reach it's pitch.
only long enough for the itch,
burning red and scarred over from the scratching,
to just have steeled.
just when i think i can put you down
you come back,
show up out of the blue
red, green and gold.
cementing the fact, that
next time,
i hold out just a little longer.

hold on and
believe
that we can make it
better.

hold on
through my fighting.
and know
that i want to make it work.

how do i begin to tell you
how sorry i am
for being
the way i am?

how can you do,
all the things i ask of you?
to understand my actions fully
and still
love me completely?

maybe i was wrong to
share those demons.

i beg you to
believe in me,
like i have always believed in you.

hold on a little longer and
give me the chance,
to get back to the woman
you said
you fell in love with.

they slide my shirt up over my head
and i hide my body against them.
praying
that their eyes,
which hold such capacity for judgement,
are fooled by the touch of my skin.

the honest fear
stands clear in my heart.
unwavering in the face of its own impossibility.

in that second,
i feel as if i am being stripped
of the feeble illusion that has granted me access
to thier desires and passions.

i'm truly ashamed in that moment
for having tricked them
into thinking
i am so much more
then i truly am.

it chews
bringing me from the depths of sleep
a half tide type consciousness
to bang on the wall a few times
and fall back
sinking deeper
into the welcoming depths

it chews
sharp and chipping
low on the floor
by the foot of my bed.
i'm awake now
my heart beating faster
as i notice
how close
it really is.

i get up
turning on the light
to take a look around
i don't see a fleeting tail
or a brown fur ball scurry
so i stomp around a bit
a giant
fee fi fo fum be afraid little rat
out with the lights
and back to bed.

minutes pass
and as my muscles
unwind and i truly
begin to think i have won...
it chews
cracking and splintering
louder now

i try and ignore it
but the sound is maddening
each crack
throbbing behind my eyes
like he is boring into my skull

stop it!
i yell like
he would understand
holding my pillows to my ears
nerves broken
heart pumping battery acid
it chews
and chews
and chews

unafraid of me
or my stomping
or my fits
and suddenly i'm the one afraid
my girlish unreasonable fear
takes over
crying
please stop
please
but it chews
coming for me
bringing hundreds
of it's friends
to join the party.
it will be through the floor boards
any second now
it's piercing eyes
and sharpened teeth
looking for something else
to chew.

rubbing my rummy red eyes
against the harsh hard light of morning
last nights laughs and loves gone cold and bitter
staining the satin sheets we shared.

i woke up alone
wondering

if you were really ever there
if anything really happened
or if the drink finally seeped into my head
and conjured up a wild night
leaving me
laughing alone in the dark
naming the shadows and whispering sweet
garbled nothings
to no one.

i would like to believe my own
imagination would be kinder
but i know differently.
straining the grindings out of day old coffee
i wonder where you have gone to
what your doing and
where you are....

but i know the danger and the
foolishness of such thoughts
so i toss them away along with the
dead soldiers
of last nights wild war
sweeping up the leavings
helping along the hobbling thoughts
that last night was a dream
and you were never there at all.

i'm lonely.
this house is too big,
and the walls have been the same shade of
pale blue
for
too long.

when he comes to me
he reminds me of everything
i ever wanted
in
someone.

it's not hard.
i just,
act the same way he does.
and we pretend,
she doesn't exist.

we haven't ******.
not yet.

but we stare,
and we watch.
we glance,
and we fight the smile.

fingers linger while passing
and sometimes
we can't resist falling into
each others arms
and holding tight
for a few terrifying seconds.

trembling,
smelling each others smell,
burying our heads in the sand.
pretending,
that no one in the world
can see us,
and this
is how it could
and should
always be.


then we let go.
only our eyes, thoughts,
and those sweet smells
lingering.

i'm lonely
and maybe he is too.

it's wrong
and i know it.
but these days,
the morals,
which i remember having,
aren't enough to make me say

no.
we can't.

i'm lonely.
and that's enough
to think

maybe we can...

i haven't had a drink in months.
but the bottle in the freezer
tugs at my sleeve.
sweet and slippery
down the throat and into the gullet
it wouldn't be hard.

to take just one day to say
**** all
and lay in a pile
of my own
listlessness.

thirsty voices shout
about how all that is well
is bound to spoil.
and they remind me that
dawn is always followed by dark nights
and that tomorrow is my day off anyway.

they whisper...
wallow,
drink,
drown,
give up and float in the only
steady arms you have known
in a long
long time.

just one day
of the old shine.
just one day
of the old you.
we never did formally say goodbye
and you would hate to be rude.

you are a shadow in the dark.
merely warmth and weight,
a delicious ebb and flow
that i float in.
my childish thoughts playing through the moment.

"look at me" you pant.
a heavy breathed plea
disguised as an empowering ****** command.

i open my eyes and pull you close.
reducing you again,
to a set of lips and an unshaven jawline
to the soft connection of neck and shoulder.

you say "i love you" in a voice that
sounds more like "i love this".
i try my best not to notice.

and when the end comes near,
it's almost instinct to push away.
back into the soft embrace of cotton and fluff.
eyes closing once more
rolling back and staring deep
into an inner void.
into a place that needs this impromptu encounter.
a place that wants to forget the shadow that was here before.
a place,
where you can not follow.

i have an affinity for being in your proximity.
and you don't see me,
not yet...

but i'm here, taking you in slowly
sip by sip.
my water weary mouth relishing
the sweet undertones of your wine.

i tell myself not to guzzle greedy gulps
and waste those dribbling drops that
roll down my chin.

how do i explain to you?
how do i even express
that excess pressure in my chest
that only comes on when you
drop careless winks
like tarnished pennies in a beggar's cup.

making me the beggar,
a terrified transient just looking for a hand out.
unwilling to look you in the eye as i stand
with limp hands hanging, hoping to catch
the tender of your time
asking you to please
pay attention.

he said
"that's what i want...a good hard rain"
and the next day it rained.

watching the heavy drops bombard
the small broken house i hide in. i wait
waiting for a leak to spring.
waiting for buckets filling up with rain water
making that uneven
plinking,
                                         plopping,
                plonking,
dripping,
                            dropping,
music that drives me mad and puts the dogs to sleep.
waiting for the rivers to creep in under the doors
and dampen furniture so it wont dry till june.
waiting for the cold wind that blows right through the windows
and the power to fail
like it does,
every time it rains.

he wanted a good hard rain
and it's here.

he will walk in,
all smiles and dripping drops and muddy foot prints
"isn't it wonderful? isn't it perfect?!"
and i
wrapped in yards of blankets and layers of ripped clothing
will agree and try to ignore his laughter
at my misery.

let's run, hand in hand, and promise not to look back.
we are young and lean with eager muscles and limbs,
built for flight.
let's run away and hide from peeping eyes.
let's not share the little we have
of us,
with them.

let's run
bodies burning and breaking down
while we gallop on rooftops
leaving a wake of suspicious whispers
and longing looks into the setting sun.
we will be leaping shadows against the
dusk's failing light. stretching long limbs,
over towns
and cities,
counties
and countries,
dark expanding space
and wide wonderful worlds.

run with me till we find what we are looking for
or until we drop dead
with ****** feet and stretching hands
still begging for something to hold on to.

i'm tired of these walls
i'm tired of this life
take me away
or follow me into the night.
run with me,
and promise never to look back.

we had been standing in line for hours.
our good, respectable clothes had long gone from
neat and pressed
to
wrinkled
limp and sweaty.

they take us in
one by one
and ask us questions
that make us stumble and nervously
fidget while they scribble notes and
raise eyebrows, waiting for us,
to show them
why we
deserve (out of all the other unwashed fools)
to work
for them.

when it's done we thank them for
their time, even though they never thank us
for ours.
and that night
they pick and choose
they skim over and laugh at bad handwriting
and the clothes we wore.

at the end of our day, we
the line of prospects,
lay in our beds,
in our homes,
praying to be chosen.
praying to ascend from this
depressing nothingness
to leave empty days
and worrisome nights
far behind.

and when that phone call doesn't come
we (because there are always far more left behind then chosen.)
shrink.
defeated and deflated,
we wipe our bleary eyes
and shuffle onto the next line.
trying like hell to
polishing up those old shoes
and stitching together that good blouse
hoping to get one more solid use out of them before
they fall apart.

“i don’t know where i’m going…but i’m not coming back here.”
you blurted out,
loud enough so we all could hear,
unafraid and unapologetic.

i was upset at first, but then
i was suddenly glad.
you were always bigger then this place.
i had to be happy for you.
you saw that big something
out there,
and you were the first to notice the freighting rate at which this town was drying up.

so,  
go then,
there are other worlds then these.
these dried up ghost towns hold nothing but rotting piles of memories,
discarded beer cans and
the few of us
left behind.

i drown that part of me that wants to clamp down
and hold you tight before you notice the cage door shutting.
i know you are not a pet to be kept,
but the sight of your bright colors is enough to make me miss your song
and drunkenly beg you to stay.

fly away little birdie.
you were always bigger then this town,
bigger then this skeleton crew of
drunk could have been somebodies
who always remember way back whens, when things were better.
when we didn’t have to choose sides and
decide if we were staying or going.
fly away and leave us with the memory of what you were to us.
you can be the star of the stories
told over and over,
laughing,
choking,
dripping red,
wiping our eyes and telling of the times
we were lucky enough to be there.
you were always bigger than us,
and we all knew this day would come.

look at me.
acting like a twelve year old with a crush.
all beating heart and starry eyed day dreams
about you
and me
becoming us.

this hasn't happened in years
and already i feel worrisome hands
patting down the wrinkles and torn edges
trying
hoping
to be good enough.

i'm that scared excited that i was when i was little
under covers with flashlights
confessing and confiding in
a favorite bear.
trying on my big sisters makeup
giggling about what it is like to kiss
and who i was in love with.


it all boils underneath that thin skin
of cool that i'm positive you can see
through.

look at me,
acting like the girl
i worked so hard to
grow up and away from.

jesus,
look what you have done,
look at all those walls you have destroyed,
in a matter of days.

i hate the word potential.
it’s one of the few words that always meant well but was only ever spoken
by sad drunken mothers,
shaking their heads while whispering into the phone
about the child she always forgets to mention in the daily report.
they always had such potential
they wasted their potential
they never realized their potential.
my mother always wanted to play piano.
And as long as I can remember, we had one, a piano,
sitting fat and dusty in the entryway,
to be passed everyday on the way in or out like a sad dog
watching you pass by again and again without taking a second look
at its empty bowl or matting fur.
She paid for lessons that I hated
and as soon as my sister gave her a grandchild and that grandchild could sit up on it's own
she sat her down at the piano,
hoping that someone would finally pay some attention
to that **** dog.
i ***** out words on pages
I scribble faces on slate
I even try to carry a tune.
Trying to see what she saw, what talented life did I turn away from?
What choice did I make that made it all turn sour?
Was it the homework I never did
or the drugs I tried
or the *** I had that suddenly turned my future from bright to dim.
Should I weep for what I could have been?
Should I beg forgiveness because I stumbled and lost the race the rest of the world is running?
I don’t want to.
I don’t want an office.
I don’t want an education.
I don’t want a husband.
I don’t want kids.
And I don’t want to ******* play piano.

I can’t sleep again. On nights like this my bed makes me ache.
I’m tossing and turning in an ocean of hot itchy blankets and deflated pillows
I lie awake.
My mind is me caught in a small dark room burning at a madding pace bouncing from trouble to worry to factoids to be kept for the next day,
plans and lists that persist and insists that there was something
I forgot to do
or did wrong or
will forget soon.

I can’t sleep and it burns,
the night stretching thin long and lean threatening to last forever and hold dawn at bay.
I feel crazy at times like these,
when there is nothing left to do but lay there and let the day rest but instead I lay awake and let the troubles of yesterday infest the promise of the new today.  I beg for smoke or drink or hell a heavy object
to bestow upon my brow blessed sleep.  

I beg you night, find my restless worry and grant me leave.
I don’t want to meet the dawn, shy as she is, as she creeps into her place.
Her silent footsteps already carried on the wind and I fear she is close.
Let me sleep, let me dream; let me get away from all of this for a while.
Blessed night let me sleep. Too many nights have escaped my hands already and I fear I’m growing senile.
I see the things that were never there and my days run like diluted paint turning the big picture a muddy brown and fuzzy.
Blessed night let me sleep.
I want nothing more than to hold audience for or hour or two.  
To speak my peace and be allowed to stay in your keep.
Blessed night, please, let me sleep.

Don’t tell me you love me.
Such things make me the shake.
My mind quakes and rattles and rolls as it unknowingly cooks up a bitter plan to turn your love into hate.
To turn those bright blue swimming pools of yours into the lowered shades I know how to deal with.
I can’t handle sweet honey dripping lips and lies of forever that taste just as sweet.
I’m broken and I will break you too
It’s what I do. Cause it’s all I know how to do to deal with a man who doesn’t lie or cheat or check out those cheerleaders ***** as they pass us, drooling like hunger recognizing a steak and looking back at me and seeing last weeks meatloaf.
I’m not used to a man who doesn’t tell me to paint myself up or trim myself down or even one that isn't at least a little like that one who told me I was lucky he looked twice. And I was, at the time, lucky he saw me because at that time I wasn’t seen by anyone. A ghost, haunting the classrooms and and halls, a blooming wall flower, growing up and around her dark little corner, tendrils arching away from the light. He was god, a pitying punk rock priest that put down the word and walked bravely into the dark twisting gardens. A martyr who took one for the team and decided to look the other way when faced with this and this and these…you know, for my sake.
I admit it, I’m bruised, battered  and beaten by those before you and you can’t expect a fair trial. I’ll do whatever I can to make you see what all the others saw. I will frame you like the pretty portrait you are putting the smoking gun in your hand telling you it’s your fault I pulled the trigger.
I try to be better but everyone knows I’m the worst, all bar room winks and smiles to just to test your line and flirting with a fate of dying alone cause I don’t want you holding my hand in public.
I couldn’t begin to tell you those deep down cravings for love. Those fears and tears that spill when no one is looking because I barley trust them to my tribe let alone a boy I barely met praising me as his one and only. A boy who can barely crawl into fray of my past issues. pages of time magazine caught in the wind each ad dawning a razors edge. cutting and tearing and stripping off the skin of anyone stupid enough to smell the buds in the middle of a brawl.
I admit it, I’m a fighter. I’ve been taught by bad teachers who make me believe that the second you take the time to find out the real me you’ll be gone. A shadow at high noon come and gone too soon thanking the lord you didn’t get in too deep before pulling yourself out.
Try not to get it twisted, I don’t hate the me deep down there but I do think it’s too much of me to ask you to peek in and be ok with that girl that can’t help but hide. That girl that talks tough but is sometimes scared of the dark that goes on and on forever inside. I don’t think she will ever meet anyone with open arms cause it’s easier to walk alone then be left behind.
I wanna believe in love, before the time has tick tocked away, leaving me the ancient spinner spinning long silken yarns about loves long lost and trying teach the young girls not to waste the years by talking the talk but not walkin the walk. I want to love and laugh and make memories but I'm afraid of choosing an end all be all just because I'm prone to some lonely nights.
so slow down speedy,  and put the *** on simmer. cause if you mean what you say and say only what you mean we got all the time in the world before those four little letters need to be added to the pallet to paint our perfect picture. don't ask for those hidden parts too quick and don't try and be slick, don't give me a sleezy cheesy come on baby please and please me. give us the time to grow and sew all the seeds that need to root before I know if you're for real or just another joker after the loot.

come to me little one,
come into the fold.
far away from the world
that doesn't understand you
and
that doesn't want you.

there is nothing left for you there
my sweet.
the only thing out there
is more rejection,
more pain.

come to me
little one,
escape in me
and don't question the dark.

don't worry about tomorrow
or the day after that.
only see me,
and us
and let the only thought
that shimmers across your mind
be of our love
and our life together,
till death
due us part.

they hate you,
i love you
they reject you,
i bring you in
ever closer.
wrapped together in our burning arms
heavy with fever,
we are one.
just you and me
and a lifetime of us
against them.
they will try and pull us apart,
but you won't let them...
will you?

they tell you i'm bad for you
but who hurt you?
and who made it better?
that constant babble of
the crowd...
they are desperate to make you
a project,
a rescued reject
they can pat on the head
and polish up for strangers
so they can be commended on their
massive hearts.
all those plastic smiles
stretched wide
trying to hide the pity for you.
they ask
where would you be without so and so...?
you must be so grateful....
why, you would have been dead without us....
like the life they offer
is any real life at all.

i say drink deep of me
and do what you want
cause you want to do it.
be wildly wicked
if you want to.
be bitterly brooding
if you want to.
be a puddle on the floor.

they can't understand like
i can.
they can't cure
they can't help
they can't possibly see
or ever accept
the person i know,
the person
you really are deep inside.
the person
i have grown to love.

come closer little one.
and i will tell you tales
of great men
and strong women,
of lives lived
quick and fast.
come little one,
live among them
they are eager to share
the secrets of the
world
as it really is.
and help you cast off the chains
of the world that you have been forced fed.

my eyes
head
and chest hurts.
i have a tooth that needs to be pulled
and a mole that needs looking at.
i can't sleep
and when i stand my knee pops.

i still can't find a job
and my bills are too **** high.
the roof leaks and the
washing machine tears up my clothes.

the dogs don't listen
and there is never any food in the house.
my last pair of jeans is starting rip
and i haven't had a decent
idea to write about for weeks.

i'm tearing through my
***** clothes,
looking for my favorite shirt
and it hits me,
i remember now,
you took it  with you
when you left.
swearing it was yours...


great.
just great.

i look into the mirror.
after a long night alone with
a cheap chardonnay,
my hands run through my hair,
they rub the tired worry from
my eyes.

we stand there for a moment.
sighing a quick prayer and
trying to steady that shaking hand.
we start to raise our heads when

she stares back
unimpressed.
she wonders what happened
blames the sickly color on the lights and
you can almost hear her voice.

"you can't run forever.
sooner or later you're
going to have to answer to
somebody."

you almost wince and try and explain
but she continues to whisper
and plant those bitter black seeds
that take root so easily.

she laughs in your face.
she hates you.
you hate her.

she throws a punch
hitting you square, she shatters.
glaring up at you
from every ******
shard and splinter.

the word people means different things to all of us
people.
some feel comfort in that word.
a sense of belonging,
the pea in the all encompassing pod
comfortable and safe in the mass of  cooing voices.

i and many others
can fear the word and all its venom,
all its horrible possibilities.
the mass
the populous
the horrible, bigger than life tsunami of
faces, voices, opinions and expectations.
your possible potential
owed to everyone
by the time you have the nerve to be born.

The weight of a million plus eyes is crippling.
stepping out the door takes as much courage
as putting on the mask of everything’s alright.
laughing with the grinning face of the
people.

we are ****** froward into the fray,
the gauntlet of each other.
given rules of proper behavior
but never the rules of humanity or compassion.
drilled with the multiplication and proper verse
but left to our own childhood devices on
how to treat each other.

people
and their million different ways to maim you beyond repair
a knife for every
old scar and tough tissue
hurts left dormant years ago
that they can’t wait to find and rip open.

that fading flickering deep down hope,
held between frozen hands
blocking it from the hard wind.
well that small little hope for humanity
for people
isn't looking so good
not really keeping back the dark
like it used to.

i can't find a job.
so once a week
i'm on hands and knees
polishing the steps for
an old white couple that feel
they are doing
me a favor.

and
they are...
letting me in their home
to vacuum and polish
dust and fold
scrub and bleach
for the few ripped and creased
dollars they can spare.
the paper sits
held sweaty in one palm
till i find a reason worth letting one go.

they  mull around
sour faced and sighing
how there is a strange film
on the kitchen floor
that was never there before.
i take the hint and run
to re-mop.

i feel as sour as they look sometimes
but i know deep down that
the scrubbing and the polishing
the dusting and the vacuuming
is a god send.
without it....
well,
i don't even want to think
about what i would do
without it.

i had a dream last night where
the man who owns the house that i scrub
came up behind me and slit my throat
my sticky glopping blood
splashing on the floor and walls
that i just finished cleaning.
and my dying thought was
how badly it would stain.

i am twelve.
my mother has taken me aside
and told me how my father died.
in a time, way back when,
now tinted gold with good memories
and the dust of hard years after.
i was only two and the family
had been complete and happy
for years before...

she tells me of the accident.
and my young mind
can't help but picture
something theater quality.
twisted metal, explosions
flipping end over end
or maybe on fire.

my mother,
frigid with the weight
of what the world expected of her
gone cold after the years of
her own rough childhood,
assures me it was quick
and leaves me to my own imagination.

that night
i dreamt.

my mother and i walk through an empty shopping mall.
she is like the adults in my morning cartoons
nothing but legs and hands,
her upper body off screen
i am small
and afraid,
and clinging to one hand.

we stop in front of a store
the double doors slide open,
and my father steps out.
he tells me to come with him
and i try.

my mother's hand clamps down
holding me fast
i pull and tug
and cry
and scream
and beg.

my father shrugs
tells me it's ok and walks away
the doors sliding closed
gone forever.

i woke crying and alone
in my bed
my mother asleep in her room
my brother asleep in his.
shaking and confused
i lay back down,
wiping at the cold trails
of tears spilt,
and hated my mother
for the first time in my life.

she sits on the curb
around 2am
drinking from a large dark glass bottle
swaying to her own soft singing
thinking her dark thoughts
and fighting the fights she never could fight
in person.

what has brought her to this place
doesn't matter.
bad choices and even worse
influences
every one's fault but her own,
if you let her
tell the story.

sitting on the curb,
throwing that dark glass bottle
as far as she can so she can hear the crash
laughing as sirens pass
and peeking eyes peer out of dark windows
to see what all the noise is about.

she tries to get up
falling the first time
another donkey bray of a laugh
then back on her feet.
to stroll and sway and sing and cry
screaming up at the cold street lights,
and anyone on this tiny street to happens to be awake,
how wrong her life has gone
how unfair it all is and how
if she had the chance,
well, she might just make the same mistakes
all over again.

her mistakes are all she has anymore
those tragic choices that reek of her
twisted thought processes.
they are the only things she can
breath on and buff up and show off
to the passersby.
as if her purpose in life
was to be a warning to others.
as if she did us all some great service
by taken a path only to mark it as hazardous.

she walks and she stumbles
she sways still softly singing
as the higher class wakes
and gets ready for work.
squinting at the rising sun
she disappears down allways
to tend to unknown day time activities.
but i know
she will be back as soon as
the street lights turn on
she will be back
with more stories and lessons
for those of us who can't seem to sleep.

i met you once
in a dream.
married for years
the pickpocket and
the traveling salesman.

fish rained down on our wedding day
and our friends released doves.
my dress was a million rose petals
and your tux dripped ink on the church's carpet.

we laughed and loved each other
chewing beeswax and
painting silly faces on our knees.
it was a lovely dream
drinking in the deepest love
and swimming through the cool waters
behind our little green house.

you told me you were afraid of the waking
i couldn't lie so i said
so do i.
we ran
but the alarm and the bright morning found us
i woke and you
were just a dream again.
no closer then a cloud.
a wish whose cologne
clings to my hair.

those mean little *******
dressed all in dusty black
who whisper in corners
and tag up the walls
with every ******
and hurtful thing
they could think of.

whatareyouthinking?imaginewhatpeoplewillthinkwhentheyreadth­is
theywillthinkyouhavelostit.andmaybeyouhave,
lookatthefuckuptha­tisyourlife.ofcourseyourinsane.

my mind a mural of
me versus me.
slander and hate
from the ones who know me best.
they creep in when
the silence goes on too long.
i try and keep them out
but sometimes
it has to be
silent.

who are these mean little *******?
whispering in my ear,
encouraging those fleeting thoughts
creating new ones
that stick a little longer.
how do you
not
listen to those voices that sound
so much like your own?

godlistentoyouwhine,poorme,poorme,
lifeissohardsometimes
y­oujustwannajumpthatcliffandgetitoverwithdon'tyou?goonanddoit.dous­allafavorandjustjumpalready

they whisper
about how stupid you look
or about how
what you just said,
was wrong
for a million different reasons.
all of them valid,
all of them obvious to
the gasping crowd around you.
they stare
and shake their heads,
whispering along
with those mean
little
*******.

they are ready to fight
everyday
to be heard.
after awhile
you can't help but take some of it in.
it's radioactive waste
posioning the ground water...
those mean
little
*******.

*stupiduglyfatdumbasswasteofspacegoodfornoh­ting

i know  you mean nothing to me.
i know you wish you did.
it's unfair for me to call you
to bring you in from the cold
promising a warm bed and
a body to sleep next to.
i promise arms
and lips
i put on perfume
and lipstick.

i tell you
what you find tonight fades in the sun
you say you dont mind
but the rest of you
sings a different song.
i choose to ignore it.

tonight
we love each other
tonight
we are everything
we would
ever
need.

i wish it was this easy
and sometimes i think
maybe the love will come later
with some work.
but we both know
such lies can
ruin lives.
so we take it one night at a time
making no promises
nothing sure
nothing steady
plunging heart first
into a tornado
hoping it will spit us out on
a sunnier side of the world

the music fills the room
an old stero crackle just below
the strings and soft peel of drums.
a blue liquid jazz spills out and drowns the
crummy ***** room i'm in
turning it into a smokey night club
washed in deep lavenders and
plush
wine stained
reds.

a man from the bar buys me a gin fizz.
we sway with the horn
and a singer that croaks out
a rusty mournful wail.
mr. gin fizz smokes
and stares at me
hushing me
everytime i try and speak.

we sway
the singer wails
the drums whisper and scratch
the horn paints
hot liquid yellows
that assault those deep blues and reds.
the gin burns
and the music
fills the room.

squeeze my eyes shut
cementing the image
let the world that was
fall and live in the
dark smokey hole that is just
a nights sleep away.

i am beautiful
and i seep with that silent class
that other women do so easily.
draped in something deep
and silky
something that hugs
and drives men like him into fits.

mr.gin fizz orders another round
and lights another for us both.
the bittersweet blues slowly mix
into cool greens and grays of a
thick bass and a set of drums
thats not afraid to speak up
and introduce themselves.