i think its weird
the cacophony and the swirling
bodies that ritualistically
converse and bend.
almost as if they were taught it.

i asked a friend,
who had been there a few times before,
what was it like.

he told me,
like everywhere you will ever go
it has its ups and downs.

summer there, of course, is the best.
unabashed, careless frolicking
days at the beach and sipping ****** beer.

but winter, too, is beautiful,
cozying next to a warm fire
with whiskey and hot mug of cocoa.

the road there is bumpy
but once you get there it's mostly smooth sailing.
'cept for that rough patch in the middle of the town.

finally I asked him,
how do I know when I'm there?

and he let out a sigh that lasted a little too long,
and he looked me dead in the eye,
and he said,
     when it's gone.

mommas don't dream their sons grow up to be writers.
but when you see the beauty in the trees in letters and words
time doesn't pass in seconds or years,
speech is with purpose, life becomes narrated.

i saw the most mediocre minds of my generation never pick up a pencil, brains hysterically naked.

mommas don't dream their sons grow up to be writers.
     they wake up eventually.

the cold vein of IV brushes my face
it awakens me to my father's tippity-tap to his workers far away
the muted news channel on the screen by my shaved head
that shows the face of the most hated man, now dead.

i understand now that doctors are not soulless.
though they may talk too much
    and are as funny as moss.
'cuz when he asked if there was anything else bothering me,
    he looked for an extra second.

We learned about Sonnets today.
The Italian, Spenserian, and the English –
Sing-songy, loving and full of word play.
Sometimes I pine to myself and wish
I could write a wondrous poem for all to read.
Unfortunately, it is just not the case.
The lines come to me at a tortoise’s speed.
I scribble, I stumble, I omit and erase.

A rough draft emerges, hated and wrong.
The rhymes are average, the meter is off.
The whole thing sounds like a bad 80’s song.
If you were to read it – you’d scoff.

So I ask the question that poem was supposed to state:
Will you be my Semi-Formal date?

smoke plumes from my core,
morphing in the daytime gray
that is synonymous with
unpleasant thought and being.

burning from the center out,
laying down, letting the fire
rage from the dark to the light,
the soul to the physical world.

a rotten stench flies from me
which alerts those around
to the dying person
that lays in front of them

still, with nostrils flared,
they stop, say “Hi”,
follow with a smile and a wave,
continue trotting along.