I am loud,
Demanding attention.
I know when I am being charming
Because I try.
I put on my impressing face
And do my impressing hair
And speak my impressing words.
I tell you my embarrassing drinking stories
And everything else about me
That you probably shouldn’t know.

I am not good at being quiet
Because that’s not who I am.
I am not the sweet girl
Who will leave you with a smile
And a touch
And a glance
Or a single word.
There is nothing of this fashion of romance
About me.

I am the girl who will point out your flaws,
And take you outside to see the stars,
And remind you how human you are,
And what a wonderful thing that is.

I am the girl who will talk about science,
And music and theology and history,
And point out constellations, laughing,
When you don’t know the big dipper’s name.

I am the girl who will make witty references,
To classic literature and science fiction,
And will tell you stories of how I once,
Made a gingerbread replica of a lighthouse.

I am the girl who will stand on a table,
And sing at the top of my lungs on the highway,
And act like a chicken or quail or velociraptor,
Or nuzzle your face like a lion to make a point.

I am the girl who takes too many shots
And then coaxes you to bed on a Russian liver,
And knows all the right places to bite, and tease,
And follows with exceptionally coherent pillow-talk.

I am not a thin silk scarf on the wind.
I am not a thing hard to capture.
You would not spend a perilous journey
Through a wild, perfumed jungle,
Searching for my slender garments
Hung beside a pool
As I wail to the breeze.

Rather, I am the bird who flies overhead
Making too much noise
Distracting from the trail ahead.
A bird whose plumage proves
What an interesting life it must be…
What a colorful life for me…
Perpetually strange
The lone comic relief.

I am many things.
But I am not quiet.
Of this I am sure.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
I wasn’t supposed to fall so hard
I wasn’t supposed to call out for your arms in the night
And my lips weren’t supposed to search for yours
As if they would actually be there.
I wasn’t supposed to nuzzle into my pillow at night
pretending that your hands were nestled in my hair
I wasn’t supposed to make small talk
just so I could hypnotize myself with that something in your eyes
I wasn’t supposed to wake up cold in the gray morning
with the strong urge to be bruised and bitten
In fits of slow, languid passion.

Unreal how our bodies match and move together,
Uncanny how our minds meld and play in synch.
My youthful love for life,
Your chuckling maturity, still unsure what life is.

Now I play soft ballads full of aching, yearning,
I can wrap myself in a blanket on the floor
With a mug of tea, and think silently on you
And the shadows I wish I could conjure into existence…
They live inside, dancing to burst free from our guilty bodies
Too ethereal, too beautiful, to be abandoned
When we (artists) know we live for such wonders.

I wish I had any other option but forgetting,
or descending into madness.
(I’m currently choosing madness..?)

And it wasn’t supposed to be like this.
I wasn’t supposed to fall so hard.
I’m so sorry,
My summer love.

He is in love with questions
And the lilting world of words,
With the fabric of philosophy
And the taste of fresh ideas.

He is in love with the smell of green
And the shifting sands of dreams,
With the hunt for profound moments
And the hunger-lust for purpose.

He is in love with his books
And the zodiacs cross the planet,
With patterns of chain reactions
And the way we cog and gear.

He is in love with pools of stardust
And fanciful notions of theory,
With darkness, deep and coveted
And the fabric it is made from.

He is in love with one who left
And the poisoned past he bathes in,
With being perpetually lonesome
And floating twixt life’s sabulous banks.

He is in love with memories, and the universe,
And nobody else.

With my choking heart, I’m grasping at dust,
And I am in love with him.

Camel crush cigarettes
Put them in a fancy box
No, I’m too poor to buy them
But if you pass’em
Then I won’t say no.

People say that it’s unclean
That you’re unclean
That they’re unclean
You smell like a hotel room
And it’s comforting.

Camel crush cigarettes
Your hugs speak of the habit
No, take your precious smoke break
**** it clean to dust
Barreling into death.

People say that it’s unwise
That you’re unwise
That they’re unwise
You smell like drunken Saturdays
And it’s delicious.

Camel crush cigarettes
I’ve never felt addiction
No, I don’t think that I could
It’s a scarlet dreamland
With one-way tickets.

People say that it’s unkind
to lungs and mind
They’re right, I find.
But you look like abandon
And it’s inviting.

Camel crush cigarettes
I’ve never loved a smoker
No, I’d always been too proper
But if you tasted like that
I wouldn’t mind a bite.

People say that you’re catering
To your un-ease
With a disease.
You feel like contradiction,
And I’m depraved.

There’s no point in *******, today,
Because I’m not looking for skin...
Today it’s cosmic electricity.
Because I can’t smell the screen's pheromones,
And there’s something to be said for chemistry.
Because I can touch my own *******,
But familiarity is hard-pressed to impress.
Because the only scraping and biting here
Is far from raunchy; my teeth are restless.
Because people have **** opinions and nuances,
And today I see caricatures but no people.
Because it’s all poor, uninspired acting,
And the only singular thing I want is truth.
The only singular thing I want.
Is truth.

Nothing against *******.
Today or ever.
But there are some lonely stretches
When I’m perched on the edge of the world,
Aroused to adventure,
And Life is buzzing past me
And I desperately want to rip into it
And savor and lick and **** out its seed
And reach into its hair and pull hard
As we bruise and break each other
And SCREAM OUT
-- LIFE!
Where redtube just won’t cut it.

Supersonic Skydive
Tell me, what's your helmet like?
Can you hear the roar of breaking
barriers of sound?
Or is it silent in your dome
Have they built you like a home
A cradle for the jumping few
Who chose to do as daring do?
Supersonic Skydive,
Tell me, what's the view there like?
Can you see the rounding planet
Arching back in every stretch?
And do the stars look different here
Beyond the blinking atmosphere,
And when you rushing, sink away,
When do you find the blue of day?
Supersonic Skydive
So lucky to be so alive
And as you plummet to the ground,
Tell me, do you look up, or down?

I think that maybe I take breakups
And half-breakups
And “I think we should just stay friends”
And “I’m moving across the country!”
And “Let’s just pretend it never happened…”
And “Sorry, I’m already doing something else that night”
so horrifically,
and yet so horrifically well,
Because life in my head
Is constantly romancing
And then breaking up
With everyone.

The weight of the night is starting to settle on my shoulders
and everything is heavy and everything is breaking
And I’m honestly lying on the open carpet
Shifting between positions where I might not get sick
From a hangover of tears and sinking realizations
And my body aches badly where you pinched me too hard
Yes you’ve drawn some blood and left some scars
Yes you wanted too much and you clung too hard
But  it’s proof that you played an equal part
And that you cared to stop about as terribly much as a brush fire
cares about leaving the earth un-charred.

On old mainstreet, sits an old café,
Where home-town-grown musicians play.
Sometimes they like to change its name,
But the clientele stay just the same.
When times are tough down in the town,
You know you can’t get the Black Dog down.

Rednecks and faux-necks and used-to-be-loggers,
Crafters and rafters, and activist bloggers,
And poets and hippies and mystics and fools,
And outcasts from the secondary schools,
And gypsies too: you’ll find them here,
Drowning in local, hand-crafted beer.

At night, locals sip organic tea,
And turn up the menagerie
Of lights and mics from another age,
Pieced together to make a stage.
And there, the guitarists waste their breath
Beating the Same. Four. Chords. To. Death.

There are some new lyrics, there and here,
But all of them memories of yester-year:
A year spent in the same **** space,
With others who’ve never left this place.
They sing of their dear loves and pasts,
And how much longer the wandering lasts.

And on they wail, and on they moan,
And twang the antique, rustic tone,
But their faces show they like it here,
This breaking haunt of yester-year,
And after the set, they carouse with cheer,
And smile contentedly to their beer.

On old mainstreet sits an old café,
Where home-town-grown musicians play.
Sometimes they like to change its name,
But the clientele stay just the same.
When times are tough down in the town,
You know you can’t get the Black Dog down.

What are these bands around your wrists
These frayed stories that barely cling?
And what are these enchantments held
That cradle your touch between each ring?
And what is this ancient writing here
That’s inked from shops of yester-year?
Is there a relic about you yet
That makes your brackish past run clear?

What is that place your eye seeks out
When your steady gaze is aether-bound?
And what steep truths have you traversed
To gather poise as you have found?
What shadows passing now have stayed
And fears upon tanned shoulder weighed?
Can mysteries be unraveled here
That in your piercing focus played?

Oh wandering mystery mountain man,
Oh sweet conundrum of my dreams,
Oh distant altruistic love,
Oh ponderer of whispering streams,
Wherefore do the stars yet speak
So I can hear their secret calls,
But ever in their praises keep
Your hidden name in cosmic halls?
Yes, to my ears they murmur deep
The stain-ed truths of earth and sky
But never leaks that hopeful peep;
Verisimilitude is shy.

Forever my enigma: you.
The heavens sagely made it so.
For I have solved the their secrets through,
But so much in you left to know.

I woke with the grey dawn again,
Thinking of you,
And couldn’t fall back asleep.
I brewed some tea again,
Thinking of you,
And did the ******* dishes.
So that was more or less productive.

How relative is time
That when I have an address
Of where to send my thoughts
I may march through the days
With my coveted "tasks" of penship
Fulfilled
Yet when I lack this focal point
And fumble into doorless walls
Each dizzy cell zips about
With not a patient comfort, all
Panicked

I never cared much for car talk,
But when he speaks, I'm intrigued,
And I don't know why.

Most men speak in tones that imply
I don't know anything,
Can't understand simple machines,
Have never seen an engine block,
And just want to watch as they talk.
But he is genuinely fascinated
With systems and forces,
And wants to share.
His passion consumes me,
And I listen, hoping to learn.

On switchbacking forest roads,
Over potholed washboard,
By steep cliff dropoffs,
My head swims with emergency "what ifs"
But not with him.
He flies over loose gravel
And I squeal with euphoric trust and delight.
He drives twice the posted speed,
And I find myself shamelessly sunk
Into a wet seat.
He pumps the brakes
And I'm bowing to the king,
Brazenly hoping that someday
He'll flip a carnal handbrake turn,
Wondering if he cares enough to show off,
Seduced like so many before me
By oil, rubber, and gasoline.

I’m aware that you decided to forget me.
I can see it’s your intent to shut me out.
It’s an ugly wall to right,
Bricks all leapt up overnight,
And the mortar’s wet with words you won’t recount.

I won’t need to see your charming lines of orchards,
For there’s rot that festers in forbidden fruit.
I won’t care if they’re all gone,
For the seasons move me on,
And no longer is the aim worth the pursuit.

Ah, I see the raging worms that have consumed you.
I’ll acknowledge that you took a mighty fall.
Yet, you’re the only one to blame,
And now you can’t control your shame,
Which explains the buried evidence and all.

On my part, I shall recount the days of summer,
For I no longer must work to sweep your name.
No more lusting; that’s all over,
Though your act’s no longer covert!
No, I’ll keep my juicy stories just the same!

So here lies the final chapter of our friendship.
For my life, I can’t tell why it comes to this.
Take the lies that you hold dear,
And your careless, cheating fear;
I shall skin what’s left, and fashion cloaks of bliss.

Eyes meet
In the corner coffee stall
Flint and tinder
All this time
Hello there!
Scrambling
Words all tumble
Scintillating
Knocking tables
Metal legs airborne
Clawing madly
Un-crisping collars
Found you
On the garnet cushions
Back to life
Imagination spinning
Staring at me
Whoops
Having daydreams
Once again.

In anticipation of the too-few precious hours in tandem, we divulged our carnal cravings at each others’ hands, but omitted fragments, saving them for some other day, finding them too truthful.

When you hold your body to mine, as you have told me you will, I want a flurry of colored breath, peach and magentas and crimsons slipping translucently from every part of me and wafting in and out and between us like a graceful fog, and not just the force of fingers that have waited too long to touch, but the electrostatic brushes of life’s restlessness falling slowly into their own gravity as we learn to trust the moment.

Our lips are full of nerves and that is why a kiss is so much more than symbolic. I placed my lips to the skin of an orange and I was met with the sensuality of the whole terrain of this world. Intimacy then, is the slow press that reassures humanity – the invitation into a world with no walls – the rush of blood that comes from being completely receptive – that is the kiss I want with your soul.

After all the epochs of lovers, these are all the same words, but they are lanterns bouncing across the plains and sparking anew in the way that the naive are always entranced by the lighter in their hand when they first learn how to light a cigarette, elated and dizzy from the *****. Twinkling.

Sometimes all it takes is a breath and I am light and wind and red paper confetti and the moon and a golden orb that turns all it touches into a shining constancy of what’s called love – and I visit your heart knowing that you can’t tell it’s me, and then I must leave– and I know that I was not in my body, but that it must have kept existing while I was gone because I always wake up in tears, and someone had to cry them.

Conventionality dies between us and there are no titles or promises to speak of. I once found security in labels, only to find that they leave no room for the inevitable growth and weathering of time. So I ask little of you – only that you are always true with me, and that you occasionally put your hand in mine.

The thing is, you can’t ignore that graceful lament-
The teal heaving of your chest-
The wash of questions in your head
That exquisitely hold pinpricks of the future.

There’s a brand of groan you know well
That belongs to feeling unresolved.
That noise you make when you’re a painting without a face,
When you’re two lines of a song that’s lost to the breeze,
When you’re a cup of water dribbling through careless hands,
That noise is the growl of restless dreaming.

There is a struggle to unpin yourself
From the avalanche of time
That has pooled thickly around your legs.
You try to kick, but it moves like molasses.
Slower than a hard thwack to a non-newtonian fluid.
Pointless as collecting antique doorknobs.

There is an urge to catch a destiny by the tail
Like you’re somehow prepared right now,
Like there’s nothing left to learn.
How fortunate you are that perceived linear realities
Can curve the hubris of your linear fantasies.

And yet there’s that gnawing need,
A craving that demands surrender,
That all too graceful lament,
Of being forced to take the smallest of steps
on the greatest of adventures.

Today there is a veil upon my world:
A gauzy muting of sound,
A mist that’s permeated the corners of thought.

I know there is a crisp clarity outside:
a pounding passion in the sunlit world,
A million hues to roll in and embrace.

My tingly thought centers all recede:
Rejecting stimuli like adventurous taste buds
Recovering from exciting, scalding tea burns.

I just have to remember and accept:
Sometime there are going to be days like this.
Lazy, hazy.

There are false idols in my room.
There are false idols in my head.
To idols, I have lent my life.
To idols, I have lent my bed.
Statues of the world I seek,
Semblances of what I know,
Truth has burnt its image here,
But ever floated on, its glow.
Holding tight to broken dreams
That crumble-crackle as I clutch,
I could have built them pinions fair
But I have strangled them too much.
Now fresh lucidity is here
To wake me from my sluggish sleep
Oh, glorious sanctity of light
Your mindful meaning I shall keep.

The days that are most full are the days spent pretending we weren’t waiting.
Our organs churn like machines producing twice their expected amount
Of free-flowing adrenaline, which we give a task to circle, rather than the drain
Of lonely, gut-wrenching “what-if-tomorrows”.

There’s the waking struggle of swinging your feet from your bed and testing your floor
And hearing a scream bubbling forth from the lethe, tickling at the daybreak,
And knowing that you must wrestle, mash, and toast it into a tasty breakfast morsel
Lest it overwhelm the dawn with restless shadows.

We drag the lengthy hours through the mud, fatiguing their thread, living mercilessly
Until they no longer resemble time, but immeasurable intangible everythings.
There can be no counting of patchwork days, only the art of making them count
What a productive little distraction, so I can pretend that I’m not waiting.

You’re like a trick candle
When you light up
Atop a cake full of frosting and promise.
And I become so very excited!
Too excited.
And I think…
I can’t have my cake and my candle too.
Candles are pretty, temporary things.
Thank you for candles, but I can't keep them,
give me my cake!
And so I ***** out this silly idea
And set you aside.
And then all of the sudden you’re there again
Setting my napkin on fire.
Which is inconvenient.

Note to self: **** napkins.
Life is for sticking your face in cake
And then getting your hair caught on fire
By trick candles.

I want my name tattooed on your lips
stars tattooed across my back
my name to be a star
I want you to hold me on your tongue
to leave stars in your hair
when I run my fingers through
I want you so bad it’s driving me mad
playing on our radio
I want your lips so bad on my stars
-want stars when you taste me
your fingers to ******* tattoos
the stars to taste our fingers
when they wander through our lips
I want our fingers touching lips
by the stars that bathe our tattooed names
in the music of the madness twixt our hips
I want our ink all over our skin
A stellar map to lead us in

First sun-warmed sand
First boots-and-socks-off beach
First ankle-deep stand in rushing water
First SPF rubbed on my face
First crocus pops up in the yard
(Delicately)

Nearby, a young father begins
to teach his toddling young
how to fish.
(Patiently)

Last high-country snowshoe
Last low-country woodstove fire
Last hot bourbon toddy
Last dreamy days of Pisces
Last longing for lost love melts away
(Finally.)

Early over the mountain
the nearly-but-not-yet worm moon
spies the confluence and I below.
(Knowingly)

Here at the place where things change,
the wild world fills me
and I devote myself once more.
(Wholly)

For one who is in love with the chase
And the glory of all things yet-to-be done,
The true rapture of Nature is in knowing
She is too Big, Wild, and Free to own.
(Like me.)

There was a time when I sang on you forlornly,
So wistfully heraldic,
That I might have thought you worthy
Of a gilded biblical throne of purple-prosed petals.
Let us be grateful then, for the song of perihelion,
And the whispered wisdoms of the dear tropics,
For the fresh breath from these friends whisks me
Back to my wakening, aurelian self.
I weave the holly in my hair,
I hang the mistletoe anew,
For solitary trees stand strong,
Though weighted by the winter’s dew.
I am Helios’s rantipole
I’ve no more time for tears of old,
With so much in me left to grow,
And so far in me left to go.

Tiptoe timidly,
oh my tongue.
Speak not the words
That toe on your tip.
Swallow the surplus,
you swift little thing,
And mind that these slivers
Are given to slip.
Forget your fidgeting,
Fingers of mine.
Flee from the keystrokes
You’re fighting to flip.
Quiet your queries,
Your qualms, and questions.
Kith care not for clinging,
Nor for your quips.

Don’t question the words
That are murmured in whispers
For they are the truest
Words to be heard.
The truth is in silence
And silence alone
But a whisper is closest
To what we can know.
And all of the atoms
That shake on their own
All carry a pitch
And carry a tone.
These too are whispers,
Though harder to hear
For no single atom
Will startle your ear.
So all that I’ve whispered
Just next to your head?
Don’t question those
Wild remarks that I’ve said.
You may have your doubts
In the noise of the day
But watch for my silence
Then whisper away.

One of these days, the glimmer in your eye that knocks me out will actually break me,
And then my words and reservoir of tears will shatter into shards of truth
That stick into and stain your hands when you apologetically try to sweep them up.

It’s not a ******* secret that I live for the hours that I can pretend that maybe,
One of these nights, I’ll be with you in more than just my mind and yours
As you grip the banister to ascend to silken sheets and wine-fed dreams.

I bite my tongue so words don’t leak, and lick my lips so as to keep them here,
Rather than the curving place behind your ear… the stalwart jaw… the capable lips that draw me near…
The things I’d do were waters clear…

The answer’s written in an inky, contractual ultimatum that squashes the fruit of imagination.
And yet, a fierce, poisonous force rises from the depths of a desirous ***** within,
And whispers to me that with contracts, there are ways to blot, smear, and tear. It scares me.

I lock it in a closet of infectious notions that I’ll slowly dematerialize with clean blood,
But rivers of the stuff won’t run clear when they’re magnetized so close to the sin
That doesn’t feel like sin, and that beckons as a beacon of bright and beautiful things.

It’s a difficult conclusion to arrive at: I must be the bad guy.
I am the mind’s mistress, the secret-almost-lover, the temptation, the promise, the snake…
Yet also the forgotten, the disappointed, the frustrated, the one who MUST keep control, the Saint.

We both know that I’ll keep floating back; my curiosity, passion, fascination, and need to learn and share
Will always countervail the weight of my exasperation and guilt-laden vexation,
Until one of these days when the glimmer in your eye that knocks me out actually breaks me.

Infatuation.
It’s a girthy, 5-syllable word and you’re
In a fat, juicy, situation.

It’s a swollen, darkened fruit
That begs to be taken completely,
Flesh devoured entirely.

But it’s a trap.

The sweet and tangy blood of it
That dribbles down your chin
To your neck
To your *******
To your heart
To your stomach
To your hips
To your groin
To your ***
Down your thighs
To your nervous toes
Is not love.

Nobody wants to hear that.

But some day
- If you are incredibly lucky -
You will look at your maroon-stained palms
And the dry, sticky rivers of years running down your wrists
And laugh until you cry when you realize
That you could wash your whole body
Because love is not in the juice.

It is not your addiction,
Your summer picking,
Your hungry belly,
Your well of adrenaline,
Your rushing of heartbeats,
Your tangling of bodies,
Your jealousy, yearning,
Nor pride.

If you are incredibly lucky
You will suddenly know love.
As silent, simple, and strong
As the fabric of the universe itself.

HEAR THE COMPLETED SONG HERE:
https://soundcloud.com/nataliejcopeland/you-said*

You said, “Why’d you fold my clothes?
I don’t want anyone
taking care of me.”
You turned back to your razor,
ignoring
the sick-stained sheets.

You said, “Let’s just watch tv.
I don’t know anyone
when I’m asleep.”
You turned back to the wall,
ignoring
the two empty feet.

But that wasn’t where
the worst
pain
was felt,
Cuz I didn’t think
that my warm
heart
could melt
All the icy hands
That her cold heart
had dealt.
But then you said,
“That’s all broken.”
And you said,
“That’s all dead.”

You said “I can’t love again.
I don’t want anyone
wrapped up in my fate.”
Well, we turned back to our peaches,
ignoring
how we knew I would wait.

They said, “Is that your pretty girlfriend?”
And you said, “She’s so pretty…”
And that was the end
Cuz we turned back into clowns,
ignoring
the message we sent.

If you wanna know
the worst
pain
I felt
It’s when I lost hope that
my warm
heart
could melt…
Cuz the final blow
that cracked my world
was dealt
When you said…
When you said..
When you said…
When you said…
…. Nothing.

You said, “I’ll still be your friend
When he comes sweepin’ you
offa your feet.”
You put out your cigarette,
ignoring
my tears on the street.

Today I extended a hand to fate
To see which door it would pull me through,
And it chose the one I was afraid of.

Today I put the universe to test
Since challenging authority is always best,
And it pulled me along for the ride.

Today I stood on railroad tracks
Because I wondered if I was invincible
And I wasn’t.

Today I sliced myself open
For I’d forgotten the pattern of my soul’s veins
And I remembered.

So I closed my eyes and bit my lip
And jumped right off that breaking ship
And into waves of foamy spray,
Which tended to my bleeding way,
The held me and caressed me so,
And whispered of the things they know
They carried me to sandy banks
And left me dreaming, giving thanks.

I awoke in a pool of scarlet,
feeling the wretched tendrils
of darker, greener enemies
working their way in while I slept.

I awoke in a pool of scarlet,
Knowing what I had to do
And applied antiseptic,
But no anesthetic.

I awoke,
Knowing why fate chose this door,
Knowing where the universe had taken me,
Knowing that though broken, I’d survived,
Knowing what it was to be me.

Knowing not to let the poison in
And not to let the shadows win.

As Baudelaire said:
"Be always drunk,
on wine, poetry, virtue"
or what-have-you.
And after sobering
from aurelian dawns
and whiskey-drenched stars,
I find solace in tipsiness
on irreverent magic eyes
from the bottom of a margarita
or a paint-stained enigma
from behind a glass of red.
Slowly, carefully, languidly,
Quietly.
Flirting with possibilities
of being drunk once more.

When pins and pressure plates crawl into my spent shoulders
I clutch madly to crush the offending sinews.

When I’ve grazed the side of my tongue with an accidental death-threat
I revisit the spot and repeatedly incise, until I’m ******* crimson and tears.

When the she-squito shoots me up via serrated needle turning me feastlike
My fingernails compulsively scavenge out the adenosine deaminase.

I sniff the arid bottles of perfumes I love that are no longer manufactured.
I re-trace my lost friendships through the riverside paths we made.
I chop onions and slurp hot sauce until I’m dry.

Maybe that’s why I’m stuck on you.

I would like
To witness you in another habitat,
And childishly pester you at work,
And awkwardly make pointless conversation-
Just enough to keep you wondering
If I came to see you or not.

I would like
To delicately undress your mind,
And walk up out of nowhere,
And playfully invite with a coy little smile-
To discuss your philosophy
Under the mundane guise of “coffee”.

I would like
To introduce my spirit to yours,
And let them circle each other in the park,
And sniff out each other’s aetherous attributes-
Perhaps initiating a game of fetch
Between two nervous systems.

I would like
To steal a busy night away,
And show you all my mundane wonders,
And see what you have to say-
Could you ascend truths in my walls
Unbeknownst even to me?

I would like
To be perfectly forward,
And say “You sparkle and intrigue me,
And I would like to get to know you better,” -
Do people do that?
I would like to.

My sensibilities are broken,
How dare you turn me into this?
Learning to live without you
Is learning to live so dangerously.

Gone are the halcyon days of
Danger, danger...
Where’s my coffee?
I fell in love,
(That's what I do)
I fell,
before I ever knew
just what that kind of bitter was.
It tastes just like it always does,
And I can't keep it  longer
on my tongue.

Dear distant stranger,
I would like to get to know you
But I’m afraid
I’ve no more quarters for the telephone.
Oh well, I guess it’s not okay.
I’ll hotwire my way anyway.
I guess I’m getting sorta good
at being where I know I shouldn’t.

I guess I never really saw you as vulnerable
With love all around
But now I see you’re just as broken.
(Well that’s just my luck this round).
And I guess I could be a life preserver,
But honey that’s not my job,
And I’d grow weary-sick of *******
-Need to wash the neon orange off-
Well, you wouldn’t want it anyway.
Flounder, drown your dreams away.

Look at me and look at you too,
I’ve made you an animal in the zoo.
I’m gawking,
Always do this,
Talking,
Like ‘Come on now, let's do this’.

Shut up and break these tiny voices
Telling me what I ought to do.
Convince me that there is no cycle
And that I'm not just
Giving my life to people
and my heart to their ideas.

There are people I know
Who will say that we are created in “God”s image
And who actually believe
That “God” has four limbs
And a head that grows hair
And finger-skins that peel
When performing demanding tasks
Such as creating worlds.

And though I think that’s kind of silly
And don’t use the term “God” like billions do
And don’t think of a body or gender
Geographically heaven-bound
Playing with pawns of people
And actually giving a ****,
I think that maybe
There’s an element of truth in this.

That by mere existence
WE are this Force;
This omni-omni-thing.
WE have created “God”
In the image of ourselves.

It’s 6:08 AM
and 6 degrees Fahrenheit outside.
My window sweats on the inside and
a truck motor runs on the street for ten minutes
working to defrost its inner cargo.
The frosty hills are still dark as hell.
Somewhere hours away you’re waking up
choking for coffee and running off
moved by the efficient early metro buses,
the graying slush,
and the misty chandelier of streetlamps.
Maybe next winter you’ll be here
to coax me to put down the books
before the too-long awaited dawn.

Until then,
Good morning.
Goodnight.

I chose to look closer into him than most do

My discernment found worlds in him that most would not

I clung tightly to pages of mystery bound by him-ness

Grasping at tendrils of smoke and mirrors

Looking between our hands for a hidden universe.

And then

Quite suddenly

I saw him:

Just skin and words and memories

I’d simply been looking through

To find reflections of myself

My past is this landscape of places that I’ve only ever seen in documentaries;
It can’t exist but somehow it must.
Your eyes are these temples built high that have fallen into sandy desecration;
Though once worshiped, they have not stood the test of time.
I was once able to say you were my world.
I miss being so simple and wrong.
It was easier.
Back then.

They're such shiny chemicals:
Dopamine, Norepinephrine, Phenylethylamine.
Life shimmers,
and each day is painted with purpose
When dosed with such potency.

I would like to believe that love,
The long-lasting kind,
The one you're supposed to want,
The one that settles you,
Where you grow old and spend Wednesday evenings answering emails and rewatching some old baking show in ***** sweats
Is enough to keep life interesting.
But chemistry doesn't always work that way.

My path might dictate some other measure of wholeness,
And more than one type of love,
And more than a couched lookalike storybook ending.
My path may require
Risk, Adventure, Longing,
Questioning, Exploration, Pain,
Brilliant platonic wildfires,
Intellectual dalliances,
And unrequited amorosity.
In short, my path may require some trailblazing.

But this precious neural spark
In my body
That keeps me in love with love
Is mine to keep
For as long as it continues to shine.