Here I lurk
Clutching my shadow
In my fists
It shivers, shrivels, sighs
A flame shushed to silence
On its ashen throne
Here I grasp
Grasp the oozing, burning night
That drips down my fingers
A palm beneath a palm I place
A palm beneath another
It the creamy tiles kisses
And will come to me no more

A rumble wobbles
around the room
Of laughs and talks
And talks
However do I mingle
In these faceless folks?
However do I fathom
All these massless worlds
Orbiting around ecstatic tongues
That birth them
Birth them on and on
Birth them meaningless, and birth them blind

I think,
Maybe when the flood dies out
I think,
Maybe then I will see
Pick up the shells this land could not drink
And read the tales preserved
In their wounds
Maybe the drunken ghosts
Serving all these brightly dressed drinks
Will approach me too—

Not yet though
Not yet

I pull little hymns out of my throat
Roll them around in my mouth
It is there they sway,
There they wilt

A gaze chained to my eyes
Wanders about
Like an injured fly
On one face it rests
On one chuckle stumbles,
A crack skipping down the wall
A high-pitched laugh blooming
In the corner
There is a bleakness, believe me
In this world

A bleakness so pitiless and rotten
Its stench covers all that is born
All that is not
All—
There is a bleakness
And I often mistake it for my own
But I do not now
It is there in every eye
In every corpse hanging between the ribs
It grows up like a sturdy ****
On arms and legs and
Bones
Up and down the aisle it flows
In this classroom twinkling
with childish mirth

Up and down
It pats heads and laughing cheeks
It is there
It is there
And will not still
Will not stir either

I think,
I must warn them
These energetic faces trying
to resurrect joy
From the flesh of stories all skinned alive
Warn them
I must, I must
But the words pile up
And floods pile up
One upon the other thousands
And I lose myself somewhere

The chatter blends in with the chortle
And I cannot tell
The shadows imagined
From cloaked figures swaying around
I would warn them, believe me
Warn them I would
If only
If only I could grasp hold
Of this darkness
That mimics me everywhere I go
Ghost of a black lamb
I once sacrificed for
A purity I loved to violence

And longing never became
A shackle so well

I think,
maybe when the flood dies down
I will breathe,
I will breathe maybe
Here we lurk
A slave upon a slave rests
A slave beneath still
Two ghosts I birthed,
Two lambs opened up,
One will not love me
And one will not not—

Or what?  



(sonnet #MMMMMMCMXXXIV)


White answers on all sides as twere, til hence
My purple kilt and pink checked skirt's detail
Look just as wont for Winter:  what'd avail
This bleaker lack of colour we feel thence
Within our very bones, or as fr'intents
The Boden slogan was in sheer betrayl,
An ex'llent motto "squeeze the day!"  Light pale
With more snow in the wings, shall we ask whence?
Come, how soup's warming on the stove as fer
All that the grinder's voice means flour anew
For biscuits.  Where did darker colours' tour
Become too deep of late?  Why does that hue
Seem dismal is't?  Do I want Spring to stir
More than I realize that soft shades 'non woo?

08Feb18c

During a storm, the colors of life wash away
The waters leave what it touches as a cold dull grey
Similarly, this is what is described inside of me today
With which black tar instead of rain flows within my roads of clay

The venom begins its warpath with the first drop of its essence
And spreads throughout my body without any sense of control
It covers my bones and all across my arms
Then my legs, my feet, my head, and my face
Any emotions from yesterday are devoured without a trace
As the venom steadily increases in its path of *******
And turns my happy day into that of dark desolation
The venom churns deeper inside of my body
My smile disappears, I am quiet, this is happening right now
As the venom wraps its tendrils around the outside of my body
No one can see it, but I show it with my temper
Letting no one talk to me as I loathe to myself in silence
The venom speaks into my ears; it tells me,

“Forget about your friends, they only hold you down
Can’t you tell they only see you as some stupid naive clown?
Now, I’ll tell you one last time to abandon all of who you know
Because I’m always a part of you, and you’ll see me again tomorrow.”

It slithers off of my skin
The nightmare creeps away into its abyss
The venom is forever encased inside of my soul
But to collapse to its will shall never be my goal.

Standing in a harvested field, the sky touching the ground
Not a raise, a tree, or a hill to be found
A coal black cloud is coming down
Standing there head back, hoping in it's rain I drown
My heart is bleeding black
Everything from a young age went so off track
I am just the black sheep
I am just the freak
Watch me as my eyes leak
This lonely watch I keep
On my knees now I just weep
It's only sorrow that I reap
For a life lived amongst the ruins
Living under a storm constantly brewing
Daylight seeped through once or twice
Made the formless bleakness more than thrice
So I beg for no more light
It just makes it harder to fight
If blackness is where I'm ment to stay
Just keep the sun away

Suddenly aged and prickling inside drab suit
(that fits in every way besides the one that matters),
sip stewed tea, UHT milk, and
be gracious about it.
Faces requisitioned from Head Office
ask questions like the answers you give
could possibly mean anything.
Try not to act bored or high, even though
you're both.  Pretend like
you could belong here.
Don't let on you think thoughts that are in breach of the House Style.
Don't, under any circumstances, let them
find out you write
poetry.  
Don't give yourself away.

Afterwards, brittle and weary outside,
notice how it feels like
your feet inside your good pair of shoes
are nailed to the asphalt reality
of this bleakly nowhere estate; you're
crucified against the
indifference of the afternoon,
bled out by another day of attempting to
sell yourself cheap and still
not closing.
You learned to walk upright for this.
Even the sun looks old and done with trying.
If a stranger offered you a cigarette right now,
would you break your two-year streak?  


The phlegmy rattle of builders' vans;
soft pale smell of saw dust on damp air;
that sense of inevitable mutual rejection.

Standing in a harvested field, the sky touching the ground
Not a raise, a tree, or a hill to be found
A coal black cloud is coming down
Standing there head back, hoping in it's rain I drown
My heart is bleeding black
Everything from a young age went so off track
I am just the black sheep
I am just the freak
Watch me as my eyes leak
This lonely watch I keep
On my knees now I just weep
It's only sorrow that I reap
For a life lived amongst the ruins
Living under a storm constantly brewing
Daylight seeped through once or twice
Made the formless bleakness more than thrice
So I beg for no more light
It just makes it harder to fight
If blackness is where I'm ment to stay
Just keep the sun far away

The eroded frames of this abandoned home, speak of a time that was once better

The pain in its voice, is sorrowfully apparent, the pain it feels creaks among the window panes

I asked why it seemed to feel this way, it spoke to me and said it was alone in its ways

The trees had begun to strangle their roots among its edges, the wildflowers set their camps on its staircases

The finches set their nests on its faded yellow window stills, the fox making a den from the basment

I sat with the rain pouring down, under the porch roof did I listen to its somber tales

In its decay I saw a dark beauty, a damaged purity that was tranquil in the erosion