I am a plant.
I am a thistle.
                   Cirsium arvense.
                           Creeping thistle.
When you first see me I am a beautiful, colourful flower. But if you come closer, you will notice two things.
1. I can ***** you. My needles are few and nearly invisible, but very sharp.
2. I am not ONE flower. I am a cluster of a hundred tiny flowers.
            I am possibility.


My opportunities were not the best when I was a seedling.
                The ground was dry and the sun burning.
However, as the forest around me, the sunlight that hit me directly lessened. The rain made the ground more fertile.

The ground is still too dry. I need more moisture to live. It is difficult to see the sun at all through the dense trees.  I wish I could at least see a little bit of the sun.

I am a plant.
I am a thistle.

Face down on my friend's bed
I wait for my shoulder
to lose feeling,

Secretly hoping the pain will last a little longer,
while she drives ink into my body
over and over and over.

I hope she isn't too drunk
to make the lines straight,
because I'm tired of hearing my mother say,

"those look like the tattoos my patients get in prison"

a sentiment always met with
an exaggerated eye roll,
and a stronger desire to let my friends get drunk
and stab me with needles
over and over and over.

He lifts the needle
from the old 5th Dimension record

(a person can only listen
to One Less Bell to Answer
so many times)

crawls into their bed
closes his eyes

and for the first time in many many nights,
he allows himself to dream.

As far as I can remember you’ve RAN my life,

From my father and mother and also Ex-wife,

We all have been your worthless slave,

Days we refused are the days we craved,

Desolation and destruction in your wake,

I’ve offered you my useless life to take,

As I fail to get my life on track,

I just shoot bigger loads of twack,

I’m as lost as the orphan boy in the woods,

I’m not remembered for doing much good,

Only wrongs and misplaced hate,

Had me wander into my fate,

I blame them all but not once me,

I blame them all one, two, and three,

So as I pointed out all their flaws,

I became immersed by your powerful jaws,

Your claws are sharp, long and pointy,

So where’s the right path can you please point me?

My direction is sporadic as my thoughts,

I knows there’s this one thing that I’ve been taught,

And that is never show weakness not in this game,

Or you may end up killed by what’s his name,

He burned you badly beyond repair,

Because you tread with little care,

I get that you were naïve,

But in my words you should believe,

I’ve been down this road my whole life through,

I beg that you won’t do these things that I do!,

I had a soul as my Fathers son,

And as my mothers youngest one,

I’ve watched these paths taken lightly,

The scenes I’ve seen aren’t all that sightly,

I’ve been young and as I grow old,

I started to learn to do as I’m told,

For if I hear those words nye,  

Soon I’ll be the one to die!,

Im so lost, alone, and misunderstood,

Sorrily the high I get just isn’t that good!,

Good enough I think inside,

But it could be better if only I tried,

Tears and blood oh I have tasted,

But its nothing to the years I've seemingly wasted!

In 2009, The american disaster film "2012" was released.
Preparing for "The End of The World" was easy.

A piece of cardboard at a Red Light.


"2012 The End Is Nigh, What's a dollar?"


We might as well have smiled, given a friendly wave,
honked our horns like we were passing the Freeport Flag Ladies.


In 2012, I was in high school with my first job.

I didn't care that In the twinkling of an eye,

we were gonna hear God's last trumpet.

On Rapture-Eve, I set out "Milk N' Cookies" for the "Left-behind"

I left next mornings outfit on the side of the road as if Angels abducted me ****-*** naked mid-stride

Turns out, the red light never turned green.

The "left-behind" kept breeding

and Hell on earth just kept recruiting

Now it's 2020,

The Freeport Flag Ladies are in Quarantine,

the signs have needles in our eyelids like mechanical spiders,

You can't even turn the news off now,

I pick it up at CVS Like a Controlled substance prescription.

They make you call in once a month to get it refilled.

Some how my amazing wife Amy and I

Not only survived the rapture,
we brought a brand new life into it.

For 10 days we were locked in a hospital

We never looked at the news.

The world melted away as we danced together

Waiting to meet our little miracle.

After Amy was whisked away for intensive surgery
and survived the most unspeakably amazing thing in the world
a nurse eventually grabbed me and asked if I wanted to meet my daughter,
I was guided to a baby table

with knobs, meters, heat lamps,

and on a tiny cushion

in a tiny plastic crib,

My daughter.


Sophia Naomi Mae Coulombe.


wide eyed

staring into my pupils

wiggling

perfect

Now we are home.

No nurses, no IV.

Somehow it feels like the end of the world and all it's chaos
was the best thing that has ever happened to us.

Everything happened exactly when it needed too.


We couldn't have had better timing

if God planned it.