And why can’t I spit poison!

I swallow enough of it!

If I don’t drain the wound the swelling will persist,
my heart will ache

The taste,
sweet and sick going down with such ease

Why can’t I take a match and watch my life burn

Incinerating the monotony that I stand in,
eager to see the ashes at my feet

Avid or lead
Salt in the way
Summation to verify our, vanity ahead...
Succor and hints of whether, a sermon of place...

The course of a new ship?
Set to sail, with suicide as a destination
Sour liberty has shown us, the boding of unity, asking wit...
The voice, of wealth and remorse is an oddity, to intimation?

Spare futures, in the eyes of the land...
Somehow, and with aged forces to avow...
Life here, is a poignant sulk, of what was chaos in hand
Toward the somber horizon, the life of seriousness, now...?

Has a marvel in times way...
Since borrowed timidity is to be a challenge, of ecstasy?
Will we sit for a nightmare, or is that a question to stay
Stronger than a half sighed, half worthy pace of choice...

Is this horse dead, or running for its life?
Such a small price to pay, for the answer of privilege?
Sweeter by decency, decorum is a new wish for strife...
Antiquity shown, or the method to a wager of sincerity's, least?

Aches, chills, glares and pains
Best served by sleep? a host of vicinity to a futures blanket
Seemingly meant and let, with a proper smile, come plane
Where the tow of vice and its vision of home, is a sick lover's face met?

It's not gonna last forever
I can't seem to decide if it fills me with delight or terror
Do I long for a sickness to shorten the days I've left to live?
An excuse so I'm not at fault and there's nothing to forgive?

It's not gonna last forever
I could cry for days on end
Not because I bleed and hurt
But because I'm so sick to pretend
That I don't

The good ole days were enjoyed with ease,
There was less to enjoy because of disease;
There were fewer people to dress and feed
Thanks to childhood mortality.


The middle-class were few and greedy,
Thanks to needs and poverty;
We could find work and be employed,
But tenure turned to workplace injury.

Illiteracy was common,
Innumeracy, our fate,
Due to the high school drop out rate.

Polio and smallpox kept in check
The burgeoning growth of the unelect.

Minorities knew their social place;
Jim Crow was voting in black face.

Heteros ruled the ****** race,
Alphabet people were an outlier trace.

In summer and winter we were outplayed and beat,
With no Air Conditioning nor Central Heat.

Let's leave the past in the past,
Where history belongs;
Where hunger and sickness
Lasted all life-long,
And the poor and ignorant
Were subdued by the strong.

We can agree times were simpler then,
As time came rushing to an end.

There once was a little snail,
That wondered why It didn't have a proper tail,
She asked all those that passed her by
If there might be a rather simple reason why.
None proved to be that kind,
Which put her in an awful bind,
Until one fateful sunny day
She met a hare along the way.
My friend he said, looking awfully smug,
A tail Is something others often tug,
That's why I run faster than near most,
Never resting coast to coast.
You instead are blessed indeed,
As you I know can get good sleep.
With a house over your head,
You're never far from that great bed.
So even when you dont feel well,
Isn’t it better than my hell?

For Hannah

She's sitting at the
kitchen table,
Full of strep and forced
to read a book
by a mom who believes
the mind can continue to flourish
while its carrying case
suffers.

Forcing fluids,
killing biotic enemies
She sits silently
while I listen to the
Happiest Music I know,
Linus and Lucy;
She frowns,
more from pain
than distaste.

Mom cooks lasagna
and brother scouts the fridge.
Nothing looks good
She thinks.
She says.
She feels.

I've had this
sharp piece of bark
between my throat
the back side and the front.
It would close my throat
if I sang.

I had to sing.

I would feel my throat
closing
feel it hurt
make myself
believe that it would be fine.

I had to be fine.

I wonder how people yell
do their throats not close up?
I hear my mom yelling
over the phone
a different kind of sickness.
She's unhappy with a life
she is not living.

She's living here.

With me. But her rage
shot through continents
found it's way back where her mind lives.
That's a sickness.
Your mind and body being in different places.

Sickness is living here.

I can't tell her about
how my throat closes
how loudness
isn't possible for me.
For I must have swallowed
every tooth pick
to feel the abrasions in my throat.

I swallowed every toothpick.

I let myself swallow further.
Let that bark fall farther in to my stomach.
Wake at night when it hurts,
when it begs to wake.
Let myself be hurt.
I don't tell her how I close.

I close my eyes.

I dream that I am living elsewhere.
I am sick. My mind is living where my body
is not. I am dreaming
of a world where
I can be sick.

~
Sleep, no sleep
No making plans
New bed linens eat my dreamland
And settle in the wilderness of my ever-opened eyes

I see you
I see me
I see everything
I'm a play with no final curtain
The story continues unabated
And the ridiculing light of day
Is as sacrosanct as an unused blanket
Nonetheless, I'm checking in
Sleep, O sleep, swallow me
~

I hope you will be there with me
In the long winter without spring:
Ever green, star bright, true north.

The pines bent under the weight of snow
Are glad of the long-awaited rest.
We will tuck beneath white sheets.
My roots tangle with yours -
Lean your limbs on me,
I will hold your hand.

I will love you as you cough,
I will love you as you fall,
I will love you in all sickness.

In our autumn we will gather harvest,
A wealth of sweet golden years well-ripened.
When the storms come
And night darkens our hearth,
I will keep a fire for you.
My black coal-heart burns slow.

Because you are mine.
Because I belong to you.
Because when we return to earth
And become good loam,
The flowers that grow on me
Will bloom for you.