(I think I fell in love in the back of a theater
foreign languages on the screen-
mourning dew in your eyes.)

Empty bars encourage the best conversation
in the dead of winter
when nobodies feel the most alive.

they order Irish coffees and Old Fashions
to remind them of the
grandfathers they never knew, while we talk
and covet the ****** hair of exotic men.

(I always awake feeling close to you
and then go to bed
disintegrated by distance- by need

love is always easier when your face is numb
having mistook the blemishes its supposed to hide
for forbidden fruit within the promised land.)*

there's a depressed bartender talking to
a manic patron,
reminding me to visit my parents soon.

Who’s that man in the black coat?
He always gets off the 11 p.m bus
and whenever we’re two *****
brown and ripped seats away
I can distinguish the smell of smoke
in his hair and the rain on his eyeglasses
Every time he sits down two *****
brown ripped seats away from me
the yellow neon lights
stuck on the roof  that he has to avoid
by bending, catch the rings in his beat up
calloused hands
I can see his fingers holding an overflowing moleskin notebook
and I am yet to approach him
about his name
when all that fills my conscious is the question
concerning the stack of papers in his hand.
                                                                               *p.e.n

There’s a dog on the bench

By the car on the sidewalk 

She won’t move — 

She wants to stay dry 

And stay on the sidewalk.

I am paved in gold & the

Parts that make up a radiator 

A rigid source of heat 

In the cabin.

Like a ligament at the crook

Of your, her, leg — I am bathed 

In the light of the fireplace 

Waning from the moon. 

I am afraid of the moon 

It may render me a wolf caught

In a bear trap;

I howl.

I howl like the dog perched

Upon the bench by the car

Crashed upon the sidewalk. 

She nor I will move for fear

Of straining the safety of dry fur.

Swollen walls like punched up paintings
of otherwise perfect specimen.
Ceiling cracked like an hour glass,
timing out the room with plaster.
An impromptu look towards the mirror
reflects a distorted crossed-man
with his hands
waiting to clap for sins.
Curtains torn from lungs,
smoking through the decades,
flung back violently so parents
can see hazy street lanterns
that decide departure hours.
Children screaming from a black hole,
a cosmic punishment for infidelity.

A stillness bred
while they sleep,
soundly and lovingly.

I like sitting on my rooftop, in a city that the one over finds
degraded and blue-collar. Its quiet and the sun heats the
tar- a soft lullaby on the bottom of a pair of feet that traverse
a life I’m always trying to get closer to.

I like things like ginger ale and lemonade; faded colors
& antiques. The belief that people still listen to vinyl
and care about our founding fathers. That they
still hand write love notes to themselves as much as for
Another.

People okay with the company
of an occasional fruit fly and a toasted bagel with butter
and honey alongside a sweet peach iced tea, sweating from the
thought of summer’s
sin.

I like sky lights & well-lit rooms; shadows permitted the freedom
to dance across exposed brick and structures
incapable of forgetting the daily histories of all their inhabitants.

My passwords are always about the planets or Greek mythology;
(I rotate).

Because I need a daily dose of the cosmos & humanity’s
attempt to better understand its purpose on this solitary fleck of dust.

I tend to bleed my existence through learning history and maintaining eye-
contact. Weekends are where people smile and emerge from their
carefully soaked-in showers, feeling clean and comforted by the silence
of a fogged mirror.

I like sentimental movie trailer music and bathtub tunes - whatever
can put to rest the parts of society that demandingly vibrate within me

(I leave).
my front door open because I appreciate individual curiosity
and creating an invitation for people to look in and see how very
much we are all alike. Needy and wanting to watch for signs of life
in others.

I like people who can carry sorrow in their back pockets & yet
**still offer to
pay for your check.

I hope one day it will fade
Like the breath or smudged finger print
on a freezing window on a car
that’s driving a little too fast

I hope that one day you find her

Whether that’s me or she or we
never speak again,

at least I know you’re happy

I hope you remember

I hope my eyes are burned into your membranes and every night 

when you fall asleep you see a flash of blue
and feel a sting of red

I hope I am the forget me not and the remember me always

I’ve always been the stranger flower in the garden,

but you loved that

I hope you love yourself

like I loved you

Fully, compassionately, with a loss of all fear—

soaring on the wings 
of child-like faith

I loved you like I loved Santa, 

the tooth fairy and 

the Easter bunny—

I loved you like
I knew 
you weren’t real

I loved you like
I knew 
you couldn’t stay—


But love yourself in a new way
Love yourself within the steely
strength of a thousand straight backbones

A thousand concrete cubes

A thousand “I love you”s
You were my first kiss 

of the old year 

and my last poem 

of the new

please tell me 
I
didn’t waste my new words

on you.

lately, everything's been about you.
i'd see "closed" signs on antique shop windows
and eviction notices on apartment doors
and remember how it felt when you slammed the door on every possibility of us.
i'd see pens and papers and stop myself in the bookstore from throwing them on the ground and screaming "i used to be the one you write about". now i just find spare ones in my room that i can cry onto when no one's around. the ink seeps through my fingertips as i break the plastic case of every pen i lay my hands on and it's supposed to make me feel better but it doesn't. it just reminds me of the ink you injected in my veins and no matter how deep i cut i can't get it the **** out.

you grew something inside of me and i swear they're not flowers because they've been flourishing when i water them with *****.

i'd stare at streetlights and remember that one time you told me you'd  kiss me under every single one of them but here i am brushing my teeth so hard it bleeds every night because the only time i taste your lips now is when i'm dreaming.

and now here i am trying in vain to paint the sunset with the color of your eyes. i didn't want to forget how they lit up when you said "i love you" but maybe it was just a reflection of how bright mine were when you finally said those three words.

well, to be fair, you only told me you loved me. i guess it's my fault i assumed it meant you'd never leave.

Everyone claims to know your name, only a few know you. Everyone has your back, only a few show you. Everyone can feel your pain, only a few Love you. Everyone knows your face,  only a few see the real you. Always alone, nobody knows it.