we paint a pretty picture out of holding on
out of never giving up hope
but sometimes it’s knowing when to call it quits
it’s letting go when you don’t feel ready, because you realize you’re waiting for someone who’s already gone
he took the last train out of this dried up town and left you here to wilt away with it
understand that what you miss is only the embellished memories of someone you used to know
but he has changed since then- and you can grow without his nourishment

Nights Are For Stuff Like This

It's 3am.
The city's sleeping and I'm not.
Lights like scattered dots burn dim outside my window.
People are dreaming and I'm awake thinking of the
life that's been passing through me like second hands-smoke
lingering in the slowed-down traffic of my DNA.
Nights are for stuff like this;

stuff like silken roads through ragged hillsides,
feelings blacker than night that disappear in the
day light, prisms  bouncing off grey ash, tiny sparks
falling through trap doors, never again to be seen
nor heard, nor taken for granted upon the long
laid train tracks of this ongoing dance.

Memory like loaded simi-trucks taking me all
the way back through corn fields and hay, through
old hard hitting rain that goes clank, clank in my brain.
Scars cutting  through my skin opening again and again
like songs that you hate but can't stop singing  on endless
streaming highways-hitching a ride inside my mind,

pitch-perfect pristine and off-key in the dark,
on a night like this blue black over amber gold.
I'm a million miles further away and one mile closer.
Signposts loud and large selling  big hopes for
happy dopes, emerging eyes now gone from me
peering through clouds because they can, because
they probably always will.

Because who knows how far they've gone and how
far I've come on this night of all nights awake in the
grid of passing stars and dividing lines, now merging into
my lane for better or for worse where gratitude needs no
promotion, because it just is or is not. Because it can't be faked.
nor pimped. Because it has no need for
patronizing nor apologizing.

Because it's outcome, a side effect of nights like this where
everything makes sense and where nothing makes any sense
at all in this gigantic freeway of time that will eventually reach
a dead end. Where sleep will come 'cause the poetry will have
run itself off the bend.
Ah yea nights are for stuff like this.

Another Model Town passes the windowed  train I ride
The train is suspended and still
A beggar, a barn, a family's backyard picnic
Each in their own concentric motion
I remain still in my seat
They remain in motion a perfect glimpse of life
A Model Life
Is life best at a glimpse? Or standing still?

i wanna take the subway
i wanna take the train
to the end
of the
line

i wanna think
in anonymity

of how i see you
in the face of each
passing stranger
of how your breath sweeps over me
in the draft from
the black tunnel

i beg the calm silence of
time passing
to align my hopes
i hope the city can set me free
i hope it reminds me that although i am lost
i am unafraid

There's no full moon tonight baby.
That ole train is steadily rolling on by
Rolling on into the night.
When I watched the news tonight baby
they promised me my moon
would be full.
No sign of rain, clear skies all night long.
That's what they said.
Where in the world am I suppose to go
On a night like this.
Knowing my moon ain't full.
Packed it's bags and gone.
Gone away at least for the night.
One last glimpse before your gone for good.
That ole train steadily rolling on by baby.
Nothing but storm clouds and the smell of rain
Done packed your bag and gone away.
My sky never been this empty.
Half dark twinkles and rain rolling down my window.
There's no full moon tonight baby
Done packed your bag and gone.
Gone away

Here, the people rest
Under the sound of a bustling train.
Here, the people sit
Under the weight of many burdens on their backs.
Here, the people watch
The time tick by too quick to catch hold of.
Here, the people yawn
With gaping mouth waiting for their time to arrive.
Here, the people ponder
Of many things, I know not of.
Here, the people quiet
Through the journey long ahead.
Here, the people ride
Through miles of endless thought.
Here, the people listen
Yet they don't, their eyes transfixed on empty space.
Here, the people are
For here they just exist
Passing as a shadow
No, there's nothing here to hear
Nothing here to see
The people are simply here.