building up
a big mountain
then tear it down
give it to the clowns

nosebleed
for a feast
endless bottom
as a treat

it’ll likes get up
tear it down
it’ll likes get up
tear it down

trail of tears
chopped off
nail of thoughts
stopped short

ego invoice
taking drugs
fat berg sewer
horrible vanity

*it’ll likes get up
tear it down
it’ll likes get up
tear it down

The Mutual Admiration Clubhouse
Is a Hall of Carnival Mirrors.

Do you like the sound
Of other voices:
The choir,
The chant,
The litany?
Or is it the sound
Of your own voice:
The blather,
The blither,
The grate,
The groan?
You use volume to make
Yourself known;
To make yourself heard
And join the absurd.
Do you like
The sound of your own voice?
Join in the chorus.

sometimes i watch
the way that smoke curls up
from a lighted cigarette
and i want to hold it in my hands and
curl my lips around it
like the indie rocker boy
who’s been staring at my friend from the corner.
but the tar burns my lungs
and i am too vain for yellow teeth and yellow fingertips
and yellow eyes and black organs.
i miss the way that you paid attention to me.
you would be humming and
pretending to be working and
i would say one word and
you would stop pretending and listen.
unless you had your guitar out.
nothing could come between you and your music
and i could never come between you and her
so i never even tried.
coming in second was never really my style,
you know that.
so i watched you watch me watch you feeling the music
until you gave up trying to read my mind and
told me yours with the chords you played
and i miss that.
i miss the organized chaos that erupted from your fingertips
that were not yellow like indie rocker’s
who is now hitting on my friend
because you always said that
smoking was for losers,
which is probably right
if indie rocker is anything to go by.
he’s nodding my friend away to a corner
and we all know how the night will end.
i will have to interject and bring her home
and he will scowl at me
because she is the prettiest girl in the room
and no one can take their eyes off of her.
she’s lovely in the way i always wanted to be
but never could attain
and i guess that i’ll just wait
for another heartbroken punk kid who
needs a shoulder to cry on.
he’s usually indie rocker’s friend
and he always wants to smoke.
and it’s going to be two in the morning soon
and i am sitting here in this place
thinking about someone who already left me.

An awkward angled and elbowed crane
Bowed and tipped his hat to me--
Asked for my number and a date.

I turned my foxy nose up.
My eyebrows arched,
And my friends laughed.

Derision seeped through his lowly form.

Years later, I am shopping after
A hard day of work--
Sweaty, *****, ordinary.
I am buying tampons.

I run into him at the store
Through a mutual friend.
I do not recognize him.

He seems taller--maybe he has learned
Confidence.
His face is tan--acne gone.
He is handsome--muscular.
His clothes fit him well.

No awkward bowing or stooping,
But something in his eyes when
Our friend asks if we've met before,
And I say, "No."

After I walk away, it dawns on me
Like an egg's yolk cracking over my head
And dripping--oozing--down.

And I hope he recognized me too.

Americans scramble about
like hyperactive lemmings
trying to fix themselves.
Vanity; egotistic futility;
pointless self-obsession.
How can you fix yourself
when you are already you?
  - mce

Little yellow finch  .  .  .
No bird listens to her song,
  .  .  .  Only cat entranced.

Those that are complacently designed
By the simpering vanities
of a domesticated world
rarely find the peace of mind
of which we all strive
because their materialistic
beliefs constrain them
in pools of normality
Drowning them in the pressures of society
and hanging them out to dry
in downloaded photos
that never fade
our lives are all dictated
by the subconscious influence
of one another
thus our souls
are irrefutably intertwined
locked together in endless struggle
mind against mind.

Dear vanity,
I don't mean to sound offensive,
But I really don't have time for you.
I struggle to make time for all the whims and worries you wear down upon my weary body,
The lies you tell, the lies you sing,
Oh this will only take a second,
Oh you have a curl out of place.
I have other things I am enslaved to that I must serve besides you.
Oh vanity, why do you continually haunt me?
You twist me up in your lies, twisting and wrapping and binding and tying me up in your lies so tight I can hardly move.
You say it'll make me have friends,
But we've already been down that bend.
For you oh vanity
Do I squirm and writhe as someone plucks out my hairs one by one like a mediaeval torture device.
For you oh vanity
Do I crinkle my nose as I pinch a blemish on my skin.
For you oh vanity do I trim my hair the way you like it so I can be in style
For you oh vanity do I wear a smile
So dear vanity,
I don't mean to be offensive
But I really don't have time for you.