I would rather be a poor man
writing what i love,
than be a rich man
shackled to a life
of capitalistic rule,
stuck in a dreary job
that gives me no freedom
for creativity.

I.
my roommate is
an extended sigh
she wakes up every morning and
makes French-press coffee,
which is foreign in my household
she has a soft heart,
liked a bruised peach
and when I smoke **** in the evenings
she talks about art house films
over sautéed cucumbers
and I pretend to listen

II.
I read somewhere this morning
that you should replace all your
“I’m sorrys”
with
“thank yous”
like, instead of
“sorry I am such a mess”
it should be
“thank you for loving me unconditionally
thank you for wanting to have my name coat your tongue
thank you for refurbishing my past like an antique dresser”
I haven’t once spoken these words
since being with you

III.
I walked down College without headphones
I could hear my blood’s humming voice
I carried the same three treats I bought with you:
a brownie
a s’mores bar
a Ruffles chip marshmellow square
at Crawford, I could hear you in the box
scratching like a rat
when I got home,
I lit a candle
and ravenously ate you on my bed

Your mind is a tunnel
that never ends
and I need to slip inside it
immerse myself for a while
for I may never know
what I might find there
but one thing I know for sure
one thing I already found out is..
about you being a writer
a poet
who has written on me
who has written a part of my life
and darling,
you have done it..
so beautifully.

(j.a.t.m.)

Sondra goes to a bar, and at some point during the evening requests that a sonata be played, the bartender looking surprised says “I don’t have anything like that”, Sondra reaches into her coat pocket and hands the bartender a cd saying “track 4 please”, the bartender lets the current song finish and then plays the cd, it’s Haydn, and the people in the bar start to look shocked, a person goes up to her and says “you know there are places where they play this sort of thing, like restaurants”, Sondra replies “yes I know but I like coming to bars and listening to that music”, another person says “I like it too, it’s soothing somehow and different than what we always hear.”

© Matthew Goff

Well, its been two years since the night I sat up late dreaming of other worlds that seemed so far away.

Yet here they are, nearly before me.

Its crazy, looking between that moment and now. I was honest and hopeful, yet all those things I wished for seemed worlds away.

Well, worlds away just turned into 3 months.

I've finished my first real novel. I'm a third through my new one. The inevitability of me being a real author is sharp and bright and awe-inspiring. I've written things that make people think and feel and hopefully have the ability to make a difference.

I'm running across the country with that man I love. Its happening. I am in love. I feel forever in love. I no longer sit and question the maybes; I feel he is for me, as long as he is who he is and breathes on this earth and walks beside me. And I soon get to wake up to him every morning for as long as we're together. Its something else, I tell you.

Wonderland has gotten kinder. I have become stronger, and things are figuring themselves out. I'm figuring myself out. Its new and terrible and great and exciting. The world of Wonderland is before me, and I am no longer afraid.

I wanted these so many things, and I'm fingertips away from them. They're mine. Its jaw-dropping. Its nearly a surprise.

Except it isn't. It logically feels that way, but in my heart it only feels right. Now, I have my writing. I have my novels. I have my love. I have my wonderland. I have my future.

All the things I ever wanted are mine, and its more than I ever thought I would get. My dreaming isn't just dreaming anymore. Everything I dreamed of is real, and you know what?

Its better than I dreamed. Far better.

Smashing glass pretty faces evening sunsets wild failures and important questions, wild abandon adventures and swimming pool braveries, desperate lover knocks on the door with wild abandon jumps into the wet air, car crash of memories and experience, party at Paula’s house parents away and many escapes, meeting friends that are met with glowing excitement romances fit the evening with a candlelight kiss.

© Matthew Goff

Everything is falling apart again;
my head won't create the words I need
to sustain my fragile state of mind. I
cannot even bring my thoughts forward to
help you understand, or write them into
something cohesive. I am completely
unable. I am terrified that this dreaded
block on my hands will never lift and
I will never get the power of words back
which I use for entirely everything.

In last night's movie, a young writer
and an older, married with children French woman
fall in love. They did not meet during a village massacre
and money is no object, Manhattan
the place I was priced out of. But after everything has happened
she cannot leave her children, not even for love, because of love,
the love that brooks no serendipity.

Here, in my family, love is taken for granted
except when it's withdrawn and then even the trees lose all meaning,
familiarity. Now it is almost dawn:
this and that must get done in committee or alone.
Don't reach, go slow as the day will allow.
But that's not what I came to say.
Perfect rest v. having a destiny.

A complete breakdown in self-discipline.
It begins by saying nothing I do matters under the eye of eternity.
Hamlet x 5 centuries.
Add to that all the science--chemistry, physics--calculus and music
I don't know. I have sat next to, at weddings,
brain surgeons and robot engineers. I hit the street
choosing a church on Fifth Ave. or Trinity Cemetery, walking the
      heartless city.

In the subsequent late night movie, a wealthy
altruistic doctor arranges for the ******
of his neurotic concubine. His guilt provides us
with an opportunity to consider
the concepts of faith and forgiveness, that all will be well in the end
after a period of meaningless suffering.
In this way the seasons have been circulating for eons via convexity.

I don't know what I'm doing but I'm doing it anyway.
You trust in genetics, God, prosthetics or prayer, whatever
gets you to the morning. That's when the sun,
a billion trillion nuclear detonations per second
warms your bones.
You may remember an old lover who's gone before
or continues to exist on another plane, in another ecstasy.

Having installed a new toilet seat
and made a few philanthropic donations
I can kick back tonight and watch movies, right?
Not. I'm ridding myself of another addiction
like illegal drugs via caloric restrictions
getting enough sleep for two people or more
and reading none of the dry words in books from the library.

When there's nothing to do, when I'm bored or dreary
I'll sit still and watch from the window, I'll wait
for the weather to change, which it will.

Be a writer who doesn't know where the next sentence will take her. A writer who focuses on her own self, studying her own brain. A writer whose heart is bursting with love and desire. A writer sly enough to give the clues to her secrets in the crevices of her pages. A writer whose words spread thought in others to give people a sense of purpose. But it's alright that she doesn't always know what she's thinking until she writes it. It's as if the words already exist somewhere and they just pour out of her thoughts. Be a writer whose mind is such a twisted place, crammed full of beauty, with darkness, the sun and a touch of madness.