Blue marble,
lifeless eye.
Rotten cherry scented earth.

Nuisances poking up,
being pulled out -
composted for new dirt.

Don't you go getting sedimental on me.
Grains of insignificance ingratiating themselves in want of new life.

Rotten blueberry orb.
Fermented fungal stink.
A world in full decay.
Eyes that cannot blink.

And it was there I said I'd meet you.
Under the overpass, your eyes grasping for new ways to say I told you so. And that smokestack heart of mine piled up a few more miles of the most beautiful memories that could fit into my nap sack before the bus left:

When you remind me I'm lip-synching on our car rides to nowhere which is everywhere with you and how I hate telling you I'm wrong.

That smile- and how it wraps around my lips when I try and refuse that lighthouse from ushering me home.

The echoes your laughter makes across the empty dining room and how intentional you spin this sound so I can hear it from the bedroom.

Your left temple- tabernacle and all- leaning against the smoke. Every night.  Not afraid of the fire.

And before I leave you remember that these trips are every bit as permanent as they are temporary. You tell me to hurry home and I remind you that I always am with you. You smile. The Sun screams, raising its voice across your face as we depart and you've never been as beautiful as when you said

*Just come back soon

~
Who can circumnavigate Avalon's depository and the palpable swoop down toward earthier terrain?

Yet, here I am.

Where is your gravity taking me, Kahn?

This building is an invitation, and I am humbled in this sense of arrival. The books are stored away from the light. So a man with a book goes to the light, the serenity of light.

And therein lies the hidden meaning.

But you won't let it become just a building; you want it to remain much a ruin; it's all somehow sinister in its celebration.

Occasional distraction is as important in reading as concentration.

And I'm reading between the lines in a corner carrel, looking out at academic crop circles; I grapple with each texture: it's this combination of imposing austerity and weathered familiarity that you seize upon to make your current landscape hospitable.

This building is an instrument, creates a sound in my head akin to music; and this music remains a glowing source of solitude, all driven by a desire to be hidden but sought after—a celebration of all things lost and unnamed.

Here I find closure by opening a book.
~

Life's fleeting moments
experiences we hold dear,
but never truly own.

It all started in my second-story room.
A quiet summer night, not a single sound,
And then a loud boom.

I looked out the window for a better view
And rushed down to the kitchen, out the patio door, and onto the deck
Because what I saw in the sky reminded me of you
A small chill nipped at my neck, and I wondered,
Could you be remembering me too?

Because with every reverberation a star shot through the sky.
A shimmering burst, like a fiery blossom, every one of its blooms.
But it lingers for just a moment, and then it disappears.

Remember when we believed that if we swung high enough we might be able to fly?
Remember when we thought we could be artists and authors by just the age of sixteen?
Now all we do is sit and sigh, waiting on the Wifi,
Telling ourselves that the dreams we had were just unachievable little schemes.

They say you moved to Spain.
Three years ago, I heard.
Tell me, did that rid you of your pain?
And don’t lie, because I know, behind closed doors for your mother you cry, because Cancer had her killed.

And I might have found a lover.
And you’ve probably found another.
And we might feel fine as of now, but someday,
Just like the pyrokinetic flowers that bombard the night sky,
My memories of you will fade away.
I just wanted to say goodbye.

My Dearest Molly Anne,
I hope you are now satisfied
With the sinking bags under my eyes and
The empty gap between my thighs, I hope
You know I can no longer sleep
Without you to rock me through the slow-rolling lake,
And sing your song of a thousand sheep.
You've started throwing
Thick red waves into my sink and
Messed with my ability to think and
Darling, you pull me
Under miles and miles of freezing sea
And you take and you take,
Never satisfied.

He wears a cloak of invisible voices,
wove from the frequency of silent screams.
Ruler of the space between waking and dreams;
He is the Yellow King.

Fear not what you can't remember,
though His kingdom is obscene:
A place of waste and decadence
trapped beneath perception,
sewn with hidden seams.  

He takes his toll,
unbeknownst,
at the liminal space between asleep and awake;
collecting your soul,
bit by bit,
inch by inch,
until there's nothing left to take.