I see your portrait
painted in your poem
such a serious soul
wanderlust must roam

looking for soul mates
perfect love will do only
finish lover's sentences
'til death never lonely.

Paint me in watercolor.
  Bring me back to life.
  Hues of laughter and desire,
  light inside brilliant light
  husky brawling of youth
  half naked, sweating, proud.

Payne's gray guilt  and ugly failures.
Broken vows are midnight black
our children watered down unseen.
It's cancer as only betrayal can be.
Take me to a barn dance and hold
me close as I saturate your soul.

Just dying to be grown up
forget my father I'm a man
I shave, drink beers in a cup
war is my first time woman
taste of Eve and ammunition
boys line up on walls to die
murmured Act of Contrition
chewed up in jaws of a lie.

stealing your prescription
keeps me composed.
born into a cauldron of
witch's brew angst and anger!

none come home complete.
each tries for normal lives.
madmen lob angst and anger
into the dinner party!

anxiety and hate haunt
the best of men now lost,
families can't cope.
they drift away in fear.

war has done it again.
good people; good intent;
make monsters of good
men and their sons.

what raw nerve is left exposed
forever hidden in nightmares
father and son and holy ghost
searching for a peaceful grave.

Our Father who gave us life
and takes it away, why bother?
We invented absurd stories and
built religions with our clenched
angry fists shaking to the heavens
cursing you for cruelty. You kick
puppys and drown kittens and make
us to amuse you gods as we die in
your cancer and weak hearts and car
wrecks and broken heart suicides and
despair in war's gas showers and
no man's land waiting to be shot.
Aids, Covid, influenza, plague or
just old age thins the ****** herd.
  AMEN

Too young for bars, but thirsty.
  Uncle Reggie owned a beer joint so
  we went in and had beers carte blanche.
  He was upstairs dying of cancer.

  We went up for an impromptu visit.
  He and his woman in a small room.
  He was in bed weak with sickness.
  We made small talk then escaped.  

  We went downstairs. One for the road.
  Everything I drank after tasted bitter.
  One day we'll all be in that bed upstairs.
  May God rest all of our souls.  Amen

Too young for bars, but thirsty.
  Uncle Reggie owned a beer joint so
  we went in and had beers carte blanche.
  He was upstairs dying of cancer.

  We went up for an impromptu visit.
  He and his woman in a small room.
  He was in bed weak with sickness.
  We made small talk then escaped.  

  We went downstairs, one for the road.
  Everything I drank then tasted bitter.
  One day we'll all be in that bed upstairs.
  May God rest all of our souls.  Amen

We're born with our story
      etched on crumbled graves
      maybe shame maybe glory
      maybe Jesus Christ saves
      no real reason to worry
      one way or another slaves
      serve a master in a hurry
      cruelty comes in waves.

Welcome to the miracle of birth,
all the bloat none of the mirth.
You had your ****** ******* fun
now your misery has just begun.
Weight gain and no more *****
never win you will only lose.
Morning sickness you have to ***
husband works late sets him free
to celebrate his super *****
drink Tequila eat the worm
get a ******* from a friend
doesn't even matter in the end.

The pills keep me sublime
living life in perfect time
Ambien close to midnight
or before an ocean flight
morning coffee with ******
keeps anxiety at a minimum.
****** with martinis
breaks our bed with ease.
Pop a pill one more go
amazed we watch it grow!

Let us pretend that all is well and
life isn't drowning in a sea of wine.
Our passion is alive and hungry.
Years ago it never died on the vine.
We live in separate hearts.
We live in separate rooms.
We crave other spaces.
We crave other tombs.
If only we could fall in love
again like we did together.
We could forget the winter
and devour each other.

I don't want to meet the parents
when I'm buzzed and slurring
so we'll meet for brunch or lunch
before my vision starts blurring.
I'll make small talk and smile
I'll pretend to love you only
even if we **** once in awhile
and we kind of live lives lonely.

A beard or discover
a truth in between
She/He a real lover
bulges seldom seen.

Flies red eye tonight asleep
for love's sad lost kingdom.
******* flaccid long ago
Libido victim of boredom.
Christ we sleep sexless
pretend love more or less.

Shot down in a bar and again
a cab ride to bed with my wife.
I'm lost in drink ignoring time.
I'll wake and wonder where my
outrage went and hope all is well
in this easy prison of my design.

Romance is born of pretty lies
   and poor judgement and alcohol
   and low bar light and juke box
   siren song swaying our hips in
   surrender as we dance to a cab
   and feed our weakness at 3 am
   in a bed of grand hotel roses.
   We wake up at noon in thorns.

Romance is born of pretty lies
   and poor judgement and alcohol
   and low bar light and juke box
   siren song swaying our hips in
   surrender as we dance to a cab
   and feed our weakness at 3 am
   in a bed of grand hotel roses.
   We wake up at noon in thorns.

Romance is born of pretty lies
   and poor judgement and alcohol
   and low bar light and juke box
   siren song swaying our hips in
   surrender as we dance to a cab
   and feed our weakness at 3 am
   in a bed of grand hotel roses.
   We wake up at noon in thorns.

Nothing is free. There's a price.
    Servitude or *** or court jester.
    There's a price of compromise. Give
    and take a kidney or heart or soul.
    Let them weigh it on their scales
    with thumbs on the ****** things.

You counsel me to choke on the
**** he stuffs in my throat and
be the wife a husband needs.
I'm in a night sea in a fragile boat
rowing to a god I hope listens
but I take on water and drown.

Have you read a poem and been
profoundly touched? Your world
trembled for a moment you cried
for a leaf, a door, poems unread.

I'll never meet expectations.
Disappointment is guaranteed.
The only thing that I promise
is your heart will go to seed.

I'm a quilt sewn from small pieces of myself
   that each of you has touched in ways unknown.
   We live in a crowd, a mass exodus without escape.
   See me in broken mirrors in lost store windows,
   on the train and at your table and in church.
   See me at AA on my last leg but angry enough
   to drag me above the flames and find an
   exodus from drink to this promised land.

Swim against the current and
promise me to never die.
Riptides and sharks and cramps
we die alone but angry.

Communism
Socialism
Karl Marx
Eat your own
let the world burn
even the worms turn.
Catholic Catechism
Baptism, Confessional
gun fights, last rights.
Incense and Myrrh.

When I first saw you
I'd loved you forever.
We danced in Pompeii
died welded together
under blankets of ash
statues of our history
witness carnal cash,
*******'s mystery.

They can be anyone or anything you want.
  They walk the streets igniting fantasy.
  They beckon us with every trick they know
  we hunger for. Set our world on fire again.

I'm in pain
  inside your
  ****** dancing
  in winter rain
  in your freezing
  bed our breathing
  like dragon smoke
  forever pleasing.

I'm in pain
  inside your
  ****** dancing
  in summer rain
  in your freezing
  bed our breathing
  like dragon smoke
  we find Nirvana.

I first saw you in a treatment chair.
   Forgive my honest catatonic stare
   and my ****** up childhood prayer.
   Am I dead? Why do I see you there?
   Dead on a cross in your underwear
   strapped down I can't kneel I swear.

I can't help killing things.
I run to a confessional and
tell my sins to a priest and
am forgiven ****** and
******* and lying and
stealing *** magazines. Amen.

Thunder storm
or war torn?
There's anger
in the chamber
no love lost
with a stranger
remind me to keep
track of every sin:
I'm trying
I'm lying
I'm crying
I'm spying
I'm flying off
the handle again.

There's anger
in the chamber
no love lost
with a stranger
remind me to keep
track of every sin

I'm trying
I'm lying
I'm crying
I'm spying
I'm flying off
the handle again.

I'm too tired to put my ******
in your starving lips. Keep trying
baby and we'll live or die in time
there's really no use in crying.
I want to dance with a lover.
My milk's purple and of no use.
Daddy still needs amphetamine,
there's no such thing as abuse,
broke what was left of my heart.
You're my hero's first time son.
We're all here thank our God
and atomic bombs that we won.

There's anger
in the chamber
no love lost
with a stranger
remind me to keep
track of every sin:
I'm trying
I'm lying
I'm crying
I'm spying
I'm flying off
the handle again.

I deny. I lie. I try. I cry.
Always anger in the chamber
shakey finger on the trigger
I fly off the handle again.
I sow fear among loved ones
beg forgiveness and do it again.
One night drunk I held my 45
against my ear and saved us.

If we could sit and visit
for a pleasant afternoon
you told me of heartaches
then I told you of my own
could we hold each other
cry spilling tears in beers
understand each other's fears
ever again share a foxhole?

Hormones
pheromones
sexting on our
cell phones.

Calling from
a phone booth
talking for hours
Love is our proof.

Coney Island amusement park
Rotor where the floor is gone
screaming for mommy in dark.
In a pod with my first lover.
Now so many true loves ago.

Living is tough enough,
Love **** near impossible.
playing card on fire
          Vargas' beauty my desire!
Forgiveness beyond reach.

15 in a state of fierce excitement
the heat of Catholic school dances,
June's centerfold made me take me.
Classmates were strange romances.

Girls bled into women I desired.
I shaved into a man they wanted.
Lust is love's spark to be fired.
In old age photos we are haunted.

Non profit millionaires
rulers who hide in Foundations
all are putting on phony airs
destroying once free nations!
Lock us down. Lock us up.
Burn us down and rule dirt.
I won't drink from a poison cup.
We still live. We still hurt.

Day to day we live this assigned life.
Are we a Punch and Judy puppet show?
It feels like it in my cups when my
spine stiffens and I find my *****.

Come morning and it's reset time.
I'll wake and wonder where my
outrage went and hope all is well
in this easy prison of my design.

My commas are in a hurry
exclamation points worry
colons horribly confused
periods indecisive abused
question mark is unsure
semicolon can't endure.
Quotation marks keep
words forever asleep.

My commas are in a hurry
exclamation points worry
colons horribly confused
periods indecisive abused
question mark is unsure
semicolon can't endure.
Quotation marks ensure
what you said will be pure.

You live in shadows of fears.
You swim in rivers of tears.
Meet me in the promised land.
Take my offered helping hand.
I'm different from the others.
I swear no smothering lovers.

Birth

Mom pushed hard to get me
into life I was stubborn and
liked where I was but she
persisted and evicted me.
Bright light and faceless
ghosts abducted me and
****** and wiped cleaned
me up and swaddled me
in a straight jacket ****
it I will never let it be.

Sick as hell he needed to
be put out of his misery.
I spilled a river of tears
waiting until his ending.
We laid him on a blanket
and fed him endless treats
while the vet put poison
in him to give him peace.
We're both chasing *****
in our dreams together.

The front of the box is kaleidoscopic.
I open it and dump the pieces on the
table. Scattered life yet to be lived?
I scan them looking for shapes that
might fit other shapes. Like I've done
with lovers. Some fit better than others.
Colors begin to reveal patterns and I
start connecting. Painstaking! Tedious!
Why do I do this? Maybe I'm desperate
for order. It begins to look like a true
picture, a photo booth black and white
of an ancient looking man with a crooked
smile and eyes you'd get lost in. Familiar.
Kind. I keep at it through the night as I
begin to know this person. Dawn reveals
the sun I place the last piece. I step back
and see myself years down the road with
a puzzled map of my life yet to come.