there’s a moment
between
“it’ll go like this”
and
it does
that
you think to yourself
“or not”

like many other things,
it’s a curse as well as a juxtaposition
two pictures set next to one another
then realizing that they’re crooked
with your audience already flooding in

what can you do,
when the future prepared for
is not the future that jumps out?

most will be toppled over in a daze
a few lucky ones will miss the beast
or perhaps even send it back whence it came
but again, most will be toppled
left in a daze for the amusement
of others

The no-more lives in Antarctic caves,
The cold, wet caverns
Of will-less stone corridors

The no-more lives alone and hungry,
Feeding on mushrooms
That bloom only occasionally

The no-more is found by so many people
Aimlessly wandering
In his cold, wet home in Antarctica

The no-more is happy when these people find him
He tells him his stories
And shares his rare and bland fungus

The no-more is met by the people who are stuck alone
But are truly in a crowd
And are finding the will to stop it all

The no-more, in its simplicity
Has inspired the power
To break the chains of their endless suffering

The no-more tells these strangers its call
“No More!”
And mimicking him, they set off to use it elsewhere

The no-more has watched these strangers for hundreds of years
Teaching them every time
“No more!”

The no-more, without realizing it,
has given them the tool to escape
and like good men they will escape
leaving the no-more to whimper it’s
cry:

no more

the cigarette
of our pent-up passion
in your mouth
is the only light
in this dark place
the world
has forced us
into

as you slink down to me
somehow seeing
through shroud of black
your cigarette illuminates
a knowing smirk
upon the red lips
of your face

those lips tantalize me
making requests
I can’t hope to fulfill
and begging questions
I refuse to answer

I cannot see your eyes
but I know the future
they see

that cigarette burns in the black
teaching me the meaning of love

as you crawl forward,
awaiting the final pounce,
I know that your cigarette
will fall to the ground
and like our pent-up passion
it will turn the room to fire
and the world will soon
catch too

He stares at me with those
Lock-key eyes
That let nothing out
And fewer things in

He cuts through me with those
Lock-jawed eyes
That are angry like fire
But cool in watery peacefulness

He answers me with those
Lock-heart eyes
That beat on the inside
But are shriveled and black
To me

She whispers this to her journal,
The one I read on her face as I
Stare back with those
Lock-heart eyes
Of mine

I am the silent boy
the one who sits with his book
the one who’s face is still when others laugh
the one who does not expect a response when
asking “how’re you today?”
I am the silent boy

I am the tired boy
the one who sits while others run
the one who hangs his head at the end of the day
the one who does not engage and neither does he
go after
I am the tired boy

I am the saddened boy
the one who refuses love
the one who had his heart stolen
the one who’s eyes gaze downward
as the sun sets on another day
I am the saddened boy

I am the boy
the one who is silent
the one who is tired
the one who is sad
I am the boy

I am the hopeful boy,
the one who speaks despite
the silence others expect.
the one who runs despite
the protest of his own legs.
the one who smiles despite
the urge to frown as he looks
out at the world
I am the hopeful boy

I am the boy
the hopeful,
hopeful boy

am I the only
one
unafraid of
there being
nothing after
death?

how long since you wrote your last poem?

3 months

why haven’t you been writing?

haven’t had it in me, doc,
just couldn’t get anything down

I thought I told you to write,
even if you thought you couldn’t?

guess I forgot
or figured you were
full of ****

what about the poems you’ve been bringing?
you’ve had poems every week

stolen

from whom?

kids on the internet usually
stole one off my friend
real talent that one is
going to be famous one day

why can’t you be famous?

because I’m not any good

who says that?

I say that

well stop.

no.

there is a silence

I think you’re lying

about what?

not writing,
these poems are too good,
too much like yours,
too similar to how you’ve
been feeling

well a desperate man
will do a lot to hide something,
won’t he, doc?

why would you be desperate?

I don’t know,
I really don’t.

*he looks away,
downward at the floor
then out the window,
he notices a bird on a branch
it flutters its wings once and
flies away out of his view

he thinks about the poems he’s written
how more effective a set of wings would be
to let him escape everything that is himself

perhaps,
I have just a
little bit
too
much
to live
for

have to much
stuff,
too many
friends,
plenty of
family
that actually
cares about
me

but I have this,

sneaking
suspicion

that it’s
not good
for
me

when I have all this
stuff
to do the living for
when do I have time
to live for myself?

why should I even
live for myself?

I, myself.
am not the
most important
thing that
depends on
me



if I died,
it wouldn’t be
who lost the
most

it would be my friends
it would be my family
it would be the theatre
it would be literature
it would be my society
it would be my country
it would be the world

because once I’m
dead
I can’t lose anything
more

but I’m not dead,
and I’m not dying
so why think of
these things?

because I fear death
because I fear my own mind
because I fear what living
for others has done to me
after all these years

when everything
I have to live for
is gone (as it will be,
one day) will I go
on?

and as long as I don’t have
an answer, this question will
haunt me still

never make a promise
never tell someone you
always will
never say you won’t
do it again
never look into their eyes
to make sure they know

never make a promise,
I promise you,
you’ll break it

because:
that’s what they’re for

promises

“for breaking
and destroying
and nothing
else”

as the instructions go/
learn from the label:

never make a promise
to your mother,
your brother,
your lover,
your co-worker

never commit to
stopping an addiction,
keeping up a love,
or being something
or not something
forever

never make a promise,
never ever
do.

there’s enough pain
in this world
for promises to
die out

so I beg of you

tell your children
tell your friends
tell your family
tell your church

never make a promise
most especially to

he tries to appear
brave
pushing against
the updrafts
and when
he swoops he
appears as graceful
as ever

but I see his
struggle,
his panic,
where to go?
where to go?
what to do?
oh god
oh god
oh god
he thinks

I walk back
inside and watch
him for a time

he flies away
hampered by the
wind
and I wish him
god speed
home

my eyes like
storm-clouds
promising a rain
like you’ve
never seen
as I whisper
with my
words
that I love
you
and you
smile
as the rain
starts and we
kiss in the hollow
way we always
do

Run,
free men,
run

by train
by car
by plane
by horse

depart from this
stagnating and dying
place, free men,
you must

you will be the first to go,
then the strong,
then the smart,
then the talented,
then the great,
until finally
only the meek
are left
and the world
will fall to ruin
in their hands

you must run,
free men,
you must seek
a new earth

you,
the ones
with dreams in your eyes
and love in your hands

you,
the men and women,
who hold the greatest
above the rest

you,
the people
who live despite
our culture of
death

run,
free men,
run

you,
free men,
must

free men,
run,
I beg of you

run,
escape,
I pray

I ask of you one thing,
free men and women
of the world:

do not look back
do not wonder what becomes
of your mothers and fathers
and brothers

we are lost
we are slaves
to our own
fortunes
and
we are not you,
you, free men

we are what you could’ve been
so learn form that

do not be us,
run from us,
part from us
without guilt,
we are jealous
of your truth

take this chance
free men,
use your willfulness,
your youth,
and
run

let this dying world
be dying

let our histories
be histories

let the past
be the past

let yourselves be
yourselves

run,
free men,
run

this earth will be here
for you to, one day,
reclaim

looking at each other
wrapped in two different
beds
we smiles, laugh, giggle
and seem happy
(it’s sickeningly cute)

we sing along to music
to regina spektor and the
decemberists
I don’t know all the lyrics
but she knows how to
sing

it’s a night to remember
I’m sure

in sixty years,
in thirty years
in fifteen
in ten

I’ll be thinking about
these great times

before everything happened
and nothing happened any-
more
before love died and happiness
stopped and youth wore away
on the rocks

I will remember the smiles
and the music and this night
like so many others will be
what keeps me going on for
the dark times to come

numbers,
letters shifting,
changing,
transforming
the meaning at
the surface and
deeper no longer the
same

we miss and we
long for a return to
normalcy
but it has flown
and will not
return

the time switches
hours and minutes
the poem morphs
into a page

the poems changing
with the times
we hugged so long
today

the numbers,
letters,
shifting, changing,
transforming
until the original
is gone
and some new
beast is built for us
to defeat

there they go
there we go
little bits of ourselves
little bits of our lives
on down the hill
towards another place
but they remember
the bigger selves they come from
the souls who love and care for them
we remember,
they, remember,
we see them go on down the hill
they see only our waving hands
we, aware of what this is,
they, feeling it without knowing
just what it is

then they are gone
on down the hill
little bits of ourselves
lost but not forgotten
they are gone
all of them
and we are left
with only
ourselves

as I turn back to the theatre
seeing my shadow across on the wall
it seems so much bigger than myself
I seem so much bigger than myself
and turning back, I am blinded,
by the world so bright for once

we step into the shoes
of a cowboy, down on-
to the dusty ground of
the plains, the revolver
strains against our side
and we feel but ignore
the sun

the town, like all towns,
is silent as we walk in,
one big foot in front of
the other, and when we
go into the saloon the
men playing cards fold,
the bartender puts down
his glass, and the ******
and other women turn
to look us up and down

and all we do is smile,
with our big broken
teeth, and they smile
too

we were the new kid
on the block, the last
hope for humanity, the
big man on town, and
we knew that things
were going to be ok
as we ordered a drink
and sat down with a
******* one side and
a fresh hand being
dealt on the table in
front of us

I doubt being
a poet
all your life,
doing nothing other
than writing
and reading
and editing,
can make for very
good poetry

what does a poet know
about real life?

he sits in his room,
he types,
he listens to music,
drinks fine liquor,
gets angry at things,
or loves things instead,
but if all he does is

write

how does he know
what you do?

I don’t seek to be a
“professional poet”

in fact,
I’m afraid
of it

afraid,
that I could never be
“a poet”
if I were to become a
“professional”
one

I want to work,
and learn,
and see the
world,
and then write
about it

because that’s the world
you
(the reader)
know
and
the world
you
read my poetry
to find answers
for

so I stay away
from the world of
poetry

I scorn it
and
love it
at the same
time

and again,
I am both the center
and the outsider
of one of the few
things I love
in this world

I stink of
gasoline,
and sweat
from hard
work, and
depression
from being
too smart
for my own
good

I look like
the down-
trodden, the
mangled
and
the chosen

hearing my voice
is torture to my
ears but entertaining
to others

I do not move
or sit still

I stink with my
existence,
long over-do a
checking in
with
reality

maybe if I got a girlfriend

maybe if I wasn’t doing
all this work for myself,
but for someone else

maybe then I’d do it,
work my *** off,
dig in and get it done
and be able to smile
about it at the end of
the day

because I work hard
when I think I can
succeed

I pour my heart into it,
my mind, my body,
everything

and when I do that
I’ve seen what I can
do

but presently,
I am not enough
and
no one is a real
enough goal

so I sit in thought,
wondering how to
trick myself, a boy
too smart for his
own good

no reason to live
or die, no purpose
to be seen, and no
idea why

life sinking down-
ward, stuck in sand
and digging out’s
impossible

smiles and frowns
and blank looks,
mind and body are
gone

I’m not enough for
myself, so how can
I be enough for any-
one else?

not all that
shimmers
is gold
but
then again
not all things
shat are
****

I go down the list

rehearsal:
check

printer:
check

vacuuming:
check

­ homework:
still to do

I smile

sometimes I get a bug,
a bug to really get things
done

it usually only happens
when I’m alone (nobody
to judge or interrupt my
work) and usually when
I’m gotten down worse
than I ever have before

so I get things done

I check my list again

work hard:
check

be better:
working on it

feel good:

I, uh...

next item
please

I clip my finger-
nails
listen to
pointless music
and try
to write a decent
poem

when will I
be able to call
myself a
“poet”

I refuse to
do it now
for fear of being
shot down
by the vultures
that constantly
circle over-
head

and in truth,
I don’t believe
it

I’m not like Hemmingway,
or Whitman, or Dickinson,
or Buk

I’m not wise,
I haven’t seen
the world,
I don’t know
anything about
anything
and most of all

I’m a kid

they’re all grown,
old or dead by the
time they garnered
any fame


and I’m sixteen,
a neophyte in a
generation of
lazy degeneration

but I am not part of
my generation, I am
privy to its problems
but stoic to its culture

I stand aside while
standing atop

I clip the final
finger, the pinky
of my left hand,
and the music
churns to a halt

I count all the poems
I’ve written

over five-hundred,
I chuckle

suppose I’m a poet
even if I’m a tad

untraditional

any time,
I feel depressed,
or meaningless,
or alone

I take a look
at any map
or picture
of our green earth
hanging in the
night

and there’s something
about it

how it’s
so peaceful,
so grand

that all my worries vanish
and I’m reminded just how
lucky I am

it would color him
and darken
him,
it would make him
cry
and make him
think

it would be devastating
and it would be
soul-crushing

it would destroy
and it would
create

it would ****,
only one,
but it would
****** more
in the times to
come

it is terrible,
and horrendous,
and monstrous,
and black,
and it happens

and it colors him,
and darkens him,
still.

if you were to
look
upon me
now

you’d find
my door
so
open

my hands
are busied in
writing

my mind
upon my
door

if you were to
look
upon me
now

you’d find
no one
in my door
frame

but watch me write,
and watch me live,
and watch me exist
with my door open

watch me write
a poem about it

and watch those offenders,
those defilers,
those vagrants,
mock and defame me
like a criminal and
a god

and if you were
to look upon me
now

while the wind
rolls dust on my
doorstep

you would find me
all alone
listening to the sounds
of “you’re a loner”

if you were
to look upon
me now

you would see a man
silently answer

“yes, I am a loner,
yes, I know that quite
well,

but there’s
nothing
I can do
when I sit in my
room
and only the wind
will talk to
me”

I have a grapefruit
sized welt on my
right shoulder-blade,
my muscles crack
when I move them,
and my beard is
coming in thicker
than it ever has
before

I clocked a random
guy in the hall and
I completely meant
it,

it just wasn’t meant
for him

poor guy

guess this is what it
means to be a man

scars on the body,
violence in the heart

tears, love,
and vice
not allowed
on the
outside

I reject my right
to all this

I’m fairly certain
nobody would know
I think at all
if it wasn’t for my
poetry

that’s ok

there is a beautiful
poem hiding behind
the little spaces in
my mind

the words are in there,
not out there, and some
how, I need to coax
them out

but I don’t know what
they’re like; they hide
so well I can’t even
describe their shadow

so it might be a dog,
who wants thoughts
on anger, and hate,
and frustration

or it might be a horse,
beckoning me to be
free and run wild

or it might be a man,
or it might be a woman,
or it might be a whale,
or a cat,
or a bird,
or a car,
or it might be a
dog

so I throw out everything,
dog-treats like remembering
how I’ve been ******* over,
and cat-nip like the last time
I snuggled up with an old
love,
and human sweets, like poems
that display the worst possible
existence any person could
have (and how I have it)

these words,
hiding somewhere
in this big ol’
mind:

come out,
come out to play,
I need you boy,
I need you back,
you know it.

oh is that’s what you are?
oh ok,
maybe I’ll go chase
another animal,
your inspiration
isn’t any
good

the reflection
of a hanged man
shines in the
eyes of a spider
spinning the first
web of spring

shush,
quiet,
silence
now

now,
we wait.

we calm our bodies,
freeze our eyes,
stop our hearts,
and

listen.

we exist in a
bubble,
staring out
at the world
for a moment,
and it’s not
beautiful

the people of the world
are greedy and ignorant

the forest are charred
and ****** stumps

the oceans are full of
the dead and the dying

the future and the past
mean nothing

shush,
quiet,
silence,
now.

now,
we listen,
trying to find
a reason,

any reason,

to preserve it,
to maintain it,
to keep living,
amongst this
hell man has
brought to
earth

the day is dark,
and wet,
and cold,
and the cars are still,
and the people are
silent,
and the earth does not
turn.

I am dumb,
and pointless,
and frozen,
and my body is dead,
and my words say
nothing,
and my mind does
not think about any-
thing any-
more.

I was going down-stairs
for some water
and the last thing I
remember
is pausing my music
before
I was getting my
water

just like that,
just in a blink of
an eye,
I was there

and I can’t remember
going down the stairs,
or what I thought as I
went down them,
or what I did as I went
down them

and I worry perhaps
I just missed something
great,
but most likely:
I didn’t

half of the teenagers I know
make art, and songs, and
poetry just to lash back
at the things they don’t like
in the world

complaining about their friends, or
rebelling against their parents, or
crying about how unfair everything
is

and the stupid ones,
the really stupid ones,
call someone out in
their work

but it’s not just the idiots.

the geniuses, the logicians,
the thinkers, the wise-childs,
the high-school cool kids,
the suicidal geeks, the god-
driven outcasts, the losers
too fat or too weird to hang
out with the “normals”

anyone.

anyone,
who makes any
sort of art,
has done
it.

and they feel stupid,
really, really, stupid
when the person finds
out and the **** hits
the fan and everybody
is on everybody’s side
and nobody’s evil while
everybody’s the bad
guy and it’s funny if
you’re lucky enough
to be outside of it
all

so just like every
stupid habit of man

(like love, and hope,
and destiny)

we cling and repeat,
and rinse and redo,
and keep writing
poems about people
we hate without
saying their name
and instead,
screaming
it

I grin at those
who get this

cold,
metallic,
unforgiving,
uncaring,
faceless,
emotionless,
all-know­ing,
all-seeing,
all-saying,
always silent,
always calm,
never lost,
never going anywhere,
never wondering,
never doubting,
unbending,
undulating,
unrelenting
a mirror,
a wall,
a window,
a door,
a hole,
a plug,
a sword,
a shield,
a dagger,
blood,
heart,
brain,
eyes

iron is
and iron
does
and
iron is-

there,
always.

always…

there.

remember your mortality
the wise-man says

know that your
flesh and bones
will die one day
and by happy with
it

you will live on
in your children,
in your work,
your memory will
float about on the
river of time

and the sage,
behind his white
beard,
rambles on and
on about his roman
wisdom
until
his bones turn to
dust
and his words
no longer
echo

as he dies,
moving on
to heaven or
no-where,
he leaves you
to remember your
mortality

how even great
men,
like him,
fade against
time’s beating
rays

your fingers and
your toes, all the
hairs on your head,
the works of your
hands, and spawn
of your ****

they bear against
the rushing waves,
of life and death
and history.

they cannot survive for-
ever

nothing,
ever can.

+

so these leaves us still perplexed

as to the meaning
of our very existence,
and to what death
is, and why it comes,
and why it corrupts
everything that ever
was

I come to you,
bearing a young face
and old eyes,
answering your
question with my booming
voice:

there is
none

forget your blood
and genes and eyes

forget the finger-nail
clippings and the dead
corpses of so many
soldiers

to live without meaning is freedom

the choice to make
what we can out of
nothing

that,

I say to
you,

is what it’s
all
about

+

I don’t think of death
I do not ponder at its cause
I do not wonder at its morals
I do not quest for its final
cure

I live,
in happiness,
thinking-

-knowing-

that this world
means nothing

and as I sip my drink,
and play my games,
and fall in and out of
love, I am not depressed
at thinking there is
nothing

in fact,
I am
relieved

it is the beat of rain on rooftops
the squeal of tires on tired roads
echoing of a cough in a church
the slamming of book on floor
calls of birds, and bugs, and dogs
pencils tapping messages in code

the tv turning on to a commercial
the phone hanging on the receiver
change rattling in a hobo’s can
a woman’s gasp at a man’s proposal

the silence of the forest
the quiet of child’s sleep
the hush of new snow
the words staring back

the beat of a tribesman’s old drum
the horns of a million city’s sewers
the strings of the reeds and oceans
the vocals of a world without sleep

the sight of man in free-fall
the smell of a fresh, new day
the feel of looking out at the
world

these are the sounds of living,
the very song of life.

we hear it
and
we play it
and
we know the tune

but,
never,
amongst all this
cacophony and
symphony,
do we ever
realize:

we were never taught this song

everybody can find meaning in poetry

it’s the easiest thing
in the world to do

you just read it
and say
it means something

that’s it

ha
ha

simple isn’t it?

too simple
I suppose

ha
ha

I sure wish I was
writing this down
right now

so that somebody could
find some,
uh,

meaning
to it

hehehe

hell,
just so they’d
find some meaning
in something
anything
even
this

I wrote the most beautiful thing today
and now I’m going to cut this beard off
and forget it because it was not within
my rights in the first place

don’t forgive me,
I didn’t ask for
that,
and don’t hate me,
because I didn’t ask
for that
either

the broken glass
is scattered every-
where

and we hop like
we know what
we’re doing

the gashes in our feet
are minor, to the pain
of showing it hurts

it rained today,
and my mind
thinks
about how beautiful
the fog was
and how good
the cold water felt on my
face
and how terrible
it would be
if I were anyone
else right
now

it is not the shadows
we survive in,
nor the undersides of
rocks,
neither is it the shade
of trees
or
the nether-regions
of the mind

no

it is only in
the cool of
night,
when all can see
if they look hard
enough

that is when we dance,
that is when are,
that is when…

…we are the night-walkers,
beings of grace.

we, the things so ugly,
we, the creatures so horrendous,
we, the nightmares and the
dreams all at once.

we walk out on ten legs
or two,
marching in no particular
pattern at all
yet in such coordination
that the armies of the
world salute in shame

our meaning is nothing

our existence, in and of
itself, is astounding
enough

we do not need to scream
from the roof tops to get
the message across

we are the night-walkers,
dancers of the moon,
we have no grace or charming
traits,
yet you fear us,
but we
don’t fear
you

or, or, or,

we could say we’re sorry

or, or, or

we could go back to the place
we had our first day

or, or, or

we could just forget all this
and go back to the way things
were

or, or, or,

we forget everyone and
everything and run away
together!
and be in love again like
we were!

or, or, or,

we can…
we can…
we can…

no.
no,
we can’t.

I sit silently,
in love,
as I always do
when I am such
perplexed

but never,
as I have found,
can I emerge from this
meditation
with grace
or obtain my goals
through my methods,
so recently dreamed
up

books of poetry sit
dusty on my shelf

written by Neruda,
Hughes,
and assorted
others

but another being
sits there
too

it is Bukowski

his seven or so books
in my ownership
slouched in the corner
singing drunken
tunes

so, yes,
this is another
poem about my
second father

but it’s less about him,
and more about the others,
those books of poesy
I could never finish

sure,
I’ll read the first
section,
maybe half
of them,
maybe all but
the last
little
bit,

but never the whole
book,
cover to
cover.

I don’t know why,
money down the
drain really,
and yet,
I don’t regret
it

maybe I’m not cultured,
slumming with henry
and his gang of profanity
and depression,
to appreciate how and
what
they’re writing

but when I go back,
after reading the poems
for a little bit before
bed,
I find that I can go to
sleep when I put down
the works of Longfellow
or Cummings.

but when I finally silence
Bukowski,
all I can do is write
until my hands bleed so
much it hurts,
or my mind works to exhaustion
while my body falls to
shambles

my greatest
allies are always
my recently
defeated
foes

by the count of my computer
I have written four-hundred
and ninety-nine poems

such a terrible number,
499,
so I write this poem
to even things out
and I sit here trying to
reconcile all this hard
work I’ve done for
nothing

I suspect
that I may be the
greatest man
ever born

because,

I am by-far
the worst man
to ever walk
the earth

it is the worst
moment
in a boy’s life, when
he sees,
for the first time, what
his father really
is

it is the moment,
that the boy becomes
a man

he must now replace
his father
he must now fool his

own son for so many
years
making him think
that his father is
god,
just as he had
thought

it is not for revenge
it is not for laughs
it is because it is what must be
done

a boy raised under a mere
man
will never become
one

humans have evolved
to see god in everything,
to make everything
better than they are

so that we’ll be afraid.
so that we’ll always
have our guard up.
so that we’ll think that
our weakest foe is our
most powerful enemy

it was needed,
for survival,
like all the other quirks
of this species
but it has changed,
evolved,
since then

it emerges when the son sees
his dad, his papa, his opa,
go from a being so much bigger
than anything else in the world
to being so much smaller than
even the dwarf that the son used
to be

it may be the fall
of the patriarch
that is the cause of all
this

but it is the offspring.
that suffers the
greatest
pain

when I’m so lost that
even the night doesn’t
make sense any more

the times when my
mind has lost logic
and ideology

music doesn’t help
and neither does
the poetry

staring up at the stars
I feel the blackness and
pointlessness for once

the lion gazes at me,
noble as it is, and
smirks

victory is on the wall
but success is behind
it

metaphor’s without
meaning all of a sudden
make all the sense in
the world

trembling I write done
every word I hear and
see

the lost tapes of a
forgotten man do
not console a man
who’s never been
remembered in the
first place

sickness deep in my gut,
I know what this is all
about



throwing up in the hall,
a barn picture looks at
me and smirks

I throw it to the ground
and watch it hit without
breaking

I run