nine poems written now
boredom on the plane helps me
why haikus I ask

everything hurts
everything

it feels good

maybe I’ll sleep well
tonight

1
2
1
2
3
4
5
(how did you read this?)

just a number,
I suppose,
but to think that my work
has been seen
that many
times
is
quieting,
simply
put

now I feel the guilt
of my 20,000 faces

fighting in everybody’s corner
I never really take a side
but work for and against each one
just as much
or
more

every time I’m asked for sympathy
I can only come back with a hollow
“yeah… sure.”

do they notice?
do they know?
do they hate me,
secretly,
as whispers
traveling through all ears
but mine?

so few,
(if any)
know this deep,
dark,
terrible,
horrible,
character-destroying,
world-shatt­ering,
locked up,
and bursting
fact of my
life

yet here I go
sharing it with
the world

I straighten up now

I will not hide this poem,
not like some,
I am not ashamed

there is truth in confession.

but to all,
not to
some.

got some cash
ready to go
let’s spend some money
on something for fun
and forget all the troubles
of this world
in depression

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

why does man
not realize his place
amongst the spinning
cogs of the universe?

why does man
not understand
that we, just like
everything else,
are one more
piece in a machine
with no other purpose
than to keep working?

why does man
not give up his fight
with the truth? or maybe,
a better question is,
why can’t he?

laugh in the face of death
give him a big old smile and say
“*******”
tell him
“I don’t care if I die,
I’m not afraid.
Not of you,
not of where you’ll take me.
So come on!
**** me!
**** me you crazy ******,
or I’ll do it myself!”

and he’ll back down
saying
“**** man,
calm down
it’s not that big of a deal”

and tell him
“no big deal?
what the hell you talking about?
no big deal.
psh.
You’re ******* death
come to ******* **** me
and I’m supposed to be ******* my pants
but guess what?
*******!
I’m not afraid!
Come at my you mad-house ****
I wanna see what you got!”

death’ll run then
off back into the shadows
where he waits for you regain your fear
but right then
high on the adrenaline of this whole scene
you can’t be touched by him

you just said
“*******”
to death
and guess what?
keep it up
and
he might just never come to get you

no more fighting
no more running
no more wondering
no more fearing

we will not stand for this life
we will not be the **** of the earth
we will not ache to be anything else

this is the time to be true to our dreams
this is the place to forget old inhibitions

I will become more, as I have always known  I was.

let us look like the Native Indian

not at the physical
but at the real

the spirit
not the form

the mind
not the body

let’s look out ourselves
who we are
what we do
how we are seen
and how we see
ourselves

let’s look at me
what do I see?

I am strong, wise,
smart, brazen, not
fifteen but inside
much older, a man
with a long flowing
beard

but that is my eye
my Indian eye

but

let’s look at me
what do you see?

I am a tired soul
awaiting the end
of an endless life

my hull has battered many
more storms
then any single ship
should ever have
to weather
and
still
I have a whole
life left to
live

I am a tired soul
awaiting a port
to finally dock in

my mast has been broken
over and over,
the sails
torn through
one too many
times,
and
the lower decks
leak with an
unnerving
drip

I am a tired soul
floating about on
a deserted ocean

my fleet is gone,
my crew abandoned,
and I have only
time and
the sea
as a companion
into the
adventure that
is death


I am a tired soul
facing the kraken’s
wide, gaping jaws

my time has come,
as the story
goes,
but in my
final moments
I can attempt one
last show of
bravery
and
jump
towards my
fate

steal brandished

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

that’s ok

the ocean felt much remorse
for the ships she’d drowned
trying to help them cross her
waters as gently as she could.

to be better
that is the challenge

it was not something said directly,
or even verbally,
I saw it in the way you looked,
the way you walked,
you said with your body
“you can be better”

without even knowing it
you smirked
knowing I will rise to the occasion
and I smile back as well
but on the inside,
for probably the first time,
I doubt
the possibility
of me doing
it

Arches tall lead from
Little dividers keeping
Some out and others
Trapped inside

Pink birds with weird
One leg stances stand
In clumps taking wonder
From the people that
Come and go like farm
Cats

Black and white bears
Lazily pick away at hard
Bamboo sticks and are
Content with being the
Last of their kind

These are the beast of
Far away and this is the
Ark carrying them over
The sea of life

For they
Have lost their
Fight

Their instincts
The things that make them
Animals

They are the peaceful wonders
Staring out of fish bowls and
Wondering why people come
And stare at their simple lives

All they have is time
The lion sleeps softly on a rock
The tiger swims, but with no prey to catch
The elephants walk about seeing the
Crowd’s shock with each of his
Thundering steps

The monkeys swinging from artificial
Vines not caring that we (their brothers)
Have given up our childhood games we
Used to play

Opting, instead, to walk lazily in the hot
Summer day and stare agape at the beasts
Who are not beasts that wonder at our
Funny ways and the food that appears
To them each day but who do not care
And decide to sleep instead

at midnight,
as I take off my shoes,
my coat,
shirt, tie, vest,
socks and
pants,
I am caught in
the delirium
of
revolution

this revolution
takes place entirely
within me

my kidneys are
attacked in destructive
raids,
my knees knocked
and sweltered with
war,
my mind shot at
and frantically
mended,
my heart has
seen much better
days

it is an uprising against
myself

a war
to overturn
the old thinking
regime

outside of me,
I can feel the sting
of bullet and
blade

inside of me,
I can see the pain
of evolution and
change

I rest my weary head tonight
drunk on thoughts of an end
to all this

by the morning’s
cool touch
I will find myself
rid of such
thoughts

wondering only if
she’ll be there for me
when I call her twenty;
thirty; forty years
from now

I watch the night turn about me
and rest my eyes for the first time

young, so full of youth,
filled to the brim with
*** and desire and the
quest for flesh,

we are living the lives they
write about

we the young, so full of
uncontained emotion, so
happy to be alive and yet
not even realizing it, we
talk of suicide but never
believe it exists

we are perfect in our
decided ignorance of
our imperfections

(it gives us strength like
nobody knows)

-

spreading across the globe,
to China, Europe, and the
Southern Lands, our disease
is no plague

to the youth of the enslaved
places, to the poor countries,
and those shackled in the old
traditions:

we give to you our itch,
our burn, our aching and
hurting that drives us to
go out and do what needs
to be done

we give to you a reason
to make things better

(just as we give ourselves)

we are the reason
the earth still spins

we are the drive
behind every new
empire

we are the innovators
and the diviners

the makers of tools
and seekers of
riches

the creators of gods
and the gods
themselves

we, so young, so full
of energy and zeal and
lust, we the ones who
create and destroy, we
who so thoughtlessly
hurtle the human race
forward

we take ourselves to bed
each night, not wondering
with whom we sleep or
where we will awake;

knowing only that adventure
is worth having in itself.

that the morning is our treasure
and the new day is more fulfilling  
than any golden trinket in the
tombs of the old kings

this we sleep with, smiling,  
dreaming of the wild chances
we are challenged to tame

-

so young, so full of youth,
filled to the brim with ***
and desire and the thirst for
a definition in this grey and
blotted world

we awake each day
and drearily attack our
lives

we the pioneers, the philosophers,
and historians

humanity cannot live without us
(and I mean to say they have no
choice)

I think I’m rotting out
like driftwood floating
with the waves, bashing
again and again against
the pier

with each impact I lose
some of myself, maybe
just a splinter or an old
piece of bark, but slowly
I’m disappearing

this, I think, is how all
things die: bit by bit by
bit while all the world
goes on

death then is not an end
but a forgetting, the slow
drain of interest until
the pulse of memory
falls silent

looking out at the ocean
I wonder how much of
me has already floated
away

exits are both ways
they need more food on here
grumble grumble my head says

at this very moment in time,
I am terrified for the future
of the human race

I wake up each day and hear things
no man should hear
and yet each day I wake up
and I am assaulted with a world
speeding towards the brink of
oblivion

I have no comment
on what is right
or wrong,

to each man his own
has always been the
nature of this universe.

but on the things we now hold dear:
the ignorance
the xenophobia
the arrogance
the paranoia
the fear

I cannot reconcile them

so much hate,
has become the norm

hate for others,
hate for difference,
hate for abnormality,
hate for normality

no one
knows the true meaning
of love
anymore

each person walks into the day
holding a brandished steel in one hand
and a hardened shield in the other

nobody knows how to be vulnerable
or how to leave the vulnerable be

we all act like warriors
battling in some unforgiving
war

yet we are not,

we are simple people
trying to live simple
lives.

on this day,
nine years ago,
a tragedy was struck
that the world will never
forget

on this day,
forty-seven years ago,
a miracle occurred
that only a few have ever
noticed

on this day,
one of these past events
blocks out the
other

hate has eclipsed love
and in this moment of
time:
I am fearful,
for the future of
humanity

I see the apparitions
of a million mourning
people
standing here
amongst hundred year old graves
and hundred year old trees

they walk slowly
tears dropping
without ever hitting
the ground

one by one
flowers of every color
are put on grave
after grave
till this bleak
and dusty
graveyard
turns into a beautiful
arrangement of ornamental
and inorganic reminders

as each grave adds to the garden
of paper flowers each ghostly figure
of some mourner past disappears as
in a puff of smoke until all of them
have evaporated into the air and I am
left alone in a dusty graveyard adorned
only with fake blooms and overgrown
weeds

the sun beats down hot on my head
and I sweat as the sun comes level
with my eyes

a little girl toddles up to me
pointing at the petals adorning
a near-by grave

she asks
“are those paper flowers?”

I say yes
and comment
on the beautiful
day

“yes”
she says
“it’s a good day for paper flowers”

and I sat there
silent
watching the sun
set
on a beautiful
place such as
this

as days have turn to hours,
much more quickly than I
could have anticipated, my
tendency to observe myself
in these moments before my
greater ones has kicked in

nine hours stands between
me and grand change in my
life yet those hours seem as
ordinary as any I have had
over these months

what I feel is a grand lack
of anticipation for the end
that is even more swiftly
approaching

I propose that this is because
this condition, this tragedy in
any other’s eyes, is nothing
but a set-back in my life for
me

while others panic, look wildly
at me when I utter this disease
that I do have, I have never done
that

I sat stoically in that office,
somehow knowing there was
nothing to worry about

to this day I cannot tell you
why I think that way

I can tell you I do

I have, in my heart,
a complete faith that
this will not be my
end

mortality was neither
further nor nearer to
my mind

as the hours to turn
to minutes, the same
amount of struggle in
the end, I cannot say
I feel any different

if anyone were to ask
me now, I would say
I hope tomorrow is a
normal day

the revolution, or should I say,
the American one, was such a
beautiful time because it was
last era were hope persisted in
this world

though they knew times were
not getting better, they knew
that their children, or the child’s
children, or the child’s children’s
offspring, would one day inherit
the beauty of this world

those men in ***** wigs and
uncomfortable cotton could
believe like few others in
history

sure, some might say the french,
in their coup d’état, had as much
or more vigor as their American
peers, but as I recall, their fervor
would turn on them and consume
them like a fire burning out of
control

some too argue that the generations
following the fathers, those trekking
out the western frontiers, those going
off to the civil, the first, and the second
world wars were just as brave and yes
they were

brave

they were brave indeed
but they were not filled
with hope

they did not expect to win

they expected to die
they expected to fail
to lose, to go down in
history as nothing and
that was enough for
them

but not Washington
not Jefferson,
not Madison,
not Adams,
not Hamilton,
not Franklin.

they weren’t in it for history,
they were in it for the future

for the history
of the day after
tomorrow

they
fought because
they knew
they
could
win

until today this optimism
had died

until today, when I, looking into the
future and seeing nothing, still smile,
there was no one who truly understood
that life is not about living

it is about the lives that go on living
after you

I have just felt
the blow
that a god feels
when he is first returned
to mortality

not to say I am,
or ever was,
a god
but I do mean to say
I was powerful,
strong,
impenetrable even,
and I have now been hit
with the force of a hurricane
across the newly soft
and vulnerable
cheeks of my
face

I had risen so far,
in my mind,
but I was worse
than ever
as I’ve found
out

now,
I am sick with it

the return to humanity
the plummet to vulnerability
the paralyses of that first
strike

I am a titan no more
and yet I never was

but this fall back to normality
is like the death of someone
I only realized I hated
after his grave
had been spat on
by so many
of his former
friends

the first time,
it was a real smooching,
there in the rain
the passion
running down our
skin

I had just asked her out
I had just brought it to a head

everything up to that point,
the flirting,
the jokes,
the talking back
and forth for
hours,
had all been leading up
to that moment,
there in the pouring rain,
the water flowing down
the side-walks and we
couldn’t even feel our
feet

but I grabbed her,
asking what secret
she had been hiding
from me

and she wouldn’t tell me,
but she gave this little nod,
this little glare, that said
“do it now you fool”

so I did

I did and we kissed,
we kissed as the world
flooded and our friends
partied on and it was
magical

now we’re not really sure
what the future holds

we haven’t gone on a date,
yet.

but that’s what Friday’s for
that’s what the future is for

and for now,
I can deal with having
a single kiss a day

still flirting,
still shy,
still unsure

but we both know
there’s something
different

something worth smiling
about

long lost or
long forgotten
we all feel as if left
by those who we
thought really
cared

come and go
is the natural
way of the uni-
verse but we’re
caught on the
barrier between
natural and
unnatural and
we hate it  here

more complex than animals
yet still animals

we feel all the ancient urges
welling up inside us as our
minds scream NO NO NO
at the things we want but
refuse to do

***
***
***

food
food
food

**** or be killed
**** or be killed
**** or be killed

in your mind
in your head
in your heart

it’s always been there
but we treat it like an
invading army

we are all animals
in a world filled
with all sorts of
other life

are we better?
worse?
the same?
different?

think
think
think

it’s all we’ve got
and it tortures us
so much

are we all alone?
each of us an island
destined to drift for
a time before sinking
into the abyss?

friends
family
and
lovers
are
all illusions
cooked up by
evolution to
keep us from
killing ourselves
at the thought
of what our
life really is

we are all alone
but the way we
survive is to stick
together even if
it goes against
everything the
universe tells us

and we are caught
between the natural
and the unnatural as
our ship rocks against
the whim of the uni-
verse and our species
continues to evolve

something died
or
something was born
after something died
or
something was born
from the something
that died
or
something has changed
and I feel like I’m newly
born and yet as if I have
died at the same time

something has changed
is all I know

something snapped
or
something broke
or
something burnt up
or
something exploded
and is still raining
down upon the land

something is different

something has changed

but the world has not changed,
there is a comfortable fear in
that

“all life ends in eternity”

I say it once

“all life ends in eternity
all life ends in eternity”

I say it twice

“all life ends”

I break it down

“eternity is the end of all life”

to even simpler pieces

“life isn’t eternal?”

it couldn’t be I think

“life becomes eternity?”

but then what is eternity?

“life is eternity?”

hmm

“all life ends in eternity
all life ends in eternity”

I say it twice

“all life ends in eternity”

I say it again

all life ends in eternity

and I look into eternity
for the first time

they warned us
they would
come

soon,
they said,
reeling from
our stubborn ability
to resist
them

but no one
suspected their return
as they came like ants upon
a bread crumb
or like an ocean
broken through
an aging
dam

there is a world filled with soulless faces
lurking out there in the void
and we dream of this world and have nightmares
about this world and we fear what sort of men
might inhabit it

so rarely do we wake up
to find
the world already
here

we, the monsters who inhabit it.

sometimes,
the only thing
to do
is to crawl into bed,
go to sleep,
and hope that,
in the morning,
all you’re failures
will be forgiven
and you can start back
on the road
ahead

sometimes,
this isn’t an
option

but when it is,
I suggest it

crawl back
-alone,
go rest your
eyes,
hope that,
-tomorrow,
you don’t hate
yourself
like you do
today
so
you can get back
to what you were
doing
and be who you
are meant to
be

the poet in me is quiet now
no longer does he sing words
of love and whisper songs of
passion, no longer does the
drive to create pull at my feet
and walk me into the pit of
fresh reality, no longer does
the relief come when the word
emerges on the page, instead
there is only dissatisfaction and
sadness.

the poet in me must have left
no longer friends with the beat
of my heart, no longer in tune
with the secret channels my mind
broadcasts, no longer demanding
me to feel that which I refuse to
even acknowledge, no longer
there reminding me that I am
more than a body of flesh and
blood.

the poet in me is dead or gone
no longer putting up a fight with
the destructive order of my soul,
no longer bringing out the human
side of my heart, no longer engaging
all of my brain, no longer pushing me
to be more than I am expected to,
no longer making me sing and
talk and believe in myself, no
he is too good for that now.

the poet in me is quiet now
and all we have left is his pen
and our memory.

when I closed my eyes
while we were making love
I could almost make out
the man you were
whispering to
when you said
that he was
the greatest person
you’d ever
known.

we sit here
all our troubles laid out
in front of us

we can’t think of anything to say
but we talk anyways
trying to convince everyone
it’s not as bad as it seems
and failing to impress even the children
and especially yourself

we sit here
all our troubles laid out
in front of us

the best of us stand
get up and take the whole pile
underneath one arm
and walk out the door

but most of us sit
watching as our pile of troubles
grows greater and greater
and more and more people
walk out the door

how does it feel
to be alone
in the dark
with nothing else
but yourself?

how does it feel
that at the end
of the day
there is nothing else
but yourself?

“a great tragedy has befallen
the young people of
this generation”

“they are so trite,
so supercilious,
so full of greed,
and now, now,
now”

“I miss the old days”

he said,
stressing each
syllable as if a thief
might steal them
away if he did not weigh
them down
enough

“when you were expected
to be something. have some
merit.”

“everybody had to earn
their living.”

“but now all we’ve got shiny,
plastic crap and chrome finished
phones that do everything for
you”

“what ever happened to wood
and steel and agonizing work?”

“I don’t I say”
with a shrug

“of course you don’t”

he said, like the millions
of other xenophobes so
afraid of the future they
aren't even aware of it

“you’re just one of
them”

he rises out of cold sands
stone eyes give way to stone
faces
his teeth are rare jewels
yet lack value
or
desire

he disturbs the dunes

silently

he tears cacti
from the ground
by their
roots

he lets
scorpions
hide in
his grainy
skin

his music
is the chirping
of dying
insects

his movements sound
like the evening wind

he travels to the rock pillar
in the desert somewhere,
seeking his answers like a
dog to his home

for years he travels,
shifting through the
sands,
and the desert grows
upon as if he never moved
in the first
place

he will find the place he seeks,
one day,
and he will talk with
snakes about things
snakes do not know
about

his rough lips will quiver
his hard eyes will well
his soft mind will bend
his old hands will clench

he will talk religion
with souls full of
deception
and
make decisions
on the advice of committed
liars

he will go from that place,
head full of answers,
and wander through the sands
until he wears away

and where he finally rests
his mighty shoulders
for the last time
there will stand a simple mark
to say he had once existed
and that he never once
suspected his
murderers

I’ve got
three dollars,
no girlfriend,
a big ol’
brain in my
head

tomorrow I will
fail in a way that
nobody could’ve
predicted

I am:
nothing more
nothing less
then a boy with
a good set of hands
and the ability
to think

why do I even try?

why do I even pretend
I am wanted?

the world does not want me
the workplace does not want me
the literary community does not want me
the women do not want me

I don’t even want myself

I am angry
but I know it’ll
pass

I feel real with
$3 and no
girlfriend

all that leaves is me

that’s all I’ve ever
really had

We are a people that only children love
Men and women proud of themselves
But when asked, cannot tell you why they
Should be

Ideology replaces morality
Sin becomes greater than overcoming
It
Never forget we are the sons and daughters
Of immigrants too

We quietly grew strong
Munching on fallow fields and iron-hard
Men
Our adolescence ended in war
But our virtue is still fading like those
Battles were justified

Like so many others,
We did not realize how great we were

Too late did we think, oh,
We are not entitled, simply
Lucky

We have yet to realize this

Never did we think god was not one of
Us

Just as we dream we live
Caught in high clouds and strung out
On past success
We are a people only children could
Love

and simply put,
they do

apparently,
to me,
staking my whole life,
all my possibilities
and future achievements,
is not a good enough motivation
to do the right thing
for me, for society,
for anything

as I nurse my wounds
of love lost,
of happiness
shattered,
I realize I was not enough
for her either

so I look to other things in my life:
was I enough for them?

apparently,
I am not enough

not even for
myself

lost
the summer day

heat waves
and bird
chirping music
this is quite a beautiful
afternoon

trees are green
the sky is blue
I am blank,
lost as the summer
day

he likes forgetting
good things
bad things
because to him
it’s all bad
because it’s all
not good enough

he keeps himself away
like some secret
that could destroy
the world
and
you have to wonder
if he knows how silly
he sounds

he’s voiceless but
he loves to scream
enjoying the cacophony
because he doesn’t
believe he can make
music

he’ll show up dead probably
not in the ground, but somewhere
like a run-down apartment
or a happy family of four
and you’ll know because
he only frowns
between when the drink
hits his lips
and
when the drink
hits his mind
like sleeping gas

he’s not worried about it though
he says there’s nothing to be worried about
that you shouldn’t worry, that this is the way
that things are going to play out
no matter if he’s loved
if he’s hated
if he succeeds
or fails
if all his dreams come true
or all his nightmares

it’s time, he says,
to make peace with it
and if you would please
just leave him alone
to feel alive
without
guilt.

what does it mean
if I don’t want her
to come back home
tonight?

though not yet ready to take on the world,
I am desperate to attack the rest of my life.

I am
seventeen

smart, strong,
and optimistic

over-brimming with
energy and excitement
and juvenile grit

it is time for the world
to meet the real me

a being of inexplicable good luck
determined to make the best of it

women, men, and children
I introduce to a man not yet
fully realized

but know this:

he will come to you with fire
and the best of you will carry
it on beyond him

as I laid in bed
waiting on sandman
to carry me off
to sleepy-land
I thought about all
we had done
together

each date
each talk
each smile
each smirk
each fight
each hug
each kiss
each ****

and in the end,
when sandman finally
found his way to me,
he had to ask me why
I was smiling so
much

now that I’m old enough,
to see and recognize
important,
historical,
events
they just seem
to keep coming
and coming
and
coming

tonight,
Osama is dead

the boogey man
the terrorist patriarch
the killer
the mass-murderer
the second ******
the king of thieves
the bearded Beelzebub
the destroyer of worlds

the colossal nature of
this moment hits me like
a truck

it is a victory
it is a turning point
it is a momentous
event

I cannot fathom it

this is the start of a new era
a dawn of a new age

in this moment
I hope the world celebrates
but I warn you,
it’s not over

yet

this is death

this is the black
of the black and white

this is the sound after the last song
this is the racetrack after the racers have left
this is the pencil resting next to a finished
masterpiece

this is your feet
this is your hand
this is your sweat
this is your face

this is your tired rest
this is your comforting grasp
this is your release
this is you

this is a book sealed shut with the eons of never being opened
this is a mind sealed shut with the steel locks keeping the eons
out

this is you in your greatest moment
this is you in your worst moment

you’ve already done the best thing in your life
you did it yesterday as you sat on the toilet,
or as you laid in bed sick,
or you read a book,
or you kept a secret,
or you told a secret

you will never be as good as you were a moment ago
and this will continue for the entirety of your life
but you never faultier
you well never fail
you will grow greater and greater every minute
even as your better self slips away into the past

this is your feet worn to the bone
this is your hand dirtied with time
this is your sweat hot with your effort
this is your face smiling in regret

this is the bird flying home to its nest
this is the car that drives past an accident
this is the artist laughing for the first time
in years

this is the white
of the black and white

this is life

it means that I am scared
that for the love I failed
before, I am cursed to fail
forever.

I face my past tomorrow

with a bandana across my eyes
and a cigarette hanging
out of my mouth

I expect the worst
and
deserve the worst
and
I do not care

I am turning my back on what was
and turning forward to what may be

am I arrogant?
perhaps

but I feel it only fitting
to look back at all their angry
faces with knowing
smirk

laughing at them
for hardly expecting it,
and even more so for
not having a clue
why