The shoe won't fit...the shoe won't fit...

Cinderella sits on the velvet stool.

My toes won't fit...my heels won't fit...

She desperately crams her foot into the shoe.

The glass it burns...cool against my blood...

Her curtain of locks mask her scrunched-up face.

Just a little longer....just a minute more...

She holds back the tears smarting in her eyes.

It fits...it fits...I'll make it fit...

Slowly, she gets on her own two feet.

A better life...better future...

*She grits her teeth, walking forward, step by step, scarlet tears dripping from her mangled feet.

There is no dusk in this city
penetrated by the raging Potomac,
Night just crams itself in and
rapes the day dry -
lays her flat against the horizon.
Mothers and children run for covers
and put each other to sleep;
in a few hours
harlots and nighthawks will do the same.

Sweet Siren
You are this city
Petticoated and pretty,
Cunning and stunning
Winking and blinking
Red
Yellow
Green
eyes popping open like sunken headlights,
Ready for the night.

I hear your wailing
red-flashed and flaming
like an open heart,
piercing the black with it's plea.
I feel your pulse-pumping red corpuscles
thrusting me deep into
lusting for things forbidden and hidden
Somewhere inside this neon wonderland.

Sweet Siren,
Sing your teasing tunes for me
Deliver me from your shelters and streets,
Where infidels and angels
Fall at your feet.
Sweet Siren,
Deliver me to the
Trembling shelter of your sheets.

Liars and their lies
roam this concrete jungle
begging for love and razors
and other disposable items.
You go screaming passed them though,
determined to save at least one numb drunk ***
in some rain cleansed back alley of vices;
only to fool your own conscience
with the lithium laced smile of charity.

Sweet Siren
Quiet your angry shrill to a hush
The tarmac and taxis are tired of us
And your princes and saviors have fled this town.
Sweet Siren,
It's time for us to burn this city down
And leave the ashes
For the thieves and the clowns.

A caliph trembles at the sound of aircraft
like a dachshund beaten too much while
his pack snap and bite and **** their legs
to *** on a better world

Their state is a chewed thighbone
covered in flies yet they mint coins
in gold and silver and praise God as they
throw effeminate teenagers off rooftops

A Turkish fisherman with a large shoe
stuffs cash into a pregnant pocket
and crams frightened souls into the shoe
which sinks on the horizon like the sun

Assassins have the crescent moon
in their left hands ***** pictures
on their phones and tight vests
leaking lava

She searched for tips on eyeliner
the day she erupted as a volcano
leaving her sheer blouse to mourn
at home on the ironing board

The world has become as mad
as Napoleon in stiletto heels
cross-legged on the back
of a tortoise singing Hey Jude

fleeting, as the earth to
rising sparrows,
life stretches beyond
swinging feet. in a breath,
it shrinks
to mere marbles in
a childhood pocket,
drips from faucets on
upturned faces, squinting
through joy and soap.

life rolls over sidewalks,
around first steps, grating
on scratching pavement.
we've had our scars
more often than skinned knees

like  piano wire, life
ties tune and blood through throat
it muzzles and goads
hyena, perched vultures cackling
life crams with cracking and
static in hope, panic.

it slips,
on the outbreath
as the earth to rising sparrows.
so we all go-quiet.

only marbles, only scars.

A colorless rainbow in a sky of imagination,

a camera-less tourist on a summer vacation.

A cloud without rain, but a sky without sunshine,

a constellation for admiration for a blind man's cloud nine.



A stemless flower in a competitive ecosystem,

the prey born with one leg, the predator without any eyes.

... a chaotic compromise.



A mannequin selling fashion and deadly sins,

a homeless man searching through trashcan bins.

A chalkboard without a budget, a teacher without hope,

the Valedictorian hanging from a rope.



It's just mental complexity like congested New York city,

daily traffic jams with mental crams, and I don't take pity.

Flash flood warning, a fair reason to vent.

Drowning those who don't appreciate how much time I have spent.

Tears of a stranger, throw me some lemons and a stand,

time to sell drama out in the front yard to prove that the supply isn't up to its demand.



Blurred vision, bullet proof heart, it's just a decision,  it's time to start.

Appreciating a rainbow in a storm of dark rage,

the pessimistic cold skin attached to a fairy tale sage.

Beer Boys at The Cross Keys
money crams the table – chalk names filled to closing
so we moved next door

to The Jolly Trooper
where a crowd of old boys drank whisky and talked clod
over pickled eggs and ham

we thought the chatter would stop
but a worked hand ****** a glass deep into my palm
‘ere, aveadropuvthisun

amber smelling liquid
raised my lips in sour expectation
gone

fire from the hearth
autumn plums and American oak-soaked grape
sculpture a smile

it’s good       **** good
a clap on the back and a glug in my glass

Beer Boys at The Cross Keys
money crams the table – chalk names filled to closing
so we moved next door

to The Jolly Trooper
where a crowd of old boys drank whisky and talked clod
over pickled eggs and ham

we thought the chatter would stop
but a worked hand ****** a glass deep into my palm
‘ere, aveadropuvthisun

amber smelling liquid
raised my lips in sour expectation
gone

fire from the hearth
autumn plums and American oak-soaked grape
sculpture a smile

it’s good       **** good
a clap on the back and a glug in my glass

Beer Boys at The Cross Keys
money crams the table – chalk names filled to closing
so we moved next door

to The Jolly Trooper
where a crowd of old boys drank whisky and talked clod
over pickled eggs and ham

we thought the chatter would stop
but a worked hand ****** a glass deep into my palm
‘ere, aveadropuvthisun

amber smelling liquid
raised my lips in sour expectation
gone

fire from the hearth
autumn plums and American oak-soaked grape
sculpture a smile

it’s good       **** good
a clap on the back and a glug in my glass

the tranquility of ghosting.

how i crave the slick white sheet hovering inches above the ground, barely swirling as the limbo atmosphere stands lentic, no corporeal body underneath.

how i desire the limited peripheral, two cutout eyes that only let me stare towards the floorboards and kitchen and cutlery i cannot pick up.

how i yearn for the final destination within my house, the ectoplasm that follows me around as a new family crams their stuff into the cabinets, desperate to make my grave smell like home.

how i wish i could float beside them, staring quietly at the little tikes frolicking around the living room couch, eons away from my own state, unaware of my inevitability.

how i long to be unable to pick up the knife, or cup, or shaving razor, or blanket, unable to smother, or stab, or slice, or bash.

from the tranquility of ghosting, the inability to harm is what i want most.

The corporate megastar with his million
Dollar Rolex on his wrist grips the bottle
That he sells for infinite profit
Because the elixir shares his name

The marathon runner, with only six miles
To go showers himself with liquid diamonds
They ping against the tarmac and roll
Into the gutters unnoticed by the greedy crowds

The craftsman briefly coats
His calloused hands in silver to rinse them of the brick dust
As they dry they lose all value
But it’s a loss he doesn’t have time to account for

The clouds ***** out riches
But the public complain

The daughter of the busy housewife
Gratefully crams her mouth with elephant ****
Her filthy hands beckon her friends from the huts
She poisons herself with the bucket between her knees

When you get used to being around someone,
you memorize where your things can't go,
(the cellphone on the windowsill, glass on the
dresser) because they -
the person that is -
and everything about them and with them and on them
occupy that space.
Their collective useless clean-up-after-me crap jams and crams and
fills themselves (maybe by magic, perhaps by fate)
into places where only you and the great clean air around you used to go,
and you want to **** them for taking over this sacred space - or at least tear
their throat a little with your teeth - their
***** underwear and the piles on piles of plastic freezie wrappers and
crumpled receipts
dig and claw their way into your skin. they burn and choke and burrow in
so deep
that
you
miss them when they're g n . But of course,
that isn't what you think of always. Not really.

Every under appreciated, suffocating action, every
dagger word, the electric pulse that tore through your skin because
they brushed up against the wrong part of you
(sometimes, unknowingly, the right part of you)
suddenly disappears with them.
And you, unforgotten, loved, have to stay.


and when they're gone their smell sticks to you
                                    for a little while.

maybe i never had the right words.
maybe that is the true problem.
maybe it was that i could never say everything that you needed to hear.

let me tell you a story.

when i was eight, my family always got together on christmas to exchange gifts.
my family is bursting at the seams, with aunts and uncles and grandparents and
second cousins and my aunt’s stepmother’s adopted niece and
everyone crams into one house, around one tree.
we do a name draw at thanksgiving, and everyone buys one present to give to one person.
i wasn’t supposed to open my present until everyone was together,
but i did.
and i was so embarrassed, at eight years old, to have broken the rules,
even though no one cared at all.
it was a tea set.
small, perfect for an eight year old, with cups and spoons and plates and a dish for the sugar.
i never could look at that tea set without feeling guilt,
and when it finally broke, i was relieved.
it had been picked out for me by a cousin of mine, and i thought that it was beautiful,
but i broke the rules.
now, on christmas, even though we no longer get together with all of my family to give gifts,
i still make sure that i am in line,
that i am not breaking any rules at all.

on christmas this year, i tried to sleep in and avoid thinking of you,
because you were going to be talking with your family,
and sierra was going to be talking to isaac,
and i was so unbelievably jealous.
and i wanted to drive over to your house and demand to see you,
but that would be breaking the rules, and besides that,
it wasn’t my place.  
christmas is for family, after all. not for old friends who are young and foolish still.

that night, i went and saw the third hobbit movie,
and i cried and kept crying.
i picked one dwarf, the one played by aidan turner who is gorgeous and great,
and i asked that he live.
and then the elf girlfriend played by kate from lost was there and i just broke down.
because they were perfect and not supposed to work out,
and they wanted to break the rules but some rules you cannot break.
yes, i am foolish.
i know that.
yes, i cried over the pain of a fictional elf when she asked for the love to be taken away,
because it hurt too much to bear.

but if there is one thing that i have learned in all of life as a foolish person,
it is this:
you take what is unbearable,
and you bear it.

there are no other options.

even though this love i hold for you is painful and sometimes makes it hard to breathe,
i will bear it, and i will learn to accept heartbreak as a part of this life.

it is valentine’s day on saturday, and i want so badly to have someone to hold me,
because yes, it is a stupid holiday, but genuine affection is not,
and i miss that.
i’ve never had it but i miss it.
isn’t that strange?

but it is possible, apparently, and it does not stop hurting.
i wish to have this love taken from me, i wish to see you replaced in my heart,
but i will take what is unbearable,
and i will bear it.

The aquarium is a jar
that crams the bottomless sea,
within a glass bottle.
Like the pool of liquid in my palms
that reflects the starry sky above,
it is a fragment
of what cannot be fractured.

he crams pills down his throat
two of them
every night
just so "he won't feel the pain"
even though he wants to hurt himself

m o r e  t h a n  e v e r.

Why shouldn't I possess a private eagerness,

an anticipation all of my own,

Such that it crams every corner of my soul.

And I had sworn I would never again open the door

Of my senses to any outward appeal.


But I have not kept that vow

and this dismays me.

Even though I again have tasted

The tangible loveliness of life,

Seen colours as pristine as the

beginning of life and love.


Passion or compassion? I can't tell.

My heart and soul rushed to take it in.

But you have given me a gift,

And in that giving you have honoured me.


I have found the grace, the sense of worth.

And these new things have wiped away the hurt.

i take drugs i don't understand
i smoke cigarettes, a bottle in hand
i say i need another and still i have the nerve
to say i have command, to say i am alert
statesmen , officeholders, yell to run and vote
what the **** does that word mean, and what the **** is a choice?
      the pocket screen is screaming, this one i chose to hold
a square box in my little hands, might as well call it rope
let me tie it around my neck, let me pour in all my hopes
onto the little screen, ego machine, sweet stasis as i choke
      
         inercia grips inside of me, we left the trees so long ago
now i get up every morning, to make richer all the rich folk
am i crying or am i laughing and i don't get this ******* joke
why are so little of us bothered, why does no one else revolt
we float on like dead ******* fish, taking junk taking a smoke
why do we take for granted, this incoherent hoax?
brown red black men scratch into the ground, a white man sells us Coke
everywhere a boot to lick, a fist to kiss and to uphold
       authority needs me blind and dumb, obedient cattle is controlled
i don't know no ******* answers, i don't know no ******* code
something punched me in a ******* dream, i saw his face as i awoke,
and i screamed as i awoke, and i gasped as i awoke-

       my ******* dripped and i was old, it was a glory to behold
worms eating my fleshy face i say goodbye as i unfold,
felt my bones so real inside myself, i began to decompose
and all my ugly was exposed, but it wasnt ugly anymore,
and nothing mattered anymore, i phone my mom her voice is gold,
      i saw her face it was my own, and i felt joy in my little bones
now my death has been postponed, a thousand times, but it will come
( my mind will then explode, all my memories implode)
all life is just a moan on an incoherent road,
that leads no where i suppose, but i still composed this ode
i'm pretty good or so im told, i believe that, i am sold

         me, a bag of organs in a mould, a body i dont even own
information crams my throat, into my body to my bones
i take drugs i dont ******* understand, i swallow tv screens on command
i take money in my hand i feign control, i misunderstand

Sundays, after beatings
He ignites the torrid grill
Browns the butter
Smacks and beats the eggs,
Ick! the shrill of boils in the scramble
Spattering at every turn
When he macerates those yolks;
Chunky bangers begin to scorch
And the tawny smoke that rises from the fry
Sheaths his face.
Greasy sweat drops begin to strain from his enlarged
and scowled pores;
A gooey film of grime and slime
Skims down and plunks into his fry,
Froth around the mouth
He slobbers more and primes his grub one final time.
He crams a pile on to his fork
Without inhaling he swallows and
He gobbles
His jowls are brimming
Will he choke?

I want her to love frogs
And mud
I hope she never stresses over
Underwear lines
Or crams her feet into too small shoes
I hope she grows up
Breaking lots of rules

Caged in the chamber of torments
The brutal ache tears my flesh,
Weakens my senses,
****** and pierces my veins on head
Constantly batters my skull,
hammer needles deep inside my head,
disbands my active thoughts to negate
Devastates my happiness,
Wreaks havoc on my tranquilty,
Stabs and bruises my inner soul,
Crams my heart with melancholy
Breaks my sanity and distorts my brain
At times impregnates my upper eyelids
Crawls through the veins around my eyebrows
Bangs on my eyes wriggling me with
Pulsating and throbbing pain
making me nauseatic
Hurling me deep into the sea of depression
To frown and fume with anger
But the chronic ache continues its callous play
Driving me berserk, exhausted, mournful
Succumbing me to the assaults of the chronic pain of the terrible headache
To be racked with pain in vain............