I lay in the bathtub soaking
wet with water running
around my silhouette.  Shaking
as the washcloth smeared regrets
over my skin. The bubbles
give my sins a scent.

As I vent I leave the shower
running so my sobs
are the only thing drowning.
The constant tapping on my face
keeps me awake as I sink into
the various stews my mind creates.

Weights are lifted with pruning. Peeling
of dead skin keeps me from
reeling into depression. There is a harmonic
progression between the faucet and my face,
the scrubbing and my disgrace, the steam and
my own embrace.

I need this state. The decompression
from being bottled up, like a coke, with a smile
is worthwhile. It teaches me
that the expression of  weakness
is key in the building of a better Timothy.

god,
ive never seen a girl that empty.
pathetic,
hollow skin in unwashed jeans.a blown egg,
empty casket
cracking sidewalk.im lonely but i can play the part,
bravado biting the sky like lightning but
you can hear your own breath echoing in me when
you sit too close.
im a mine shaft, im stale air and stone. i dug myself empty when i tried to believe
i need no one but myself.i don't need anyone else.blisters on my heels,
thoughts on self-defeat, self-pity,
self-immolation compared to arson.
when you pulled out all my teeth you told me it was so i could kiss you fuller,
deeper; you said *now you dont have to be afraid.
now you cant hurt me.
it rained last night but i thought this was a drought year, should i feel something?
i slept through the thunder.GOD, i hate thinking about this,
i hate these harness ribs hate air pockets in my chest i cant take this pressure.
when youre leaning down to kiss his lighter i'm sending you 50 texts that all say the same thing,
accoutrements of disorientation,
swollen fingers. i dont think i'm doing this right.i think i'm a different person
every time i get dressed in the morning,
every time i sleep.all the words ive misheard  stack up like unfinished manuscripts,
like letters from neglected friends.
this was wrong when it started and now it's just confused.
hoarding matches, hoarding lighters like that'll save me from the rain.
think about the bones beneath your flesh.think about the sturdy rock within your soft thighs.
think about your liver.think about your bloodyourskinyourmeat.
think about the last time you spoke with feeling.
think about the last time you dreamt. remember when you said you wanted all of me? said you felt afraid,
you said sometimes you feel like
i could eat you alive,
reaching over my event horizon,
leaning towards antimatter lips.
why did you call yourself a storm you're only hurting yourself?
why did you call me an earthquake when i'm the only one
im ripping apart.
you keep sticking your tongue down the throats of people who just want to bite it off.

Incendiary, explosive,
those gnashing teeth,
they hold us in their throws beneath
these seven gorgeous waves of angst

They expand but never contract,
leaving us infinitely searching for our center

And when we crash,
And we will crash,
I'll pray to your god you'll never surrender

If you do,
I can't swear I'll wait for you,
I can't promise I'll always remember.

She ain't depressed, she sings all day
Songs of another devil
Saw a dog, stilted awning dance

Stay, another day
Still awake, dreaming
Sleeping at daybreak though
Silky and delicate

Submissive, absolute danger
Salted, assaulted, decompression
****, another detail written

Seasonal affective disorder
Sadly attained death

the war, the war, the brother.

the zombie movie
about buzzards.

the hungry enough horse.

the 48 hours in which a ******* dyslexia
goes undetected
in parents of special
needs
children.  the explanation.  the action

words

mixing twice.

the face first exhaustion
brought to bear
by
a behind
the scenes
taste test.  

the cyst on a brother’s knuckle.

the fight, the civilian
birthday suit, and

the civilian
burned
by clothes.  a she

as, just as

deserted.

There is a young Lady in Scotland
who was as shy as can be.
Shy Sye had a difficult time
saying Hi or Bye.
It would just make you cry.

A challenge went out
for she would not shout...
with her eyes
"Here I am. I see you."
or
"Can you see me?"
Then she raised her eyes
And was pleasantly surprised
when she found some friends
who spoke with their eyes.
and
she did not suffer the bends.

Decompression can be painful
When coming from deep within
and letting go of all the fears
of  "safety" of where you have been.

But out she came
with doubt and fears
Maybe almost tears...
To find a new world.
In the rush of it all
She is now walking tall.

And now the rest of the story
will be told, moment by moment
day by day...
Until she becomes who she
wants to be... a therapist...
Helping others in their need.
Where she will put it to the test.

Shy Sye is now (soon to be) Happy Sye.

Congratulations My Dear Sye!!

film.  prayer.  kittens in a box.  serene nudes thrusting the skylight.  trinkets in a first floor gift shop lifted by a man dreaming beneath a decompression chamber.  a one use snowglobe.  ash.

hole in a rabbit.  a woman who talks once a year to firecrackers.

earth on earth.  a baby without toes applauded for having two heels.  a pregnant person who’s played on god

a simple hoax.

if I could distil every fantasy Id ever dreamed
condense my desires from reams into mere chapters
take every vision of you Id ever seen
making reel after reel of memories captured
maybe then I could relax again
knowing having them
made you mine forever after
whatever happens next
you pass every test I could administer regardless
A plus
Flawless
please consider this my application
to recommence relations accordingly
sincerely yours

The first attempt ended in nothingness. Ribbons flowed from the belly of mother hollow, and though they grasped at their own absence, their fingers broke like brittle leaves, returning to the mother’s flesh.
This was the birth of change.
The second attempt ended in madness. Shadows rose out of the nothingness in waves and cascaded into pools of being, but when being opened its eyes and saw its image, it let out a threshing scream.
This was the birth of separation.
The third attempt ended in lack. Fire poured from the cosmic maw and baked earth to blood; flesh gorged on itself, and pale figures gripped the edges of rivers, gaping at one another, unable to speak.
This was the birth of despair.
The last attempt ended in man; and nothing birthed after it.


Appended File

Source states the archaeologist was investigating the Mariana Trench. Strangely, he began displaying symptoms of decompression sickness on the descent. His state worsened, but, due to his insistence, the pilot continued the mission. The archaeologist began recounting, in “muddled and broken speech”, accounts of his wife and children. In interviews conducted after the incident, colleagues claim to have never met any persons matching such descriptions. Soon after, the archaeologist collapsed. The pilot recounts, in a shaken tone, “By all means he was out. Like—I called to him, you know.” When asked why he did not administer first aid, the pilot replied “I couldn’t st—he was out cold, I ******* swear. I didn’t notice it at first, moving my hand over his face, you know—staring into space. I grabbed the kit, turned back, and that’s when it hit me. His eyes weren’t glazed, they were fixed on me. Tracking me. Like—those weren’t his eyes, anymore.” When asked to expand on this, the pilot broke down and had to be escorted from the room. The archaeologist has yet to awaken from his coma. It should be noted his eyes are closed.

— 37, Male. Cairo, Egypt.

For a year or possibly more,
Decompression begins:
Purging electricity, electronics.
Fall away, Internet, Oh!
No more cellular,
**** the television set,
Except, perhaps, a radio,
Lest I totally forget....

Hello, paper,
Hello, books,
Come off the shelves;
Lose those ***** looks,
Warm again before my eyes,
Feel the press of my writing stick.

Thoreau, the fakir,
Left the social order
Just a year,
Though just how far
He really went
Remains foggily unclear,
And the fact that he returned
Suggests that Nature
Left him feeling burned.

So, like a diver,
Rising from the deep,
I'd take a while to meditate,
To let the busyness-es go
And put electric dreams to sleep.

slipping
slowly
under
the
saltwater,
the
coolness
so  
sensual,
like
softest
silk
against
my
skin.

sloughing
off
sweat
and
days
disasters
I
sink
further
down
to
rest
on
sand,
sifting
it
through
my
fingers

rising
only
to
take
simple
breathes
I  
allow
myself
to
silently
decompress
and
my
soul
simply
sighs

you: alone after sunset, gathering firewood and skimming the shoreline for bodies with your eyes (only the entire beach is abandoned by now)

me: nine thousand planets away, complacent to the decompression window reflecting my own grotesque image while alarms go off in the other room

every stage of this session
this press & decompression
feels unbearable
memory like pond water
hazy copper-toned
recollections of clarity.
this melancholia
is supposed to be an omen,
a sign of tides turning.
resurfacing from depths despicable
yet, they are familiar, recognizable.
the world above
moves overwhelmingly fast
for a shipwreck whose
every sigh is an essay
each blink creates ripple-wave-typhoon-tsunami--
feeling forced,
but too medicated
to crawl back to
that which my fingers twitch for.

altar

the baby is too light.  its mother puts it on a scale that reminds her of a plate her empty childhood couldn’t break.  its mother invites neighbor boys to punch her in the stomach.  some of the boys bail.  some don’t.  the mother’s nickname doubles as her real.  the baby is not called bricks.


zero

when I couldn’t get my head around the surrender of my body to the flotation device of an immaculate conception, I’d simply swallow a baby that had swallowed a pill.  years go by and I am zero.  the number arrested for suicide.        



basics

because he is asleep, he does not find himself sleeping in the tub.  something slides from his belly and becomes wedged.  his dream business goes under even in dream.  he makes eyes at CPR manikins.  his son, his life, pushes for legs.



safeguards

I call this piece

the hotel room
that left
your father.

a hammer is a good bid, an unmarked
bottle of cologne
is better.

your mother stopped in
to let me know
my high school
mile time

was threatened.

she said she would’ve come sooner
but she had to work
a fork
from her thigh.

the disabled are born liars
but lie
only once.  




turnout

before the parade
I carried with me
a trombone
and entered
the high
corn-

what I played
there

was mournful
after
the fact-

a tune
for no one, for a tree’s

late
cat


outlet

depression is a non-starter.  depression is depression unknowingly cured.  it is like I have this shirt because it exists and not because it invites everyone whose shirt it’s not to enjoy joy.  I don’t want to hear you say you’re sad to say.  I ******* to reappear and think it might be why my father vanished.  it’s enough during foreplay to flicker.



viewership

my youth spent trying to see the devil as a young man.  my motherly youth.  my **** scene a return to form.  cut from yours, you have your baby’s eyes.  I went unborn.  I went beaten.  we went together in broad daylight when broad daylight was god’s elevator.



pressure

the original thought in my head was to be postdated by god until god learned he had a baby on the way.  I had children until I could only have four.  what I say to self-harm is pay attention.  my daughter raises her hand on the off chance she buried something in her teacher’s body.  (we have stopped talking

but I can squeeze her anorexia into a phone booth)  poverty myth:  I groom my sons with the beak of bird abandoned.  real time I tell my tongue it’s ******* curtains for the mouth I’m getting.  full circle my daughter surrounds those brothers of hers that mine clone.        



On having a secret mother

the boy is lacing up his right shoe
when he sees
the string
tied
to his middle
finger
and wonders
how asleep he was
when it happened-

(being forgotten
is a lot like
being forgotten
by) harm, that purple balloon

lowered into
then surrounded
by

the inactive
construction site
of the world




On suicide

you are further than I
in your worship
of the slow
vehicle
that carries
praise
back and forth
from appearing
to reappearing

god (how else)
to bully

what would
wipe you
clean
of body

language…
 
On foreclosure

any chance, no,
of improving
upon
my impression
of god.

noises beneath a bomb or bomb
threat.

wheelbarrows, wagons.

the occasional declawed cat
past which
I make
like I am
rowing.

(in wheelbarrow)  (in wagon)  otherwise,

no cats
on cat
island.


On libido

the previous verse was a poor man’s bible.  like wildfire a fondness for appropriate discipline spreads.  one scarecrow means practice, two scarecrows mean parentage.  a third is your father’s failed garden of baby teeth.  is, by definition, is.  I are

motherless.  what mother doesn’t know doesn’t worry.  many spiders came on the wind and a few were swept into mouths briefly opened by age. what made woman did not make the disappearing girl.  flashing back to a scene that’s not there or forward to one dependent on space, pain arrives

in memoriam.  


On memory*

for all the showing, one would think the only things born were eyes.

when lord
says
or lords
say

this is the body

I tend  
in unison
to trail
behind
my voice

as if

I could make my own
remember
the anesthesia
it underwent

to intervene.





On devastation

brother, there’s not a cigarette

on earth
that you
can surprise


On the past

my death a warped photograph of a former awe, my life

four children
drinking water
from glasses placed on either side
of my sleep-

it is on these nights
when I am sick
that I become the sound of my ears
softening
my mind’s
thoughtless position
on time, that I am ably

here, ably slow
in sight of
the aging

marksman
I’ve given
a sporting chance
 


On supervision

you may have been a child
projecting a maze
or an adult
memorizing
the hollowness
of things.

in a condensed version
of poverty’s
obstacle course
I still hold the hammer
that works for a mirror…

with dog or with dogs, we were presented
as two examples
of how to be
family.

I love me a farm machine
and the week
you knock yourself into.

(a silo
saddens
a drunk)


On phobia

before the brat kid
can repeat

this is not
the television
my father
writes for, it is my understanding

that such a child
belongs
to the itch
to have a child
disappear.  as I refuse

(to enter
the ocean)

I’m pretty sure god has put my death in a bug.  






On the need for a watchlist

if one can talk of it

one is most likely
not
poor.
    
we called you to life to give you a name.
odd imagery ensued.

a prisoner gave birth in the yard of your mouth.

god became the man men wanted to be.  god wore a dress
he could see through.  a short history
of heaven
made its way

to hell
to have its
location

shared.  

your mother developed a stutter
for which I developed
a stutter
application.  things began to click

on you
and when that
didn’t work

your fake cry
took on
a depth

of meaning
made us dip

(into
your brother)


On paternity

as his mother heard yesterday he was born to some nobody everyone can describe, she instructs her barber to slide a lit cigarette behind her ear. as unimportant as the barber is, his pencil makes a subtle change in her dream to put a cricket on the witness stand.



On contact

talk early, walk late.  

eat
for food.

hold kitten
like a rifle, your father’s head

to god.

call my / with your

premie.



On looting

we move the cemetery to confirm there is nothing outside of this town.  the ******* remains a two man show.  leash laws are for dogs and angels.  our doctor has a touch of deer worry.  exercise is for the birds.  god is the pitter patter of imagined feet.  our fathers double over in bathrooms from the shame of not calling out for paper.  our mothers have done the math.  by now, most kids have eaten a popsicle alone in a church.  I’m in it for the stick.



On my father being gay

a crow
born inside
a footstep
is passing
for dark



On having little to no vision

the amount of thought
given to locating
the secret
mind.

I am on count eight
of ten-

ten, the future.

I call your hiding place
water.

-

of course you dream of falling-

those toys
are the toys
of god’s
children.

-

staring contest-

the only child and the twin, then

the lonely
victor.

-

let there be
all

the light.

 

On decompression

the zombie movie
about buzzards.

the hungry enough horse.

the 48 hours
that go
undetected
in the parents
of special
needs
children.  

the civilian
birthday suit, the war

footage.





On the expected delays**

in this place
paid for
by another
country’s
melancholy

two dreams
of being
run into
by a newly
pregnant
late

bloomer

are had
by the one
man
we share

like a comb
to forget
whose hair
was first

My desperation is not discreet.
It sprays off my tongue every time we meet.
Like the octopus squirts ink to evade capture.
Inky I love you's flood from my mouth, a Tsunami of rapture.

Loving you is the ocean and desperation is decompression sickness.
Whenever I come up to breathe my head spins, nitrogen bubbles explode in place of butterflies.
Isolated on this lonely island, my clouded mind tears me asunder.
If I die a living death  you would be my beautiful, poetic blunder.

I had two hours of that wonderful stuff left,
"one hundred and twenty minutes,
seven thousand two hundred seconds
7199 seconds
.
.
.
.
I did this for around five mintues while I span
in a chaotic orbit of myself. Its amazing how
air burns as it hits nothingness like a cornered
beast knowing its time was about to end.

I couldn't believe that this was my final frontier,
corny I know, always wanted to say that.
I was pebble dashed by the exposed features
of god only knows. But unfortunately for them
decompression had expelled them.

I played with the voice command as it counted the
moments to my demise [French] 99 minutes quatre
vingt dix neuf minutes [Russian] 98 minutes
Девяносто восемь минут and so on till I got to
English, not American English what is that English??
And in a condescending voice I mutted as it continued
its saying, 89 minutes your so fu#ked, in 88 minutes
You going to be ******* vacuum, and not like a Dyson.

I giggled as images of what not to do with appliances
wondered in my thoughts. I stared on as she lay there
limp like a sack of potatoes. The flames now devoured
by the emptiness I was swimming within. Bodies in
frozen static forms wondered past me, like walking
down a street not looking at who was only steps away
oblivious to there features, not wanting to stare.

Can you whistle in a space suit? I never tried till now,
well you can, but my ears were ringing and then I
reminisced of that moment my door rang. That
day that changed everything, and here I am now
******* air like its going out of fashion.
"Live the adventure, see new stars explore the unseen,

Well we saw the planet but not the rings, peppered us
like buck shot. Not lingering like a tome of lost souls,
if this wasn't real I'd have thought it was a corny Sci-fi
movie but this is more realistic than I wanted it to be.

Then I heard that voice, no god dam way, out of all
the people to survive it had to be him, I shook my
head in disbelief. I turned on the speaker system,
"Paul where are you, "coming in fast, I swam in a
drowning manner only to have his crutch land
on my visor. "Are you for ****** real Paul, really,

I got him off my face and he was just mumbling,
dude shut up and chill, "Were going to die,
"No **** Sherlock, did i just speak that out loud.
Why couldn't it have been Lexy that survived
least I'd have died with a smile on my face.

Corny chat up lines lingered in my thoughts
"Hi Lexy do you come here often,
"Wanna walk the spaceman,

But Paul brought me back shaking me in fear,
I punched his visor like a jibber jabber his head
bounced around, god that felt so good.
Then he started crying, what the......
So i momentarily un fastened his visor. Before a
word was expelled he was a popsicle and silence.

I didn't **** him he was already dead, he just didn't
realize it. I  attached his air cord to mine, replenished
what was lost then kicked his **** to the galactic curb.
I played with this extra life how my expelling it and
flying around in playful bliss till that dam voice echoed
through my visor. "two minutes remaining,

Well play time was over what was it to be? cry like
a baby as i clung to the last gasps of air or just open
my visor and take in a mouthful or dark matter?
decisions, decisions...................................

Relaxin'
Comin' in for a crash landing
After a week exploring man-made weaknesses in the Ozone layer
It ain't no easy ride
But ya gotta come down, man
Yeah ya gotta go home
Don't ya?
It's like high dollar paste or glue
That binds me belly-down to this bed
Deceptively soft and comfortable
Mother, where are you?
Oh, Father, why don't I care?
I would still recognize your voice
Even if my eyes have forgotten what you look like
Do I expect forgiveness
If so tell me what for
You seemed to always want more
When my best was all I could give
How could I have known
It wasn't enough
Nothing can stop this train
No adequate force
Relaxin'
This is decompression
Sleep come down
Mama...

~

[On mother, father, god, dog, *****]

what if the eyes in the back of my head

hallucinate

what if
the eyes in the back of my head

during surgery

during

a haircut

~

[On foreclosure]

the occasional declawed cat
past which
I make
like I
am rowing

(in wheelbarrow)  (in wagon)  otherwise,

noises beneath a bomb or bomb
threat

~

[On the past]

my life

four children
drinking water
from glasses placed on either side
of my sleep-

it is on these nights
when I am sick
that I become the sound of my ears
softening
my mind’s
thoughtless position
on time, that I am ably

here, ably slow

full view
of the aging

marksman

~

[On phobia]

as I refuse

(to enter
the ocean)

I’m pretty sure god has put my death in a bug  

~

[On the need for a watchlist]

if one can talk of it, one is most likely not poor.  we called you to life to give you a name.  god became the man men wanted to be.  god wore a dress he could see through.  a short history of heaven made its way to hell to have its location shared.  your mother developed a stutter.  your fake cry took on a depth of meaning made us dip

(psalm
for satellite)

into your brother.

~

[On paternity]

as his mother has heard only yesterday how he was born to some nobody that everyone can describe, she instructs her barber to slide a lit cigarette behind her ear.  as unimportant as the barber is, his pencil makes a subtle change in her dream of putting a cricket on the witness stand.

~

[On my son having little to no vision]

I am on count eight of ten-

ten, the future.

I call you raindrop,
your hiding place

water

-

staring contest-

the only child and the twin, then

the lonely
victor

~

[On decompression]

the zombie movie about buzzards.  the hours that go undetected in the parents of forty-eight special needs children.  

~

[On lore]

I have two dreams of running into the newly pregnant late bloomer.  in the first and most recurrent, I am operating a remote control car I’ve lost while worrying about a brother’s closeness to a certain pilot.  in the second, my mother is talking lights out to nostalgia’s previous owner who agrees with her that the roofs of buildings need to be smaller.  in both, I get the sense my father has already hit the pop fly under which he collapsed muttering baseball, baseball, ghost of a baseball.

~

[On suicide]

I was here long before you guessed my age  

-

(our proverbial sister dons again the birthday suit of body language)

-

the dog won’t eat.  might it know

we come from the family of sitting and dying?

~

[On contact]

hold kitten
like a rifle.  pop

a paper sack
at your father’s

ear.  ah, your father

who was made to kneel

for two
maybe three
things

(god, shrapnel) a flying saucer

from the wreckage of his church

~

[On writing]

my sense of place is a person.  *** is odd,

right?  this thing that auditions

for what it has.

On an early Monday morn
Into this world my mother bore me
Although I never asked her to
But still she bore me
Into a hospital
A patient
Out of the train
Onto the station
The light, the air,
The Decompression,
No wonder that my first impression
I can't remember,
My mother thought I had a temper,
The nurses watched my massive member,
They put me down as baby boomer
Yeah, I was born to be consumer
But when I'm in my old age
I hope to be if not the driver,
Then at least the passenger

Aren't we going somewhere?

On holiday, perhaps?
Where birds of paradise dance
In savage colours
And sing in dazzling trance,
Where man's institutions are far away,
Where banks don't feed on our flesh,
Away from roaring trucks with pigs
Set for slaughter,
Away from downtown Bangladesh,
Away from ugly neighbours
And their children,
Away into the sweet fresh air
With no wifi
No zombifying TV,
No bling-bling chavs with one beat one key one theme music,
Where the weather is tolerable
And the scam of social media is no more,
We will leave the choking fumes
And strange wars...
Except we won't,
Cause that isn't where we go.
Let's be realistic,
We like postmodern world
It's lovely masochistic,
It takes out minds off questions
That probe beyond statistics,
Questions we don't even know how to phrase,
But fools are always one step ahead,
Delays make them enraged baboons,
When I am in my old age
I expect to see banners on the moon
And clouds shaped by advertisers,
Robot womanisers
And insect appetisers,
New ways to use fertilisers
On human brains
Making us none the wiser
But great at analysing market value
And levels of offensiveness.
I hope you don't think that I'm implying
That you will have something to do with this.
I know you're all good people here..
It's the corporations, of course.
Those classical psychopaths:
Self interested
Manipulative
Always the best
They prefer not to compete with the rest
Nor accept responsibility,
They suffer no conscience
Feel no remorse
And present superficial versions of themselves
To the world,
To the good people
Who take on their traits
Day by day
Year by year
Generation by generation
Because .. you know ..
Market forces and ..
Hunger .. for .. something..
Progress something !...
..it's the right way!
So what would you like to change?
Is this really your pimple?
When I am in my old age
I would like to be simple
I'll have my special armchair
That will be the envy of all people,
And I'd like to hope that something will be done
About climate change
But for that Israel needs to cease to exist
As well as all the other countries,
Old and new,
And national symbolism must get relegated
To the domain of underwear, swimming trunks and bathing towels,
Where washing machines will eventually bleach it into oblivion,
And the world must become truly global,
Entering the space age
United under redefined humanity!
When I am in my old age,
I still expect to see insanity on a global scale,
People fishing in empty oceans
Sailing their way to French Polynesia
on raging 20 metre waves
only to find French Polynesia
somehow not there anymore..
I hope not to be a bore in my old age,
I hope nostalgia won't be classed as a
Disease
And heavily medicalized.
I hope suicide will be legal like bread
I hope my head won't have the texture
Of a woman's inner thigh,
I hope my neck won't look like an accordion,
I hope I won't be making involuntary noises
Every time I lie down,
And I hope to lie down between women's inner thighs
From to  time,
Yeah, I really hope this can be arranged
When I am in my old age
Even if I smell of old people
I hope the smell of old people will be ****
I guarantee it will get very messy
If they won't let me
Take my pension money out
all at once,
I intend to own the stage
Until my very last breath
When I am in my old age
I hope impending death won't make
Religious, or spiritual,
Whichever's worse..
When I am in my old age
I fully expect hats to be in vogue again
And smoking in airports
And free range drugs
When I am in my old age
Maturity will triumph
Over the teenage bugs
With naked ankles and baseball caps,
And the myth of youth will rightfully collapse,
And I will order and convincing martini,
Drive a convincing car,
Snap a convicting finger at the waiter
To the rhythm of swing played at the bar
Somewhere close to the equator
On some not-too-distant star
I will be my own dictator,
I'll be my own tsar
And all will be jolly!
Apart from all this
I really have no worries.
So let me get drunk and let the world laugh
For there is a remedy for everything
But death
(and burning cathedrals)
And as long as we are laughing
We do not weep
About the roses that we picked
That even the sweetest showers
Won't make grow again.

I've been down for so long being up feels foreign.  I've been down so long I made my way to my ancestors and acquainted with them. I've been down so long I think I need a decompression chamber because my lungs are not used to breathing freely, so used to breathing synthetically. breathe the breathes permitted at the permitted times, but now breathe freely. breathe like my ancestors wanted me too. breathe because i want to. i want to breathe. and now i can.

I resolve not to be April’s fool
Not to look like they do
And stumble into the onslaught
Of sleet
Having no shelter under empty trees
No defence
Against the present and the past
Make it all new
Make it all last
While on the mirrored streets
Beneath the sodium glow
The winter bites
Slowly, in between the bone
Taking no way around
So we rifle through the bargain bins
Look for treasures in someone else’s lost and found
Again we cover it all in new hope
That this year unlike the others
Won’t start to dangle from the same old rope
That hope that keeps it all afloat
Before that slowest of all sinking
Down towards
It’s ok we’ll cope
But then again it’s always back to front
A simple case of I will, you won’t
And a chance encounter throws it back, an endless wish
That finds us, before we know it, somehow back to this
Where in colours dulled I think of you
With my my devils hands and empty time
What else to do?


You in that charcoaled woollen coat
Where despite the cold
There’s gloves kept in your pockets
And an open throat
And I know that with this comes the swollen heart
Somewhere there’s a point in this
It will slowly burst apart
With pressure from daily decompression
Slow rise from secret depths that never end
Would it be better just to come up fast?
Feel everything I ever wanted
Surrender
Accept the gut twist from my self-inflicted bends
Or simply hold my breath some more
Take my time until I surface once again
Then in clear light realise
It’s just the shadows of things
The things
That the starting of a New Year
Always seems to bring

Decompression overwhelms
Concrete mentalities,
Shattering them
Like false glass.

Heavy is the head
That dawns the crown;
An anchor of lead,
Pulling us down.