Sometimes
when I'm lying awake at night
on an air mattress of a pull out couch
not sleeping because of the weight
of why i'm here in the first place.
I cry.

the tears stream directly onto the pillow
pulling off old remnants of eyeliner
and mascara
Dirtying the pillow

I cry because
I am alone

alone

alone fearing the darkness
what it brings
and if it will find me
the darkness
I spent so much of my life in...

The darkness I fought so hard
                                                       To get away from...

And I'm still fighting

Neglect
ing everything around me
and inside me
everything I am

Rotting slowly
unshaven legs
smelling of sweat and
lost love

*******
on top of the sheets
and my clean laundry
dirtying without care

Neglect
ing myself
and the giving
of a care

"Too many things are occurring for even a big heart to hold." - From an essay by W. B. Yeats

Big heart,
wide as a watermelon,
but wise as birth,
there is so much abundance
in the people I have:
Max, Lois, Joe, Louise,
Joan, Marie, Dawn,
Arlene, Father Dunne,
and all in their short lives
give to me repeatedly,
in the way the sea
places its many fingers on the shore,
again and again
and they know me,
they help me unravel,
they listen with ears made of conch shells,
they speak back with the wine of the best region.
They are my staff.
They comfort me.

They hear how
the artery of my soul has been severed
and soul is spurting out upon them,
bleeding on them,
messing up their clothes,
dirtying their shoes.
And God is filling me,
though there are times of doubt
as hollow as the Grand Canyon,
still God is filling me.
He is giving me the thoughts of dogs,
the spider in its intricate web,
the sun
in all its amazement,
and a slain ram
that is the glory,
the mystery of great cost,
and my heart,
which is very big,
I promise it is very large,
a monster of sorts,
takes it all in--
all in comes the fury of love.

i walk with no head between my shoulders
setting fires with dead lighters
dirtying the lines and the condition carrying heavy in each step
and the steady ticking of my watch has become my heart
i can't recall much between coffee grounds and a pair of soft eyes and smile
things don't seep in and it has become a taught art
something tied to me; something i tied myself to

i thought that if i did everything i could,
you would no longer occupy a corner
in the garden of my heart,
but now i see that it’s not my decision.

love is a two-way highway,
and you keep emerging like forget-me-nots
in the spring.

i tried digging my fingers into the soil
and ripping you out by your roots,
but all i accomplished was
dirtying my hands
and making even more of a mess
of myself.

this love is programmed to be perennial,
but trust me when i say
that i don’t need you or any other flower
to make my life more beautiful.

I am compelled

I do not even obliged to
In my mind I would keep the name as mıh
Eyes grow is growing
I do not know mecburum
You know me the heat.

Preparing trees to fall
Does this city is the old Istanbul
In the dark clouds are parts
One side of the street lamp is
The smell of rain on pavement
I am obliged not you.

Sometimes love is fearful dismally
People are tired all of a sudden one evening later
Prisoners to live in the razor's edge
Sometimes it will break your hands passion
How many lives are removed from a living
What if you knock the door sometimes
Humming in the back of the misery of loneliness

Fatih in a poor playing gramophone
From ancient times to play a Friday
I stop and listen to sound at the beginning of the corner
Should I bring unused gök
Week disaggregated data is available
How do I go What if I keep
I am obliged not you.

Maybe June or mottled blue boy
Ah, you do not know who does not know
Eyes hijack freighter is a desert
Maybe you get on the plane in Yesilkoy
Horripilation is all wet
Maybe you're blind, are in rural precipitancy
Wind will bring bad hair

What a time to live if you think
These wolves have perhaps mess
But without dirtying our hands Ayıpsız
What a time to live if you think
Susan would also start with the name
Order to move inside of the secret sea
No other kind will not be
I am obliged to you never know.




Attila İlhan

I want to tell you I could love you.
I could make you happy.
I could make you fall apart on the
bedroom floor,
helplessly and desperately proclaiming
that our love was more
than the nights of
raised arms and oceans of threatening depths.

But fifteen is an age when all of this
is just a dream,
a cliff where the jump is even more
dangerous than everyone says it to be.
Fifteen is the age when I believe,
that my hands have grown rough enough
to take yours
and maturity and age
have always been our similarity.
But fifteen is just another name for
"You're too young."

I cannot promise you that a wedding ring
would worth more than
the freedom to love the women
of taller heights and wider hips
for their lipstick is much darker
than the lip balm I use to
smoothen the dried skin.

For I do not know what it is like
to slide the glass between my fingers
and to taste the golden bubbles
freeze my teeth.

I do not know how to light a cigarette
or how to inhale the scent and death of rebellion.
I do not know how to let the ashes fall
unto the tray without burning my skin
and dirtying my nails.

I do not know how to make you want me,
how to dress and turn my curves
into mountains you wish to explore.
I do not know how to turn my tongue
into a weapon much deadlier
than the wind.
I do not know how to make you
feel beautiful.

So with all of the worlds streets, corners and
dimly lit bars,
I am nothing but a little pigtailed girl
with a lollipop in one hand and a poorly written
love note in the other.
And there you are,
as tall and as handsome as I've always seen
you as
with no time to look down,
only straight ahead.

But I guess, thats okay.
The heels would never have fit me anyway.

There was a child went forth everyday;
And the first object she look’d upon, that object she became;
And that object became part of her for the day, or a certain part of
The day, or for many stretching cycles of years.

The dew laden grass became part of this child
And the fresh daisies and lightly scented lilacs and
the song of the morning sparrow,
And the crisp air, the mud puddles and the tall, tall tress that rained water droplets, when the wind passed,
And the magic world within the reeds, waiting for a curious someone to discover all the twists and turns and available hiding spaces.
And the yellow skunk cabbage and weeping willows, with their gracious locks—all became part of her

The golden grassy haze became part of her,
And the anthills poking up from the red Earth,
And the shaded creek, loosely singing.
And the freshly picked strawberries, dirtying any white shirt.
And the content busker sharing his music and stuttering his words, in a most peculiar manner,
And the passing grandmother walking hand in hand with her granddaughter
And the Jamaican man kissing his pipe and the funny odor that followed
And the old Italians bantering about soccer outside small cafes and coffee shops, that dotted the street like lanterns on a string
And all the changes of city and country, wherever she went

Her own parents,
He that had father’d her, and she that had conceiv’d her in her womb, and birth’d her,
They gave this child more of themselves than that;
They gave her afterward every day—they became part of her.

Her mother’s care-free ringlets, falling past her breast, her open hands and thin arms hidden behind an over sized shirt, the strength in her voice,
And the youthful, naive nature woven into her giggles.
The father, klutzy and drunk, the sudden change from a hearty laugh to an unsettling yell, the large hands and the lost feeling that showed through the anger. The confusing elixir of love and hate.
The landing in the stairwell, the black dial phone, the old tarnished green oven, the stapled on carpet, the Rug rats pillow cases and the laughter so good it hurt.
Never ending love—the difference in words and the actual inner emotion felt--wondering if dreams are reality--and if perhaps the real world and all its conundrums is a carefully devised skit.  
Who decides a mirage is an illusion, is it the same inhabitants who crowd the streets?
Do the rushing people, passed from one generation to the next, think the same thoughts, do they laugh at themselves or the passed on jokes that follow their age group, and are the sparks of people just mirages themselves?
Men and women crowding fast in the streets—if they are not flashes and specks, what are they?
The bakery windows, row in row, the fake cake in the window, the names of the streets and the differing decals hanging from car's indoor mirrors.
People being within the cars zooming by on the highway, the jingle of the Popsicle truck and the sticky hands following. The feeling of trying to wipe away the stickiness on tall grass, walking across the peeling yellow paint of the highway divider, left to the side of some lonesome road---the wooden train set and the carefully maneuvered tracks,

the orange morning sun, the rising steam from plants and houses, the comforting sleepiness cast over the whole town, settling upon rooftops and curling into closed arms, The mid-day beaming street, seen from the city bus window,
The fresh ocean and the old ferry boat, the smell of oatmeal and scrambled eggs and over buttered white toast. The balance between the clouds and sky, sharing the space, the dry feeling gathering around the eyes, the white waves forming from the ferry boats side, the gentle rocking from side to side,
The cold feeling the window casts as the face, leaning against it, gently surrenders sleep to the lulling gesture—knowing the world is round by glimpsing upon the horizons edge, the thought of explorers who sailed the same sea only years and years ago.
The innocence beaming down from the heavens and leaving speckles of white on the ocean’s surface, the cluster of yellow beaked seagulls greeting the arriving boats, the distinct fragrance of the earth and sea joining together, the salty barnacles and shore mud, the leaning  grass with  crusty sand clinging to its base.
These became part of that child who went forth every day, and who now goes, and will go forth every day.

i'm walking down the street
bare feet, without a care
**** uber, metro, I hate public transportation,
i'm dirtying up this sidewalk, for a few years already
i'm writing down a will, in my mind, close to my eyelids,
because i'm on the wrong side of my mind
i feel sick, tasting the bitterness of humanity
when I wipe mankind on the side of the pavement,
at the very deep, there's masculinity mixed with *****,
i'm walking down a bridge full of empty shells
i pass hordes of girls who are smiling insincerely
and again, i feel a boost in my veins
and again, i'm louder than mirrors
and as in the mirrors, voidness space,
and it is me, who takes the best from it
i absorb this poisoned air.
In the ears of mine, i can hear electro heat,
i feel like one man one Jean-Michel Jarre,
rain is pouring through me, sticks to me like fog,
i wrap myself in the warmth of two MDMA's,
someone glances surreptitiously and steals my soul,
you have a backpack full of cash, i have a suitcase full of emotions,
i'm going on a journey through the cursed city
like a hermaphrodite with a broken rod,
streets, like stigmas, cry with hollow screams,
in front of clubs content abortions on the sidewalk,
let's leave this lie, like the walking dead
assertiveness and pride to the gutter washed away.
And again, this booster is kindling my veins
i'm dirtier than a new jerusalem
and similar to it, i'm sticking to everything
and so I'm taking the most out of my heart
and I absorb this poisoned air once again.
and so the booster flows through the aorta
it is flooding my tarred heart,
destination reached.
and my wallet is shimmering with bitter crystal
nothing will change the course of this chemistry,
betrayed. betrayed by their own bodies
vidi, no vici, veni on its own,
and i'm catching a laugh, standing still in the subway
i am still absorbing poisoned air.
hatred.
jealousy.
i've seen enough.
today, in my city, sun rises in the morning.
you will remember this day forever or forget it for eternity.

I miss the feeling of pure happiness I got when I was able to run around in the rain and not get in trouble for dirtying my clothes.

I miss staying outside on warm summer nights with my brothers catching fireflies until we were forced inside.

I miss jamming out to "heart and soul" on the piano with my dad, thinking it was the coolest thing in the world.

I miss my grandma telling me not to roll down the hill with no shirt on because I would be itchy. (But I did of course anyway. Several times.)

I miss waiting for the heaviest snowfall, and going outside for hours to build a snowfort. (Even though we got cold and kicked it down anyway.)

I miss being carefree. Only worrying about what mom was cooking for dinner.

Most of all, I miss how much more the little things meant to me.

I long for those feelings again.

Not many tensions,
nor any excitement
Life has ever been
a placidly flowing river!

Single and free!

Over differences,
never been any disputes
never had to consult,
nor seek consent

Single and free!

but doesn’t his house
with its cold, mildewed air
reflect his heart?
A house so full of things:
a hoard of well stacked books,
exquisitely carved Victorian furniture,
antique collection of curios,
ornate drapery

Yet so full of nothing!

The prim order of the house
never disturbed by naughty hands
nor shuffled by dusty feet
dirtying the Persian carpets
 or smudging the glistening floor

The well laid bed covers
never get creased
by the body’s desire
and Love’s tight embrace
and never, they bear
the fragrance of female scent!

Sometimes he would shake
from foot to crown
at a question hurled by
an unknown voice;

“Did you squander away your life?”

Then he recognizes….
he has been a lone traveler
ever walking through
a one way lane
that will wind off
with a few more steps!
If, by chance somewhere
a new track
branches out
he would no more be
a solitary *****!
There would be a companion
to hold hands!

Now it is too late!

The last stake
Isn’t,
Then is,
Suddenly
Heavy
Rusty
Gilded in mud
Dirtying her fingers
That bend
To grip
One
By
One.
And in the moment
Her grasp
Is complete
She knows
It had
Always been
This little detail
At the end.
It’s not hard
To pierce the belly
(Right below the button)
But it’s two hands
That force it through.

What be a hero, whether men or women, cometh loud or silently?
Will to right wrongs, bring justice, suffer worldly injustice willingly?
Peace time ****** are rewarded with death, absolute law,
In war and times of flux, killing be viewed with praise and awe.

Righteous paladin challenge evil kings when others yield to tyranny...
Enlightening masses of reason, entrenched bigotry through poetry.
Father searching through garbage for his child's teddy bear,
While uncles and aunts view dirtying hands with fear.

The die is cast...beyond all, cast away to die or prevail,
***** a monument to our testament, beyond the ****** veil.

I'll pretend that the rain isn't already
falling in my chest
when you ask me to drown with you.
Didn't you know?
Or did you choose to look away?
Because when I read about the way
Virginia Woolf wrote her own
ending,
filled her pockets and waded right in,
I didn't feel pity
like everybody else.
I understood.

I'll pretend it's not really so
knife-edged
when you say that
I'm only a lie on your page.
And that that diffusion
of red and
blue,
dirtying your thoughts
is just a mirage,
the work of some crayons and pen
only you
hold in your hand.

I'll pretend my spine isn't caving in,
trying to prop me up
against the onslaught of
myself.
And you.
And him.
And whoever he is.
And all your eyes, blurring
into one green light that only seems to
fade.

I'll pretend somebody loves me.
And he isn't afraid.

The world is calm and still.
Everywhere the people take advantage
Of what they already have.

Then, a virus hits the planet.
Supposedly wiping out a whole city.
Because no one dared to visit.

The residents had become
Dead and yet alive.
Deceased and yet surviving.
But only on what?

The stench, the smell,
the horrid, putrid scent.
Of rotting flesh.

Pieces of body do lay on the ground.
Dirtying the ground.
the blood has turned to dust.
Just dirt in the earth.

After time it spreads.
One person to another.
When your last you'll say
It's a rotting pandemic.

Sins sit on my shoulders.
At first, I think they are just dust;
I try to sweep them off with a light brush.
Then I realize they are freckles,
blankly staring at me,
dirtying my clear, alabaster skin.
As I run my fingertips over them,
I find them feeling rough
like sandpaper or cement bricks.
I try to dig my nails underneath,
attempting to prop them up
the same way I would with
an easel and a picture
or an ottoman and my feet.
They are difficult to peel, though,
and I find that it takes a great struggle.
When I finally rip the sins off,
I toss them up in the air,
allowing them to float around
as I breathe in heavily,
sighing and relaxing,
thanking God's speed.
I forget, though,
that those freckles
float and sail like nomads,
wishing to come down a couple inches
and find themselves again on me.
I flinch and sway,
trying to keep most of them away.
But I become careless after a time,
and welcome one or two over to lay.
Back again on my shoulders,
back again come my fears,
once again I must pick and pull,
once again I look like a fool.
I acknowledge the distrust
that I lay in God's lap.
I see how my promises
highlight my acts of disobey.
These sins on my shoulders
restlessly play
as my fingers are scratching,
scratching away.

concrete flinging monkey that i am:
albeit albino -
tinged with himalayan salt hues...
   well this little detail of my working
limbs: concrete -
3 parts of sand 1 part  magic dust:
some water -
here's a dead-earth dough -
it's not a pizza it's not a pizza dipped
in caramel to be subsequently
deep-fried: it's not a scottish ingenuity
project for a heart-attack:
after all... a mars bar battered is missing...
oh my little edinburgh...
one of those nights and mornings:
having finished watching the matrix
trilogy and expanding on:
joys of 5am: being awake prior to
the cockerels shooting out their salutes
to the ***** of white noise and fat
on leaves glistening in: an abyss of a yawn -
the crags and st. arthur's seat:
big ******* volcano sleeping
in the middle of the town...
          such crispness of urban life...
the streets so devoid of noons and...
  buying that carton of cornflakes
      and some milk and enjoying a double
variation of crispness...
well concrete flinging monkey as i
were today: doodling my slow
in the garden... digging a trench for g.i. joe
soldiers in my take on world war I...
so the weeds (morning glory esp.) would
take to teasing its presence from my
neighbour's backyard...
  obviously there was a spider: a glutton
of a eye-fest... whether it was just finishing
its delight or...
           the moth: i guess it was a moth
had a missing head...
  so grand slurp champion was *******
all the details...
   i nudged it once, i nudged it twice...
that bulb of: bottomless pit torso that
probably arrives at secreting a web...
i nudged it once more...
nothing...
no nervous scuttling or having to parachute
onto a sponge of its exoskeleton...
i arrived at the posit: my little world
and my inquisitive lense of the microscope...
apparently a spider will not mind
being nudged by "the hand of god"
should it be eating a moth...
    hardly a lazy sod:
                  what's there to admire the a priori
argument:
   it's not like a spider learns
to become the architect of a web -
it's not like dogs learn to swim...
                     throw a dog in the deep end
and watch the gruff ruffian tread!
duck beast...
                    no... apparently you can try
and try to agitate a spider in the middle
of his meal... even after...
after the meal? the spider had to eat
up some cotton...
    like a bear might prior to undertaking
hibernation... to clog up the ****...
the spider started nibbling on some
of the web...
    and i guess they do that...
go hunting with a web:
                  at the opportune moment...
a day's worth at best to pass the time...
once the meal is over
they figured out to clog up the nutrients
with some of the web...
   can spiders take a ****...
but unlike agitating a hungry spider...
which will scuttle the moment it
is brushed with a tip of any sort...
this well fed specimen took things... lightly...
i could have... done...
the extension of "scrutiny":
buried the ubiquitous bulldozer of fangs
that concentrated on the guillotined
head of a moth in a dollop
of my concrete...
                       i just find it impossible
to **** moths... hell... some night
i'd a proud caricature of man in what
become a nursery -
            come sunrise i don't know whether
i am the graveyard
my mouth the last "search" for these...
        "refugees" from the torment of the night...
conversational overtones in this:
"poetry": it's not something to
make memory architecture of rhyme...
rhyme alone is not enough...
lyricism - i am not gorging on wishing
for a Keats replica...
that it might rhyme and be better
ingrained: a burning coal of fluid ink...
or that horrible alternative of: the haiku...
mash up: i write for the sake of not being
able to afford the paint the canvas
the brushes or the superstitious agony
of what's already preemptive in such
an undertaking...
                     but it's better tested:
      from this day's depth and its
eyes made most pertinent -
      (this shouldn't be hard...
all i have to look for is a -ent suffix
to match)
           toward some forever incessant...
my own limbo toying with body:
to later succumb to an anybody...
                lazily rhymed -
    lazily staged: for all the gold
of the leprechauns... k k k k koch:
                                  chasm and a miasma...
by god's sexless and the devil's
**** and furry *****...
   i want to rhymes...
i wants to rhymez...
               rhymez likes ping-pongs...
in another tongue:
the plural of echo: is not ecce for a cappuccino:
etch 'ere...
         crescendo bother: blues...
i forget there's painting involved...
no crisp solidified sounds:
   a tongue lapsing up a lisp and a labrador
cow-traffic of moo: st'...
                        from colour to a sound...
an alphabet ring-a-ding-ding...
in another tongue the plural of echo:
              ech...
                     not... m'eh... or eh... for an E...
which is first sung and later cited: eeee (longating)
e-ha!-o...
              not e.e.k.o.
                             prune juice fermenting
from drinking: god this brain this sponge...
spiders and spiders...
        spiders and spiders...
first inconvenience is also a staggering
remedy: failure on my part...
hangover from a love that lasted...
well... from april through to september...
           obviously impossible as i couldn't
just see the need to "pet" tarantulas...
           me and my fickle arachnophobia...
it's sometimes there: it's sometimes not there...
and "there"...
hell... if a louis zukofsky can play
the tender part of aristocratic verbiage:
here i come towing a guilty expansion
project: under the proposed guidelines
of: democracy... had i a tongue with
a sidewinding penny to boot...
that i might lisp or spit point blank
an empty fill: and... there would be an
academic career waiting for someone
as i might: provide... postmortem...
                 it's not an agony of
the overlooked...
it's just an agony of agony...
   for some per se pressure to peruse one's
own lack of detail...
to have to complicate the demands
of an audience as a...
  "back-up plan": B-project...
                         in seeking redemption:
or gravity -
   all i know is that i'm not a narrative
architect - i'm too poor to paint...
or rather: i have a photographic memory
and i'd rather make food that cezanne
wouldn't want to paint:
or debase by eating...
          could you paint still life
these days: no... not very: not really...
but i am not a journalist... either...
primarily so...
             i am a democrat on the level that
i would be happy to live
outside of plato's republic:
it's not like plato ever convinced that
figurehead of Syracuse...
                  so... spoilt eggs...
chicken strutting flamingos...
     red's an oopsie come blue and purple
is born...
that's not true...
green and yellow will yield blue...
fair enough...
               but as sure as death: i am...
big credit to punctuation as a revision
of: not anti-rhyme: but certainly not pro- it...
    because i'm constipated on this
type of exertion...
i want as much of the holy fire of lyricism
to burn a mark on the cinema of
memory...
   but... alas: here's my 2nd best take
on this not being tabloid journalism...
               - so how come everyone started
to write: cute?
i mean: if not a cute rhyme then...
some variation of the exasperated haiku?
  - sputnik...
           in sight a digression rubric...
it's the same idea:
   - sputnik
   - moon shards
    - elevations of comparisons
   to match up to a meteor crater with
a slice of apple crumble...
    - sound is most certainly not colour...
- could i call nouns primes:
  or numbers? odd... even...
             red elepahant 1 G
              blue sky 0 K
              horrible hat 9 pro
circus envy... esp. clown envy...
                        this couldn't possibly be...
tabloid journalism...
or "poetry"... it's how far democracy
allows itself the pursuit of: ideals
with a hint of veto... for the pardon
of the status quo hierarchy...
                 concrete flinging monkey...
- robert duncan: nee san francisco -
i write by eyes alone -
i neuter the sounds employed
to challenge like neither *** -
best unscripted and that...
       metaphor of metaphysics
                collage of misnomers -
at best...
                     having to sit with
a slab of lard on your head at noon -
       this least grammar this last exasperation...
a furniture of a "poem"...
an earthworm's guide / guise of the tongue...
wriggling away at the benign...
        postcards and a slick licking of
postage stamps...
                 i forget to pause: i pause...
i paint with this bothersome blood of ink...
the crisis at the revisited crux...
stale europe dying h'america...
                i have yet to read anything
i have written aloud...
   i have yet to read anything i have written
aloud...
i have yet to read anything
i have written aloud:
resonance...
                    revelation 13:5...
          the beast was given a mouth to utter
proud words and blasphemies and
               to exercise its authority
  (for forty-two months)...
time a forgotten space...
or at best: a concentrated suffice of it...
a most bearable 10am in september...
i'd like to think i can't be
exasperated... or i might just:
jest at overt-punctuation...
          - written as pure eyes and
a beethoven towing deaf-        -ness...
    too much of: jack of all trades...
- we once had a "pardon" of handwriting,
in that we once employed a quill
and a detail of ink -
but not now but not now
of this clicking machinery like
chickens' pecking grains or letters...
         spiders and spiders and all those
freelance romantics...
a democracy of language that can
escape a caging formality to the endearing
dear sir, kind regards essay / letter...
language in a tuxedo...
language of escapism...
that one might treat a watermelon
as driftwood... or the crucifix as such...
  - that this can be a language that cannot
be a mechanised slaughter -
  for a throw-away: a 20th century admiration
for some variation of the "up-to-date"...
i am having to diminish
the base of an argued for: carpenter...
by bone... by bone... by each...
carrying of the vowels without:
the pentagram soliloquy -
           that could only be a variation
of rhetoric without an eagering of an audience...
this ingrained son of sam
this glittering blood feud of nights...
a line of an exasperation...
and each and every akin to this "maxim"...
because this is not tabloid journalism...
and it's not because it's
a democratic avenue of would-be squalor...
my niche partitioning
between those literate and those:
hardening a candyfloss of tortures:
       born air: settled in a tomb of fire...
born water: settled in the double sediment
that's once a breathing air comb
into frets of grain...
and earthworm wriggling...
now cement... malicious albino ape jester:
my little evil at the passable concern for
salt and the himalayas...
in that i work on the worth of:
teasing clone i - not in english not in english:
but in english...
  in this... tongue that's a best
butchered body of... a scrutiny that's
almost a... verifying anatomy... best:
   brick by ******* stacked...
a harbour of anathema and dangling
posits of: walking-9-to-5 abortions...
            high cue: but otherwise there's always
a managing of a queue...
that's bottom brass and godhad grey...
with a tease of a concept of hair...
balding snow on tomorrow's mountain...
- that i never hear what i write...
that i see it...
            i see "it" borrowed from somewhere
that has to be revised and revisited and
so-forth backed up renewed into
a ******* Guggenheim... renewing:
          new yorker slang and formalities of
rent... and... shackled up with...
dirtying the shells of oysters with...
prior the lemon and the glug of
the slugging: a word for lessening tourism of
Penzance... or anywhere in south wales:
cornwall...
         i tried loving the russians...
i tried loving the russians...
but then i had a mirage of a girlfriend
that had to tame tarantulas and i was
an arachnophobic tease -
                 - that in poetry the narrator is "somehow"
not the protagonist...
disembodiment via a section by
section - this limit of a candle...
this the kidney... this the heart...
but a "polyphony" of chicken hearts
towed into a broth...
          that poetry doesn't allow
a narrator... that i want to pick out a mask...
and i want tabloid journalism to spew
out of me...
this little detail this grammatical
arithmetic - sound of A...
and the syllable tease of a consonant -
impromptu question:
              asked in between: "in between":
what is a consonant K...
then again: in borrowed rome:
KAY is not the greek kappa...
what is the nurture of over-naming
and what are synonyms?
                      layers upon layers and
this is not a purity of jargon-jesting...
spiders and spiders...
                    - such that i believe in the anonymity
of readers and how i don't expect
a comment section:
   that bukowski made poetry pop
for: a gary snyder admirer...
  
  or - how one hundred arrows were sharpened
on flesh: and were dimmed...
because to crown this crude
metal creed against a stone....
and had to make coagulation of
frothing bloom -
extracting pauses to make a living
with taking wheel:
              burning rubber and burning
kites...
             burning threads and shoelaces...
dissolving sugar into
caramel...             an oyster that became
a tongue.... and a tongue...
its uttermost silence that could be
wrapped up back into a clean
residue of: biting / nibbling
for a piano... because never at a...

           such is the concept of rhyme...
that one can beg for guillotines
to... supposedly... "end".

from latin: a letter i can see...
a word i can: lip-read!
               not this... vanguard
of sanskrit and the glagolitic.

translate the letter to a status of a number...
whole: holes...
from nothing the sieving project.

Because you cannot use borrowed breath,
and move lips of another
that are pasted on your face.*

These words swam through
my mind
behind my eyes
and never visited your mind
or saw green swamp irises.

My words wear shackles;
the chain attaches stubbornly
against a cloud of nothingness,
the cloak you wear and the plume that spreads
behind you, where I am--
trailing the ground, dirtying, muddying.
Decomposing.

How nimble the fingers that point at the WomanChild,
the creature who does not learn to grow
because she wants to keep living and borrowing time,
not breaths, not skin cells and DNA and memories
that do not erase without ripping up the cassette and the VCR.

My words were meant to meet yours and touch pinkies.
Your thoughts made your words and body and smile lines
Run, run as fast as you could
                     from a Monster, a Curse, a King.

I am the sword of tongue and the fist that crumbles
when a beetle passes by.

You are scared of me.

The security guard was walking through the courtyard yelling. Lockdown mode. That’s what they do when someone has a gun. When people could die. When your school is on the news and everyone sends your family flowers and homemade lasagna. When I feel an anxiety attack coming, twitching my hands usually helps me calm down. As we were ushered into the auditorium by teachers with faces like a funeral, I didn’t feel the need to move my fingers from where they held one strap of my backpack to my shoulder. I wasn’t sure I could move them at all.

When you read a book about a school shooting, they always talk about the chaos. Kids running away from the unstable teenager with a gun, teachers trying to make sense of the disarray, wondering which window you could safely jump out of. They don’t tell you about the waiting. They don’t tell you about the graveness of the teachers’ faces as they ask you to be quiet. They don’t tell you how a tiny corner of the blackness lifts when your friend texts back. They don’t tell you how you will not stop staring at the door that leads directly to the parking lot, wondering when it will burst open with a crash, a bang, and the color red.

I stared at the stage lights still left on from drama class. I rested my muted white converse on the seat in front of me, then vaguely wondered if a teacher would get angry at me for dirtying a chair while teenagers and adults alike sat wondering who wouldn’t get to go home that day. A girl I’d known since second grade texted me and said her algebra teacher barricaded the door with an old, orange bookshelf. Three flights of stairs between us. My friend told her mom she loved her. Too many miles between them. I thought about my dog, sleeping at home on a green blanket filled with holes. I couldn’t remember the last thing I said to my mom that morning. I couldn’t remember the last time I said “I love you.”

When I read the books, I didn’t realize how scared I’d be. I didn’t realize that my throat would close up like the eye of a tornado and the rock in my stomach would double in size every time the teacher got a message on his radio. When I read the books, I wanted to know if everything would be alright. I turned each page with the raw, nervous energy I was so interested in reading about. But as I sat between my friends on the auditorium seats that were now much too red, I didn't want to know what would happen next. I wanted to grab my friends and run away from the red of the seats that could so easily be echoed in all of their faces a moment too late. As my shaking fingers tapped out a rhythm on my phone, the reassurances from three floors up and the anxiety bombarding me from all angles mixed with the clanking sounds from behind the stage to create a bloodshot mind uncertain of its actuality.

I have been unaware of these walls I've built
that surround my vocal chords,
restricting the vibrations meant to be heard

These dirtying stones that make up my ribs
and cage in my heart
Pluck out the colored feathers of my opinions,
and gag my long winded but silent stories

I cannot explain
why,
or how,
the words just won't come

I want to be heard
but my Silence is comfortable,
like the sadness that cradled me
for so many starless nights

I need to let you in
like I let him in
and her in
and them in
but I don't know where to begin
Anxiety comes in waves
and Silence bottles it up, stifles and swallows it.
Because it's easier that way.

These loud yells and thunderstorms
ease me backward into the Silence --
My safe haven.
where the only sound is the air ****** in and pushed out
from these two boarded up lungs.
My words are unheard and I allow them to be

Here, there are no locks,
no bolted doors, no filter for my thoughts
Here, I break down those walls
and place them around me.
Here, the Silence surrounds,
and I listen.

wonder at the innocence of the year before
feel tired of complaining about it
feel nothing when the anniversaries of your eventual demise begin to unfold
ungently
ripping the lace and dirtying the satin

feel like this is just the way the world turns
and that you turned with it
turned from everything you learned
turned to all the horrible
disgusting **** that you knew was in you from the beginning.

just let it happen
just let it let loose
stop trying to stop it
stop crying after ***
don't you want it by now?

That Sunday Morning,
the fresh scent of winter in the air,
just slightly coming through the door every time it opens,
entering with the people coming in from the outside,
and following them everywhere they go.

Everyone seated,
spaced out as if saving a seat for someone that was never coming.
A man up at the front,
he speaks,
wanting me to listen,
and he thinks I am for my eyes are on him,
but my mind wanders farther away with every word he says.

He asks for a moment of silence,
and as I see curly, grey-haired women
and the almost fully-bald elderly men bow their heads,
I too, look to the floor.

I do not close my eyes like everyone else;
they remain open as I study my shoes on the back of the pew in front of me.
I know I shouldn't have my feet on the books,
getting them ***** from the dry, dust-like dirt on the bottom of my shoes,
but I do it anyway.

I finally notice the silence of the room,
so big it could echo with every slight movement you make,
yet remains silent.

There are so many people in here with me,
too many to count without getting distracted by the beautiful fall leaves,
catching the warm, yellow sunlight outside the partially shaded window.
Still so silent you can hear the clock ticking from the other side of the room.

For the first time I close my eyes
and picture darkness.

My mind wanders and finally,
when I open my eyes,
seeing so many people surprised me,
for the silence was so deep,
it was as if their spirits had left their bodies,
As if they were already in Heaven,
As if God had already called them home,
but he left me behind because I had not listened to what the pastor was saying.
Because I never closed my eyes during prayer,
or maybe, because I had my feet on the pew in front of me,
dirtying the books.

I'm convinced ghosts and memories are cousins
I feel them in the walls
In the bathroom, in my(?) bed, and even in the glossy surface of the sink
It's just the wind I chant surrounded by stuffed friends
Then why do I feel so full I crave purging
Why do I feel their essence dirtying my palms
They're clinging to the hem of my dress
I want to yell
STOP HAUNTING ME! I'VE DONE NOTHING TO YOU BUT MOVE ON, THAT'S ALL I COULD DO.
My weary head meets the wall.
He replaced us. He hid all the tiny traces of us we didn't take and moved a brand new family unit in
Avoiding speaking of us like it would erase us from existence
From existing here.
I say quieter
I did nothing. I did nothing.

She follows you

Because you welcome her in

You send out fancy invitations

With calligraphic RSVPs

And wax stamped seals

You sprits them with the
Smell
 of your heartbeat 

And cradling arms

dare you not to risk

letting herself deny

The memory of  “we”

Dare you not let any sense

Ever evoked be

Forgotten


You sit patiently in hand

With understanding and silence

With independence and      love
*
Secretly lusting

For the moment

She rests her delicate feet

Firmly at your door

And you open with      
*Satisfaction
There she is

Ever so fragile

With her tear stained face

Needing you

Making you feel worthy

Giving you her life

Her breath

Her body 
            
that she unselfishly

Throws under you

For you

Dirtying linens

Where purity once lay

Taking your fill
Another piece of her empty
lonely soul
Weak fragile...and all yours


And you wonder why
She screams for you
   You say she can't let go
          
               Of course she can't darling

I want to write a poem about the calmness of sand
cooling on a coast in early morning's soft light.
Or lapping waves creeping to my toes
on a lazy summer lake with the sun at its peak.

I want to write a song about the freedom of birds
and clicking crickets humming in the rain.
Or cracking sticks buckling beneath armored feet
as the sun sinks down below tall mountain peaks.

But all I can write are poems about sandy toes
dancing in the dawn and dirtying the sheets.

And all I can sing are songs that you hum
in the middle of the night when you're fighting off sleep.

taking candy from spiritual strangers,

whose only wish is to

connive you into understanding—

that you are mortal and thus can fail,

at anything and everything you set your mind to

by using distractions of your flesh—

how it feels to be touched

echad echad

you call the names but they barely

mean anything by now

these eyes

once so pearly oceans are now

shut-off hell’s gates that call you forth,

asking you to lay down your soul for

something so fleeting as

succubus sugar lips

and you finally understand

echad echad

it calls to you as you try to walk away,

to try to better your bleeding,

your razor-sharp dreams—

so diamond clear that you cut yourself

reaching through the void

to feel it, to feel something

becoming possessed by the idea of possessing—

something—

a spirit a person a hand a light at the end of the

tunnel that you’ve been limping

and dragging yourself towards for so long

that you barely remember what it feels like

to be free

to be joyful to be happy and you wish,

you hope,

that some sovereign crown some prize

is waiting for you when you emerge from your filth

into new white clothes,

a conformation in snow,

leaving behind the Harry Potter scars the demons

the hatred you’ve spent years hoeing and raking and sowing away at—

digging your soul out from under the ivy that’s been

creeping numbing,

you look into his windows open up his chest cavity

to find the flailing flawed organs

beating madly away

I love you I love you

echad echad

but it’s too much to rip sutures out now

the skin has grown over—

the molecules trying with all their dark matter might

to heal their physics their chemistry,

the great scientists had no notion

of the neutrons and protons of the spirit

the Holy Spirit of all the ages,

combine, puzzle pieces that confuse and puzzle

your very matter and mass of existence

why do you love how do you love,

what is this

echad echad

friends who wish to become guardian angels

when they fall through the void,

but who find themselves already there—

living skeletons living shrouds—

I want to help but step back stand back

let the bomb implode without absorbing the fallout,

and sometimes I fear I’m becoming a fallen angel too,

the youth and light splintering through

the windows of the houses that sometimes I swear I see

specters spiraling through—

so I constantly exorcise the notion of darkness from

within the very abyss of my cranial lobes

without lobotomizing myself from the pain

of two thousand years of history

cry for the Biblical hysteria

can you hear it—

nearby the horizon you should hear the hero

dragging crucifixes as chains

and sin, sweet sour sin,

is the taste in my mouth every morning,

no matter how many times I swish the mouthwash—

I’m constantly reminded of the fact that I am human

and thus cannot attain angelic security in my beliefs—

bless me again for I will fall

I will feel

this anxiety until the second

Saint Peter ushers my soul into eternity—

I can hear my track record echoing now—

ringing a hollow sound—

every time I convince myself of one more vain day

one more lustful night,

every time I see your eyes,

wide as Horus’s,

but inside I see Cerberus snarling against his choke collar,

so I continue calling out

over my shoulder as I flee

echad echad

for at the center of this infinity fold lies love,

for this is a metaphor,

for monsters of Hades dirtying the waters of our minds,

having us believe that lust equals love

as E equals MC squared,

but it’s not exact except for exaltation

so it echoes the old adage

echad echad

pink ribbon scars

he tastes like you but sweeter—

anthems of our childhood that want us to feel

like we’re not alone but what is there really—

to help—

and why isn’t every drop from Heaven holy water,

so that every time the rains come our past lives wash away

and we are born anew—

Dios Mio! Mein Gott!

crying S.O.S. S.O.S.—

what would Saint Augustine say in our present state,

ICXC drawing the sign in glittering gold to

protect to bless to save

our simian style souls,

and Twain asked who prayed for the devil

the precursor to the apple-fall,

Newton style,

and it is God,

God prays for the most fallen of all,

so why do I find in my heart that it is so hard

to forgive those who have done so little

in comparison—

sing the baptismal rite,

sing ICXC,

letting our sins be scrubbed through cross-like metaphors,

but what truly is my cross to bear—

to always fall into a love so poisonous

as Eve’s apple as Snow White’s apple—

I’ve drifted I know

but I sift through the sieve of my body,

searching through the oats and grain to find the seeds

that fell on ground not hallowed,

to recultivate them to grow—

Lord knows my rut my routine

is as bad as the next heathen’s,

my dress hangs on my frame,

a skeleton queen

trying to gorge my heart out on a love not pure

a life not fulfilled,

help me I pray—

this is my cry—

my anxious mind feeds off of trying to decode

the taps on the glass of eternity,

trying to reach through impenetrable planets to ask—

what is this love I want it so bad

echad echad

I’m a baker’s making of nature and nurture,

trying to unearth from the dregs of the soul

the meaning the feeling

of why of what of how

but finally finding that no matter how maddeningly

brilliant,

how beautiful and ******,

we cannot know the mind of God—

we are not titans,

we are not the same stuff of myths of legends of angels,

and I cry, I cry, I beg and cry,

my beggar’s prayer is to know

when I have been given such grace,

why am I still greedy for more—

for I read to you from a play,

I read to you from poetry that you claim is not about you

but it is,

for only you have the dichotomy of fast knives

and feather kindness that I could express

so eloquently,

but you don’t understand you will never understand

the marrow of my faith in a God that you believe you are as strong as,

even as I plead you to stop playing with this soul

you have been so graciously given,

because you are dazzled by other

seemingly stronger things in this life,

your eyes becoming clouded by this idea that you are immortal

even as your heart palpitates a warning to slow—

to slow it down—

I’ve seen so many brought down by these myths of power

and magic, candles burning brightly

now snuffed and made silent by spirits you know naught of,

and I cannot stress the simple thing that strength

is more than pride and Samson-ian body girth,

but you battle away these tried truths in

the face of temptations,

giving up and throwing down the sword that was handed

to you to fight to persevere

and I see—

I see I see I see—

the demons that you fight are titans in your shadow,

even in mine, they are tall,

and I have to let you go because it is slowly becoming too much

too hard to handle the reins of this bucking rearing thing

that was once love,

because no matter how much of my sloppy dripping heart

I throw in your face

you will never understand the depths the dark recesses

of why, of how,

I came to be in

echad echad.

You pushed me from my home,
The moment you mentioned sanctity,
That I‘d be dirtying something,
If I touched it,
I’d be ruining it for everyone else,
If I took part,

But what is sanctity anyway?
Am I capable of being god’s child?
Must I strip back layers of my love first?
But can I love god,
If I cannot love myself?
Can I love myself,
If I am not myself?
I can’t help but love.
And I’d quite like to get married,
And maybe to have my first dance to Elvis,
And to throw the bouquet,
And to hear the words:
     “You may now kiss!”
Does that sound unclean to you?

I want to honeymoon, somewhere in Italy,
I want us to cook dinner for one another.
Is that impure?

I want to have and to hold in sickness and in health till death do us part.
Is that ******* *****?
Does it make you sick?

The moment this country said no,
You are not love,
You want,
To ****,
Love.
Even when other people were saying,
We understand you, you are good, you are clean,
You are love.

This stopped being my home,
You tore the ground from under me,
in the name of “sanctity”,
I’d love to stop being angry about it,
I would love to,
But my policy has not changed my policy has not changed my policy has not changed,
My policy will not change,
And that is all you and I will ever have in common.

I wonder,
do you still try and file
every particle of skin
left under your nails
from the nights we spent alone
Listening to the subtle tune
or the bands we once flavored
alongside at an absolute.
I wonder,
Do you still try and dig in the dirt?
The dirt that grows outside the window
I'd sometimes sneak through on those late summer nights.
(Do my footprints still remain?)
Do your hopes remain focused
on the act of dirtying the smell
of the daisies,
I had pressed in my hair
To a far a place
where all thoughts of me
will become the remains.
The daisies you dug through
with the skin under your nails
Hopefully leaving the faint smell
Of the flowers that use to lay in my hair
under your nails
alone in your mind,
a constant reminder,
of my ongoing memory.
(I did exist)
Or are you planting the stems
You've plucked right from me.
From the underside of you nails
planting them in the ground
In hope of a sprout to appear
of a new "daisy girl"
Or are you simply trying
To mask the thought of me
From coming to anything,
Anything less than a halt?
Is the nostalgia,
really keeping you up from your thoughts?

There’s a certain heaviness to it,
the inherent darkness in a silent room,
**** near oppressive,
dirtying,
almost as if it’s crawling into you,
isolating you.
Utterly alone.

Then you remember her,
half curled on your chest, cradled in the nook of your arm,
wrapped around you.
A thin smile,
just barely exposing her thin, top row of teeth.
A faint glimmer in the inky blackness around you,
starlight.

She looks up at you.
It’s an extreme cliché,
to call eyes a window to the soul,
but it’s fitting.
You look down at her and meet her eyes.
Seeing her,
that childlike joy, curiosity mixed with tempered wisdom beyond her years,
all coalescing into beautiful, amber eyes,
makes that darkness feel a bit less heavy.

You see the corner of her lip trapped between her teeth,
thinking on what to say.
You’re doing the same.
Whatever words are spoken next decide an uncertain future,
a tipping point.
“I think I’m falling for you.” You want to say,
but you stay silent,
you’re terrified.
“I’m sorry,” she says almost mournfully.

That darkness comes creeping back,
weighing on you,
on your heart,
and it breaks you.
You like to think she heard it,
that breaking of hearts,
that she understands.
But she still lays there,
enveloping you,
who are unfeeling and alone.

Love Toy
by Ryan P. Kinney

It all started Valentine’s Day.
       A day of plastic hearts and candied affections.
Two love-weary travelers,
Overwhelmed by loneliness and desire,
Found solace in each other’s arms

Our stark white uniforms mingled.
Our glasses clinked.
Our lips meet.
While the sins of loves lost
       Hung like the albatross
And pressed a crooked heart into your bare skin.
So beautiful a moment
      For such a deceitful act.

You spent the whole night, transfixed.
       Listening to my heart beat.
Amazed that something so beaten
       Could still function.

In the beginning you were “The Crush”
A passing fancy, I was sure.
       Born of my desperation and your compassion,
But that act crushed “The Crush”
One simple kiss.
       Spoke the words, “I love you.”
And began our own false romance.

I could see how beautiful you were
       Inside that shell of obscurity.
You could see the light that shown within me
        Shrouded in a cloud of darkness.
We both had such beautiful scars.

But you refused to be committed.
To wear these bindings
And dwell within these padded walls.
Yet, kicking and screaming,
       You still accept that you love me.

We are cloak-and-dagger lovers.
       Borrowing sensation
              Stealing kisses
       Whispered intimacy
              And secret *******
One holds the hush, the other the blade

That is for but the moment, though.
We spend all our raw emotions at once.
Choosing to live fully
      At only that instant.
We have all the time in the world to die.

You can’t keep me from others
And I can’t you.
But I want no other.
Although you stand in front of my face
       You refuse to be seen.

What do you want from me?
I want everything from you.
I want to peer into your darkness
       And drink in your warmth.
I want to be so intimate
        You’ll have to smoke a cigarette when I’m done.

Our liaisons have become a formula for pseudo-dating.
Meet
       Kiss
              Touch
                      Feel
Repeat, as necessary.
So close to the real thing
       That only the word “girlfriend” separates it.

We ARE seeing each other.
We see more of each other
       Than those who don’t.

We even see the barbed wire
       That separates us
Digging into our skin,
       Ignored
While we exchange momentary, blissful passion.
I love you,
For now.
Tomorrow, who knows?

I will surely go to a Hell of my own making
        For loving you.
               Sullying, dirtying, corrupting you
And it is that fact
       That keeps you from me.

The guilt of my sin,
       The heft of your innocence,
Weighs heavily on my soul
       As I drag you down with me.

But, in spite of me,
A new hope was born in utero
Inside this woman came new light.
Enveloped in your inner angel
Was proof that I could love again.

You will hurt me
       I will hurt you
To which I reply
       Please do!
             Don’t you dare stop!
For the love of your God
       Let me feel something.

Some love is better than none.
Pain is better than the void.
Let’s just live in the moment.
And agree this is weird,
       And *****,
             And cheap.

All I can say for certain is,
       I love you.
You say you love me,
       But what does I love you mean,
When it doesn’t mean I want you.