[Verse 1: Drake]
Versace, Versace, Medusa head on me like I'm 'Luminati
This is a gated community, please get the ******* the property
Rap must be changing cause I'm at the top and ain't no one on top of me
****** be wanting a verse for a verse, but man that's not a swap to me
Drowning in compliments, pool in the backyard that look like Metropolis
I think I'm sellin' a million first week, man I guess I'm a optimist
Born in Toronto but sometimes I feel like Atlanta adopted us
What the **** is you talkin' 'bout? Saw this **** comin' like I had binoculars
Boy, Versace, Versace, we stay at the mansion when we in Miami
The pillows' Versace, the sheets are Versace, I just won a Grammy
I've been so quiet, I got the world like "What the **** is he planning?"
Just make sure that you got a back up plan cause that **** might come in handy
Started a label, the album is comin' September, just wait on it
This year I'm eating your food and my table got so many plates on it
Hundred inch TV at my house, I sit back like "**** I look great on it"
I do not **** with your new ****, my *****, don't ask for my take on it
Speakin' in lingo, man this for my ***** that trap out the bando
This for my ****** that call up Fernando to move a piano
**** all your feelin's cause business is business, its strictly financial
I'm always the first one to get it, man that's how you lead by example
Versace, Versace, Versace, Versace, Versace, Versace
Word to New York cause the Dyckman and Heights girls are callin' me "Papi"
I'm all on the low, take a famous girl out where there's no paparazzi
I'm tryna give Halle Berry a baby and no one can stop me

[Verse 2: Meek Mill]
Versace, Versace
Its killers, real ****** that's all in my posse (shooters!)
I'm getting so rich that they making up rumors that I'm illuminati (rich!)
Just me and my ****** we killin' these *******, go body for body (murders!)
These suckers be hating, they praying to God that I don't cop a Bugatti
Hold up, drop the top on the rari
Pull in the club and I'm stopping the party
Hold up, got ******* on *******
They poppin' on molly's I'm prolly at Follies with PeeWee and Tip
Of course i went with Lou
I did everything that I said I would do
I really won't tell you that I'm better than you
But we're not on the same level as you
Cause the G55 got a hell of a view
Regular ****** make regular moves
With ya regular ***** and ya regular crew
And you ***** still smokin on regular too? Like word?!
What a shame, my *****
Louboutin blood like Game, my *****
Get left tryna aim, my *****
Like Saddam Hussein, my *****
I'm whippin' this brand new machine
100 bands in my jeans
Call yo ***** Barry Sanders
She done ran through the team
I got hoes out the D
They playing on the team
Do anything for me
I mix that xan with the lean
Hold up, let me get it back
Versace, Versace
I'm gettin' this money, I'm stackin' my broccoli (racks!)
I'm running my city
You might gotta pay me if you land on my property (tax!)
I bought the boardwalk and I parked on the ave
****, my life's like monopoly
You caught a new case and you got outta jail
Boy, you look like a cop to me
(Get out of jail free card?)

[Verse 3: Tyga]
Aughh! Versace, Versace, I brought that **** back, all these ****** they copy
Medusa head on me I'm at the hotel, Versace Palazzo
I rented the yacht for a week, but I bought the convertible Lambo
Six mill for the mansion
I see haters coming I need some more ammo
These ****** gay that's Elmo
So much green I turned camo
Some hoover ****** on flannels
Light light you up no candle
Grip on that handle Yosemite Sam ya, that ***** bang like a banjo
Told my arms dealer no need for a box, I don't read the instructions, I throw out the manual (WOO!)
Versace, Versace, my brother king Trell he in a Ferrari
I don't look the same, my camera the same, I made too much money (WOO!)
Paul Pierce is my neighbor, I told him he should of went to the Clippers
I got some crazy ideas for Versace, get them and tell'em my number
Versace, auggh Picasso, Basquiat I'm cocky
23, 15 mill I'm just getting started
Pop water my water
I walk around on my wallet
I don't **** with Saddam but, that's gold all in my toilet
Statues of Horus, and the annubis is polished
I don't got to, rap about, coke for you to enjoy it
I'm bout' to join the money team, just holla' to Floyd about it
Versace, Versace, I'm taking my money to the Cayman islands (WOO!) Versace Auggh!!

[Outro: Quavo]
Versace, Versace, Versace, Versace
Versace, Versace, Versace, Versace
Versace, Versace Versace, Versace Versace
Versace, Versace Versace, Versace Versace

You are a hard ghost to pin down
my will-o'-the-wisp

If I approach you . . .
you recede
If I back up . . .
you approach

But you never let me touch you
My marsh lover

A light unto my heart
Burns where I cannot touch
Cold flames of blue leave me
No traces of heat upon my lips

My heart shivers from lack of loves inferno
The strength of my skin
Cannot be measured
The merit of my bones
Cannot be weighed

Nor will my love be finite
Caged or displayed
My lips seek soft wet kisses
That reign down on my soul

A baby from Burundi sits next to me today.
He coos and drinks and swallows his mother’s milk.
His father speaks Swahili. Smiles, tells me that his last son
Is going to grow old in Rochester, NY,
Where I sit in a white-walled waiting room, watching
Mothers drag their babies by the armpits to be weighed.

A boy with braided beads holds up four fingers and tells me he is five.
He is too skinny. His pants are sagging and his iron is low.
His mother takes his vegetable checks, stuffs them into the back pocket of her jeans.
What the little **** needs is two percent milk, she says,
Her gold hoops fluttering.

Her son struggles with the small wooden chair he is carrying.
It drags along the carpet, hitting the high spots, and his tiny biceps flinch.
He sits, facing me, while a name is called. And another.
Another woman’s son hands me a book and waits.
He is watching my face and I watch his mother kiss her boyfriend in the first row seats.
He tucks his chin to his chest when I ask his name. Whispers, tells me Jayden.

First page. What color is Elmo, Jayden?
Shoulders shrugging. His lower lip, puckered out and innocent.
What color is he, Jayden?

The color of Jayden’s skin slaps me across the heart when he says he doesn’t know.
He was born in Rochester, NY,
With trash bags and Burger King wrappers wrapped around the fence
That separates his house from the street on which he will grow old
Too soon.
He starts kindergarten in the fall and I tell him Elmo is red, like his t-shirt.
Like his mother’s fingernails.
Like the tomatoes and bell peppers and beets he has never seen.

A girl who went to my High School carries in her youngest child
Who is old enough to walk, but wobbles.
She calls her daughter “thunder-thighs” instead of Jazmyne
And strips off her shoes. Her belt. Her gold bracelets.
The scale says Jazmyne is too heavy for food assistance.
The state says her mother isn’t poor enough for welfare.
The girl I used to know leaves without her daughter’s shoes or the food checks she came for.

In conversations of pretension
We talk about first and third world.
Pretend that America is the land of second chances
Where a baby from Burundi can grow old in cashmere sweaters,
Even when his parents couldn’t pay.

The father who speaks Swahili looks at his shiny watch and his family’s vegetable checks.
Smiles. Tells me his last son is going to grow old and full
In Rochester, NY.

I can’t help but wonder if you still have tucked away all the letters and the notes and the list of reasons why I loved you.
I wonder where you left the guitar strings that I gave you for your wrist
I thought I saw them in a picture of you,
the one with the girl.
I could be wrong.

I think about the things I wrote to you and wonder if you’ve ever looked at them again
And felt the warm singe of pain when you read the words that we meant
when we were naïve enough to think that we were different.

I wonder if I still cross your mind when you scoop ice cream
Because you know how I hate skimpy scoopers.
Or when you find a hair on your arm that's freakishly longer than the rest,
if you wish I was there to pull it out.

Sometimes I think of your mom
And I wonder if she kept my picture, the one she kept on the mantle right beside yours.
What did she do with my Christmas stocking?
I can’t help but wonder if it’s been passed on to your new girl
And I don’t know if they’ll watch West Side Story together,
If she’ll enjoy it the way I did.

I imagine you never thought twice
When you came across a hair still on your pillow, or the faintest of my scent
Or my bobby pins on your bedroom floor.

I remember finding the bobby pins and hair binders of other lovers
when I came back to you for the last time.
They were scattered across your carpet like cruel reminders of all the other heads
that lied in the bed that was always mine.
I wonder if she ever finds mine and feels the same.
Probably not.

I imagine you’ll reread that book someday,
The one I got you in high school when you went through your philosophical phase.
And I wonder if you’ll notice the inside cover where I wrote “I love you”.
I’d always thought there was something special about a book with an inscription.

I remember sitting there for a long while, trying to think of something heartfelt
to say to you,
But all I could manage was “I love you”.
Maybe that’s because I knew that anything else I felt for you would have an expiration date
And I’d wonder if you’d read it when I was gone, and those words wouldn’t be true anymore.
Or not to you.
But I think of you reading it now and it won’t seem silly because it will
always be true.
For both of us, I think.

I think about the time when I first moved to your big city
And I got lost in your neighborhood and I saw you from my car.
You were walking right towards me.
I drove away as fast as I could and I couldn’t breathe or talk or smile.
Did you see me too?
I looked in my rearview mirror, and you never looked back as I drove.
I wanted so badly for you to move away.

I can’t help but wonder if you wonder
About your drawings and your notes and the music you showed me and if I still listen to it.
I do.
If I still wear my black pants that made you go crazy
or if I refuse to listen to The Joker, despite my favorite song lyric of all time,
because it reminds me of the time on your uncle's dock
When we decided we needed a song but we were both too drunk to think of anything sentimental.

I wonder if you imagine a bittersweet feeling coming over me
when I hear the Bee Gees and think of you singing in your Elmo voice,
Or if i ever find myself recalling one of your "facts of the day" and wondering where I learned it.

******, I hope you wonder.

I come from innocence:
shared VHS tapes,
Disney movies rewound so many times
they got jammed,
late nights spent searching for a lost Elmo doll,
orange Tic Tacs,
bedtime stories by Dr. Seuss
and later, J. R. R. Tolkien,
when Saturday mornings meant
waking up at 6 to watch cartoons,
and sleepovers involved liters of Mountain Dew
and Godfathers pizza.

I come from a magical world
where number 4 Privet Drive is my second address,
Big Brother is always watching,
and sleeping with windows open are invitations for Peter Pan.
A place where Mr. Darcy is my soul mate,
I have two dogs named Old Dan and Little Ann,
to follow a white rabbit is encouraged behavior,
and if you asked me who my hero is
I’d answer with “Sydney Carton.”

I come from opposite sides of the map:
One half includes
Springfield raised grandparents
giving me 20 first cousins,
29 second cousins,
annual family reunions at the lake,
home grown tomatoes,
and alcoholics.
The other half is four thousand miles away and includes
only two cousins,
phone calls every Sunday before two,
and phrases like “Weltrusten” and “Ik hou van jou”
that sound as English as “Good night” and “I love you.”

I come from transformation:
dance recitals where wearing lipstick and hating it
turned into High School
when we all started wearing eyeliner
because it made us look older,
summers soaked in sunlight
are now dampened with summer jobs,
monsters no longer lived under our beds
but in our heads,
clumsy first kisses went further,
romances disappeared
and were replaced with heartbreak
so agonizing
even chocolate couldn’t help,
funerals became imminent,
trophies won at basketball camp- age 7
mean nothing
when you’re told you’re not good enough- age 17.

I come from friendship:**
stupid fights for no reason
always meant brownies the next day,
five dollar Photobooth pictures at the mall,
scary movies we never finished,
sneaking out at three in the morning to swim in the neighbors pool,
and surprise birthday parties
complete with Silly String.
Learning that it’s okay
to let someone see you cry sometimes.
Dumb ideas like wagon racing,
and glow stick fights
that left welts on our arms and legs.
Lord of the Rings movie marathons,
girls night out at Buffalo Wild Wings,
riding bikes down the middle of the highway,
mix CD’s,
Red Mango runs,
words of comfort,
advice,
love,
and seeing the beauty in each other
even when we can’t see it in our self.

I'm just getting in the bath,
Someone else wrote the letter,
I don't want to make a. Mess.

Draw me the water
I point at the tap
Burden no family
Hold my head under icecaps.

Merkel Cells, diluted sensation,
The end of fingertips cant feel your
Flesh.
Shriveling in the cold,
Shivering to stop freezing,
But I cant. What am I doing?
Can I want this now, errectores pilorum erected.
Have I set motion to,
Cogs in a watch I cant adjust.

my lungs mark absolute zero
this is me sitting in chemistry class
english
10th grade
asking sam to suffocate with me
every alvioli is pinned by ****** as thick as knitting needles
my chest is permafrost
my sternum, antarctica
the ribs hollow out
capillary beds lose all the haem
out of their erythrocytes

I'm losing St. Elmo's Fire.

The baths still panting out,
Water roars, gushing spout.
Proud the current sweeps me through,
The porcelain lining this white hell bathroom.
It's bone cannot hide from my blood,
As if I'm isotope 226 of Radium.
Heat seeking marrow.
My serum is Hodgkins Lymphoma,
Tearing through sheeting tile,
Like a young cancer child,
Afflicted,
Leukemia,
No chance,
No good blood left,
To let.


Soon, it will all be gone, and the rivers that
freeze in my arms, and the ribs that are icicles
form, and the atrial canal is not like Venice,
it is the Rhine in winter, the Volga during
the solstice.

Spring will never come again.
Spring slipped its head into the bath water, like my own.

Where I reside now…is not my home. Well, technically it is. I have lived there for more than almost two and a half years, but it still isn’t home.

Home is where the smell of apple-cinnamon fills the house during Christmas; when tons of tasty food covers the kitchen tables, and family members dig into the dishes.

Home is where I spent my childhood; where the room I slept in’s walls were a mix between the palest pink, white, and grey; the walls covered with my name and stickers, and  the Elmo sandbox I played in when I was five.

I used to ride my bicycle down the street and back, and spend time at the neighbor’s house. I remember reading a favorite book of mine, while walking my dog down our long street.

Home, where I would walk outside with bare feet, cringing with every step because there were rocks covering the ground. The bonfire would be set ablaze and I’d get close enough only to back away again because it was too hot.

Now home is a foreign place to me. I no longer smell the sweet fragrance of apple-cinnamon during Christmas. The food seems to be less as is the family.

Where my room is now one color, white, and contains two boys beds; the stickers gone and the walls now freshly scribbled on. The Elmo sandbox is gone and probably sand less.

My bike is old and rusty with a baby seat attached. The neighbors aren’t as friendly. My book isn’t as fascinating and no longer is a favorite. My dog is getting old and no longer wishes to walk.
I wear shoes outside, and the ground is covered with dirt. It’s too much of a hassle to go outside, only to smell like smoke when you returned. The seats that surrounded the fire are empty.

My home is now filled with everything I used to know. My world is different than when I was a child. I’ve grown, and can see that there is no evidence that I even existed there.

They’ve replaced me. Two little boys, my nephews, are now my Daddy’s favorite babies.

I am at the end of the boot, and have been replaced.

Home is where the heart is, but what happens when that heart is broken?

Mon coeur...my heart
Is where I start

A journey as long as present and past
Over metaphorical oceans, oh so vast

Tranquil seas of turquoise blue and emerald green
Oasis to seas which for a time were violent and mean

Mon coeur...my heart
Would not be torn apart

A berth in a favorite Mediterranean port
Provided safe harbor of a sort

Reminding mon coeur...my heart
It had yet to reach the start

An unexpected voyage to an uncharted sea
Would lead me to believe there was something more for me

A voyage that made up for the many years of frustration
That always led to perpetual exasperation

Mon Coeur...my heart
Had at last reached the start

An open sea to travel
Honest words that never felt the gavel

A closeness
An openness

Both of which had not been felt
Both of which made my heart melt

Impeccable conversation
Invigorating recreation

She had to be made for me
We fit together so perfectly

My best friend...ma chere
My Elmo to her Carebear

Sunny days
Stormy days

Through those we made our way
And together forever we would stay

The journey over an endless placid sea
Was not meant to forever be

Shoal in the night
7th of June if I remember right

Mon coeur...my heart
Was finally torn apart

I know that all happens for a reason
And some are only with us for a season

But little does that help
All I can muster is the weakest yelp

For what I lost in the end
Was my best friend

The Cape of storms, bay of Bengal,
the southern trades,
I've sailed them all.
I
drank in dockside taverns,
met ladies by the score, been
picked up from the gutters and
then I've sailed some more.

Barbie screams for help in her dream house
as you rush to the scene, a towel tied loosely over your shoulders,
a pillow beneath your shirt in place of a Kevlar vest,
and only oversized sunglasses covering your identity.


As you rush to save her, Elmo – your first rescue –
clings tightly beneath your underarm, bobbing gently
as you scale the ottoman and jump from couch to couch.


To the unseeing world you are Batman,
Wolverine, the Flash, and all of the Avengers –
ordinary men made heroic through radiation and tragedy.


But I see beyond the alter ego, past the acrobatics
and death-defying maneuvers that merit the oohs
and aahs within our general definition of heroic.


I see a boy truly worth admiring, the boy I’d call for help
if needed, because in you I see all boys, In you
I see the beauty of biology, the lovely product of a number
of atoms I will never have enough lifetimes to count.


If you could only see the splendid hue of your wide-eyed
innocence as you tie your teddy bear villain to the chair leg,
unaware that the seemingly simple steps of your chubby fingers
require a million more steps within you.


The sheer energy coursing from nerve to nerve
with each dip of your head and bow of your lashes
is more incredible than any power
induced by gamma rays or infected spiders.


When you place your hands at your waist in glorious victory
and lift each rain-booted foot over entire civilizations
of Lego people, I am made aware of the social circles
present within you, the cliques of tissues and cells
moving uniformly inside, carpooling toward their respective jobs,
their kinetic messages traveling faster than
the water-cooler gossip of any terrestrial worker.


And while you separate your plastic dinosaur army
by rank – in this case color, shape, size, and title –
you show the world that the truths you contain
in your four year old brain could rival
any super computer or evil mastermind.


A Pomerian named Lucy yips at your feet,
making me keenly impressed by the relatively few genetic signals
that separated you from her in creation, the same genes
that invented the stormy gray novelty of your eyes.


In truth, being superhuman is only a lofty dream
because the awe of being human
is our most overlooked achievement.

But we do not realize this truth until
we’re older – If we ever do – once we’re past
the age of dress-up, too old to announce this fact
by wearing tights in our favorite colors
and a cape with our own initials.

I jumped from couch to couch, avoiding the floor that was lava.
The balloon soared and floated in the air, and it could not touch the ground.
Circus animal cookies and chocolate milk were there everyday.
When I was small, the world was big and magical.

My role models were Barney and Babar, Kermit and Elmo.
I wore pink leotards and frilly tutus and stretchy slippers and shiny, black tap shoes.
I’d look up at the sky to see that fluffy white clouds were bunnies, hippos and butterflies.
When I was small, nothing was impossible.

Parks were kingdoms and the jungle-gym was the castle.
My glittery costume gown and my plastic tiara meant I was a real princess,
Peter Pan would come take me away, to live in Neverland.
When I was small, I was immortal.

It’s strange to be a stranger to you
Even though years have passed,
I hope you think of me
And how we made it last.

Your golden curls and goofy smile,
Burned inside my memory
School yard parks late at night,
The way you made me smile,
Oh so bright.

I wonder what you are doing now,
I hope you are happy and not alone.
I hope you found laughter
And a love that healed and was strongly grown.

Do you remember how we told each other everything,
How proud I was of the silly twisted bracelet ring?

Are you still Afraid if lady bugs,
The way they fly, they way they crawl?
Do you still give the world's warmest hugs,
Is Elmo is the best above all?

I grew up loving you,
So I beginning to accept that will never change,
But the fact that I don't know you any more,
will always be forever strange....

I wanna be the hero, I want to be the good little boy, but all this life has me down
and I can’t live in this little town, where everybody frowns, and people walk around with crowns
Looking down because you act a little different and weep yourself to sleep.
It may not be just this town the destroys little boys dreams,
But I’m not going to stick around to watch my home split apart at the seams

My first memory I told my momma that I was the ugly duckling from her story,
she whispered “goodnight son”, and rolled her head back chuckling
She must have known for a long time that it was truth
But she insisted on tucking me in so I showed her my pearly white tooth
Because I thought she made the world all better
But when she kissed my head she told me a lie, and It was all to stop the bed wetter.
And it worked for that moment of time
I was too young to understand that other people wouldn’t be so kind

And when my daddy read me stories the next night it was no different
I told him that I was the black sheep that cried wolf, but he was indifferent
He just told me his stories even louder to stop my interruptions
From breaking the perfect bubble they wrapped me up in complexions.
My father told me about the three little piggies and how I was the strongest of them all
Because the big bad wolf could never blow down my bedroom wall
But what he didn’t tell me that all along he was the wolf in disguise
He was eaten himself, and I was next to be gobbled up; a pig who won first prize

However, I never got the chance to go weeeee weeee weee all the way home
Like every six-year-old kid dreamed of on their first day gone.
Within ten minutes of being in reality, I was told that Santa wasn’t real,
That stories were just fiction, and broken hearts won’t actually heal
I ran home that day fertilizing the grass below
It felt dead inside the kick to my reality was low
The grass I ran home on had been bone dry for six years
But I never really knew what to name crying since Elmo never really showed any tears

I wanna be the hero, I want to be the good little boy, but all this life has me down
and I can’t live in this little town, where everybody frowns, and people walk around with crowns
Looking down because you act a little different and weep yourself to sleep.
It may not be just this town the destroys little boys dreams,
But I’m not going to stick around to watch my home split apart at the seams

From the crib to the high chair, from the training wheels to the big boy seat, I was off
Off to meet talking trains, dancing zoo animals, and bright smiling people lit like Rudolf
I wanted laser guns shooting at me, ninja stars whizzing past my face
And everyday boys like me saving the day from bad guys that I'd have to chase
But nowadays criminals are for the news crews, and fights were for action scenes,
Adventures and joys were six planets away in Pluto’s playful puppy dreams
But I distinguished reality as fake because your fake was my reality
That I so desperately tried to hold onto since it was more lively than gravity

I was told the easter bunny had died and my cat didn’t go to the vet to rest;
the Superheroes were just drawings on a piece of paper destroying the forest
Not fighting the joker nor galactic alien ships; not even raising a finger to save a cat,
But I watched thousands of people die on my kindergarten screen in a concrete grave.
Superman never showed up to stop either of the hijacked planes,
And Mrs. Burger, the only teacher to ever give me a red light, cried for at least an hour in pain.
Before this, I had no idea what death was, but it had become blatantly clear to see
That whatever it was, where ever it took people, I swore up and down It would never take me

Because I wanna be the hero, I want to be the good little boy, but all this life has me down
and I can’t live in this little town, where everybody frowns, and people walk around with crowns
Looking down because you act a little different and weep yourself to sleep.
It may not be just this town the destroys little boys dreams,
But I’m not going to stick around to watch my home split apart at the seams

Elmo,
Your name and your face
Are engraved in my soul
Why did you have to go
Didn't you know you were my home

You have left me homesick
For now and a lifetime to see
You were my best boy
Please come back for one last treat

the day i lost you,
i never thought that i would lose you forever.
the day i lost you forever,
i wished we could be together.
-
you are in a better space,
a higher place.
i still feel the warmth
of your embrace.
-
i still dream about you,
somehow i live without you.
i know you’re watching down too,
i know i gotta get through.

hope is a burning buddha candle.
set aflame with his ornate head slowly melting.
we sat in silence and blew the candle out before his waxen ears met his shoulders, but you would’ve liked to have seen him exist in a puddle.
you sit quietly that morning and wonder what it would be like to exist in a puddle.
you decide that you would have liked it.

hope clings itself to the fabric of the floral sundress you bought two weeks before the leaves turned shades of burgundy and ochre.
when asked why you bought it, you shrugged it off.
you wore it, baring shoulders and all, alone in your room with the blinds open.
the september sun glanced at you and you at it.
you were never a dress person, but the blue and pink flowers seemed at home on your torso
and who were you to separate blooms from their home?

hope is your baby brother showing up at your door, sand blonde hair reminiscent of the beaches you were raised on.
he smelled like salt and violent adolescence.
in his hands, he clutched four large pieces of fruit that he stole from the hotel because he said that the fruit bowl from home missed you.
you saw novels in his seafoam grey eyes that read that he missed you, too.
you hugged him
too tight
too many times.
you didn’t cry when he got in the car, but you did when he called you later and said that he was counting down the days to christmas.
there were 114, now there are 109.

hope is st. elmo’s fire and holding your best friends hand as you explain to him that you always felt like ionized plasma.
that you’re like lightening, but not quite.
it is stopping the car on the side of the road to pick wildflower bouquets and press them between the empty pages of your new journal.
it is squash blossom pizza and $60 parking tickets because you were too lazy to catch the bus.

hope is writing a poem and, for once, it not sounding like a eulogy.
hope is writing a poem and not hearing your voice shake as you recite it.
hope is writing a poem and finally feeling like a poet.
hope is writing a poem and finally living like a poet.
hope is writing a poem.

Mind a steel trap
stealing thoughts and memories
cars and high chairs
the Shang Dynasty of "The" great wall
never once said
"What if I can't?"
they only said *****, please
let's build a wall to the moon
Nepal wanted to join in on the fun
captured children like Hansel and Gretel
fed them their own feces they puked for weeks
no candy here
just cold hard abs
rippling
like the ocean
tye-dyed head stones
skipping graves rather gravely
could you spare some change?
Nah man just some odors
re-ordering from Fed-Ex
exponential increase of refraction
reaction
all base
tickle me Elmo
and give me strength.

Notes From The Poet's Nook: My Body Has Changed

There is this moment
When the mirror solicits an
Unwanted confess,
No tort or tortuous devices required,
The self-evident, undeniable.

It is almost as if someone punctuated your life with a
.

Traffic light. Stop. Red. Green. Go.  

Stop n' go.
Periodically.

But while you're momentarily waiting
Some convertible-rider boys pull up aside,
Whooping n' hollering,
Cause they like what they espy,
A woman, no more a changeling,
That excites their almost mature juices.

You call them idiots,
Flip them the eagle bird,
Smiling somewhere where only you and
Poets can envision,
That grin, a womanly gleaming,
Deserves a poem unto itself.

Other moments, other lights,
When time whispers kindly,
It's  now, today, is my-time.

Alone you go the drawer,
It's Bikini Collection Day.

Valuable space wasters,
Even that one, resident of the night table,
In the photo momentous,
You and the kids, on your lap,
Unchanged from the way you know it,
The one you swore forever keep.

Not to the trash they go,
After all, perfectly usable,
So drive to thrift store depository,
Where reusable dreams are stored,
And now future memories to be
Husbanded by someone else's husband,
On someone else's night table.

Got a mortgage, two college funds,
A ton of worries and a
Paunch, a gut, to hold 'em all.
Stand up straight, breathe in hard,
Still there, as if you didn't know, unchanged,
What ya gonna do about it?

You got too much stuff, no way it's the poet's fault!
Go to the couch  and bake a plan!
Cause that's why linguists gave us, maybe and tomorrow,
My fav word when rhyming sorrowful...

You see that child in the photo next to me?
In the baby seat, skeptical of all the cooing noises?
That look I treasure, for she be my genes,
My grand baby, who trusts no one but
Mom and Dad to pick her up,
Sensibly cautious, even tho I blow kisses
On her belly button, the one that says Press Here,
For raucous laughter and present-ed her 25% of herself.

Nowadays, almost two,
Her body a change machine,
Now she is a pusher, not a pushee,
Pushing Elmo in his carriage
Look me up, but see her.

Dressed to the nines, a Manhattan lady.
I missed that moment, too many came, coming.
Changeup and fastball
The only pitches in her repertoire,
So far, but if her dad don't teach her a cutter
**** right you smarmy left handed hitting boys,
Her Poppy sure as sht will.

Ok, you know me. Got remind myself to stop
Before I get dribble mouth.
Guess that's kinda of a
Momentous change for me,
But lucky for you,
I can still do it,
Write a poem 1,2,3...
5, 6, 7, times a day,
If that stops, it wail be
Because....something changed me permanently.



July 6th, 2013

choking on flowers.
sleeping on pins.
living with me.
pull the trigger, beautiful.
razor blades and kisses.
cupcakes in the fridge.
tears in the bathtub.
polka dot fears.
Elmo on TV.
don't forget,
you're living with me.
paper cuts.
broken hearts.
pouring out your feelings
all because nothing is perfect.
you're living with me.

“Good morning, love,” you whisper.

It has always been the sweetest sound I always hear before I formally open my eyes for the new morning. I could not imagine, waking up one day not to hear your voice beside me. It is like a melody of hope and love that even my imperfect days become brighter and sunnier. A chilly morning always lulls me with your mint breath that puffs like a cloud of smoke in my face every day.

How I could forget, the way you undress me with my favorite red Elmo shirt and teases me for my unsymmetrical body. I hate it when you laugh at me, comparing me to the human body systems you have studied in your Science class. I hate myself being half-naked and shivers in front of you but you always pull me in your chest and incubate me like a baby. That makes me feel safe and enough.

Your fingers then begin to wander around my body starting from my head down to the end like a thin map, locating the bones you have not known. You have memorized the number of ribs, the hiding-place of my moles, the width of my waist, the length of my thighs, and the weight of my brain when I lose myself in the fantasy you make. I know you will kiss me after that. A warm, obsessive kiss as if I belong to you. Like I am only made for you. You own every little thing about me as you sealed every edge of my body with your lips and hands.  

In this room, you always play your favorite Taylor Swift’s song on your phone and sing it to me foolishly, in out of tune while looking me in the eye. You would ask me to sing it with you the best line of the song: you are the best thing that’s ever been mine. This makes me laugh, blush, and even makes me cry in such unfathomable bliss I feel every time we do this. I forget the things that make me scared and worry. I want to hold you forever like what you did whenever I fall head over heels for you.

You are not actually my type. I never dreamt of loving the exact opposite of me. You hate the smells of books and will never pull me in a bookstore just to read George Orwell’s or Harper Lee’s. You have never been to art galleries or even museums to look for paintings and sculptures. Mostly, you never read my paper-scented poems and short stories peppered with similes and metaphors. Those things make you fall asleep. But, you always show up and try to understand my world.  

Our story is nothing but a cliché.

Sometimes, we both sail through the angriest storms that left us unguarded. There were days that our rooms were jam-packed with simple misunderstandings that ended up with spicy arguments. Those nights, when we sleep against our backs with wet pillows and separate blankets. We fixed things, though, before the sunlight peeks through our curtains. We entwined our hands again. New and fresh like there is no scar at all. In the next months it’s been always benn the same. We usually run in circles – a cycle that we never break.

The room succumbed into the silence that was once smeared with laughter and dreams. The heavy tension surrounding us, expanding more each day. From our bed to tables. The distance between our hearts stretched to a distance beyond our reach. I do not recognize you anymore as you have metamorphosed into another being. A different stranger.

As much as I want to save you from drowning, you were already trapped in whirlpools. I firmly hold the thin string of hope to battle it out against the current. I pulled myself together and swam harder, as fast as I can do. I can already feel fatigued. Without a word, you unlatched your hand and let yourself adrift farther away from me.  

I was lost. I traveled all alone in the cold sea, looking at the sky. That made me realized that I was already defeated in this battle before it had started.
____________

My head spins like hell. All things are blurry and indistinct. I am staring at my phone waiting for a text message to pop up. I notice the dried red rose on the vase. The books on my shelf are dismantled and seem like some are missing or misplaced. The printed shirts and my pants are scattered on the dusty carpet. I caress my much-loved red Elmo shirt as if I am searching for a lost memory. I drink the last glass of beer, staring blankly at my phone.

Funny how all these stuff occupy every space in my room yet it still feels so empty without you in it. I forced myself to stand on the floor and decided to open another bottle of beer.

“Good morning, my love,” I regretfully whisper to your absence.

These words are not for reading.
Not for singing, not for shouting.
Not for saying, not for whispering.
These words are only for meaning.

After all, solving for x
Should always equal y,
And without such instances
Of equilibrium there can be no variance.

The scale must balance
Or the dragon will tip,
And tipsy dragons with their *****
Breath, perpetually drunk off their
Own fumes hunt –

All the lonely people
Where do they all come from?

Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, TOCK
Out of rhythm -- as appears to be the style--
Or-not-style-or-maybe-style-is-out-of-style.
Oh Bill, what have we become?
These roses have no names!

And their smell is ****.
Emo – Elmo **** – with no hope for redemption.

If we had forever to entwine ourselves
In the same way the Alps pierce the heavens
Tearing at this schism of sky
We could shed our skin into the
Dance of the wind as it whistles
Through the wind-chime collision
Of our skysung bones

You are already dressed as an angel
And I can see you
Fumbling to find the halo
You keep in your purse in case boys like me
With amber harvest moon eyes come knocking
At the mountain cathedral of your lips

There is a choir in your belly
That sings in the language
Of sunset summer evenings
But I want to rewind you back
To the bare budding of spring
And do to you
What April does to the cherry trees

Please
I am an aurora blown south
To arch you into St Elmo’s fire
So let’s back bend ourselves into an ember
To remember that life
Is a fleeting wildfire of a dream
But when you wake
Don’t you still want to taste
The smoke
On your lips

Tears vermilion reflecting the night,
St Elmo's fire burning bright,
Sea sick sailors pray for the light
Doomed and forgotten nets are dry.
Albatross soars, wings of flight
Guiding the lost with cries of gulls,
Let us laugh at their misfortune,
Schadenfreude
Styx flows too soon,
Gold on each eyelid
The Titans shall have their due.

Hyperion weeps to Neptune's view
As Icarus burns to seas of blue
And the sails catch on,
Enlightened by the
Dawn multifaceted hue.
Scarlet prism gems
Reflect the fallen, truth
Through crimson tinted lens.

Life as a high school wallflower served me
without any budding female friendships
until lo…
a gent tulle mandate from my late mother uprooted me
from mine kempf familiar bedrock level road terrain
which venue offered a groundswell
to blossom forth into golden sterling resplendent rod

of natural equipoise (this an unbiased opinion) and balance
with freestyle improvisational swinging motions
unchained from the moors of formality
and lit figurative saint elmo’s sesame street fiery dance

allowing, enabling and providing this shy awkward self
during his young adulthood
to cast away four ever
thy self embroidered handsome

straight as an arrow
naturally high as a kite young guy
buzzing like a yellow jacket
thus liberating spontaneity that je nais sais quoi joie vivre

clamoring headlong toward venus
from healthy pistil packing overflowing bin
laden well nigh testosterone erupting *****
toward opposite gender

whereby bravado donned as key
to *** field of whet dreams
fostering initial albeit late blooming
roll in the hay hormonally rooted rutting squeal!

First things first I'm at the beach. It's awesome, we're on a little island and it's all rich white people. Today me and my cousin walked barefoot through a marsh for 3 hours and I cut my toe and he sliced his foot open. We got chased by alligators and cops and I had fried alligator for dinner(it was great btw) and the best part of all of this is that the last girl that cheated on me is texting me and she is all for being friends yet she can't see why I'm not all into the idea of bffs after I found out she'd been ******* some German kid named Elmo. He's a ****** too, but hey I'm a super huge ******* anyways so it's expected. She keeps saying me and This girl will be a cute couple. How do I politely tell her to **** a fat one. It's midnight and she won't stop texting me *** does she want. She said something happened at a party the night after she met my parents.... Waiting to know what she says is kinda gut wrenching. She said she did it because the guy was nice to her... The **** (my farts smell like alligator