I live in Van Gough starlight
Picasso tension in my knees
Our mother elegantly paints the breeze
Mondrian boogies at midnight eternally
Take it back to the charcoal fight

And I feel like I'm wasting every second
While she hides behind her Mona Lisa mystery
Never learning to appreciate the lesson
Always forgetting to remember our art history

"Where is my Monet?", I say
As I look through the blurred vision of an impressionist day.
A double paned view of reality
Swaying beauty through eyes once knew.

Where is my Monet  or be it Van Gough?
All beauty's vision framed newly printed Picasso.
Shadow me done, and once never knew
What others should have seen as they counted me too.

So now, I say no
Not of Van Gough nor Monet,
I see beauty no Rembrandt nor Picasso to sway.
I see a simple little girl with all she will need
To see the world lovely and in the midst of all, succeed.

Head held high, flexing the shell
bright lifestyle, I know it too well.
It’s a tall tale to tell but its best that you know
that things get better at the end of the road
Not too long ago, I felt the same way
I dealt with demons that crept in the grey
And maybe it’s hard enough to ask for help
but it’s harder to watch yourself
give up once you’ve left the shelf

Nah, I couldn’t stomach the pain
like a trumpet, I blew the in out of sane.
I popped open a vein to paint my blues, violet
and threw a pair of cans on to block out the silence.
I’m not defiant; I defy any tyrant
that tries to buy my compliance.
I ride with the giants, stride like Midas
minus the greed, all I need is kindness.

Spread your wings; shed the ego
live amid the kings like a needle.
Be your own hero, succeed the sequel
take charge, zero in on the easel.
Reach for the stars, you are an artist
Van Gough goals; erase all the hardships.
I may try my hardest
but I’m not the smartest
but good work ethic leads to a harvest.
Reap my carcass, long after I’m gone,
brains over brawn, shame on you all
for thinking that these walls can hold me in.
You get the memo? I’m better than I’ve ever been.
Binge drinking is a sickness in itself
try to **** the pain but the pain kills the help
as well as low thinking it will **** your brain cells
if you try to **** the pain, you will **** yourself

© Matthew Harlovic

it's all good,
Van Gough reprints on the walls,
tact in,
type writer on the carpet floor,
a boxelder bug hides in between 'U' & 'I'
I've got a dollar in my wallet,
hair on my face,
and the dog waits at the door for me to be wild,
the room is cold,
the heater is off,
the electrician is drunk,
i hand him a bottle of wine,
we end up painting the walls,
with the left over blue buckets of paint in the basement,
"now it's like we're in heaven"
the bellyed drunk brown eyed electrician,
his hands face hair clothes covered in paint,
"now you are heaven"
and we laugh,
lighting cigarettes that taste like women,
and the Television screen is cracked and leaks out Volume 3 News
some how we are free at this moment in time,
when the color of the walls are pointless,
when the television screen says nothing,
when the bathtub is broken,
and the water pipes whine,
and the mind is fairly crazy,
fairly drunk,
fairly mad,
but it's all good,
because rent is paid,
and the world's fist is taunting me,
to see how long i can go without eating,
and how fast i can create.

Eternal Anaheim

Somewhere in the dark back streets of the big easy this scene opens a dope addict slumps in the chair by an old filthy bed in an old
Seedy hotel this last hit was his last to many trips the highs that were no better than the siren call of the ****** of the deadly
Godless streets a mockery a disgusting counter life contrasted with having a loving wife and a family now the needle dangles from
A dead used up body and all the time the sacred book, open its cover the twin doors of grace and love outwardly they open the very
Portals of glory speaking of highs your first steps on arrival the mountains surrounding the holy city on the peak the great Sequoia
Down the mountain then the Redwoods then the Cedars they not only are in stands but they have designs formations each has an
Esthetic quality a mood some darker blends into lighter a virtual mosaic that reflects the thoughts your thinking you can walk down
The mountain enjoying finding the right footing or you can do a slow floating glide and take out the hassle at the bottom the foot
Hills begin again trees but now they not only speak to the senses of the mind and eyes but the heart feels an inner talking and aliveness
That wasn’t known about trees before flowers are dispersed there are a sea of them high ones short ones they have continuity of flow
Should I say mind blowing well this is a true high isn’t it then the low lands flat lands which ever you prefer also your choice they can
Be moors shires or better mist filled with the hint of Gwendolyn and Sir Lancelot Camelot awaits my dear friend beyond in rings and
Diamond splendor gardens on the order of the hanging gardens of ancient Babylon or the royal gardens of Leningrad or Paris touched
With living scenes of Monet, Matisse, Renoir or Van Gough’s french country side then the orchards every fruit especially Pomegranate and figs apples
So sweet you can hardly resist dancing along as you enjoy its heavenly taste then the fields where the heavenly corn grows that they
Make the true angel food manna from the corn as high as the angels themselves seven to eight feet tall just a hint of green left here
It is translucent clear as glass to your ears comes the sound of mighty tumults of water coursing ever swiftly to the Crystal sea follow
It to the walls this bejeweled linear spectacle bluest Sapphire reddest rubies gold leafs they appear as strawberries Grandma should
Like that Emeralds now I like Onyx first its bands or white then it has practically all colors for you to view these are all the size
Of a locomotive is that Walt Disney at the throttle all the children will say it is and then the gates of perfect pearl the streets that start
From them is translucent purist gold feel left out sometimes I’m writing about your inheritance its in his last will and testament what is a
Place that isn’t defined by the wafting smells the Jolon Mission is made special by the wafting scent of Lilac that pervades the grounds
Here Manna cakes and cookies for a start but it says the master will feed the bride with a masterful banquet just go in your mind to
Grandmother’s kitchen or the smell of pancakes when dad used to cook them but you really have to stretch so the restaurants you
have visited with closest friends and loved ones add them all up then multiply by a thousand your getting close now for the city’s
Infrastructure the shops I mean I can’t believe that they will not have at least some that will be dotted with the whimsical huts and
Fiery tale feel like those in Carmel California then throw in some adobe architecture from New Mexico some Italian bistro or just stands
With pizza as the roof why not well the mansions are left and the most important the glorious throne and He who will set there as we
Lay our crowns at his feet joy singing his look of love and acceptance will be worth everything I have tried to describe back to our
earthy home there are prisons full of our children friends that are prisoners of other vices just as bad as the ****** they are going to
lose not only heaven but their souls that have been paid for in blood, agony and undying love reach them it’s a little bit of heaven down
here Merry Christmas

The irony in this situation is overwhelming.
Night after night, I lay awake,
Remembering a time when I wasn’t contained in this wretched Asylum.
When I could look to the sky and see the stars,
When only I had control over my thought and actions.
My memories of the outside keep me sane,
This is where the irony comes into play…

I remember the dark skies,
Illuminated by the vivid stars,
Making meanings lucid
and showing past wrongs.
I’ll inevitably be here for quite awhile.
So all I have is the sudden flashbacks,
More than welcome in my lonely mind.
To motivate my escape,
I think of the peaceful world,
In the dead of night,
The soft glow shinning over the town’s sleeping inhabitants.
All of this will remind me why I need to get back on the outside,
All of this will keep me sane.

This might be my last chance to write anything worth writing.

Once I stood for something tall and proud, a set of ideals and heroes.

I am no hero. No great power to wash away the shadows on your face.

I have betrayed who I am, what I stood for....out of emptiness.

I am waiting for the walls to close in on me, looking for the web to be closed over my broken limbs.  

Wake me up please, I'm tired of not enjoying this life, living only to fix those memories I see all around me.

Van Bough had something to say, and he cut his ear off in order to prove what he painted on canvas was real I think.

I am on the edge of a knife, about to find my destiny, either in hope or handcuffs.

Somehow, someway,  I have to make all this mean something, lest I give up on the world entirely.

But that doesn't matter, I am no prophet,  no wikasa kakan

I have to make myself ha e the courage to face the worst, face my soul,

I miss you like maps miss fingers,
Like mikes miss singers,
Like hells bells miss ringers,
Like bringers miss takers,
Like ******* miss fakers,
Like cakes miss bakers,
Like lakes miss boats,
Like bad swimmers miss floats,
Like politicians miss votes,
Like doting parents miss school plays,
Like nymphomaniacs miss lays,
Like hypochondriacs miss prescriptions,
Like ****** misses addictions,
Like carpets miss friction,
Like Billy Bunter misses midnight feasts,
Like the grim reaper misses grief,
Like Henry misses the good fellas,
Like sand sculptures miss umbrellas,
Like Rubix cube devotees miss puzzles,
Like rabid dogs miss muzzles,
Like Van Gough missed his brushes,
Like speed freaks miss rushes,
Like pens miss paper,
Like the Mona Lisa missed Pater,
Like the canvas misses the creator,
Like  the thirsty miss water,
Like the hungry miss food,
Like ***** miss the lewd,
Like the mind misses mood,
Like the tides miss the moon,
Like the sane miss the loons,
Like the dark misses the light,
Like the brave miss the fright,
Like the kite misses the wind.
I miss everything.

Time Volume: 1
I’m eating up the hours
one by one.
Blink.
Click.
Blink.
another screen,
more non-words
Blink.
Click.
Just letters.
Click
9000 more words
blink
and more time.
Click.
To be forgotten.


Learning to forget
The melting *** cast a boy and I ran outside,
A slime soaked goblin, a monster from the pit
Lobbing clods of mud at a harmonic sky
Whirring with dragonflies and lolloping bees.

Sun and rain prepared a day on a different earth
Where there was life in the monkey puzzles,
And scuttling battle grounds that
hid hundred-handers beneath concrete slabs.  
Gravel churned up tiny black dragons,
rotten logs, fortresses of tiny fiends.

I had a sword in my hand, I was noble.
Defender of the realm, scourge until tea,
The hero of worlds
everyone else couldn’t see.


Time volume 2**
Excalibur was stuck fast
When the new branches fell
Click.
the tips of my fingers are beginning to rot.
Blink.
Click.
If only I could
blink
stop the second
click
See the world behind glass.
blink
and dance out of time.
Click.
This snow globe,
Is not the Antarctic.


Artificiality in Imagination
Turning my back on time and space with
Bottled brains, ***** mist, powdered thought
I chiselled into old pathways.
I carved a silk road through synapse and nerve
to return to my monsters.

I saw a sickness of colouration
A lynx effect for the sky
tearing punkish streaks into the atmosphere
that were quickly blinked away.
Sunspots, cloudbursts, tussocks, grass,
Paper squares, green, red, purple, pink, blue,
pungent smoke, bugs, ripples, shivers,
polka dots and blank spots.
A storm-cloudy stomach.

The perspective of a head plastered to the soil again
saw thing for what they were,
a tiny amazon thought lost to rationality.
My heart thumped for a fear and joy
in a way forgotten by time.


Time Volume 3
Why is it called wasted when it is time well spent?
Click.
my god, my eyes hurt.
Click.
Just 9000 more words.
Click.
What would I give for a pretty girl sat under a tree.  
Click.
search * (pretty girl sat under tree)
Click.
She’s hot.
Click.
So is she.
Click.
… could always.
Click.
don’t be stupid.
Click.
Just 9000 more words.


Fantasy for a Counterpoint
I questioned what’s real when she blinked at me
and stopped existing  when she closed her eyes.
No one taught us to write in blood,
Tattoo our names into each other’s skin,
Leaving claw marks for the world not to see.

Whatever you drew was Van Gough
Whatever you said was Keats,
Whatever bruise you left was Tyson’s.

The outer layers of or skin are dead,
It’s funny whatever you touch on a person,
Is already dead.

Just before our love got lost
I noticed a thread break away from the braid
Around your head,
a small incongruity,
That made your hair a mess.

Love became what it was when you said you were
‘as constant as the northern star’,
And I replied, ‘yes - always in the dark’.


Time Volume 4
This is progress for my sake,
Just in time.
Blink.
Time is money.
Click
Time flies.
Blink
A stich in time
Click
This is a paradigm of nothing time.
Click
I’ve got so much time.
Click
And so little time to waste.
Blink
I’m a long time dead.


Hope for a handful of dust
Eventually I will while away these lonely hours.

What black rocks stir while we sleep?
What prayers rumble still, among old stones?
Do they speak the eternal city and glow civilised blue -
Or burn timeless black?

Does the probing ivy find us out
And the blunt head of a worm investigate
our most intimate parts?

Or does a spectre rise from the soil
To live under children’s beds?

When is the point that death
Becomes something breath-taking -
And the brook, my brown blood,
The dead leaves my skin,

Is it fantasy
to put something
where nothing should be?

The soft earth will **** me in
And give my brittle bones
To worms and crows
What stirs beneath the stones,
may always be worms and crows

It was 10pm when I decided to leave my apartment
there was snow on the ground
patchy from the dry cold half winter half sun heat
I decided to check the mail
I had been drinking three dollar wine for hours staring at old paintings on the wall
paintings of kansas
paintings of tornadoes
paintings of Van Gough
I had written a poem on the wall
dedicated to the cockroaches and lamp posts of new york city
I wrote it in lipstick and spanish
I opened the mailbox
I felt the moon on my shoulder
I saw a shadow that wasn't mine behind a fence
it was from Florida
a woman I had once fallen in love with
with her brown hair curly like that of smoke of a cigarette
it read “i miss you”
I had decided to die right there
with the half melted snow
the half grown grass that was green and brown
the cigarette butts
the broken glass
with the moon still on my shoulder
a thousand miles behind winters blanket of clouds
I decided to die there
lighting a cigarette
wet from my lips
I lied down
with the orange letter in my hand
with the orange cigarette lightbug in my mouth
smoke dancing out like Amazonian women in heat
I pictured swamps
I pictured the city on fire
I pictured her naked in my hands
giving her self up to me
letting me have her lips and her legs and her stomach and her love
in the distant
behind the city buildings ears and belly button lint and sirens and swing music and the flickering of beer bottle caps and the burning of tobacco
from lips to tongue to throat to lung
then back out
in a ball of stretched smoke
headed only to the clouds up above
which angels and the moon slept behind
It would have been good to die there
the ground felt good
I thought of Texas
rivers
cow skulls on top of lamps
I thought of Mother and her
rose bottled liquor
I hought of Father
and his eyes that were enormous with
poverty and Tommy Hilfiger sweaters
I thought of
Her
alone in florida
full of sun
full of days and full of nights
I thought of Death
and how he must envy me
I smoke cigarettes to make it easy on him
he knows I wont go
without a fight
without spit in his hollow eye
without my blood
on his fur coat
when he comes in winter on a horse
or a Cadillac from the 1930's
I thought of many brave men
drinking their hearts
their bellies
their eyesockets to sleep
with Tall bottles of gloriously cheap whiskey
I thought of war
and I thought of lighting another cigarette
but it was cold
and I decided to go inside
with my windows
with my Van Gogh paintings
with my blind cat who purred at the dishwasher

i am on a bus and i am sitting next to a girl i haven't sat next to in a very long time.
we used to listen to taylor swift and now we are listening to poetry that makes us cry.
i am so much happier than i have been because i am looking at art and i feel like maybe,
if i try hard enough,
i can become art.
the colors remind me of my old bedroom and they remind me of my old best friend.
she was in the hospital last month, because she overdosed.
i promised her once that we could talk about our end, but we never did.
i wonder if she ever thinks about me.
it is one am and it is raining and i am wishing that he would paint my portrait to keep in his pocket,
to immortalize in a frame that is prettier than i ever hope to be,
on a wall next to painstakingly created flowers that hold more emotion than i will ever feel.
the moon has a special hold on poets, but all it is doing tonight is making me wonder why my hands don't pull angels from stone and beauty from destruction.
i am wondering if i am still alive, if any of these people are still alive, and if the dead feel good about themselves.
i am wondering why i feel so different than i did last year.
maybe it's the dress and the notebook and the quiet steps i take because i don't want to disturb the art,
or staring long enough at a stranger that i can pretend to know his story, and that he wears his father's watch.

i am on the bus and she thinks i am less sad because she is less sad.
but when i look at all the art the first thing i feel is jealous, which is really the same thing as being sad.
i want to spend forever in the glass rooms but i don't deserve to, because i am so selfish.
i think that if i look at monet and picasso and van gough for long enough i will absorb them,
but i also want to walk past them, to the pieces whose plaques contain only a lifespan,
with no detailed description of the reasoning behind the use of numbers hidden in the abstract.
(picasso put them in so he could stay in touch with reality.)
i think that maybe that's why i am doing so much better in math this year.
i just want to stay in touch with reality.
because i have been staring at "evening mood" for half an hour and all i feel is sad,
because after the sunset there is nothing but darkness and that's what the night brings and it's what thoughts of you bring too.
it is called sandstorm but it makes me think only of the sea.
i think i need to get away from here for a while.  maybe i will go to the sea.

i haven't been on a bus in a long time, but here i am.
i spent the day as something i have always wanted to be.
we haven't talked in a month but she still thinks i am beautiful.
why am i crying?

Welcome mats, and overprescribed ******
that my cousin gifted me on Tuesday.
I don't sleep anymore, because i'm always up ruminating.
Not about anything righteous or measurable -
just eyes closed, pacing narratives.
Breaking off one rib at a time,
to save man, to give him her.
Sitting loudly under neon bar signs,
drinking absinthe with Van Gough’s depression.
Hope is a dangerous thing,
so it’s better not to have any.
I would have done a boring man’s laundry
just to form an attachment over my own delusion.
Love is a dangerous thing,
so it’s better not to have any.

the museums
the art galleries
all had he visited
     van gough
     rembrandt
     dali
    picasso
knew he all
and their works
   paintings
   drawings
  sculptures
 and etchings
surrealist and  cubist
and he dazzled his audiences
with his vast store of fact and opinion
        till the sorry drunk
        troubled his thoughts
       with accounts of john next door
the man who visited
      when our man was on  his rounds
      giving erudite talks
and bargaining with dealers in antiques

Thinking that someone loves you is better than nothing,
but what people don't realize is that it was all pokes at jokes
and I bet he smokes,
or knows I do
and doesn't like the smell,
or the way I breathe out,
or how the rings come from my mouth
and are never on my fingers.

And I have paper cuts on those same fingers
that want to be in your hair,
and your body,
(all of it),
and I hope you want them there,
because that's exactly where they'll be
if we ever meet.

The dirt buried in my prints
will leave marks on you like a million hands and feet,
drenched in paint and smeared over your temple.

I bet you don't care what I look like,
or that I have a Van Gough pin,
or that people like to write my name.
I'm glad you like to listen,
and that you're smooth with words,
so I can fall asleep to the sound of your golden text.

I never thought I would like an arial view,
or that I would fall in love with strings of it
all laced together into a perfect fabric,
(or web).

I hope that you're not allergic to sound,
or jelly beans,
because I want to see you cry and smile at the same time.

Van Gough ate yellow paint
To make is empty insides happy
If I swallow these pretty pills
Will I finally be free?

Do you want to sketch all your life
Or learn to paint a master piece?

Do we not sketch to learn, to develop, to grow?

So why do you still sketch?
What more do you hope to learn?
That people are vulnerable?
That you can hurt them?
That you can leave them?  

Are you not tired of sketching outlines?
Don't you long for tonal quality?
For careful composition and a considered pallet?

I know your secret!
That the canvas scares you, terrifies you even.
All that you will be revealed on that unforgiving scape.
That expanse of white which must be filled and not by charcoal and line.
You will be revealed, exposed and displayed for all to see.
You will be revealed in the shading,
In the sensitivity you give to light and to contrast.
Yes, you will be revealed...
But in it you will be filled in.  
You will have no freedom to remain as an outline of a man,
With all hidden in fine graphite lines and hastily hatched shadow.
You will have to mature as a man, as an artist of the soul
And set yourself free on a canvas with confidence and brush!
What a liberation!

Will the first canvas be a masterpiece?
In all likelihood no!
But it will be a beginning
And how can you consider yourself an artist if you never paint!
How many sunflowers did Van Gough paint? How many chapels?
Was he satisfied with any of them?
And was each of them worthwhile?

Paint my friend, take up your brush and paint.
Use colour boldly,
Reserve fear and reservation for other pursuits
Or better still leave them from your pallet altogether.
Be sensitive and subtle with your treatment of the subject,
frame her well, carefully
But be bold.

There is little point in holding back.
Do you want your canvas to scream, "Hesitation!"?
Paint or don't, but if you choose not to, declare it to the world!
Do not act like a painter, talk like a painter and look like a painter,
If you do not paint!
Declare "I like to sketch"
And sketch until you bear no longer to leave a subject unexplored in a monochromatic if artistic hiatus.
Be true, be bold, be clear and when you feel the time is right paint with the same honesty and boldness with which you sketched.
Then it will be a true training,
Not the pontification a of a trainee conjurer working above his station.
Complete your apprenticeship, graduate,
And step forth into the world.
Confident, upright, paint brush in hand.

this is what it looks like to me.
a queer white picket fence
this is what I believe it to be.
the sun shown through the trees
and rays landed, thusly
on the particles that dusted
the front porch.
begging us to take a picture,
that would eventually
be given the title of "dad vibes."
and the cats are staring at us
through the domestic screens
on the windows, and I swear
that I heard one them gossiping...about
us.
you make vibrate.
it's like aorta telepathy.
something must be wrong
with me.
I swear,
I've never seen a more unlikely pair.
we have the same nickname,
I think that is SO ******* cute.
and yes, let us pillow talk about
road tripping, to see
van gough's bedroom.
and HERE,
I lie with you...
looking up at the ceiling.
surround by four walls of warmth.
canary yellow is something I've been obsessed with lately.
it's something I see in my dreams.
a colour that blesses my soul with the ability to imagine
something
as serious as serious as
a ***** balloon popping contest.
and
as hilarious as
the way, I look
when I'm pacing my way through
my to-do lists.
i know, that it is
spring break,
but a diet of coffee and
"ciggies"
may have contributed
to our lack of sleep
or
maybe
it's the four days we spend in bed.
then
when you asked me
to sit on your face,
i knew this to be true.
I'd never want to bid you adieu
if, at some point in my lifetime,
my soul could copulate with yours.
if I could beg you
to make more noise.
I'm sorry I'm so quite between
these sheets.
I notice these things
and FIND them to be true.
I left my boxer briefs in your dresser.
my ripe gift
is to be left
for a worthy soul like you.

I don’t love you like a woman typically loves a man,
With mushy words and hearts and fireworks.
I love you like the ocean crashes onto the shore.
Or how Spring melts the snow with its warmth.

I love you in a way, that a child loves their childhood toy,
Unconditionally without cause, simply because I can.
My love for you isn’t black and white,
I love you more with shades of gray.

I love you with heartfelt immaturity, like a teenager
In love for the first time, finding any reason to fall head
Over heels again, and again,
Because you make me feel like I’m walking on clouds,
Feeling giddy about falling for you, everyday, over again
For the rest of my life.

I love you like paper soaks up ink from the pen,
Uncontrollable and hungry for more words to be,
Written of infatuation and adoration.
I love you, like the dots go above the i’s,
And the lines go through the t’s,
Or how a period at the end of strewn together words,
Somehow makes it a sentence.

I love you the way, the Sistine Chapel was painted,
With slow broad strokes, and the patience of a steady hand.

I paint you with words, the way Michaelangelo, Van Gough, and Picasso painted the world;
With beauty, undying love, devotion and truth.

And because I know of no other way to love you, than this,
You will always be a beautiful masterpiece,
That I was more than lucky enough to find,
Along the way through my journey of life.

And I promise to never repaint you,
Or tarnish your frame,
But to love you the way you were made,
Priceless Perfection...

Dear God,
I know your secret.
If something is too good to be true,
it probably isn't.
A merciful father who never leaves,
always loves, and promises immortality.
All if you abide by his 10 little rules,
But it's not that simple is it?
An entire book,
Imperfectly translated through tongues and time,
paraphrased to fit what we see as logical -
Your words coming out of man's mouth
Justifying hate, and slaughter and genocide.
What happened to thou shalt not ****?
Was that even what you really said?
Or was there a different sort of bush
Moses was smoking in the desert?
Did you ever mean for your words to be twisted
like the minds of those who **** in your name?
God help us from the people claiming to do God's work.

Dear God,
Do you ever get tired of playing Santa?
Tell me, when did praying begin to resemble
Siting on a jolly man's lap
Asking for toys and candy from his knapsack?
Because your people,
these days,
are starting to sound more and more like bad friends
you only exist when they need something from you -
I was one of them.

Dear God,
do you feel more and more like an under-appreciated artist?
Like Vincent Van Gough or Poe,
Never recognized in their time,
Bound to die penniless and forgotten.
Do you feel as though all your masterpieces
Will be eclipsed by the tragedies and mistakes?
Good intentions lost,
as if chaos is what you tried to make.

Dear God,
I can't say I'm all too fond of you
But anyone who says you do not exist
Because of global warming, or kids with cancer,
or a dead family member
Does not know what it's like to be a father.
To create some something,
send you out into the world,
and just hope for the best.
I understand that the human race was a baby you did not abort.
A child you didn't necessarily plan to have.
You sent us to our first day of kindergarten
With a tight anxiousness in your chest
And a book bag with everything you thought we needed.
We needed you.
We threw a temper tantrum
and got sent to the principles office.
Some of us graduated, some held back,
others failed.

Dear God,
I understand you are man-made,
A necessary concept, easy to believe.
You give us peace,
that our sins are not our own
And all will be forgiven if we just ask.
But who will forgive you?
People got tired to praying to
Gods of War,
Gods at War
They needed some stability
and Jesus was recompense.
Well I'm sorry, if one of many martyrs
Does not erase the memory of a man
named Abraham.
An old soul with an old wife
Too aged to have children.
And yet, they did.
But Isaac was only a boy
When you decided to have a rebate.
"Take him to the hill and sacrifice him" You said.
"He was never yours in the first place."
Is that a fate you would wish on anyone?
A father forced to **** his only son.
To think
You have known the pain of losing a child
when Lucifer fell.
Did you just want to inflict the pain you felt?
Well, when Jesus came down
You learned we were a virus
Humans are not angels
Crucified by us
We killed him.
And you could not drown us out like rats
Flood the earth
We are still alive
We spread like poison.
Gasping for air, foundation, salvation.
But whether you watch us suffocate,
Or send us to shore,
There was still suffering.
You can't erase that,
You can only make the smudge a stain,
Turn black to gray-
Not white
Never white
Your God will never be white
And neither will his people.

Dear God,
I understand why people want to see you as pure
That there is a reason
Some kind of explanation, and a savior.
But the only thing that put us here
Was a faulty ****** and ***** teenagers.
No divine ******* prophecy
We are high functioning apes
With the ability to choke out life
with these opposable thumbs
Or choose love with all the words of the people before us
and the people to come.

Dear God,
I know your secret.
You are a disappointed father,
turning a blind eye to the college drop-out of a kid
You forgot to mother.
Maybe you never existed
But just because something is man-made
Doesn't make it easily forgotten.
Dear God, if something is to good to be true
it will more than likely just disappoint you.

I miss you like maps miss fingers,
Like mikes miss singers,
Like bells miss ringers,
Like cakes miss bakers,
Like lakes miss boats,
Like bad swimmers miss floats,
Like politicians miss votes,
Like doting parents miss school plays,
Like nymphomaniacs miss lays,
Like necrophiliacs  miss graves,
Like hypochondriacs miss prescriptions,
Like ****** misses addictions,
Like carpets miss friction,
Like Billy Bunter misses midnight feasts,
Like the grim reaper misses grief,
Like Henry misses the goodfellas,
Like sand sculptures miss umbrellas,
Like Rubix cube devotees miss puzzles,
Like rabid dogs miss muzzles,
Like Van Gough missed his brushes,
Like speed freaks miss rushes,
Like pens miss paper,
Like the Mona Lisa missed Pater,
Like the canvas misses the creator,
Like how the thirsty miss water,
Like the hungry miss food,
Like ***** miss the lewd,
Like the mind misses mood,
Like the tides miss the moon,
Like the sane miss the loons,
Like the dark misses the light,
Like the brave miss the fright,
Like the kite misses the wind.
Like a phone misses a ring
Like every misses thing.

The Crack in My Voice

the one held by structure and poise
the one held by sincerity yet worry
the one held by the thoughts of you
and I together

The Late Night Deep Breathe

the one that got me through my wednesday night anxiety attacks
the one that whipped away my tears 5 times in counting
the one that carried my suitcase across cities and trains
the one that made me finally see you
and I together

The Van Gough Poster

the one which makes me think of better things
the one which sees the starry nights to come
the one which takes me back to the core of myself
the one which creates what is you
and I together

The Argument We Had On Church Street

the one that led me to ignorance
the one that made me cry for 2 minutes straight
but i haven't cried, even 5 months later
thats how i know that everything is real with you
and I together

Alumni of 2015
Sit back and allow me to shed some light on life

Because while you were sitting in the back of lecture halls, I was sitting in the bow of a pipe getting a pHD in life.

Your existence has the potential to be nothing to the world.
we are but parasites,
The reality that pamphlets and professors ignore.

The whiplash of our adolescent enlightenment will hit us
and we too will be mere machines to corporate Britain
The tide of the premise you walked against in marches will soon be your every day mundane
9-5
Decent pay
Earn a wage
Live another day

But when we are old and lie in our death beds
Our last breaths will not be wasted on:
'Im so glad I paid off my student debt'
'Im so glad I got a masters in something I never used'
'Im so glad I got a job and married and had kids and a house in the suburbs'
'Im glad I was mediocre'

Our existence,
Minuscule as it may seem  
Will produce shock waves in the atmosphere of tomorrow and 20 years from now.
Our existence is a miracle in the sense that your genetics coded you perfectly,
doubting your own greatness is to refuse to pay homage to the mosaic of DNA that connects us to the earth we were born from.

Failure? Fear not .

We are the generation of **** ups, back wash of a dumbed down society,
Fed narcotic lies of fame and fortune.

Van Gough and Piccasso died vagabonds
Anne frank in torture
Cobain, Gandhi and MLK with a bullet
Hendrix with bile

The greatest die in the most foul ways
And this is how you must strive to end
I beg,
No
I implore you to seek the most outright yet not immediate destruction your perfect heartbeat can manage,
Only then will the  memories you bring to your deathbed be stories worth telling.

They will of course will be tainted by the impure things that you did *
No other experience will suffice
Filth and glory and gore and ***** and endless **** will be your legacy. Calling your side man for a ride home,
Travelling the world with your whole life stuffed messily in your back pack
The men and women who wrote sonnets in your skin with their eyes alone,
Getting a one way ticket to a place you have never been before and watch your gold skin become tinted orange in street lamp sunlight,
Couch surfing and trainhopping your way through consciousness

This will stand as your testimony of existence.

And you will pass on this following message,
Be it to the family and friends you have acquired,
Be it to the nurse who's not paid enough to listen to your ramblings,
Sing it to the grim reaper himself:

You will say:
'This is your enlightenment:

Stop trying to live

And learn to be alive'

You fail to see the beauty inside you, you can't see the person I'm staring at.
I am screaming at you and you can't even hear me. I am begging for you to just look in the mirror and see what I see.
I see a man, with curly brown almost black hair. A dimple on each cheek, and misplaced freckles that make your face like a painting from van gough.
I see the poems thought up inside your head, just not being able to write them down because you don't want the criticism.
I see a ten year old boy, living with his best friend at the time cause his mom was an addict and his dad was a drunk.
I see a boy with sad eyes crying because he doesn't feel loved from the world surrounding him.
I see a boy yelling and cursing at his parents for bringing him into this unfaithful world, crying out for attention that he thinks he doesn't deserve.
But now,
I see a man who is stronger than his demons.

How would that be
for you and me.

How would that go off
between you and me.

He is out of his mind
he talks of, I was thinking of Van Gough, and his paintings
and maybe out of my mind
but is for me to known
and you to find.

Take me for what I am, just s surreal dreamer
but find what you said
or thought
Be what you are a latteral thinker.

We went down in history.
Best worst couple alive.
We deserved an award.
Tiger striped pajamas
And a SLIGHTY
Illegal pengin drawn on the side of a building.
Made by a painter
More worthy than van gough.
Goodbye.
And I say that with no hatred.
Goodbye.
We had a good run.
As you said,
You and I,
Were never meant to be.
What was it?
5 times?
7?
To be honest I’d lost count.
So goodbye.
Im not washing all those campfire songs and broken bucket memories
down the drain.
I’m simply storing them in a box that has your name.
A box vacumed air tight,
So that I can never need another band-aid
With a green crayon on it.
That box will be sealed,
But only opened in short filtered bursts
Just to remind myself,
You were here.
To remind myself of a first kiss,
A first wish,
And somehow we ended up watching the avengers?
Don't ask me,
Because I was too busy looking at you,
To take even a second watching the movie.
Which you were fine with,
Because you hated
Superheroes.
Which Ill never understand,
Because your sister and brother
Look at you,
Seeing nothing but a driven
Well thought out
Superhero.
For a while there,
You were my superhero too.
You managed to get me out of a tree,
Which I have now learned,
Are not to climbed
When you have a fear of heights.
Im not sure how,
But even in the middle of the night
With a blood moon clouding most of the light,
And a bunch of your friends talking about the latest gossip
You got me down from a tree
That I had decided to climb,
Just to see see the moon better.
I had climbed
To where the branches swayed in the wind
And to where tall girls with 110 pounds on their body
Were definitely,
Not designed to be.
Once down,
After what seemed like hours of agony,
It was probably about 3 minutes.
I was scared shitless.
But when everyone left,
We stayed in the grass,
Trying to make our own constelations.
Out of barely visible stars
Shodowed by a red tint,
That drove out every speck of light other than its own.
Thats kind of what you were like.
You drove the life out out of me,
And created a new one.
You locked up who I was in a cage
With the key having been thrown into the nile,
I called it love.
Because you were trying to make me better than I was before.
Someone who fit your lifestyle.
You turned me into a broken record
With so many scratches,
The glossy look of the tracks were barely visible.
But you werent all bad.
You kissed me at a campfire,
Walking back to evening circle
Where we would sing some weird song
About the sun being gone,
And the day being done?
Then we all went to our cabins,
But I was frozen in place.
Because theres no way that was real.
It wouldve meant that my wish,
The way you told me to wish,
Actually worked.
One of my friends had to take my arm and drag me in my daze back to the cabin.

You took me to a golf course
just past the woods,
Because you thought it was closed.
It was not closed.
We learned this when a golfball missed my head by less than an inch,
It was an honest mistake,
But we laughed.
Partily because of the golf ball,
Mainly,
Because that was our luck.
Our luck was having a ball miss my head by an inch,
And a golf course that lacked green grass,
was still open.
Our luck was getting lost,
Because I got distracted by the wildflowers in the woods,
And walked off to make a bouqet for you.
We werent lost,
We were just,
Taking the scenic route I guess.
But we wound back up at the baseball field with built in playground off to the side
just as light decided to dip from view,
And leave the very sliver of a moon
To try and keep us able to see.
That was our luck.
But you had bad luck
And so did I.
We seemed to circle in hurricanes.
A world being thrown about until that quiet little eye.
Before we were thrown back into misfortune,
We were addictive.
When my bad luck met yours,
It was the kind of darkness no one longs for.
This was not the darkness of sleep
Where you could go and be alone.
This darkness was not that.
Our darkness was a silent room that screamed loudly
Hoping to deafen us through our separate walls,
Our darkness was a room that had no doors,
No floors,
And lacked a ceiling.
But there was still no way out. Barbed wire
Higher than our Mount Everest of past,
And even your ego couldn't climb on top of mine to get half way up.
So we sat in opposite corners of our big and screaming rooms,
And waited for the whisper to turn it all off.
My whisper.
My whisper was apologizing and making promises you wouldn't never give me the chance to keep.
Your whisper back
Was an army of paper airplanes with one message.
I forgive you.
For every apology I said
And for every piece of my heart I cut out as a peace offering,
You gave me a paper airplane.
Each with the same intent.
The intent to make the point stab into my skin,
And bleed more poison into my blood,
Without me noticing the scratch.
You distracted me by sitting on a now broken bucket,
And by laughing when I made a joke we both knew wasn't funny.
You distracted me by laying in the grass
Or putting your head in my lap.
And I distracted myself by playing with your changing colored hair,
While pretending this was real.
I wanted it to be real.
For me it was.
It wasn't for you.

But sometimes our difficult rooms separated
And though our rooms no longer screamed at each other
The rooms screamed at occupant of it.
Mine screamed at me,
And your didn't scream but was silent and let you sit with your pain.
My room couldn't do that.
My room tore me apart,
Because all of the shredded pieces would eventually go to you.
And suddenly,
Our rooms connected and a paper plane flew my way.
I let it hit my right cheekbone.
I opended my paper expecting your usual note.

But it was different.
This time your note said no.
I hadn't whispered yet.
But “no” still landed in my lap.
My whisper back was one of confusion.
Another one of the paper airplanes hit my heart,
But the paper was worn out and red.
It wrote,
Not safe for you.

And again I whispered,
This time a pained confusion,
I asked what your paper airplane meant.
This time your paper airplane said:
I'm sorry.
And then,
All of the paper airplanes caught a small fire from their edges and then they were gone.
Even the ashes,
Gone.

My drive took me to Malvies
Along a rough French road
A perfect sight delighted me
Natural sun dials stood in rows

Fields of velvet brown eyes
Looking at the sun
Gently swaying in the breeze
Halos circled every one

Like soldiers to attention
In unison with each other
The sunflower community
Are like sister and like brother

Yellow sunshine petals
Gold coins in the rough
Famously inspired
In pictures by Van Gough

My hair flowed in the wind
Breathing in the freedom
Happy faces welcome me
inviting me to see them

Sun dials follow shadow
Sunflowers pursue the sun
Gazing up to the sky
Absorbing life they've won



Inspiration:

Malvies is a very small village community near Limoux in the South of France.  I spent many Summers there and when in season, the drive takes you through amazing fields of Sunflowers which are a spectacular sight.

I have turned you into my very own masterpiece
Is this what you wanted?
Traces of my red wine lipstick litter the defined lines and curves of your body
My nails leaving raised lines down your back
Dark bruises inked into your sun kissed skin
Your breath labored, pupils of your emerald eyes blown wide with lust
Your neat honey locks completely disheveled
Your clothes in a heap on the floor
My hands and mouth have explored every inch of you, and carefully sculpted your body into my most prized work
I have created something worth more than any Picasso or Van Gough
And all it took was a crooked smile and a little whiskey

From:  Monet's impression of A Summer's Day
To:  "The starry, starry night" of Vangough's way
Finds the mystery from artistry of canvas and ink
--And gives my mind a moment's think.

What now does it render,
Of both color and spendor
What pros ever written
Might it tell.

When once unknown and now,
Never to be forgotten
Lives
That never end.

Oil spills onto paper
From an eye's Moment in time
Now rewrites its history
In rhyme.

With Monet of my right
And Van Gough of my left
Balances between the two,
Talent just known to few.

I gather my thoughts
of day and night
And place them
Whole and new.

A transference  of time and hour
Through portals of memoired pasts
Bring memorials of perfect views
That last, and last, and last.

Kathy S. Dillard
083008

If I could write everything I'm feeling
On the tops of the walls in acrylic paints,
Would the words drip down the wallpaper
In silence,
Reminding me that emptiness
Is only relative,
That whatever magazine cut outs
And indie band posters I've hung over the years
Can dissolve into the vastness
Of my memory?
That somewhere in my organs,
There's pictures of you drenched in
opera house pinks,
Van Gough sunflowers,
Georgia dirt reds?
That the paint ran down the walls
As quickly as you ran to me,
A four minute mile of I Love Yous,
Paint dribbled bursts of joy
concaving over the stillness of the pavement,
Blissful evenings where the wallpaper
Was hardly a bother,
Just white noise blurring the rest of the world so I could focus
Focus on nothing but you