if i was a pearl i’d feel itchy scratchy stuck inside an oyster shell if i was a tree i’d  be a big fat redwood fantasizing about Julia Butterfly Hill living and peeing around me if i was a dog i’d be a Catahoula hound if i was Italian i’d be Sicilian if i was pasta i’d be spaghetti if i was Icelandic i’d be Bjork if i was a rock star i’d be Elvis Presley Bob Dylan Jimi Hendrix Jim Morrison John Lennon Bruce Spingsteen Maynard James Keenan if i was i writer i’d be Herman Melville Mark Twain James Joyce William Faulkner Thomas Bernhard Yukio Mishima Naguib Mahfouz Phillip K. **** Gabriel Garcia Marquez Annie Proulx Lydia Davis if i was a poet i’d be Walt Whitman Sylvia Plath Ted Hughes Gwendolyn Brooks Pablo Neruda  Heather McHugh Carl Sandburg Robert Frost Arthur Rimbaud Dante Alighieri Homer if i was a painter i’d be Leonardo Da Vinci Michelangelo da Caravaggio Johan Vermeer Rembrandt van Rijn Paul Cezanne Marcel Duchamp Jackson ******* Mark Rothko Ad Reinhardt Anselm Kiefer Susan Rothenberg if i was a photographer i’d be Man Ray Ansel Adams Edward Weston Diane Arbus Robert Mapplethorpe Sally Mann Helmut Newton Richard Avedon Annie Leibovitz if i was a philosopher i’d be Socrates Plato Aristotle Jean Jacques Rousseau Sören Kierkegaard Immanuel Kant Karl Marx Georg Hegel Friedrich Nietzsche Henry David Thoreau Ralph Waldo Emerson  Jean-Paul Sartre Jean Baudrillard Michel Foucault if i was a singer i’d be Woody Guthrie Otis Redding Grace Slick Bob Marley Joni Mitchell Marvin Gaye Johnny Cash Patsy Cline June Carter Patti Smith Chrissie Hinde Nick Cave P J Harvey Beyonce if i wa a band i’d be Velvet Underground Ramones *** Pistols Clash Cure Smiths Joy Division Uncle Tupelo Pixies Nirvana Nine Inch Nails Madrugada Sigur Ros White Stripes Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra Justice of the Unicorns if i was a boot i’d be Chippewa Frye Ariat Red Wing Tony Lama Wellington if i was a shoe i’d be Christian Louboutin Jimmy Choo Kedds Chaco Chuck Taylor p f flyer if i was a dress i’d be Channel Dolce & Gabbanna Giorgio Armani Marc Jacobs Comme des Garçons if i was a cowboy shirt i’d be H bar C Rockmount Temp Tex Karman Wrangler Levis Strauss Lee if i was a hat i’d be a Stetson Borsalino Stephen Jones if i was a fruit i’d be a mango apple banana blackberry if i was an scent i’d smell like fresh perspiration jasmine sandalwood ylang ylang the ocean if i was a doctor i’d be a gynecologist neurosurgeon if i was a flower i’d be a hibiscus rose orchard if i was a stone i’d be a sparkling ruby diamond opal if i was a knife i’d be a k-bar switch-blade machete if i was a gun i’d be a Remington Winchester Beretta Glock AK-47 if i was a car i’d be a Lamborghini Ferrari BMW Saab Volkswagen GTO Ford Mustang Dodge Challenger if i was a  TV show i’d be Law and Order if i was actor i’d be Charlie Chaplin Humphrey Bogart Steve McQueen Robert De Niro Ed Norton Shawn Penn if i was an actress i’d be Marlene Dietrich Ingrid Bergman Natalie Wood Audrey Hepburn Marilyn Monroe Helen Mirren  Meryil Streep Brigette Fonda Robin Wright Julianne Moore Angie Harmon if i was a female comedian i’d be Gilda Radner Lily Tomlin Nora Dunn Joan Cusack Sarah Silverman Tina Fey if i was a  football player i’d be Sid Luckman George Blanda Walter Payton **** Butkus Mike Singletary Joe Montana Jerry Rice Payton Manning LaDanian Tomlinson  Drew Breeze if i was a celebrity i’d be Charlotte Gainsbourg if i was a rapper i’d be Tupac Shakur if i was a movie director i’d be Sam Peckinpah Robert Altman Stanley Kubrick Roman Polanski Werner Herzog Rainer Fassbinder Louis Bunuel Alfred Hitchcock Jean-Luc Godard François Truffaut if i was a bird i’d be a eagle hawk sparrow bluebird if i was a fish i’d be a dolphin shark narwhal Charlie the tuna if i was breakfast i’d be a French toast pancake folded in half with 2 strips of bacon in between if i was a cold cereal i’d be snap crackle popping rice crispies shredded wheat cheerios oatmeal if i was tea i’d be Japanese green matcha Irish breakfast Tulsi Thai holy basil Lapsang souchong Luzianne Lipton if i was a soap i’d be French hand milled ayurvedic Avon Ivory Dove Pears Aveda  if i was a man i’d be a football basketball baseball tennis swimmer athlete if i was a woman i’d be a track star runner writer painter gardener doctor nurse yoga mom i'm just scratching the surface and the beat goes on lahdy dah dah

School was always humuorous to a degree in my opinion because of the underlying idea
that the more damaged you were, the cooler you were in the eyes of the rest of the school.
I have heard numerous conversations that began with something along the lines of, "Oh, you
think YOU got it bad, well my dad blah blah and my best friend blah blah and my life is hell."

I decided to get a little personal and share with you guys something I have never actually
told anyone in entirety yet. I am pretty sure the whole story is still only here in my brain.
I will, out of respect for these people, change their names.

It's October 31, 2012. It's about noon, and all of us sixteen to twenty-two year olds are just waking up.
Brianne woke up probably a few hours ago already to tend to her son, Aaron. He is adorable, one
and a half, blond hair, blue eyes. I have been living here for nearly two months. I am supporting her,
Aaron, and myself with food stamps. I get two hundred dollars a month to basically smoke **** and drink
on the government's budget. Trust me, I'm not proud of it either, and if I could I would pay it back.
Since Brianne is a single mother and an adopted child, she has a single-digit monthly rent (I was *******
baffled to hear this) and receives support from her foster parents. Basically, if I want to stay here forever
with absolutely no consequences save to miss out on a life of my own, I can.

Brandon is putting on clown make-up so he can troll the streets as a juggalo. I find this amusing as I always
liked to mess around with ICP fans, but he's a really cool kid so I let it go and I even help him perfect it.
I notice he has a bottle of Stolichnaya in his backpack and it's practically full. That, to me, is temptation.
I ask if he would mind me taking a few drinks here and there from the bottle and he says it's fine, so I proceed
to get a nice one p.m. buzz. It was always my favorite drunk, very light, and airy, almost like you're still asleep.
Something bogs you down, but it doesn't bother you, somehow it makes you lighter.

For the rest of the day, we hook up with a few friends, go out and trick or treat in the pouring rain, get soaked
and wait for two hours under an overpass while Brianne goes and gets her car. From there, we proceed home.

At this point, everyone is over at Breanne's and we're all making dinner and drinking beer and having a good time
(Aaron is with the grandparents tonight). I guess I started getting angry about the recent events (for about a month,
everyone in our group with the exception of Brandon have been slowly losing items...but they're obviously being stolen.
At a point, a few of us did some research and determined the only person who could possibly have stolen
a good deal of these things has to be Brandon) and I decided I was tired of sitting on the news waiting for no one to make
a move after a solid two weeks of being certain that we had our guy. So I called him out... and proceeded
to begin burning bridges slowly and very surely for the next few days. I am pretty sure a fight would have broken out
if Bri hadn't taken me into her room to relax. When I finally do, it turns out I woke up the upstairs neighbor,
her baby, and everyone in the house has left save for my friend Jeff and his girlfriend Marissa. This concludes night one.

I later learned that Brandon was not actually the person who was stealing from us (unless of course
he just happened to not get caught when we found out who had done most of it) and I feel bad for bringing the whole
thing up because I would have liked to stay in touch with him. We got along swimmingly and he actually did have
a lot of interesting things to talk about. Smart, nice, hilarious... Well, maybe he'll turn up one day.

The next morning, I woke up to find the house empty save for Jeff and Marissa in the next room, but where I am,
it simply appears empty. I don't know what happened but I intuit that I have been sleeping all night without
my girlfriend. This upsets me and I begin to weep like a confused child, which is exactly what you do when you're
helpless and too drunk in the brain to figure out how to pull yourself out of a helpless situation (trust me,
I own the handbook). Marissa walks in and begins to explain to me that I had scared her too much and she slept
on the couch and that she had left to go pick up her son. So I realize I need to calm down, but I can feel
Jeff is not happy with me in the slightest, considering he will not come and talk to me (this is extremely painful
because he is probably one of the best friends I have ever had, with a mind that vastly exceeds that of everyone
I have met save one other, and he's a different story). They leave and I decide to stay in the house all day.

This is a very bad idea. I stay home, watch re-runs of a show I have seen billions of times, and considering
that Brandon and I are no longer on good terms, like a complete *******, I drink the rest of his *****.

In walks Bri, it's around 7. She's not happy. She proceeds to tell me that the night before I asked out a friend of mine
and she said yes. And I was a bit shocked because I couldn't remember it at first. Then it all hit me.

A few days before, Aaron called me "dad." Now remember, this is not my child. I am dark, dark, dark, and she had this kid
about two years after we had any past relationship. I am extremely worried in my mind and I realize I am headed toward nothing.
That I am stagnant and can not even afford to go back to school. This scares me, so I drunkenly asked out Tanya.

Tanya...we had been friends for about five years, and I had tried to get with her so many **** times... she was like
one of those girls you see and you're instantly reminded of an anime character. Tall, thin, beautiful hips, perfect
proportions, lovely hair, eyes, voice, and a personality I can liken to a Disney princess/black metal lumberjack.
The kind of girl who has a tough exterior, but inside, she just wants someone to tell her everything is going to be ok.

After about two hours of pleading with Bri to let me stay, I finally send Tanya a message, and we hang out for the next
two days, whence I whisper in her ear that everything is going to be okay and we proceed to have quite passionate ***
for those nights, where I discovered the secret to making a woman ****** with my tongue (tip: if the underside of your
tongue isn't completely torn apart, you're doing something wrong). But alas, I could not stay.

This is the part I dreaded, because I know I have to go back to Jeff's house and ask him if I can stay there for a while.
And I got the answer I expected.

The words he used...

"I'm *******...extremely ******* at you, and disappointed." It was like a father saying it to you. And him and I
have a very interesting friendship built on such an extreme understanding that I knew exactly how badly I had been spiraling.
I began to leave and he gave me a slice of pizza, with that slight smile that told me "just go find yourself, we'll be fine."

I hobbled off into the night drunk, with one piece of pizza and all my food at Bri's, which could have lasted me another few days,
easing the transition into homeless. And it could have prevented a horrible occurance that took place the following afternoon. I
was crying, because I knew I was dying, but I didn't want to ask either of my parents for help, because this was the first time
I was out on my own and I was far too proud to give up and let the world make me its victim. So I walked...

Sixteen ******* miles...

To the next town. Took me all night because I was dodging traffic, easing into trees, avoiding on and off ramps, trying to stay
away from any police that may exist on the road. When I finally arrived in the next town (where I knew I may have one contact)
I decided to sleep until the morning came so I could have the energy to find my next venture.

It was five thirty am. I had 3 hours until sun-up, I had just walked enough to be burning, and there was plenty of whiskey in my veins.
I had left my sleeping bag with Tanya hours earlier, wishing in the park that I had not been so naiive as to think I would be allowed
back in the house. So I pulled out a pile of ***** clothes and put them over me like blankets, in some random corner of the local
park, under some bushes, hidden from cold and sight, with great hope...

Fifteen minutes pass. My eyes shoot open. I am freezing. The sweat has dried and frozen to my body. This is hell.

I grab my things and with the worst effort I can ever remember myself mustering, I drag myself to the toilet.
When I open it, the first thing I check for is cleanliness. It's spotless. I am so relieved. I sit in the corner of the room,
which my knees to my chest, head in my hands, wrapped in a leather jacket I had gotten from Jeff (ha, he really is my
guardian angel, though he would laugh to hear it).

I catch winks, occasionally looking up to check if the sun is rising. When it finally is, I get up, change my clothes (I had
ONE clean set of clothing and it had been rotting with the rest in the backpack) and immediately head to a thrift store where
a family friend is working.

On my way there, I notice in a little parking lot near the store a sight I had never actually come across but I always thought
would be the most amazing luck, and it was timed in such a spot in my life that it was the ultimate miracle...and a curse in
disguise.

In front of my eyes (this miracle appeared in my path as I was walking looking down, so it startled me) was the worst possible thing
for me: A half finished fifth of Smirnoff, and a half smoked pack of Marlboro 100 Reds. I open the pack and sure enough, the celophane
protected every cigarette inside from any water damage. I am ecstatic. This is not only amazing, but highly unlikely.

So I down the bottle in one go and take the rest of the smokes with me.

When I arrive at the thrift shop, it turns out I am there on a day when my potential savior is not working, so I get her number from the clerk
and head over to a payphone and realize... I have no money. So I decide to go on a quest for dropped pocket change.

Before I even leave the parking lot, I see a young man, no older than 23, sitting on a nice red classic-style Corvette and he's
reading William S. Burroughs. So naturally, I decide to strike up a conversation with the young man. Turns out he's the nicest guy
and his name is Jordan. So him and I got together and decided to go out for a game of disc golf (some may not know what this is;
Imagine frisbee but with a golf theme, so you need to get from a tee pad into a basket. Really fun, centering, and extremely popular
with potheads, Californians, beer-drinkers, and hippies) and before we go, he asks if I would like to snag a few beers first.

I tell him a piece of my story and he can tell I am down on my luck and broke so he decides to help me out. He buys us both some beer
and we proceed to disk.

Turns out he's an ex-****** and has been through quite a bit of hell himself, so we find that we're in a good position to help each
other make some better decisions in life. After the game, we go over to a payphone and he gives me money to call my friend.

Buzz (this the only name I am not changing because her name is ******* badass) answers the phone and unfortunately informs me that
though she would take me in any day of the year, she just moved in to a house with one older lady she takes care of, and its a single
bedroom apartment, so there is just no way it can work.

So I go back to his car and tell him the news, and he says he thinks he may be able to put me up for a few days until I can sort
everything out. We go back out to the store and grab ourselves a fifth of *****.

We end up in the park playing music, talking, performing standup for one another, and I begin to realize I am drinking too fast,
so I try to ease back a little. He was playing a version of a Radiohead song I had never heard before

"Everyone this way. Okay, get your hands against the wall. Spread your legs. Don't move."
The doors clanking, some ******* won't shut up in the next cell over.
More slamming of doors, someone rubbing my body all over trying to find my knives, no doubt.
And my AK 47 I conceal, and my ****, and my ... oh ****, I really did have **** on me.

"Move forward. Turn around. Alright, go to bed."

----------------------------------------------------------­---------------------

"Get up. Come on, slowly... There you go. There's a few more coming in so we got to get you to another cell."

Clank, clank...

"Pick a bed."

----------------------------------------------------------­---------------------

Something is wrong. This bed is not covered. There is no comfort. It's just a mat. And I have no pillow. This is not a house
of any sort, my bag isnt what I am sleeping on. Something is very wrong here.

I am in jail. Oh of course.

I know the answer before I hear it, but I ask anyway: "What are my charges, ma'am?"

"Drunk in public."

-------------------------------------------------------­------------------------

I'm about thirty miles or so North of inner Seattle. Not a bad place to be. I'm working for a Safeway. It's somewhere around
the first of June. I receive word that Bri has been on ******. And I may have left at a crucial time in her life thinking
only of myself, but I needed to go somewhere I could be productive. Yet my decision left her in a position where she turned
to hard drugs...

I can't help but feel I am to blame. I am listening to the dull, stupid words of my ex boss, Rod, who is telling me
that even though I may feel like I need to help her, there is nothing I can do for her, so I should bury myself in my work
instead. He tells me this in about six hundred different ways before I leave the room after twenty minutes. Well great.
I may have no focus here at work today, but at least I killed almost a half hour of the day just listening to someone
*******.

I am at a loss of what to do here, but I eventually get a hold of her, and after a long time not talking, we come to
somewhat of a closure, and she is beginning to sober up herself. I realize we were both in incredibly hard times, and I still
wish with all my heart there could have been some way I could have helped her raise that boy and stayed and been her
love, and at the same time, still go to college, and progress and get a good job...but I was in a small Northern California
town. There was nothing left, all the old shops were out of business. It was time for me to move on then, and we have
all seen better days for it. She looks incredible these days by the way. She lost an insane amount of weight, and I know
a lot of it had to do with the drugs, but if she truly is sober like she says she is, she'll be getting much better.

A few weeks ago 3 people I used to know and hang out with died in the span of a week. It was a terrible tragedy, and I have been
thinking back on all the names of people I used to love very, very much before they got lost in some way.

There's Lorne Holly, who killed himself after a few weeks of detoxing from crank.

Layla Harmon, who died in a car crash, blunt head trauma, with a drunk driver (I have a tattoo for this, I will never drive drunk).

Heavy Eagle, who killed himself after years of drug problems.

Chaz Lipman, who died in a car crash as well.

Ren Rain, who I am still not sure about...

And of course, Tray Beraldi, who was my closest friend's cousin... I wish I were there to mourne with him...

Last night I got a text from my best friend, who said he couldn't sleep and he barely eats anything anymore, and he feels like his throat
is going to explode, and he cant swallow and his neck is killing him constantly. He has been this way for a year, and he is talking constantly
about getting a gun and blowing his head off. And no one believes him because he constantly talks about it because he is in so much pain.
No doctor can diagnose him so far, he has no idea what's wrong with him, he's been tested all over the place, he has no hope, he's barely
cligning and he doesn't know how much longer he can hold on.

All I really want to say is

Lord? What I have done? I don't pray, I never pray, I don't even know who I would pray to. But WHAT ELSE DO I HAVE TO DO?!

I bring myself across hell and I pull myself from the worst depression I h

Dear Hot Straight Actresses,

Stop playing perfect lesbian characters on TV that cause me to become wet on lonely Thursday nights.

It’s the equivalent of waving double chocolate fudge cake in front of a menstruating woman who has just been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.

To name a few,

Jennifer Beals as Bette Porter on The L Word.
Stop it!

Naya Rivera as the sassy Santana Lopez on Glee.
Stop it!

Angie Harmon as butch goddess Detective Jane Rizzoli on Rizzoli & Isles.
You may be in the closet but you are gay and stop!

And Sara Ramirez and Jessica Capshaw as the married ****** Dr. Cali Torrez and Dr. Arizona Robbins of Grey’s Anatomy.
You…you keep going. You two give me hope.

Hope that someday my insanely high expectations will be met when my hot art collecting, sassy mouthed Doctor with handcuffs in her back pocket jumps from the screen and onto my sweatpants covered lap.
In this crazy assumption that I’ll end up falling out of an apple tree letting gravity push me into the arms of a woman who fixes my broken sense of reality with a amazing great hair and a wedding proposal.

Missing out on the

Hot barista who gives me an extra large when I ask for a small

or the

Budding **** artist who invites me to her galleries only to realize her muse has oddly the same hips as me.

or the

Best friend who is still stuck in the shadows of my closet.

Nope…didn’t see any of those.
I’m too busy watching the **** tube to see what low cut tops they can get away with before they leave the set and back to their husband and 2.5 kids.

All I’m asking is…

…when is it coming out on DVD?

7:43 AM - Period 1 - Symphonic Band
I hid behind a bank of instrument nooks, each beaten, worn and termite chewed to ruddy brown and grey colors. Doors of old supply cabinets with peeling, plastic, paper coverings squeaked in a draft that no one could find. I kept my backpack against the trumpet section, just around the corner from the door, where no one could see me. Class started eight minutes ago, but Mr. Rants was gone as usual, and our student substitute Nick, was not not here yet. I unhooked the metal clasp on my Fossil backpack, searching around in the front backpack for my gum. I popped it in my mouth and bit down. Crack! Stale.
In a side pocket I found a tube of mascara I had shoved haphazardly in due to my rush from the house this morning. I untwisted the cap and wiped the tip of the brush on the rim, looking for a reflective surface. In the cubby directly in front of me was a trumpet case and a harmon mute. A shiny harmon mute. I stared at my warped reflection in the surface and laughed at myself. I thought "Only a real musician would do her makeup using a trumpet mute." I stabbed myself in the face leaving a long streak of gooey black on my nose. "******" I whispered and licked my finger to wipe it off. I laughed again, my hand still at my face. "This is one of those significant moments" I realized. "I'm not sure why though."

2. 4:21 PM - After School  - Way Home From Orthodontist Appointment
She stroked my hand, which was flat against my leg. "Sorry honey, just because I am a little disappointed because of what happened doesn't mean that." I was silent, staring straight through the windsheild. She sighed and pulled her hand away. I fiddled with a rubberband, my legs crossed beneath me in the passenger seat. I was hurt; I thought we were done talking about this. Hadn't she forgiven me? Like it mattered. Telling her was the right thing and there's nothing more I can do. Light Gives Heat by Jars of Clay came on the radio and as I looked through the rain, repeatedly punching my window, I felt something well up inside me. The feeling that actors must get in dramatic movie scenes. Closing my eyes, I imagined I was in a movie. That it was about me, that I would win whatever I wanted in the end and that I was clever and beautiful. "This is a significant moment" I thought. "But not like this morning, not at all."
I looked over at her, she was expresionless, tapping her finger gently on the steering wheel.
"Maybe I'll post something about this on HelloPoetry later." I thought.

If life was a bed of roses, then
My neighbour would fit the bill,
He’d built him a twelve room mansion
Next to me, on top of the hill,
It made my cottage look down at heel
Til I grew a hawthorn hedge,
So nobody could look down on me
Though he did, from up on a ledge.

His name was Jeremy Harmon, and
His wife was Amanda Cale,
I’d played with him in the schoolyard, though
He’d won him a place at Yale,
He’d spent his life in America
Though he’d come back home to wed,
And stole the only woman I loved
From our own pre-bridal bed.

She’d fallen hard for his Ivy League
And his Yves St. Laurent suits,
His rented Aston Martin, and
His R.M. Williams boots.
He’d made a pile and he flaunted it
Before heading back to the States,
Taking Amanda Cale with him,
I got her note too late.

‘I’m sorry John, and I know it’s wrong
But he swept me off my feet,
We’re going to live in Chicago, where
He said that life’s a treat.
We’ll live in a condominium
And he promised me a maid,
Oh don’t be sad, for I’m rather glad,
Just think of the love we made.’

And that was the last I heard of them
For almost twenty years,
The name of Jeremy Harmon passed
My lips, as a sort of curse,
I just got on with my life, but brought
No woman to my bed,
My head was full of Amanda Cale
And her betrayal, instead.

They turned up totally unexpected,
Rang my front doorbell,
‘We’re going to be your neighbour, Hey!
It’s good to see you, pal.’
He seemed to be totally unaware
Of the grief he’d caused, back when,
I held my tongue and I kept my peace,
‘Okay, I’ll see you then.’

A year went by and the house went up
And I grew my hawthorn hedge,
Amanda worked in the garden planting
Seeds and lawn and sedge,
I did my best to avoid her, though
She tried to keep things light,
But chuckled things like, ‘Remember when…’
And I’d say, ‘That’s not right!’

‘You made your bed when you left with him,
There are no memories,
I saw you last in his Aston Martin
Waving through the trees.’
‘That was a mistake, I know,’ she said,
‘But things could turn out right,
He goes away on his business trips
And I’m all alone at night.’

I’m sure I said that it wasn’t on,
I’m sure I told her to go,
But she was given to plots and schemes
About things I didn’t know.
She asked me once for a bag of lime
To use on her roses bed,
And like a fool, I gave her the tool
To let her back in my bed.

Jeremy went on a business trip
And didn’t come home at all,
She said he’d gone to America,
Their marriage had gone to the wall.
She came to cry on my shoulder then
Each day, for almost a year,
And in the end, I had given in,
She seemed in a deep despair.

Her garden then was magnificent
For her roses were in bloom,
‘I’ve never seen such a great display,’
I said, one afternoon.
‘You can thank my husband, Jeremy,
He’s been working, all this time,
You’re tied to me for eternity
For you supplied the lime!’

David Lewis Paget

He lay there in a *****, unkept ball,
Having surrendered to the pavement.
Wisps of stringy brown hair
Covered the lines on his sunken in face,
His yellow smoked eyes, rheumy and blurred,
His vision hazy, like a punch-drunk boxer.

Kathleen Harmon sashayed by
With nary a glace downward.
Once they were equals,
When they sat together
During high school Chemistry.

Time slowed from a Tango to a Waltz,
As a drop of saliva
Kissed the pavement.
Stringing there from his cracked, parted lips.

His tangled brown whiskers,
Patchy on his cheeks,
Had lengthened with the passing days
Since their last meeting with a razor.

Nikes, Prada, and Gucci
Ignore him in passing
All sports, fashion, and business meetings;
On the clock, and self-absorbed.

Dusk marked the sky
With a violet crayon
Worn to a nub,
Then worn to nothing.

A sudden thud startled him awake!
Then blackened hardwood stunned him as it bit into his ribs!
A caustic voice berated his slumber,
A navy blue reminder that even surrender was no escape.

There's a quaver in the skin
by the blue eye plaza:
Bundy's glittering lips
spread and spread and spread.

We all love a pretty mouth
filled with charismatic teeth
that assure you: all is well.
All is well. Come: get in the car...

No, no, it's alright - it's an actor,
it's a screen, a script -
glass and paper.  
It's not Bundy, it's just Mark:

Mark the UCLA quarterback,
drinks his beer and takes his shoes off
like anyone. But you have to wonder
how sticky the mask becomes.

Let’s pay homage to many innocent black lives that were taken by
the corrupt system:  Martin Luther King Jr.  Malcom X.  Emmett Till.  George Stinney.  Will Brown.  Sandra Bland.  Trayvon Martin.  Ahmaud Arbery.  Breonna Taylor. George Floyd.  David McAtee.  Natosha “Tony” McDade.  Yassin Mohamed.  Finan H. Berhe.  Sean Reed.  Steven Demarco Taylor.  Ariane McCree.  Terrance Franklin.  Miles Hall.  Darius Tarver.  William Green.  Samuel David Mallard.  Kwame “KK” Jones.  De’von Bailey.  Christopher Whitfield.  Anthony Hill.  Eric Logan.  Jamarion Robinson.  Gregory Hill Jr.  JaQuavion Slaton.  Ryan Twyman.  Brandon Webber.  Jimmy Atchison.  Willie McCoy.  Emantic “Ej” Fitzgerald Bradford Jr.  D’ettrick Griffin.  Jemel Roberson.  DeAndre Ballard.  Botham Shem Jean.  Robert Lawrence White.  Anthony Lamar Smith.  Ramarley Graham.  Manuel Loggins Jr.  Wendell Allen.  Kendrec McDade.  Larry Jackson Jr.  Jonathan Ferrell.  Jordan Baker.  Victor White III.  Dontre Hamilton.  Eric Garner.  John Crawford III.  Michael Brown.  Ezell Ford.  Dante Parker.  Kajieme Powell.  Laquan McDonald.  Akai Gurley.  Tamir Rice.  Rumain Brisbon.  Tony Robinson.  Mario Woods.  Quintonio LeGrier.  Gregory Gunn.  Akiel Denkins.  Alton Sterling.  Philando Castile.  Terrance Sterling.  Terrence Crutcher.  Keith Lamont Scott.  Alfred Olango.  Jordan Edwards.  Stephon Clark.  Danny Ray Thomas.  Dejuan Guillory.  Patrick Harmon.  Jonathan Hart.  Maurice Granton.  Julius Johnson.  Jamee Johnson.  Michael Dean.  Keith Childress.  Bettie Jones.  Kevin Matthews.  Michael Noel.  Leroy Browning.  Leroy Nelson.  Miguel Espinal.  Nathaniel Pickett.  Tiara Thomas.  Cornelius Brown.  Jamal Clark.  Richard Perkins.  Michael Lee Marshall.  Alonzo Smith.  Anthony Ashford.  Dominic Hutchinson.  Lamontez Jones.  Rayshaun Cole.  Paterson Brown.  Christopher Kimble.  Junior Prosper.  Keith McLeod.  Wayne Wheeler.  Lavante Biggs.  India Kager.  Tyree Crawford.  James Carney.  Felix Kumi.  Asshams Manley.  Christian Taylor.  Troy Robinson.  Brian Day.  Michael Sabbie.  Billy Ray Davis.  Samuel Dubose.  Darrius Stewart.  Albert Davis.  Salvado Ellswood.  George Mann.  Jonathan Sanders.  Freddie Blue.  Victo Larosa.  Spencer McCain.  Kevin Bajoie.  Zamiel Crawford.  Jermaine Benjamin.  Kris Jackson.  Kevin Higgenbotham.  Ross Anthony.  Richard Gregory Davis.  Curtis Jordan.  Markus Clark.  Lorenzo Hayes.  De’Angelo Stallsworth.  Dajuan Graham.  Brandon Glenn.  Reginald Moore.  Nuwnah Laroche.  Jason Champion.  Bryan Overstreet.  David Felix.  Terry Lee Chatman.  William Chapman.  Samuel Harrell.  Freddie Gray.  Norman Cooper.  Brian Acton.  Darrell Brown.  Frank Shephard III.  Walter Scott.  Donald “Dontay” Ivy.  Eric Harris.  Phillip White.  Dominick Wise.  Jason Moland.  Bobby Gross.  Denzel Brown.  Brandon Jones.  Askari Roberts.  Terrance Moxley.  Anthony Hill.  Bernard Moore.  Naeschylus Vinzant.  Tony Robinson.  Charly Leundeu “Africa” Keunang.  Darrell Gatewood.  Deontre Dorsey.  Thomas Allen Jr.  Lavall Hall.  Calvon Reid.  Gerdie Moise.  Terry Price.  Natasha McKenna.  Jeremy Lett.  Kevin Garrett.  Alvin Haynes.  Artago Damon Howard.  Tiano Meton.  Andre Larone Murphy Sr.  Leslie Sapp.  Brian Pickett.  Frank Smart.  Matthew Ajibade.

There are so many more that have died at the hands of the prejudice system.  All of you will never be forgotten.  Your legacy will forever live on.  Rest in Paradise to the fallen angels.

Take me
Jezabiel
You make me feel
As if
Im in a spell

You are the one
Underneath my wings
You are the one
That makes me crow
And
Sing.

I can't leave without yah'
Babe'.
You are the holy one
Above.

If I take you for granted,
Make me be the one,
That is stunted;

I am forgotten
Without you;
I am death
Without yah'.

Got a lot a worries,
Oh' you know
It's so.

Little sugar near me
Little sugar near my bowl.
Can't you see
That your life
Is nothing but words,
And a
Half-hearted pray.

Wolfs all around me.
You're the love of my life.
You take me to places
I never thought I'd go.

Take me slow.
Love me heavy.
You are the girl,
I've always wished
To know.

I feel your breath.
It rests upon
My paper thin
Napkin
Neckline.
You are my Cleopatra,
Streaming past
A transient dream.

Take me as I am,
All harmon, all joy,
Patriotism
Reflects
Like lost reflections
Of past ages
**** past remembrance.

Everyone is a main character to someone.
Amy Harmon; Making Faces

Screeeech goes the sound of the metal door sliding to a close in a house black as crows. An owl howling—juxtaposed with white earthenware pecked by rainbows. Happy Christmas from the trenches of bone meat and parsley. I’m legs crossed in a quiet corner screaming “cut!” because this strange stage play needs to be noosed. The compactor reeks of trauma pressed too neatly. Coats piled on the floor with salted mistletoe. A savory kiss from the host as she clack clack clacks her dentures. A hand not to be slapped, but severed—falling onto the feast table. A crack of pepper. The guests scream as apples tumble from the backyard tree. Quickly wheeled away to conceal all of the rotting. You see, the morning sun in Harmon insists on licking a clean lawn. But this boy is a dawn renegade with a fistful of fuel. And when I unearthed your heart, I set it aflame. Cranberries in my smile, while the black house burns.