After moving to Windowville from a smelly pet shop,
Lord Lispy Lizard felt he would soon be on top.
The view from his new place was quite superb,
Lispy couldn’t believe he’d had doubts about the burbs.
“This year will be swell,” he thought, “It’s my time to shine.”
It was easier to think this away from mildew and brine.
However, Lispy was in for quite the surprise,
as there was a roommate in his highrise.
Shy, she had been watching from behind the plants,
nervously eating handfuls of ants.
Being alone for so long had taken quite a toll,
her former good looks had faded and left a troll.
Still, she was determined to confront this stranger,
in order to see if he presented any danger.
She was not too worried, he didn’t look like much,
and she was certain she could take him with only a touch.
Hardening her resolve, she lept out with a shout,
forgetting she had forgotten to pluck her mustache out.
This was not all, she had not bathed either,
And the yell she let out sounded like a deranged ******.
Needless to say, Lispy lept up, screamed, and bolted.
Both because he was scared, and a little revolted.
“Just my luck,” he thought, cowering behind a rock.
“But I’m a man, I’ll go out there and at least try to talk.”
So Lispy stood up and brushed himself off,
clearing his throat with a less than manly cough.
“I’m sorry…miss? I didn’t mean to run
It’s just that I’m allergic to the sun.
I got scared when it’s rays reflected off your pretty smile,
And thought it best I took off for awhile.”
The girl was a little confused, her teeth were very mossy,
she knew this because she never did any flossing.
But she decided to go along with his claim,
saying “That’s okay sir, let me tell you my name.
They used to call me Elenor, back when I feasted on Orange Roughy,
But the fatty whose cage we’re in just calls me Fluffy.”
Lispy couldn’t believe this thing had been rich,
especially when she looked even worse than a witch.
Still, he was a gentleman and did not want to be rude
so he said “What a pretty name, where does Fatty put the food?”
“I’ll show you,” she said, “C’mon, follow me.”
Beginning to think how nice it would be
if they ended up married and had lots of kids,
as it must have been fate that Lispy showed up when he did.
So later that night Elenor jumped in the pool,
scrubbing away dust, dirt, grime and drool.
She plucked out the unsightly hair on her face,
and pulled out a ribbon from inside an old case.
When Lispy was awoken by bright sunlight streams,
the vision he saw was that of his dreams.
There Elenor stood, shining like a star,
looking nothing like the former monster all covered in tar.
He couldn’t believe she had cleaned up so well,
with not even a hint of her old sour smell.
With this one look Lispy fell in love,
as if he had been struck by something up from above.
To this day Elenor and Lispy live in bliss,
even though she had not brushed her teeth before their first kiss.

there’s a sea of people running away from the smoke of their pasts.
they call out the names of their mothers, and ex lovers
they look up at the sky and fear that the moment
they've been waiting for
has happened already.
call me a stranger, it’s okay.
it’s okay to say that the moments are evanescent,
because they are.
but it’s not okay to pretend like
they never happened
because they are here. fading, but here.
i’m here. fading into the blur of people, but i am here.
tell me something.
tell me i’ve been running towards the wrong end
of disaster, or that the world is upside down and
i’m actually walking on the ceiling, and
that years, and years, and years ago,
people used to swim in the sky
and swallow mouthfuls of the galaxy.
wait a moment.
i know it’s been too long,
because i’ve waited for ages to dance in the moonlight,
to go
around and around.
there is no remedy for going in circles.
but to take the straight path would turn
me into a straight-edged square.
i’d rather not become that version of myself,
that person scares me.


/


the night sky is easier to imagine
when
you close your eyes with that classical music playing
in your ears, flannel sheets wrapping your body
in their embrace.
i embrace the lights in the night that are lanterns
floating in the dark conquering it, if only just for
a little while.
they say only light
can conquer the dark
but they never really tell you whether or not
the dark can ever swallow the light
in its mouth of black holes, whirlpools,
and eternal sleep.
the lanterns go out,
and where are we but in the dark,
making ourselves into something
that is almost useless,
but not
pointless.
are you ready now? i ask.
are you ready?


/


your cough syrup throat and my candy corn teeth
are playing hide and seek,
i’d never make you bleed.
the glitter on your eyelids remind me
of a time that was prettier than this one.
the stars would  s  h  i  n  e
and b-l-i-n-k like neon lights,
and they’d carve our names into the bark of the
sky, a memory of the oceans we drowned in
when they stretched between us.
your lispy words, and my groggy voice.
mornings, and skydiving from the chandeliers
into a pool
of deeper thoughts.
i’m caught up in my imagination,
it’s the weights around my ankles
pulling me down
into a more dangerous place
where imagination and reality
collide.
i find asylum in the everyday nonbeliever.


/


hurry on now, my darling, it is getting late.
hurry on now, my lovely, although you can’t run from fate.
these celestialities are all driving me mad.
this celestial city can’t be all that bad.
it can’t be
all that bad.

Have you ever heard
A catastrophe at the other end of a telephone?
The shriek and silence
Of unknown violence
The wail and moan of a dial tone
Phonetic kinesis corked!
Words twisted to the snap
Wrung to the crack
A digit bridge bedlam
Calcination of lispy, nasal, rasp, and husk
Bellow whispers fanning ash
A static sting and the ears go black