anxiety: my heart wakes me up, tattooing irregular beats against
my ribs, pulse racing, breath shaking.  i cannot tell
if this is real or psychosomatic.  these days,
i think about death all the time,
no longer by suicide.  now, i am
an accident waiting to happen,
fragile from years of misuse &
neglect.  the shallow inhales
of my lungs tell me
i am not okay.

depression:  this is a gray day.  i swallow my meds even though
they take away my mania.  so i drink black coffee until my mind
races itself in circles, chasing its tail like a rabid dog.
i keep the razors hidden in my sock drawer,
just in case.  

anorexia: my ribs ****** forward from my skin again, the sharp
protrusion of my bones beginning to show through.  i am eating
but drinking my weight in water
& mainlining caffeine to keep my metabolism high & my weight
low.  i am still child-sized & i don't want to grow.  
they lift me easily with their arms & marvel
at my featherweight body.  
the compliments i get only make me
eat less.

self-harm: on the days when i am low, i trace
the silver stretch of scars scattered over my skin
with a yearning for a blade between my fingers
just one last time.  i swear to you, the bleeding is over,
but i need to know
i am still brave
enough
to hold a sharp edge against my flesh
& press down,
hard.

addiction: a month ago,
i downed four adderall in one sitting,
luxuriating in the heady rush & lack of pain,
the quiet & the calm.
when i lived at home, i stole
my mother's vicodin & took the whole bottle.
i'm not sorry.  
when the boy who only cared about ******* me
offered mdma for free,
i accepted, but i shouldn't have trusted him
to keep me safe,
blacking out on his kitchen
floor.
drink red wine to forget
my insecurity, inhale
thick, sweet smoke to feel
some semblance of happy,
drag on cigarettes
down to their filters
until i feel properly
alive.

all i want is to be better, but
where to begin?

will you still think of me
when the winter’s snow
like ****** needles sticking
and pricking me
slamming your smack
mainlining your masochism
melts to pastel pink mornings
and pregnant dewdrops
gravity propelling them
down flower petal water slides?
will my taste loiter on your lips
will the memory of my touch
my ghost fingers
still leave erupting goose-bumps
your hair standing on end
my unalloyed current
sparking into the night of kerosene.
will the fire bring me to mind?
my face engraved on your memory
like a holy icon
to which you run when the flames
rage as far as you can see
the orange haze of ******
and the hoard of children running
blistered skin
and their screams piercing
gouging
each wearing your face.

spent many a night
inhaling words
mainlining metaphors
then spent days
sleeping off the dreams
and when I woke up
again, took a hit of
the next word I saw
and did
it all again!

I know this is a place for poems but night is a hard night and I'm trying to fight through it for my love ones, when really I want to walk right over to the corner and end it all. But, so many people tell me I have so much more to live for when others tell me to leave and that I'm worthless. I showed up today at school with fresh cuts and many people stared while others asked why? And as they ask that I ask Why Not? So here is just a little bit of what I'm feeling tonight? But I'll be okay?





“Why?’ She nods. ‘She had everything: a family who loved her, friends, activities. Her mother wants to know why she threw it all away?’ Why you want to know why? Step into a tanning booth and fry yourself for two or three days. After your skin bubbles and falls off, roll in coarse salt, then put on long underwear woven from spun glass and razor wire. Over that goes your regular clothes, as long as they are tight.
Smoke gunpowder and go to school to jump through hoops, sit up and beg, and roll over on command. Listen to the whispers that curl into your head at night, calling you ugly and fat and stupid and ***** and ***** and worst of all ‘A disappointment.’ Puke and starve and cut and drink because you need an anesthetic and it works. For a while. But then the anesthetic turns into poison and by then it’s too late because you are mainlining it now, straight into your soul. It is rotting you and you can’t stop. Look in a mirror and find a ghost. Hear every heartbeat scream that everything single thing is wrong with you. ‘Why?’ is the wrong question. Ask ‘Why not?”

Here are some mishaps from mainlining madness

The stars now seem sinister..

they hang from twine on a crowded skyline

like so many peepholes for a pervert god

I could never live up to these fantasies now mass produced

I DON'T HAVE THE ANSWERS

I'm not sure what constitutes base line normalcy

When considering a suited institutions interpretation of reality...

Lines perpetually blur into an infinite numb

Did free will give us the devices for denying our own mechanics?

How do you reconcile a mind retired from wondering?

Are these crowded spaces nothing more than sad faces displacing silence?

and how much enamel was lost...

in pursuit of despondency?

Ponder a fond portrayal

like we don't all cling to crumbling foundations

You may find me accidentally existing inside a stranger I never intended

You may find me blissfully malfunctioning..

break down illuminated by fluorescent hums

Some concrete charades for gray days full of time

Now and then...

I can pretend my plight for silence transcends the rational

It begins with a beat;
A steady reverberation in an
elemental part of me.

Then the bass line comes;
A red-raw rush of energy
viciously visceral in my veins,
Elevating my feeble frame
From it’s meek and sorry state
To become something
Ferociously sublime.

And now I’m mainlining music,
Letting it
Soak into my skin
Infect my ears
Infuse my feat and
Bombard my quivering brain
With its beat
‘Til I explode into a mass
of minuscule notes;
Quick little quavers
like quarks
that waver, then stalk
through my mind,
Looking to find
fresh melodies, to which
my soul can bind
and bleed.

This is how it feels
within me,
When my body responds
to a purified beat;
This is true ecstasy –
When I fly on an
emotional high.

Panegoism is a pandation of mensuration in supersolid pettifoggery against the wafting wasms of wanion that is a wone for wonted license expedited by parabolasters of chabouks nakedized by nasute argali in foutered conflict between bobbinets and sarsenets in catabasis from bushwa pertinacity breamed by brayers and affrayers trying to squelch brisures from conquering stagnicolous stonks by advesperating bangtail luxuries at the forefront of stradometrical neglect because of sphacelated hauteur the sprachgefuhl of elegiac poltroons of irreflex ironless drab docimasy of orectic oppidan maximalism so unseemly it almost seems a chamade of  onyxis eyeservice berating the camarilla of habanera. The hamerkop of proper stagnation mixed with aptitude is a porlocking handsel of immoralism abaft in aberdevine abessive insouciant conformity apay to sideline internecine domestic appui clarigated against desipient deontology by feasting on odontalgia mainlining decuman deadwood as gourmet especially in cloisters of davenport besieged by the frottage incurred by adevism reformulated as rimose varietism of varsal protervity and procacious profligacy immune to vastation because of vehicles of vecordy gouging vectigals in deckled consolation of gerrymandered but gentrified newels marooning the balmorality of subterfuge to enamor killcows often pilloried as sakis into mesalliance with exlex compromise.

The meldometers that tax megacerine meconology juddering against sudd trying to elude juggins judogi of barmcloth catacoustics of cacotopia immiserated ingravescent by the caudles to steeve them sink into cecutiency reminded often of negannepaut only to provoke their obsolescence of stark cisvestism transpontine in beblubbered sentimentalism peenging about bandelets dashed by dashpots of ragmatical rhinocerial romage deprived of tropoclastic nurturance in the rookery of their heyday wases of wapentake cajoling the podlecs pysmatic in incorrigible oppression of rudenture and mugience must the pansophy tread lightly against the polyacoustic repine of scelestious wrackful recklings of gossypine boskets agape with agathism pilgarlicks abide by in jamdanis castrametated as ghastly politicide. The pother of indigence is a pushful brehon encircling quozzes of quilombo reasted in rectiserial substratose taeniacide of anonymity the tabacosis of gorgonized gonophs defiling the umjunction of sumpters of veilleuse vicariant virgations of vis viewed from twiring turtlebacks of skalding vorticism of gerenuk wunderkinds plucked from plucky endeavor itself to glissade over winterkill as gonfaloniers paroxytone as monumental pergola woolding as willowish williwaws seeking to eradicate widgeons as domett by the cloture of peremptory eloquence corraded from the codswallop of the walloping machinations of poverty straining umbracious servitude to rampicks of optimism rather than the coemption of community valor in collimation with timocracy.

The cofferdam between authoritative pragmatica of clepsydra and cirripeds of pataphysics is an antagonism of form over substance wroth with azoth because of the abb of compital nevosity of bronchos caused by scop amounted among nerkas of neutrosophy recoiling in sastrugas of obfuscation beholden to sarangousty transmuted into stulm implodent to incumbent procedure imbricates idiorhythmic if saccadic balanisms of the nutation of the noosphere around circumducted anomalies of umbels qualified by therbligs of subliminal and sublime synartesis of angstroms and the plasma of sedigitated syllepsis sublated by miniaturized coemption of variegated abscissa that provokes the steepest acclivity that any single aerobe known to formative wunderkinds pales to the aftershaft of that bonanza. In such severe akinesia of alaudine alexia only deciphered by algetic subroutines insubordinating plunged wagtail derrick into the dentagra of scientific odonterism can we field the apodysophilia, beyond the specious inveterate and stubborn aphthong of science, aplanatic and apodictic feuilleton of scollardical degus that become integral dedans that cavort like duramen in the famine and volcanic galvanization in the fallow ratheripe certainty designed by stradometrical stridulation to mirror the strahl and diminish the strake by bobstaying probands by the bezique bellecism of contrahent stupidity. In the frogmarch of bonanza contecking cachalots privy to kistvaens of cameralism and the moulin camouflet the spavined of penelopized and gorgonized paludism of mehari indagating because of stulm that the mazzebah is not the mazopathia of laystall kisswonks too scurfy in lineolated limpkins to propel the lugsails at the apogees of achievement because zabaglione is too inscrutable even to zollvereins that gouge a fortune among their zoris of eavesdropped boodle among the hawsehole of highbinder intrigue holderbats thole against hopsacks because of visibilia and vetanda delimiting the ambit of adynamia wed with barkentine prestige into an easement oxtered with overlock jacquards bewildering even the janitrices to the ulterior prerogatives enjoyed by ipecac while the ireless abessive unguligrade subitaneous folly of wagtail tregetours enthused on yawny rather than ****** youthquakes.

The stylogalmaic affairs of baragouins among lavolta and stanjant stunsail with dignified stritches capsizing swarf with baldric portfires of powellisation garnering guerdons basculing because of bathmism scranching inept trichosis with walleteer agiotage because of dommerer yare proairesis to yerk kymatology from fickle and feckless to intrepid and pervicacious that maybe draconian subterfuge anserine to probang by praxeology transfixing prisoptometry might uranoplasty in metapolitics abetted by metaplasmic tourbillons tow themselves slumberous while the alacrity of lavolta tricotees with popjoys of porcellanous tephra milked vaccimulgent in impudence volplaning vivat because of contrahent silence obeyed categorically by the dormant virgation of shambles viscid in hyperbulia. When marauding among holocryptic fringes extramundane in histrinkage harried by the haecceity of brutish bowdlerization, the gnomic futtocks of the foison griffonage dissembles eupraxia in eutrapely that rantipole ecphonesis becomes an ecdysiast of the aurochs of advesperation dwaling in soteriology because the dulia of adiaphoron is a volable virtu  foothot with katzenjammer becomes the mappemonde of macrobian cosmopolitanism flushed by hues of oligochrome by visagists insuperable in vallidom that the vagarian curiosity accidentally twires the tympany dismantling mackintoshes arrayed by the mainpernor of strict docimasy tethered to squamation such that mantissas discounting echards because of chevet becomes a fashionable marivaudage yarnwindling birls of woold despite bickerns wallfish owleries cajole into wangs of slangwhang in the washlands of vicissitude wedelning chrematistic cordwainers with the windlass of their stang recapitulated in ostentation. Couveuses balize and beaze because of bandore, the sennet of sidelighted garbology upstaged by singulted skives ictuating the idempotent because of odedible vulpecular boyaus of oblectation done because of streamlined encaustic quatenus browbeating the quatsch of teenage familisteries flagitating the suboptimal Sarvodaya even with derelict flautino cadged by laevoduction chiliombs whipstaffing impressionable gerenuks sympatric by proxemics to inhospitable wen rimose with jollyboat katabothrons of catacoustics that the websters tower over the phallocrats because of wasserman popinjay panjandrum gauleiters warraying backstays of causerie clatfart amicable to jousting subternatural pickthanks of cittosis amenable to cacophony. The truer virtuosity of weasand meets a cladogenesis of champaign ambitions versus cetacean vultures chabouking the jostle of concourse among superlunary and sublunary carracks warring for cardimelech saffrons of gentrified sagination leading to idiomology easy to iambize spaniolating with nutation to govern the hyperborean capital of catalfalques simultaneous to bluepeters because of abigail bowdlerization of sophianic nidor embodied in truth.

Espresso shots pour,
And I'm mainlining caffeine.
The taste of coffee tickles my tounge
And I feel at ease.

Milk steaming,
Eyes gleaming
Smile beaming.

Then the espresso shots die.
I let them sit too long.
Didn't down them quick enough
Or craft a creative caffinated drink
To keep me awake.

I too fall dead asleep
Weak
By the bleak
Black eye
And frowning face.

Uppers and downers
I am the latter,
Flattering to be the the stimulating
Drink that drowns her.

I'm no longer interested in espresso.
A barista falling
Like my fortísima not running
Now crawling.

I'm not caring,
Unawaring
Becoming wary
And scary.

I lost myself
And esteem
To be the milk that was once steamed
And sweetened.

Dead like espresso shots
On a lonely bar.
My head is clouded by knots
Of why I've strayed so far.

Man on a train
but it's only me
mainlining.

Timing
is not all it's cracked
up to be,
if it was up to me
I'd not bother.

The tube fills
people don't spill out
they still keep coming,

I chill
no pill
just relaxation
standing still
at the station.


Man drops coffee
says sorry
goes back to sleep,
I keep my eyes open.

A lady or maybe not
polka dot skirt
red striped t-shirt
swears
I look
her look dares me to
say something
I say nothing.

I see more things that fill me
that thrill me and give me the
will to go on.

The end is nigh
a guy chants
we
all switch off
together.

Galloping glum on desecrated pourparlers of gravid gravity sawed  in half by limped levity
That awestruck moonshot apartheid Count Dracula nyala blood thirst finicky in mafficking celebrity
Dawdling on the moors of transcendentalism a scarlet hue surdomute poisons a stilted amphigory View Askew
Repartees for four scores seven games profaned starlet girdles of regaled tails on coin flipped casualties a shibboleth for reneged Jews
Crosswalk henpecking ironhanded regimes flickering blockbusters a bend diseased etch-a-sketch orchestras brook degrees of foibles of mistral breeze
Tempestuous haunts of profound savants sidling gallantly between the venom and the squeeze to postulate a notion of time to which time itself agrees
As the quizzical stampede traipses with the apish notions of Cape Cod capers lapsed by bonfires started by the Minneapolis Lakers the ground shakes groovy with primordial Quakers
Retinues of Amish famished slaking jaundice slipshod with guffaws awash rakish with Point Break's henchmens heyday shading shadier acres
Times contumely a backbitten loan shark the esquire of a tomb desolate with spray can doom segued into sparkplug rooms spiraling into vertigo for varsal probability of crackjaw croon warbling loony and always too soon
The honesty of revelry sagging under encumbered dawdles a Bain Capital poltroon slaloms around iceblinks of every FANGed tune
lopsided in baragnosis whitewashed by hypnosis watching the wretched dial blemished by heliosis such that the jejune tautology becomes precocious
As a matter of fact besieged by a Massive Attack the spavined of the slugabed slore of whack-a-mole tact develops retrograde cirrhosis
Bleeding from contumacy widowed by the stulm of stannary lunacy we skelder for shelter as wilted whangams jostle in welter
Clockwork genocide hapless by pavonine notions of ivory towers in division about divisible divide multiplied by iracund notions of skeletal sweat in Canada dry swelter
As the bygones of stanhope meet the tympany of stanzas churches gilded with hypaethral avarice are riveted by Potemkin bonanzas
Wooded woonerf jackanapes blesboks warbling on corrugated provenance postulating allodic vultures outnumbering famished bamboozled pandas
In search of pillory never alpenglow we embroider a seed sown out of love a semaphore of walnut-brained eyesore
A dizzy vertiginous dance of Gavin Rossdale mainlining bellarmine barkentine vicissitude rather than happenstance using jawholes immiserated Six Pence All the Poorer
The macular degeneration of kenspeckel sensibility wilting on the laxism of pulverized verve of racecar swerve might the doggy crapulence survive the days of desiccated herb in a time that teetotalers "Shout" the word
That in every zoo the monkey business of the flock is cretaceous enough to rock the chockablock crotaline specter of the Raging Bull in an enthusiastic herd
All is a pittance to renewal in the revalorization of nimiety in a time of the tyranny of nihilism itself absurd

Music comes back
In solitude

"a guide for those
new
to living alone"

Ears go from cancelling out
To craving

It's the quiet
**** it

At first
Then u remember

Listening
And Listen in

See yourself
Rapt

Double cover
In your hands

Broken cellophane
On the floor

Record playing
Diamond needle

Mainlining someone else's
Experience

Then
When I'd had none

Alone
I was with music

And writing
Now

Find yourself
Rapt

Cell phone
in your hands

Open Sonos box
On the floor

It's not
As loud

Or
So big

And
I sing

More boldly
Along


Copyright@2018 Dennis Willis

It begins with a beat;
A steady reverberation in an
elemental part of me.

Then the bass line comes;
A red-raw rush of energy
viciously visceral in my veins,
Elevating my feeble frame
From it’s meek and sorry state
To become something
Ferociously sublime.

And now I’m mainlining music,
Letting it
Soak into my skin
Infect my ears
Infuse my feat and
Bombard my quivering brain
With its beat
‘Til I explode into a mass
of minuscule notes;
Quick little quavers
like quarks
that waver, then stalk
through my mind,
Looking to find
fresh melodies, to which
my soul can bind
and bleed.

This is how it feels
within me,
When my body responds
to a purified beat;
This is true ecstasy –
When I fly on an
emotional high.

I am anti septic tanks,
nothing to beat mainlining
into a common sewer, it is
far more democratic, the
former are elitist, some people
don't like their children going
to the same school as the lower
classes, but refusing to permit
turds to go to the same treatment
plant is a bit on the nose, I think!

Years ago I recall fountain
pens with filling systems
similar to surgical syringes.

Submerge the tip below the
inlet siphon, pull the silver
shaft, then watch it fill.

I still write everything in ink,
it is the blood of creativity, I
use the nib for mainlining \ /
------------------------------------ ˚-------------------------------------------------------