She knew
It would be good
as she stood
under a sky more colorful than blue.
As she stood
on a threshold of something
that smelled like the silk and satin
he had slept on just the night before,
She hoped for more
than red lights flashing,
than hearts surrounded by fences.
But, she only heard the mashing
of sweetened heartstrings not fully cooked.
If only she had looked
for something more than a cookbook.

lightning pulses through my pitch
strike me with your presence, stitch
the gaping ridges of the aftermath.

dark, is my prism.
weak, is my shell.
loss, is my repetition.

my gaze is shallow water
as the sun begins to bend.

when nothing grows, we hunt each other.
attempting satisfaction of the flesh, we eat meat.
carnivorous campers hiking through hail, we retreat.

parting clouds,
beams,
breaking through our moisture.
the rays build our spirits to cast
shadows.
evening arrives.

flames draw our photographs
and we're captured in thought.
candid sweetness, through darkness we fought.

today is the first rain since those memories
and everything I swore I couldn't feel last
winter comes rushing, swinging limbs,
swinging branches and I'm barreled.
all boxed up in the lack of things.
swinging gently before the snap,
my body descends
as I open my wings for flight
there's no surprise in my eyes
as the past repeats itself for I am
punished by gravity every time
I surrender to survive.

Ginger ale, coke, lemon and lime
Don’t have a watch, can't tell you the time
Iced Coffee with milk, no sugar for me.
Don’t care for sweeteners, prefer caffeine-free
used to drink Yoohoo, but can't seem to hold it
Once owned a Ford Falcon, but somebody stole it

My father is cool, he trims up the hedges
Mom's kind of smooth, but rough 'round the edges
Once found a seashell, put it to my ear
all I heard was a-guzzlin' beer
guzzling beer, not what I expected
had me a Mexican, but soon he defected

Looked for him everywhere,thought he was nappin'
But he'd hit the pavement, hirotchees were slappin'
Somebody told me he's back in Borrero
fryin' up churros in a fancy sombrero
next time i move, gonna keep it professional
hire a crew, and avoid the confessional

Dined on raw fish with a *****, beguiled
'Till he told me he'd die before having my child
Excuse me, I told him, I think you're mistaken
I'd rather have triplets by **** Clay Aiken
Been burned before,but I'm still kind of shocky
Swallowed my pride and swore off the Saki

Low and behold, a dude who says "Schmat-zah"
unorthodox fella, who can't stomach mat-zo
Head full of curls nice Hebrew diction
believes in his heart aliens are nonfiction.
He ain’t into me, prefers to be single
Made sure my milk and his meat didn't mingle

Stopped into Quick-chek to get me a bite
met up with Manny who put up a fight
mountain of misery, terrible liar
asked for a bike and he gave me a tire
Flattened but patched my heart isn't aching
I think it's a sign the thing was worth breaking

The back roads to Red Bank are bumpy and narrow
******* the bones but good for the marrow
I looked at the clouds, shook out the lining
can't see the forest for all of my pining.
Ironic that shells echo the sea
the old man batters 'em mercilessly

Mets beat the Yankees,what can I say?
Wanted for nothing, nothing got in my way
Got up to stretch, fell through the bleacher
and into the arms of a snake oil preacher.
Tinctures and ointments and warming love salve
can't erase hurt and the memories I have

Heard it before, how time is medicinal
But for healing the heart the price is additional
Beat for beat and measure for measure
grapes of gall and fermenting displeasure
tasted enough to know this can't be real
while mashing my heart in the search engine wheel

In taking that road to that carn-evil ground
for one lonely toad on the hairy-go-round,
something was lost in the folly and fun
as I'm counting the cost for all that I've done
I reach for forgiveness and snatched from the ride
am taken to places where nothing can hide

in the light of the One who is no longer mad
better than anything, more fun than sad
eternally loved, as it was from the start
the past is forgiven, all's well with my heart
as for my heroes, and the ***** I've pained
Nothing is lost and everything gained

Ginger ale, coke, lemon and lime
I've got a watch, won't give you the time

Golden shimmers
Bright lights
The finer things in life
Waves crashing
Thoughts mashing
Finding out the unknown
Artist adventures
Musical excavations
Silver stars
Forever scars
Choosing your path
Mistakes made
Forgiving gaze
Monumental discovers
Shooting guns
Bright burning sun
Death of friend
Holding on til the end

As I lay beside my darling
On an early Sunday morn,
I could feel her rounded softness
Sleeping under blankets warm.
My mind caroused the memories
And loitered on it's way
And found itself deliciously,
Immersed in golden play.

I remembered something special
In the way my little boy would look
As his eyes rose up in wonderment
When I read  his favorite book.
And the joy involved in feeding
A hungry little mouth
When the porridge spooned all over
From the eyebrows heading south.

A tantalizing moment
On the beach down by the sea,
In the warm December sunshine
With my happy family.
We were running in the black sand
Drawing circles with a stick
As the surging waves approached them
Laughing little boys were quick.

Laughing, happy moments
And some sad ones like the day
When dear old Meg, our Labrador,
Got sick and passed away.
Young Boaz in his sadness
Climbed the big tree to it's crown
And it took a lot of pleading
To persuade him to come down.

And young Solly played the taniwha
At the Cornwall Park school play
And a better taniwha has yet
To grace the stage today.
A natural in his element
This young comedian
So hilariously funny
As he drew the audience in.

The tender, loving moments
As we both strolled arm in arm
Through the verdant Ferntree Gully
With it's sunlit grace and charm.
And the towering eucalyptus,
Hanging wood smoke in the air
And the whiplash resonation
Of the lyrebird hidden there.

Of Buttercup's wild parties
When fancy dress was king,
When everyone would whoop it up
And laugh and dance and sing.
When mum's and dad's and little kids
All joined the happy throng
With  spud mashing as a ceremony
And a night of fun and song.

Of sitting in the garden
With your feet up and a book
And a cold beer at your elbow
And a barbecue to cook.
With the easy feel of family
As they go about their day
And the joyous sound of summer
When two noisy tui's play.

Memories of yesterday
Moments in the life
Of ecstasy and agony
And wonderment and plight.
And the ordinary ness of everything
And the magic everywhere,
Like the auburn in the sunlight
As it strikes my darling's hair.


Marshalg
Mangere Bridge
10 October 2009

The flood gates open when you smell the familiar scent from your past. Remembering times that were long forgotten in the back of your mind. Every person has that one scent that instantly draws them back to a simpler, happier time. That one scent that brings forth memories that were buried deep within your subconscious, dusts them off, and lays them out in the light.

The smell of your mother’s perfume - brings you back to when she held you.
The smell of play dough - brings you back to that small seat in the classroom mashing colors together.
The smell of your house - where you instantly feel safe and can be yourself.
The smell of cut grass - shows your father pushing the heavy lawn mower as you play outside in a spring evening.
The smell rain - brings you to a moment of renewed energy and excitement for what’s to come.
The smell of smoke - reminds you of late night talks around a bonfire.
The smell of your old boyfriend’s cologne - Hits you when you pull out his sweater and remember the night he gave it to you.
The smell of wood chips - where you spent many days playing and laughing with the friends you haven’t seen for a while now.

It comes when you least expect it. These smells of nostalgia enter through your nose and hit you straight in the heart. And you can’t help the evocative smile that pulls across your face.

"What kind of a person are you," I heard them say to me.
I'm a person with a complex plumbing of the soul,
Sophisticated instruments of feeling and a system
Of controlled memory at the end of the twentieth century,
But with an old body from ancient times
And with a God even older than my body.
I'm a person for the surface of the earth.
Low places, caves and wells
Frighten me. Mountain peaks
And tall buildings scare me.
I'm not like an inserted fork,
Not a cutting knife, not a stuck spoon.

I'm not flat and sly
Like a spatula creeping up from below.
At most I am a heavy and clumsy pestle
Mashing good and bad together
For a little taste
And a little fragrance.

Arrows do not direct me. I conduct
My business carefully and quietly
Like a long will that began to be written
The moment I was born.

s Now I stand at the side of the street
Weary, leaning on a parking meter.
I can stand here for nothing, free.

I'm not a car, I'm a person,
A man-god, a god-man
Whose days are numbered. Hallelujah.

My foggy mouth tries to hide behind rain-smacked glass.
She says goodbye with complacent stares
and with the sudden flash of an umbrella.

The red of her dress doesn't belong in my life.
Each of her strides carry my resentment and weariness,
alongside the melting grey of the Seattle skyline.
So, I don't yell for her or imagine our lives,
as the windshield wipers sweep her image, out of sight, but not out of my head.

I return home, the half I was for decades.
The tread of my shoe mashing bluegrass,
digging up seeds and insect carcass, with every step.
Storm-soaked magazine subscriptions lay on the porch,
and her name is tattooed on every one.

The dog lays on the carpet, ears and eyes perking up at me.
And he knows he's truly alone, because I'll depend on him.

Eggshell kitchen cabinets are jammed with her:
Vermilion, saffron, and burgundy glasses hold
half-empty hangings of golden flat draft,
keeping her day-old, dried saliva smothered on the edges,
like transparent ocean waves dying on a glass coast
and buried in the bottom of the sun-pierced vortex.

What I couldn't realize is that the cup was me:
marked in so many ways,
letting decaying memories burrow and stay.

Here are my eyes
my fried eggs
teal lily-pads floating
on white albumen.

Here are my elbows
like deformed peaches
my knuckles the peas
wrist corn on the cob.

Here are my teeth
my frosty Stonehenge
a ring of slabs
solid halibut.

Here are my ankles
four gobstoppers
cracking as rocks
under her size-five feet.

Here is my nose
fastened to my face
the garbage chute
meets hoover hybrid.

Here are my knees
two wrinkled potatoes
mashing in their sockets
as waves crumble on me.

Here is my hair
my straw candyfloss
unlike her buttered popcorn
curly-wurly waterfall.

Here are my tonsils
squashy strawberries
wedged at the back
of the cave I once made.

Here are my lips
azalea-pink sweets
flecked with salt
from our slice of sea.

I dive in deep.
I expect to plunge into the deep depths of it,
Instead I fall into a shallow cesspool.
It's my own doing.
I am the only one to blame.
You told me to take a leap of faith.
Your faith.
I did this all for you.
I dove into a shallow, shallow pool
So why, tell me love, why do I feel as if dying underwater?
My lungs are mashing together,
And it is too late for me to speak.

If peace were a state we all agree to imagine, a state
we
envision as uni-
versal in any song, peace, calm, flowing deep, state
of being
in any man, wombed or un,
in any family, any tribe, any deme of agreements unbreakable,
any hermit cell

any bubble of believing generating proper people to fit
tradition and mystery myths without

re-tying truth to may, the verb. That's vainity.  
Religion.
(re-ligamentation,
like muscle to bone wit sinyew,
same stuff strangs a bow, for a fiddle ora arrow,
y'know)
that's somethin' else.
Religion could mean read the instructions, too.
All together
----
stopping to live. slowing, not stopping. pre-stop.

whisper,
say, earth,
hey, earth,
can you hear you now?

---
the dictator dictated the dictionary,
he/she/we/me

learned to speak as spoken to, in the boss tongue.
Ma or pa,
or whosover was fustus wit d'mostus
taught the good ol' boys.

But wisdom saw a way. We've been woven in a story.
We are in the code. Ethos, Pathos, Logos.
Those old Greeks examined them some life, I'd say.

Language rules the iron fist's grip,
meaning empowers
laxation, re
loose
gut brain pain fraught fear of the iron fist crimping
the flow of solidity
punch in the gut

Knock thashitoff! Now, flush

in ifity, boo, be bop, I'm an ice cream cone,

like those alien ones, mebbe,
moving stones the weight of 737s,

my cones of power defy your hour of suffering patient
per fection of...

what, wait, allusion to "Let patience have her perfect work"
what is her perfect work?
Quote that San Francisco band. Oh. Did that. Love.

you ask. The reality I see, you say, no, I say, me.

I am patience, the feminine form, 's perfect work.
Patients must put up with me,
you see

----
fear is terror's weapon, am i right?

And it is written, the fear of the LORD (KJV)
yhwh, in the unsayable way, God's name, only name, eh

is why that started?
Old Job let out a yelp, hey, earth is great, but you have no idea
how this feels.
You know lots of stuff I don't know, but mortality is not one of em,
as far as I can tell.
How 'bout a referee betixt us?

Hey, sus, pect me a spectacle

of the great contro
verse un ifiable, unif, once possible now, nullift.

got it.
Every other direction known. Take a fearless, peaceful-
feeling
path past all that.
Peace, be unto  you, earth. For my part.
The examined life is worth the living. You are in this one with me,
a very important part, an object, an aim to see what

could be there, a like mind, washed ashore.
----

A.P.I. Art Pax Intel

act as if they are listening with interest, paying
actual
attention, add pieces
of life stuff

I am 71, my window is my horizon, or
better said,
my horizon is my window. I have mini-horizons,
i think
like this... chromebook attached at finger tips,
I can and may be making some counter wave that clears
the crypto frost from my window to your
realm.

Who took your may? Do you recall the day?

It was a teacher who took my may,
but I won my can, That's a plotted point, I
ponder on my porch
partaking in curds of ways to do so saline a work

Fantasy education system U of old dudes like me,
tired old dudes who have no desire to argue,

but, really, don't tread on me.

the old greeks were at rest, the slaves were under control
but we old American men in twenty nineteen
we have A.I. and pensions enough,
my examination can go far deeper than Aristotle's.

Part taker, trope positions, anonymous wisemen's roles in
this generational take on
we, the people, by realization, not revelation
of the
traditional worth of wisdom found under hoary
or shiny-fringed heads and grey beards and
amplified through ear hair
like antennae.

Admiring and worth. Hmmm.
Mira, look upon the ozimandian heir and
wonder, why am I a part of this, an eight billionth of this

interesting time of changed time,
time duration,
it is known relative now,
a precocious child of twelve can explain the paradox.
But time travel, imagine...
The ships,
The captains venturing where... slaves and would-be thieves
would, or could be made to, row or man the ropes,
whether any sweating soul endured to the end,
or not,
Who cares-- we recall only the history of kings.

Aha, there were teachers paid to teach
Admire-alty of the strong who keep us free within our walls.
That was the meme, be like
obediant to
the man on the horse.

Extreme Narcissist rises as the needed leader, least meek
of men morphs materially into the Nuclear God?
the opposite of peacemaker becomes hero?

Endure. In your patience, you possess...

Here's the deal. Life ain't fair. No war ever worked to settle
the mixup over the actual reason
for con fusion. Fusion sticks stuff together that has a pro

pensity to repel.
En-trope, we wrestle that, we fight it with
weapons un-carnal on any fractal level where matter matters.

Settle down, we say, by being at rest, fretless.
Let my peace, you say, come in me,

now, in your bubble of peace,
where no damnation can exist, begin
to grow, feed on knowledge proven no lie.
Start with one, unproven
reason you have for laying down or taking lifetime from anyone,
or for anyone.

Plus and minus, up and down. Mere words.
Confusion is mashing things together to make stuff

like earth. You look close, **** augmented us,
we inherited the only biosphere in the known universe,

and some ******* hell's angel wannabe...

Nope. Fractally can't happen, time being duration, not
an arrow on a gravity bound arc.
From "it is finished' going viral,
Nailed it,
no contest.
Yep, peace makers won. Deck was stacked.
The idea of the act of
Nuclear war launched the tyranny of phobias,
including an old idol word bound fear.
Logophobia
fear of God idea is the beginning of wisdom. think this, what if

wisdom began in you when you imagined the evil
men have realized from their shared imagings,
Logos imagined it first. What if that?

for lack of vision,
my people perish. AH, fractal up
about a thousand Mandelbrot tics, okeh.

Did we come away with treasure, or are we lost in the war game?

---
how many is enough to make the effort,

ef fective effort to learn.... check. didit, still am. one's enough.

ef fective effort to use the learning right ... check, workin' on it.

Whee gotta cut some traditional slack to the clowns
who keep the poor man happy for the hell of it,

y'know, life's hard at the bottom.

but it ain't
no fun.
And happy minds bounce. No lie. Bi-polar on demand, kinda.

K'mon down. The price is right. Got moonshine in the evenin',
after-the-cool-of-the-day, unquiet late spring night,
Stars aplenty,

laid back, leanin' on the tree of all I can ever know or
ever know
already. Ever knowing, you know. Feels good. Starry night,

in focus, with our shared augmented eyes beyond

the base-bubble of life, where I fit.

---- bored old man? is that pathetic, or what?---
Is this a good that you can do, asked, but I allowed no quest to form.

The point of any story in my mandlebrot set of stories never imagined,
is why I make the daily efforts, find the point, mark it a peaceful
place at the end of a hard row to ***.

Making the point in ever, where you notice your role,
this is the peacmaker's privilege, for the prize of playing your role,
the rest that remains, is mine to use right, examing life
amidst confusion you may have stirred up on your own way here.

we plant the seeds of our own destruction
"everything in moderation."

here I am in backlash station,
braiding my hair
with poison in my lungs,
on my breath,
in my stare.

my silver tongue has an alchemists tooth
a lung for a lung and the whole world's done
anti-smoke anti-drink anti-fry
diet coked, diet thinking, diet guy
yes, he's gonna die

bleeding through his finger tips
we touch lips, hips? say goodbye,
maybe take him home next time.
he's got me in a bind
stuck in his rhyme
he peeled me from the core
though I had a rind
but the fruit which I drink
is GMO such as he,
the fluoride in my sink.

a love poem made me think
a tag is such a drag
because a label isn't me,
a price could be
innocence
mystery
a held too close and you're history

he sent to me
late night called to see
if the aches from which I break have calmed down to be
more of a lesson than a test,
more of a sleep than a restlessness.

there's no one who should have to witness this...

"I'll be okay."
maybe I'll say it again...
"I'll be okay."

For once and forward because I want to,
a lot of people said I didn't have a choice but to
and I don't want to hurt any of you,
with the insanity of keeping things in
with the feelings that I simply suppressed
thought he made me happy and undressed
foolishly traded my tears for alcohol
sweet words for smoke, true love for a joke.

I've lost all I could lose
let him take all that I thought could be took,
and now I finally see what was to be had all along,
what was there all along...

you all were right and I was wrong.

I ran away, that's not okay,
but I'm back and here today.
I love you all, I love you most,
I wont push you away, so hold me close.

I'm breaking and aching, I'm shedding out tears,
I'm sorry for masking and mashing my fears.

I know I don't know and I wish to learn quick,
there's not that much time and there's no love in a ****,
excuse my bad language for I do not speak  French...

I'll stop with the jokes and go for what's true,
there's no more emptiness in the words "I love you".

Forcing an alignment of corporate resources
for some theory of best fit correlation
doesn't work on Kingdom People
when using an unspoken method of tabulation.

If Life is about true spiritual growth,
then why do ministries attempt to pigeon-hole
not making any allowances for us
to develop, expand and break our current mold?

Despite multitudes of outcome possibilities
the Church seems to suffer bouts of paralysis
from the continued mashing of talents and gifts
resulting from unexplained Presbyterian analysis.

There are many ministry leaders who speak of vision -
Their tone indicates that the laity is completely blind and numb;
their message is clear - the Body is not interested
to reach the Earth before Kingdom Come.

We are souls with great, untapped potential
and not just elements of an array.
Despite our abilities and life experiences,
our dreams and desires we're not allowed to convey.

For a failure of Church motivational tricks
comes from cramming God's People into a human matrix.



Author Notes:

From the book: Reaching Towards His Unbounded Glory
The ISBN is: 1-4196-5051-3

Learn more about me and my poetry at:
http://amzn.to/1ffo9YZ

By Joseph J. Breunig 3rd, © 2006, All rights reserved.

I.

Blurry green and brown shapes rush past me
at the speed of light, i spin around and around.
Trees, people and playground equipment blend together
in a whirlwind, i am spinning around so fast
i think i might die.
My small hands grip the edges of the black rubber tire.
i squeeze my eyes shut,
thinking that might make the dizziness stop
but it only makes it worse. Pain enters
my fingertips - my arms are ripping apart.
Still, i hold on. i’m afraid
that if i let go my head will hit the ground and my neck will snap.
i hear my brother’s laughter swirling around my head.
i want to beg him to stop the spinning
but i know that crying and pleading only makes this game last longer.
When i asked him to play this wasn’t what i had in mind.
So i wait quietly.
This will all be over soon.

II.

Darkness is all around me.
The one tiny hole near the lid of the toy box allows
only a sliver of light into my little wooden prison.
i run my fingers along the dark walls
beside me and all around me, feeling
the grains of the unfinished wood.
My finger catches a sliver and it stings
but i don’t cry because
crying only makes this game last longer.
The old toy box groans under the weight of my brother’s body.
i can hear his fingers mashing the Nintendo controller
and his feet kicking against the outside of the box.
When i asked him to play, this wasn’t what i had in mind.
If i wait quietly, he will eventually get bored
and this will all be over soon.

III.

The grass is wet and yucky underneath
my body, cold and slimy.
Rows of houses watch in judgement
against black suburban sky,
their inhabitants fast asleep and safe in their beds
while i lie here with this strange man’s ***** hands around my neck.
How did i get here? A few too many rounds
of *****-fueled drinking games,
each sip burning up a piece of my awareness
until all i can comprehend is his heavy body
on top of me, his cold, unfamiliar eyes.
When i asked him to play, this wasn’t what i had in mind.
Each time my ragdoll head smacks the ground,
the sickening sound bounces between my eardrums.
He could easily ragdoll me to death.
i pray someone will step outside and end this game,
but screaming will only make him panic,
and wild animals can be unpredictable when cornered.
So i wait quietly and hope
this will all be over soon.

F&cking;**
is what I did before you came along
15 minute sessions
between classes
in a ***** dorm room--
hands clawing
lips mashing
hips crushing--
they filled me up
and then left me feeling empty
broken

but you came and picked the pieces up
stitching me back together with your kisses
you showed me you loved me
in the most intimate of ways
hands holding
lips searching
hips grinding
heating your home in the dead of winter
with the steam off our own bodies.

Red – the colors match underneath
the mashing of trashed feet. A bittersweet
scent swishes around our soft palates
until intoxication renders us useless.

The artificial artisan could’ve gone lighter,
but she knew it wouldn’t have been as
beautiful. I gasp and gaze, looking for the
fake signs that she had felt the same.

I’m uncomfortable with a crowded room
partly because there’re so many personalities mashing into one
and too many conversations being held out of spite
i’m restless to the idea of meaningful small talk
because I truly do not believe in it’s existence
no one is happy to be here
and we’re all drowning our sadness
in different ways that no one would ever know
we're forcing ourselves to become one
and I will never understand

You stupid, amazing *****.
Your Mad heart vilifies Deceit,
Mashing Xanax and ******,
Benzos for the price of flight.

Yet there you stand
Idyllic and idolised,
The chemicals and pheromones
clash and dance magnificently.
The Moshpit of Deceit
Is your tragic sanctuary.

It was clear to me then, but it escapes me now. Infinity was condensed to a single moment, I don't know how I knew that, but I did.
I saw standing before me, a tomato, a swine and a human. They stood side by side. Their physical bodies were dissimilar, but their souls were all the same.

By cutting the tomato you cut yourself, and by killing the swine you **** yourself. They all may not look the same, but what they feel is the same. You are the tomato, you are the swine, and they are you too.

To you this is ******, but to me this is life.
Life has got to eat life, It is how we survive.
Life has got to eat life, It is how we stay alive.

Life to you rings a different tone. You claim that life is more than food, that to feed is to ******, but no one says a snake is a murderer when it kills a mouse.
You say no one needs to die in order for others to live. But death comes one way or another.

You say:
"Stop mashing that potato,
Stop cutting that tomoto,
Stop pealing those carrots,
Stop grating those onions.
Just because you can't hear them, does not mean they don't scream;
And just because they aren't people, doesn't mean they can't feel."

How you see the world is the only way to see it? But I saw infinity in the fraction of a second, yet it was an eternity. I saw that what we see, is what we want to see. And that what really is, is what we make it out to be.



I was laying in the dirt, then the dirt became me. I then fed a flower, then I became the flower. A doe ate the flower, then I became the doe. A wolf consumed the doe, then I became the wolf. A man skinned the wolf, then I became the man. The man lay in the dirt, then I became the dirt again.

Life bleeds into new life, It is how we stay alive.
Life bleeds into new life, It is how we survive.

I've got the world's best kept secret
locked in 2 AM screenshots--
her late night musings over a crusty joint, a crushed pill,
or some ***** cigarettes.

She sends me her thoughts,
fears,
anxieties,
insecurities--

at her most vulnerable,
absolutely the most beautiful.

Her anguish stressed in the digital scroll
(though she doesn't like Kerouac, I let her borrow my copy),
her stained fingers mashing all their hurt and nicotine
into the keyboard--

and her pen aches and her paper stains
with the unrequited love she empathizes with
in the somber pop punk songs that explode from the stereo
she sings loudly on cold and lonely night drives
(I shiver in her passenger seat).

And she made for me the greatest of mixtapes,
her holy scrawl expounding upon a dull grey donut-shaped
slowly fading form of intimacy,
a blank CD--

"This mix is a good time"

and when I jammed it into my car stereo I was illuminated.

She is so cool, she is so punk,
and in her clandestine drugstore car charger thefts,
broken poems,
impalpable aesthetic,
impeccable music taste,
illuminated or even further obfuscated drug trips--

I have the world's best kept secret,
and more than anything, I wish to share it with you--

                                     so she can make someone another mixtape.

This is going to start out as a story about
Not knowing if you are fully alive and awake or
Still lying in bed, dead asleep.

But, we'll see where that takes us...

Opening scene

It's 2:54am.
He wakes up in a fury
He's covered in sweat
and for some reason he's crying.
But the room is so dark that
He doesn't quite know where he is.
I fall to the floor and scramble around for
The little light under the door but it's not there
and he panics, he screams out but there is no sound.
Just then the floor drops down and he is standing backwards
In the kitchen by the sink and the carpets stink like
Burnt hair and then he feels the heat
Of the devil's spawn or the devils *****
One of them and then one more
They lick up his spine and burn places
That he has hurt before
I turn around sharply
To find the clock
and the time that read
Could not really be real
It was 3:33am
Am I losing my mind?
What is this Hell?

Then the walls fell
and I lost everything again.

                        *Blood
                       ­          guts
                   - Strange *** -

They need it.
I need

Outside

               11:34am.
The man walks out of his house
The two steps are now three
The back porch is on the front porch
There is daylight and
The trees aren't there
The sky is green and
The grass is red
I've always hated christmas.

Then suddenly,
The swans appear
Black and white
They begin to pick the flesh
From his muscles
and the trees sprout out
and they are crying now
and the clouds are melting down
Onto the ozone layer
How sad this life is.

The man is still awake and in no pain
Just confused on why time slipped by
And brought these bats in the day instead of night
He closes his eyes. . .
But only for a second just to take it in and when
He opens them it was nighttime again and
He is alone in his front yard
He looks above him. . .

The stars are more beautiful than they have ever been
He drinks down the cool water of the universe
and goes back inside to lay down
It's 4:05am.

This time he lays on the couch
in the living room. . . there is
  Something right about this
          For now at least.
         He closes his eyes
   There arises a strange smile
His back begins to peel again like
Those ******* ****** are back and
  There were strange operations
   and monsters moving around
     So violently screaming and
       Slashing and ripping out
                 The better half of
          The man's sanity
            and I can't see. . .

Anything but this madness and
I don't know what time it is because
   He can't move
                             His eyes burst open
Like water from a fall
       and he lies there in such terror as he
Watches the hall scream down farther
and farther away from him so far
away that he thought briefly of his father
                                                and his mother
                                                and his sister
                                                and his lover
I wanted them near me
More than ever. . .

I then became weightless
He knew he couldn't fight it
You will never win this
I know, I will never find him
You won't make it out alive
Well we'll just have to see in due time. . .

The demons then became anxious by this
and from it they began their most
Ultimate Unholy Vengeance

So the man lied there still
and let them **** him
Until the blood in his heart
Became too fierce to stop
and too hot to boil
So the man lashed out
With a blue vein in hand
To end this horrible mashing
Of the minds and
To note the time
It was 11:34am.

What a strange hour to stand.

Will (t)his torment ever end?
Does this man even live?
and then. . .
                     I woke up
           I opened my eyes for real!
and there was my father standing before me
                Gun in hand

"Let's go!" He said. . . "We can make it out of this."

            *******.
    The woods were thick
But the dive was nice
We drove around and talked about old ****
           Good times.

**** what they told me!

I'm gonna make it out of this alright.

And then. . .
                                                               ­                     I
                                          ­                         woke up/fell asleep.

Bitter apathy,
Blinding interest,
Blocking Passion,
Binding my hands together,
Bending my thoughts,
Bifurcating my efforts into weaker strings of yarn,
Seeking to cut them one by one,
Apathy in it's own right is more driven then passion,
Driving to end interest,
To war with passion,
To blatantly blend my mind into a pulp,
Mashing it,
Tenderizing it,
Relaxing it...
The Apathetic Man lies needless,
Controlled,
Happy and content with the boredom,
And as he prepares to rest,
One final time,
He closes his eyes,
And just at that moment he notices a flash of light,
A small explosion of thought in the distance,
A fracture in the ground,
He feels a second of interest,
Leaping out of bed,
Snuffing the quivering candle as he flees his home,
Frantically huffing and puffing,
Sprinting with all his energy towards the interest,
Hoping in his mind that apathy will not get there first,
But he has the element of surprise,
Apathy had not anticipated this...
A sudden instantaneous development of a true and powerful passion,
Deep inside him...
Still sprinting he sees another flash,
In another corner of the sky,
Red and Black this time,
Apathy is trying to trick him,
But he will not be swayed,
He is unstoppable now,
A seed of life on a dead world,
Growing,
Spreading,
Again another light flashes,
Apathy is begging him now,
Offering him protection from fear,
But he is not afraid,
He will make it.

well hey, they decided you had to be puritan shunning your eyes at the word ****... but said you were to be crucified twice-over to see ******* and **** and other morbid clown balloon images that deviated from censoring ****-all / nothing and ensuring you were comfortable with dyslexia of pulverising images that could only be reduced to a close-resemblance of words (onomatopoeias) - ol' McDonald 'ad a farm...**

god save the queen,
god save our...
come on! come on! come on! come on!
do you wanna be in
             my gang my gang my gang?!
do you wanna be in
             my gang my gang my gang (my *******)?!
(garry gloater, uhu uh hum aha um - elvis proved
the english stiff upper lip could be cured - sore
the lippy wrinkle of disapproval insinuated, soar
like an angler's catch of the fisherman's hook!
but the stiff pelvis couldn't - exporting
a redcoat to america is like importing a ku klux hood
to england, ha ha.)
leisurely in Majorca binge drinking
in Bristol is a N.H.S. concern,
Madonna faked the *****,
the ***** faked the Madonna
because of the seasonal olive skinned trysts...
drunks' trolley banks and cabbage heads
of mashing up hairstyles at a metal rock gig...
it was once 80s Nevada deep freeze,
now it's airy new york Warhol cool...
shinobi said: dragon's ***** gave birth to
fast blinking ninjas...
all the world's a stage... but no man
should turn into the world just because
he was given a stage... tabloid literature
faked shakespeare plagiarism of death too frequently....
Anthem Britannia - sail the seas of ****** milkiness
gluten free passive vitamin C, D & A recipients
in the multi-pill... of all the former empires
i got the ****-hole... learn the basics...
the perverts are out there, ready to scream the words:
***** REEL! and get their nuts jotted down
in a blender of teenage emotion...
we're talking the new age futurism off futurism,
since the date prescribed by Fukuyama,
beginning / ending when people stopped the 100
cyclone and entered the lasting 2nd half of the 20th century
as a bleach for the 1st part of the 20th century,
meaning they had to grapple with writing history
and stop looking at art as "post-modern",
well basically modern post-mortem
of the millions dead... the art they make these
days is just gagging for a shooting-spree.

Ginger ale, coke, lemon and lime
Don’t have a watch, can't tell you the time
Iced Coffee with milk, no sugar for me.
Don’t care for sweeteners, prefer caffeine-free
used to drink Yoohoo, but can't seem to hold it
Once owned a Ford Falcon, but somebody stole it

My father is cool, he trims up the hedges
Mom's kind of smooth, but rough 'round the edges
Once found a seashell, put it to my ear
all I heard was a-guzzlin' beer
guzzling beer, not what I expected
had me a Mexican, but soon he defected

Looked for him everywhere,thought he was nappin'
But he'd hit the pavement, hirotchees were slappin'
Somebody told me he's back in Borrero
fryin' up churros in a fancy sombrero
next time i move, gonna keep it professional
hire a crew, and avoid the confessional

Dined on raw fish with a *****, beguiled
'Till he told me he'd die before having my child
Excuse me, I told him, I think you're mistaken
I'd rather have triplets by **** Clay Aiken
Been burned before,but I'm still kind of shocky
Swallowed my pride and swore off the Saki

Low and behold, a dude who says "Schmat-zah"
unorthodox fella, who can't stomach mat-zo
Head full of curls nice Hebrew diction
believes in his heart aliens are nonfiction.
He ain’t into me, prefers to be single
Made sure my milk and his meat didn't mingle

Stopped into Quick-chek to get me a bite
met up with Manny who put up a fight
mountain of misery, terrible liar
asked for a bike and he gave me a tire
Flattened but patched my heart isn't aching
I think it's a sign the thing was worth breaking

The back roads to Red Bank are bumpy and narrow
******* the bones but good for the marrow
I looked at the clouds, shook out the lining
can't see the forest for all of my pining.
Ironic that shells echo the sea
the old man batters 'em mercilessly

Mets beat the Yankees,what can I say?
Wanted for nothing, nothing got in my way
Got up to stretch, fell through the bleacher
and into the arms of a snake oil preacher.
Tinctures and ointments and warming love salve
can't erase hurt and the memories I have

Heard it before, how time is medicinal
But for healing the heart the price is additional
Beat for beat and measure for measure
grapes of gall and fermenting displeasure
tasted enough to know this can't be real
while mashing my heart in the search engine wheel

In taking that road to that carn-evil ground
for one lonely toad on the hairy-go-round,
something was lost in the folly and fun
as I'm counting the cost for all that I've done
I reach for forgiveness and snatched from the ride
am taken to places where nothing can hide

in the light of the One who is no longer mad
better than anything, more fun than sad
eternally loved, as it was from the start
the past is forgiven, all's well with my heart
as for my heroes, and the ***** I've pained
Nothing is lost and everything gained

Ginger ale, coke, lemon and lime
I've gotta watch now and won't give you the time.

“Well if the shoe fits.”

And it never does,
either too tight or too loose,
with my paint-thinner feet,
narrow, knifing through the canvas
heels flopping out at the back
toes mashing together at the front,

pacing between shelves at the store,
growing anxious mom impatient
in the waiting chair,

shifting between sizes,
walking prison-style with shoes zip-tied,
a second, third opinion,
salesclerk gets out the foot measure,
I take my socks off,
put them back on (are they too thick/too thin?)

feet either mashed or cavernous
if the salesclerk crouches down and presses a thumb at the end
and gives me an okay sign
I’ll walk around with ****** toes and bruised heels the rest of my life

because only others can convince me what my body truly feels
because mental illness is impalpable and therefore
unbelievable
and broken bones and black eyes
will perpetually surpass what lingers in my troubled mind
for I know not what the body wants (it’s ***, I think)

no,
I don’t know how it’s supposed to act,
or feel,
so I can let someone else decide for me,
as I let mom order my Happy Meals,
and buy my clothes she picked out,
and tell me what kind of girls I like,
and make my doctors’ appointments,
and file my taxes,
and pay my bills
(I just give her the money),

and I am convinced my body and mind
do not exist on the same plane,
and whatever signals they send each other
I render skewed
and the messenger disabled

and tonight I told mom
the shoes I’ve worn for five days straight
don’t fit
and my feet hurt
and she sighs and laughs simultaneously alongside the family
as she hands me the number to the store

and I halfheartedly wish
she’d make the call
or lean down and press a thumb
to the end of my shoe
and convince me it fits.

--Home, August 19, 1:41 AM

Hello Pigment.
I missed your squish-
your fingers staining my favorite picture books.

I need your oily claws
your head-mashing whiff
the way you smile with toothy indifference

you climb over
all walls I orchestrate
and sit turgid
with bright Grandiose on my blanched skin.

my life is your palette,
you have moved in like a sloppy roommate
and your haphazard possessions drape the cabinets,
the chair,
the sink.
I love it.

you inhabit every vacancy
-a bulky mass of
magical “art”
and
no matter how much I mix your
complementary colors,
you appear
ever so bright.  

please… don’t leave me open canvased.  
splotch to me left and right
taint any negative space
barge in without
pusillanimous footsteps.
whip your camel hair bristles
all over my pages.
color me, pigment!
                  
             Splatter, Paint.

One by one they stagger in

And one by one
They are stabbed again

And there is not a single thing
That you or I can do for them

As they are they
And we are we

And we
We are Americans

All us worldly citizens

And we
We will do it all again

But

Bigger better
Smarter harder

Bigger bombs
Bigger bonds
Better arms
And better cons

Smarter teams
Smarter dreams
Harder fiends
With harder clings

To speculative seams

Sinking into the dreams
Meaninglessness

Free will
A cress

Made in the finesse of last laughs

Trapped in a maze
Amazed in lapsed..

Pain
The same as sympathy

Empathy fills me
But not you

Who the **** are you
Feel me feeling you

I am the impossible
Possibly hostile

Martyr to a better place
From carvers of the human face

Disgraced

Plucked and pruned
Fallen from space
****** imprudent
Shielded in hate

Grace is made this way

I can
I will
I am

And we can
All relate

From sculpted slates
We can blame the genetic traits

I stand
I ****
I am

Still me

But a who the **** are you
Is still a who the **** am I

And I am merely me
Marrying myself to the breeze

Flowing dis-compassionately

The woe only in I
Same goes for you

What’s mine is yours
And what’s yours
Is mine too

And you
You are
So ******* beautiful
To me

For me..

Waiting patiently
For us to meet

As this
This ******* dream

Is disintegrating

In graying hair
And brittled teeth

Right before me

Between my fingers
Secreting my completeness

The sheen that lingers
Of what may beat this

You are Less and less
Amiss and drifting through an abyss
Of timelessness
Or *******

Lighting the nothingness
With the something’s we have lit

Crumpling the summoning
Under running concepts

I flip it
Loop it
Re-repeat it
Speak it
And there it is

Until it's all there is

To be convinced
Of it ever being

It is what it is
It is what you make of it

But it
It is non-existent
Despite the coherence
Of the zing

It's still *******

However you paint it
Manipulative and complacent

I still sing

And once you get it
The pit still sits

Right where you left it
And you still aint ****

Merely being

We Just ride it
Until the end

Slowly declining in its decent
Commending the contempt
And spending our worth

To vent and purge
The splurging words
While observing the swerves
Of our naked nerves
In the sunlight

I writhe in light
Like in the warm shower insights
To my life
Lost when I dry

I'll be alright
When our eyes
Lock on the same night
On the same starry skies
Hypnotizing our lies
Into drive
As we drive
Off the same cliff

It's candle lit
Convalescence
To our testaments
To love and hate the love
In the wretched lessons
Lessened by the blessings
From the others projecting
Our chances of living
On our setting sons

Till the dawn of war drums
Strum with our fathers guns
On the gumption
Of the stun
As it fades away
As the faces deteriorate
From pictures framed of mind

Despite the rewinding
To the reeling back
Of everything that happened
In the snap back

Unto impact
It is the rubber band that snapped

That held it all together

Facts are still facts
Or perhaps
A map
To what happened
And trapped it
To one singular act
Of submission

The intuition
A mere vision
Made to action
Seeing is believing

The deceiving traction

Mashing the imagination
In its station for supremacy

Satisfaction

A ration
Of the disbelief
Molding into my souly retreat
Where I shall lovingly
Accept defeat
And fall upon my knees
Unto your love for me

Seeing you reflecting
Your similar beliefs

Once unbeknownst in the grief

Simply beautiful

I see us disappearing in the seas
In pulling tides
And swirling cities

Where we complete
Upon meeting
As we sink

Kids
are mashing their heads
into walls
having a mid-life crisis
at 18.

I was teetering on the precipice
of something.
edging towards the glimmer.
mashing tongues,
you tore me limb from limb.
I'm glazed with sweat.
you baste me in honeydew.

in the bedroom we speak in vowels:
oooOOHHhhooo
uUUHhh.
AAAAaaahhh
The sounds of death,
Long awaited for.
I died like this every night and loved every minute of it, bruised down to my bones.
i i i, want moremoremore.
Give my teeth a whitening.

You are the eye of the storm
the first leg into a pair of pants
the bone with the best sense of humor.

you left me high,
but not dry.

accept this broken french as a gesture of my affinity:
je taime
tu me manques
je tadore mon lapin
bisou bisou