"misfiring" poems
This trail leads to the animal crossing
It fails to accommodate intrepid adventurers,
Bushy tailed explorers, mountain climbers,
Talkers to squirrels and chewers of pine pitch.
The divine medicine denies us the headspace to believe we're really dead,
The reclined estrogen felt good against twenty million years of insecurity
Golden-layered, factually flawed
It lay exposed for decades
Rusting innards and misfiring sparks
None of the heavy equipment does what it says
Robot arms move with intensity
No programmer yet programs tenderness
The limiting factor has always attracted the acting crowd
Always desperate for theatrical work they magically appear
When it's clear that they're needed
But heed the warnings, they're known to be cheaters; the people who say so could also be wife-beaters
No need to wait for a stereotype
Follow the one you haven't lost touch with
May 9, 2013
May 9, 2013 at 4:47 PM UTC
I’ve tried really, really hard
to not look like I’m trying-
See? I am Super Girlie-Girl
for one night only.
Every detail attended to.
I’m even wearing kitten heels
for ***** sake.
(quite literally, I think)
I’ve gone for pretty…
(or as close as age allows)
... not at all scary.
I’ve no idea what we’ll talk about but,
so far, I’ve managed to say hi
and not stare at his hands.
Still thinking ‘bout them though.
I’ve seen him play guitar-
‘nough said.
He’s grinning and I wonder,
briefly-
If I might’ve let slip as words
some of these thoughts but,
since no one near by is rolling round on the floor
******* themselves laughing-
I think I’m safe.
He’s just given me the most beautiful flowers.
The deepest red roses, all half-opened velvety buds
and frothy white gypsophila.
(it’s one of those bouquets)
Closer,
almost burying my face in the petals-
they smell delicious.
That's done it.
Even without a context- that word turns me on
but now?
My brain is seriously misfiring.
Pinging thoughts and words and images around
like a demonic pinball machine.
Oh Dear God-
I hope he’s not a mind reader.
How long, do you think- can I stay
hidden here in these (delicious) flowers?
How long before I need to try one?
Before the urge to lick and taste and bite-
overcomes me?
That just wouldn’t be cool, would it?
Not on a first date.
Oct 6, 2011
Oct 6, 2011 at 3:15 PM UTC
Mental disability what an epigram, it bounds on burried complexity
Titter inside hysterical effectuation
Feeling electrical currents misfiring in my cerebellum
Screaming unremebered prayers in my night terrors at the devils fornication
Remaining in my presence, anticipating my sleep
***** to reverse the dementia
Waking day dreams, lost in unreality
Descry vociferation calling my name
Wanting to claw my etes out against nebulous shadows creeping behind
Wanting a medium to banih apparitions from my space
Paranoid of all establishment
While securing eye contact with others, they could decipher all my thoughts
With binoculars neighbors surveil
Me camouflaged with drawn shades and pale skin
To go outside summoned all my demons
Wanting to battle, rage war to fulfill some morbid desire
Annihilating hordes in my dreams by any means
***** to reverse the madness
OCD for a little control
A million times repeated thoughts flashing in my eyes
Confusion! What day is it? Am I doing something wrong?
Not glancing in mirrors hiding from myself Garbled guttural utterances in my left ear
Hot breath on my neck
Bawling at flexibility and spontaneity
Not in my scheme for the coming confusing hours
Wanting to pull my skull off exposing the insanity
Just wanted it to STOP!!
***** to reverse the derangement
Limbs not answering brain waves crisscrossed as they dwell
On a daily basis surviving hell
On a nightly basis in true hell
Needing to shriek and explode
Afraid to sleep, walking in exhausted dreams
Broken pains in my bones
No peace day or night
My medication saved my life
Aug 26, 2013
Aug 26, 2013 at 11:48 AM UTC
How about that gasoline
in Autumn rain puddles?
How about them cars that don't start,
can't start.
I just wanted to start.
Playing games like this never amused me much;
I guess I'm more of a reader than a writer than a toy-game-player.
I want the facts.
None of this horseshit media circus,
ignorance is neither knowing nor caring.
Nay bliss,
It was bliss on those cold winter nights,
night twilights pressed hard against the city-smogged sky
where the gases of sugar beets and petroleum reflect back down orange.
Orange on the snow and orange on snow drifts and snow flakes on your eyelashes.
Little orange dusts
**** your lashes grow long)*
dusts fallen halfheartedly like rain in the fall
and rain puddles shone red
and blue
and green
and orange, orange, orange...
Always orange.
Like gasoline in rain puddles,
gasoline in cars that won't start.
They can't start, don't start;
My engine must be misfiring.
(How about them metaphors for a heart?)
Will you call me when you get there?
Sep 5, 2013
Sep 5, 2013 at 3:43 PM UTC
Die at the mouth,
live at the eyes...
nominal head
downed.
Action Painted
by misfiring
nerves...whose
spasmodic dance
choreographs
days...on...end.
Oct 14, 2012
Oct 14, 2012 at 11:28 PM UTC
Hope serves the watchful eyes of the tireless observer.
Freight trains of predacious signals burn through the Western hemisphere, misfiring the neurons of walking creativity. Authenticity belongs in the unknown showers of passion. Growing out in billows of lover’s hair. Lost in translation, victories will be claimed in earnest. To failures be honest exploration.
Ignorance will not bind the bees of new springs or the birds of southern departure. I contend for further marching. Bring about the movement. Action stems from desire. To knowledge I lend my contribution, through passion we make this in-land testimony. Behold the passing of butterflies. Many ponder these chances of fate. Decisive will the what-if tragedies be if one could see the reversal of choice, but rain still falls. Events unfold with the consequences of existence.
Knowing the truthful selves of East and West comes at the even pace of diversity. Personality differs as peaceful individuals of preferable serenity work inwardly as the proclamations of the lively bodies of social intrigue light their torches. Jugs of withered grape inebriate the tongues of their mood. Unifying the tangible honesty of exuberated calm. Flows, flowing in rhymes of poetry.
Sep 18, 2012
Sep 18, 2012 at 1:17 AM UTC
Smelling sharp,
Line up in the graveyard.
Throw in your bones.
The pious are the sactified.
Hold the bottle,
Intermittent puddles.
Full of people.
Breathing and suffocating.
Unconvinced thoughts,
Continually misfiring.
That poisonous smell,
That soft ticking.
Pulling me closer,
To the end of the world.
Burn the spires,
Complicated regressions.
Dead mind,
Straight to stone,
Close the door on,
The shadows on the ceiling
Apr 4, 2013
Apr 4, 2013 at 10:36 AM UTC
Hope serves the watchful eyes of the tireless observer.
Freight trains of predacious signals burn through the Western hemisphere, misfiring the neurons of walking creativity. Authenticity belongs in the unknown showers of passion. Growing out in billows of lover’s hair. Lost in translation, victories will be claimed in earnest. To failures be honest exploration.
Ignorance will not bind the bees of new springs or the birds of southern departure. I contend for further marching. Bring about the movement. Action stems from desire. To knowledge I lend my contribution, through passion we make this in-land testimony. Behold the passing of butterflies. Many ponder these chances of fate. Decisive will the what-if tragedies be if one could see the reversal of choice, but rain still falls. Events unfold with the consequences of existence.
Knowing the truthful selves of East and West comes at the even pace of diversity. Personality differs as peaceful individuals of preferable serenity work inwardly as the proclamations of the lively bodies of social intrigue light their torches. Jugs of withered grape inebriate the tongues of their mood. Unifying the tangible honesty of exuberated calm. Flows, flowing in rhymes of poetry.
Sep 18, 2012
Sep 18, 2012 at 1:17 AM UTC
it’s the twelfth of can’t-remember
as i find myself marveling at the soft cadence of your affection
fluttering against my cheek in faint echoes of conjured memories,
and crafted illusions which bind me in turn,
to the hollow chambers of misfiring synapses
and daisy-chained coaxials tethering my lips
to this anvil-shaped heart.
the steam rises in wispy forms
from places where all is void
and memories are married with dreams
becoming those smiling faces
left in the picture frame i brought home from the store,
smudged by the cellophane,
and now conceived whole by the very absence
of a loving progeny to call my own -
pieces of me left to bloom amidst the shadows
exalting themselves sub rosa within the absence of light.
it is a moment to taste the waters
and wade out until my bristly chin
is beguiled by the ripples born
of *ulacia's stone finally reaching the bottom,
and cry out little pieces of nothingness
to bounce off of the shoreline,
if only to sate the grumbling deception
that my tears could float here without end or amen,
isolated within these painful shapes of you
to clot the cursive wounds
all the while imploring of elysium
that one day i shall awaken to a strange smell
and realize . . . that i am burning.
Jul 15, 2013
Jul 15, 2013 at 11:12 PM UTC
Tired
Brain spits words in fits and starts
The internal running commentary misfiring badly
Ideas stuck in bottlenecks
Traffic backed up and down the on-ramps
Leading off the congested thoughtways
Tired
Stormwater overflow pours out of blocked drains
Sidling up the gutters of fallen leaves
And other assorted detritus of modern existence
Spewing out over footpaths and under cars
And over the tops of the boots of downtrodden dawn treaders
Tired
Mountain pass impassable under it’s mercurial precipitate mask
Features only glimpsed in snatches
Like looking through a white picket fence while running
Thought trees bunching up around the middle
Warping under the sun and the scrutiny of others
Tired
Collapsing under the weight of the wave function
Subatomic particles currently in a state of nonexistence
Abandoned altogether by the Higgs, thoughts vibrate and dissipate
In extraordinary frequency and noise
Drowned out by the audible hum of the big bang
Tired
As if running a marathon in treacle
Start with a whimper then dribble to a halt
Running barefoot on salt flats
Or over pillows in stilettos
More time spent on face than feet
Tired
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more
The court jester prances for the Big Queen *****
And her merry King of Fools with his band of merry drunkards
Quickly losing the point of it all
As words start tumbling down in random order
Staccato signal messages like binary or Morse code
Information overload threatens to upend the boatload
Like the military dumping refugees into the harbour
Buckle up armour and wait for the onslaught
Of somnatic visions, twisted psychedelic impressions
Land mine concussions in the fevered dreams of veterans
Who witnessed limb torn from limb
In the name of something nobody remembers
Lose their tempers and start a war on home turf
Jungles petrified into concrete monstrosities that blot out the sun
From the flowers that feed in the cracks of the pavement
Everywhere bereavement and none shall take leave
From the cold, impassive logic of Death
Who comes knocking as you read this
Wired
No chance of sleep now
This is why one shouldn’t write poetry late at night
Sep 26, 2012
Sep 26, 2012 at 12:41 AM UTC
.
i wake before the others
betraying the family bed
conduct domestic procedure
(the sun has yet to rise and punish)
the rooms are illuminated with the city dim
projected from streetlight in
a dossing grain of orange
wiltered by the sheets
we use to cower our windows
in this near light i go to spread a morning meal
a tray of fruit, yogurt and breakfast biscuits
i bring it too our low living room table
but Abrupt !
there is a form occupying the table
i scout for a spot to place my wares
put the tray / direct contact / the floor
and make a closer examination
on the table
it is a soldier boy simple life spent out
this warrants artificial light
i pull the cord on the corner lamp
in a glimpse of eyes the bulb pops dead
i know i won't meet result this way
its a brain pattern going on i determine
and remove shrouding from a street view
orange wash lends to the olive uniform
both hands hitched
to his webbing in the middle of his chest
helmet discomforts his head turned to a side
eyes yelling a relaxed nothing
no surprise to his ****** features
boots that haven't even made mud yet
this is clean but for the blood reduction
a syrup for his presentation
no fooling and there is.. the gun
the child in me and the child in him want it
he makes seventeen at most
and it is now i feel
when i see the device
war oversees
makes international the weather
May 16, 2024
May 16, 2024 at 1:27 PM UTC
Hounds
The hounds are barking again outside my window.
they are snarling and snapping with teeth of ice
that rips my tears into a tundra of frost.
The indifferent air carries their hunger
under the unhinged door in my head;
a gale is coming, feral and wild.
I am not comfortable in my head right now;
Chain smoke to keep my hands to myself.
I wander through ash and fire: what have I done?
Planets
I am helpless against my misfiring neurons;
numbed against myself and you;
Pills streak like comets across the bed.
In the sky the stars peer in confusion,
planets misalign again, a sun implodes,
Earth groans and shifts, somewhere something dies.
Swirling galaxies light up the synapses
Serotonin battles amphetamine
Orion stalks the twins and unsheathes his sword.
Submersion
I need some water on my feet, my head;
submerge me in the Lethe and bathe me in forgetfulness
the room grows hot and I swallow another star.
I am swathed in your concern, smothered by your regard.
I need clear air to think,
the night and the susurrus of hibiscus bathed by the moon.
Inside my room in my bed
white noise and white sheets wrap me,
bundle and bind me tighter than panic.
No, I will not go outside tonight.
The hounds are barking outside my window-
they come for me.
Nov 29, 2014
Nov 29, 2014 at 9:28 PM UTC
I’m 40,000 feet above the ocean
And 400 parsecs away from this Earth
I say hello to Orion’s nebula
On my way to towards the unknown
Deep in space within my own my brain
I feel the neurons misfiring on every end
I try to rationalize everything
Why am I feeling overwhelmed?
Ignorance is bliss up to a certain point
But never knowing what’s past this universe
Has my head thinking to a boiling point
But for now it’s getting late
So I fastened my seatbelt
As I return back to Earth
Jan 2, 2021
Jan 2, 2021 at 5:04 PM UTC
Box cutter to skin
Stop!
But the lights are screaming
The corners become razors
The stars even hurt my eyes
And the voices are vices to my head
My skin becomes a prison
My vessels and veins are clawing to get out
Misfiring neurotransmitters, the doctors say
Swallow this cocktail of pretty pills and you'll feel fine
Pastels of pink and yellow and green
Swallow them daily, I do
But still the world screams and cuts at me
I want dark and cool and peace
This world does not understand
It hurls at me
Throwing knives and swords as I sprint away
Box cutter to skin
Peace as the stress drips down my arm
Dark as it drips faster
Cool, peace and dark
Jan 3, 2013
Jan 3, 2013 at 9:48 PM UTC
His body grounds me...
I was an alternating current
with a frayed wire
Sputtering... sparking...
Misfiring...
Alone and flickering in quiet desperation...
Then he drew me in with his hands
Held me tightly, pulling me close...
Inviting me into his Center
Insulating my circuits from the heat of their own charge,
Reigniting those cold, dead connections...
Redirecting, realigning
Aeons of my dissipated energies.
I become more, now, than some
Reckless, erratic sunburst...
Snapping and flaring on the mere surface of things...
A loving so strong it makes me re-enter the belly of the beast,
He and I, we become the pulse...
Folding ourselves into the warm, primitive heart of God...
Selflessness... Sacrifice...
Joy, Radiance... Gratitude...
I find all these things here.
And everything false just quietly disappears.
Apr 10, 2015
Apr 10, 2015 at 10:47 AM UTC
For her eighteenth birthday,
a gift from the fates;
she knows how she will die.
Before, there was a vague notion—
A shadow cast by a hungry dragon
who roosts on the branches of the family tree,
devouring her ancestors, waiting and unslayable.
Now, the diviners speak to her in pedigrees
and punnett squares, leafing through a deck
of tarot cards, checking vials of her blood
for patterns in the tea leaves at the bottom,
hardening the shadows at their edges and
twisting peripheral horror into prophecy,
a promise, and she sees it all,
she sees everything, laid in front of her
and stretching out like a golden string
towards the vanishing horizon:
The sharp burn of dread at every twitch
and missing memory, jellied elegies oozing
from the center of others’ puffed pleasantries,
years spent watching her soul
get thinner and thinner, trapped
within a broken heap of matter and flesh,
cursed bone, misfiring electricity,
eroding endlessly, self destructing,
never ending, ending soon,
and, at last, alone, gazing back on a youth
spent gazing forward, ****** and dying
and derelict, and decades in the making—
she asks herself, what would she not give
for the chance to unknow,
to trade the dragon for the slow, soft lull
of the indifferent stars,
and to die whole and confused,
like the rest of us.
Jun 20, 2016
Jun 20, 2016 at 1:24 AM UTC
Sad is the day when a man carries a gun,
to end a life and sow the seed of hate,
divide and deconstruct what has taken eons to build,
reckless and selfish this prophecy occurs,
to what end does the man have,
in their own mind of misfiring thoughts,
lies create alternate reality,
bullets need not be fired,
words and understanding will heal,
together we will build and strengthen,
divided we fall.
Jul 17, 2016
Jul 17, 2016 at 7:21 PM UTC
its hilarious when he says it
then I say the same sentence
but the words sound fumbley and dumb
I end up chuckling it off and we laugh about how dumb it was when I said it
so supposedly it's all about the delivery
I guess I'll work at a pizza place then.
oh wait I already did
but I stopped doing that because it wrecked my car
my car said "please no more"
it started with the misfiring
I was like okay lets take you to the shop
so the misfiring stopped and i was like all better now right?
little ham and pineapple to this house, how bout a pepperoni over here
oh and what about some cheezy bread to 455 barry st.
a week later i turned the key and the start up was slow and i could hear the murmurs
"please no more"
I was like come on you are my income
but the tan beast was relentless and finally I took it to the shop again
and quit my job.
now my beastly and tan station wagon is in tip top condition
and I'm going to work on my delivery
of words and jokes and actions and kindness and all good things
but not pizzas
even though pizza is a very good thing
i love you my lovely car please take me on more adventures
May 28, 2018
May 28, 2018 at 9:01 PM UTC
wax-coated tables
sealed with stains of
vinegar, cheese
and questions from my father
what is his story
Behind every story
there is struggle
betwixt highlighted glory.
snowy hills,
mountain peaks,
laughter.
there was a drain
******* it all away
as if today was always
a black and white yesterday.
and so I brought red into the equation.
a knife-
bringing dormant veins
to life.
silence is the loudest
silence is the saddest
alone and dragged
unwillingly
down one-way streets
chemicals misfiring.
They don't understand
development of false wiring.
The blueprints had shined-
there were smiles in between the notes.
The eights were serotonin,
the wholes were adrenaline.
Silence still screamed.
When nothing speaks for years,
the crust rusts eyes
like the underside
of the old Ford
in dad's shop.
Beats,
kisses,
*****
The rust spread north
as my extremities
fell to the ocean floor.
I fear I cannot float on
any longer.
Somewhere between
pills,
plastic,
a princess,
and polycentric support
was the epicenter.
It tasted like fudge
on a warm winter evening
by the fireplace.
The silence still screams-
I doubt it will ever cease.
But the secret is always knowing
that the sun still shines during sleep.
this is where he lies;
this is his story-
betwixt his struggle
love,
art,
*and
invisibly,
blinding glory
Sep 23, 2015
Sep 23, 2015 at 12:41 AM UTC
99 cents for an iced tea
At the corner liquor store
But when the men in suits came and shut it down
We couldn't go there anymore
The man at the register never could add
Or maybe he short-changed us all
It wasn't the quarters he took from the kids
But the product in back made him fall
The stuff was the kind like none you'd ingest
Just go in for the coffee because that'd be best
Avoid all the product he put in the back
Because not only will you have a heart attack
But your mind and your eyes would be decieved
And the things you would see would be believed
Like Dave in the last five minutes of Stanley Kubrick's depiction
Of a Space Odyssey, but you would mistake reality for what he wrote as fiction
Up would be down and down would be blue
And your poor little brain wouldn't know what to do
All those misfiring connections made right by gunpowder
Your neural responses as sensible as chowder
Like Less Than Jake said, "I don't think I can yell any louder!"
Oct 7, 2013
Oct 7, 2013 at 2:09 AM UTC
balancing on the tops of trees, I
see everything, still,
in clarity, in the sharpsmooth confines
of my frustratingly stoic pre-frontal cortex
I sluggishly struggle through the snarls and tangles
of my "emotional conundrums"
to quell the misfiring synapses still bouncing wetly within.
no pressure to focus
no tactile center to make it stop
the speeding car we nearly didn't miss
the feeling of this space
gently and dangerously adrift.
the shakes of a savior
who feels like a fool.
I really didn't want
to have to skip school.
Jan 27, 2014
Jan 27, 2014 at 11:49 PM UTC
Doesn't see through proper eyes
No vision like yours or mine
You look at that boy
See his devilish charm and good looks
Feel the animal attraction boil in the marrow of your bones
Your thoughts like seamless clockwork
She sees that boy
Sees him bloodied and broken
Feels the ache to be the one to brake him
Her thoughts are misfiring like they have countless times before
You see that girl
See her soft skin, hear her laughter
Feel the animal attraction rise within you
Your thoughts a well practice reaction
He sees that girl
Sees her skin peppered in blood, hears her scream
Feels the handle of a knife as if it were already in his hand
His thoughts are violent perversions on repeat
You glow with love
They burn with lust
You ignite their sickness
They consume your life
They devour your death
They talk like you
They think like you
They speak and walk and dream like you
The capabilities of one in the hands of another
All the same, all capable
A choice, an experience
A love, a connection
A betrayl, a lie
Waiting to awaken
Waiting to release
Jun 4, 2010
Jun 4, 2010 at 1:40 PM UTC