I never really wanted to have an agent
Just one day I met this lady and she starting arranging my gigs and stuff
She gave me this kelly green handkerchief and told me to wear it in my left back pocket at all times
I have followed her orders religiously and now own more laser discs than all my friends combined

Do you know where the Trinidadian bakery is?
I'm supposed to meet the paperboy there and give him this pencil case

May the black cats of January be afraid to cross your path

as the mornings darken, I imagine the paperboy’s mother will soon be joining him. if my wife can stand her, she doesn’t say. what she cannot stand is living here. the paperboy’s ******* mother- what a dilemma. I’ve seen that boy with his fingers in his mouth as if something is there to explain the purple chore of his being. I’ve seen his black teeth. I’ve seen dogs bite his elbow once then leave him alone. I’ve watched his elbow heal a day at a time not once adorned with bandage. seen him crack a dive bird to ground with the rolled up paper of my neighbor. who prayed over the bird and raked it to gutter. whose cat brought the bird to my step, yawned, and dropped it. seen that boy look dumbly at a mosquito on his arm and I’ve seen him let it finish and remain fixed on the spot minutes after. hours even.

during these few short months,
i have done things i never even thought of,
or could even see myself doing

for example, one weekend,
back home from college, i had learned that
my parents took a local newspaper
delivery job

the job consists of:
picking up the papers
organizing the things for the most efficient route
and driving around very late at night when no one else is awake to deliver them
we fill those newspaper racks that i didn't even know still existed
other than that, we rarely have to get out of the car
it's kinda neat

i'm a paper boy

one night, my dad and i took the papers out a 4 in the morning
after just staying awake and watching television in the living room
and we haven't been on good terms for about the last year of my life
not talking very much, just being quiet, alone,
and listening to country music on the radio,
we drove through my childhood town
where i grew up and where he hates
where we both hate
where we're both
just tired

it was like it was abandoned
we only saw three cars the whole trip
in a town that has a bit of a traffic problem

it felt like everyone was dead
it felt like everyone had vanished
or had run away from some cataclysmic event
but forgot to tell us

and time felt so slow
then, he complimented my driving

then, i just wished i could've
told him that i love him
what's wrong
with me?

this just in:
a needless road rage killing
a senseless movie theater killing
a pointless middle school shooting
a meaningless ****** suicide
an irrational child homicide
an illogical workplace massacre
a specious robbery shooting
a mistaken identity ******
an inane ****** for hire plot
a random killing of a farm family
a worthless gang related ******
a futile car jacking slaughter
a crazy serial killing
an groundless paperboy shooting
an unnecessary police shooting
an unfounded revenge ******
a juvenile crime gone wrong
a harebrained scheme ending in blood
a mad shooting spree
more at eleven

Under water colored lilacs
The water colors the world
Running along her driveway
The rain comes along and runs down
Through the mist she runs out
To see if the paperboy missed

hi
I don't know what 2 say
Im marty and I am a man
I live in plymouth
and I drive a mini van
my fav things are
pizza friends music and my dog tracy
I play games online alone
and I am a paperboy
and my family lives overseas
dating is not my thing
so I am on this site.
and I want to fall in love.
and my fav movies are
**** bill jaws jurasic park and **** bill 2
I don't know what 2 say

maybe you liked my profile 
so send me a msg or
cyber-roses or a digital chocolate box
or click the flirt button
I like to talk sometimes
when I get lonesome.

Who were you?
You were once a girl with glasses, who hated dolls and any shade of pink on your clothes.
You were once a girl who hated that phrase, no matter how many times you were told.
You were once an individual scared of breaking out of your shell and showing the world your beautiful blue wings.
You were once a young 12-year-old boy; learning the meaning of love and how to apply it to yourself, without finding it in other things…
You were once a troubled 14-year-old who hated his naked reflection and drowned his sorrows in pill bottles and toxic love you knew was enough to ****.
You were once a friend with a heart made of sweets and chocolate; enough to give you cavities or make you ill.
But now, who are you?
When you look in the mirror, what do you see?
Do you see a beautiful blue butterfly, with wings spread wide?
Or do you see that troubled youth, ready to choke on some pills and die?
Do you picture a future? Any future for yourself 10 years down the road?
Or is your mind bombarded by the past and your perspective of the future blurred with the words echoed
In the back of your neck, stopping you from thinking clearly;
Stopping you from sleeping those nights you’re awake and looking at the ceiling?
When I see you, I don’t know who I see anymore.
I don’t know if I see the boy you used to be or a stranger with eyes drained of joy.
Are you just a copy of what you’ve dreaded to become, or are you a paperboy?
Are you a paperboy ready to hurt me with your paper cuts? Please be careful because I am oh so delicate.
You probably know this though; too afraid I’ll break so you don’t even keep in touch.
My apologies if I’m fragile. My apologies if I’m beaten and torn.
I’m just terrified of being left alone, or finding someone plagued with thorns.
I found comfort in a friend like you.
But now, who are you?

Morning newspaper
Greets you with a smile
“Thank you paperboy”
Swallowing tablets
At the sunny ball
Watching the faces
Shape shift into rabbits
Morphing
Into who knows what
Feel like Alice
Explosions of color
And grandeur
Overwhelming voices
Lead the game
“I am God” shouted
They laugh eternally
Though it’s only
Temporally
And clouds devour
The yellow sun
Raindrop suicide
With their mile high jump
Tambourine and guitar
And the dancing
So much dancing
That summer is lost
Among the headbands
And shirtless kids
A blur
A blur
But what a swell time!

Strange
How when all is going
According to
Plan

The record stops in spin
Clouds turn to black
And the round back straightens

I'm awake here
Seeing bare
Attending to cares
But unfulfilled

There is a liar amongst us
She smells of raw fibs
I run my palm
Across my bare chest
Feeling ribs

We are bones
And meat
With a mind we can never fully

Control

A mystery
To myself

Born again
Dying again

Re-living
Nothing

Attending
To
No one

There's a white envelope on the nightstand
With a sum of unmentionable dreams and desires
The shelf stands *****, but I am crooked
Burning a candle in the twilight of midnight
Reminds me that a gift is also fire

And then there is the fact of movement
Evolutions only prime device
There are no tricks
There are no riddles
There is nowhere you can tinker or fiddle

Overtime, we only get better

Move her
Admit him
See that I
Am inside every syllable
Etching a private universe
To perfection so whomever
May choose to enter
May re-live and experience

Matters of Heaven and Hell

Closed off
Sending smoke signals
To
Irritable Gods

Bunk beds with religion
We amass our hatred
For one another

Then play chess with jazz playing in the background

Red oyster shell wrapped around
A ghost white finger
Music tiptoes under my doorway
And the mailman is late with my paycheck

When I worked
As a paperboy
I enjoyed
Riding the bus to school

Because of late night snacking
I now have anxiety
About free breakfast luncheons

A next step for mankind
Seems like a lot of work
And very little pay off for the rest of us

Why are buses designed so poorly
And have no Maximum Occupancy?

Say goodbye to late night friendship
With snapskypefaceinternaboutfacecreditreport.com

She moved her hand
Over her eyes to block out
The sun. The brightness
Comforted her, but, being
An only child, she disapproved
Of anything resembling comfort.

A new noon is upon us
I speak for anyone with a pulse
A new moon has arisen
Any speakers of tongues shows false

Anonymous fortunes
Have arisen between the black and white
Bed sheets are randomly bursting into flames
And grandma weeps regularly

When love dissolves
Like the first fog of dusk,
The sun burning through
Mists futile efforts to shroud we dead men,
Put your ear to the ground
Hold to not make a sound

Witness the frost break
As the business men cut their steaks
See the poor out on the gutter
The addict trip and sputter
Change is not around the corner
The lies are as thin as the coroners smile

This kind of place
Smells of dry skin and regret
Dead brush and a unforgiving sun
Love takes off
Its always on the run

Sometimes
I don't know the difference
Between me and you
Sometimes
You try to tell me something
That I know just isn't true

White cut on the hem of her dress
She says something to me
But I can already tell that she's in distress

"Let me in your taxi," she squealed,
The bangs of her hair bouncing over her face,
"I'll tell yah something. I'll show yah' some lace."
I opened the door with a stone hand
And as she sat next to me I looked over
To see she was holding a beat up tomato paste can

Whispers of truths only turn into bigger lies
A butler coughs as he adjusts his tie
"The body needs to be washed up around the thigh,"
It explained, a shadow under each of the mans eyes
"There is no instrument man can trust to rely,
Other then that of God and his belief in the upside."

A road
Dispelled

A life
Cut short

A boat
Drfiting
Into Port

At last the fog has burned away
So we can decide
Whether you go or you stay

He buried the arm.
Black dirt, cracked under a blazing sun.
His bones slid stiffly into one another; shovel slipped from sweat.
He’d covered the face already. A pale mask of serenity with burnt black sockets.
Dead leaves blew past his legs. The house shook. Boards rattled against the wind.
A paperboy passed by.
What a stupid waste of flesh.
He waved.
******** stupid.

Unpleasant fingers that make a noise that I'm not comfortable with,
Not on my watch will you slander the name of her Boar.
Under the dandruff wigs of fellow coachmen,
I stand and say: Follow the path of preferred map-tracks,
Disregarding the glass of subtle milk,
Disregarding the shattered plastic, all, over, my, head,
Believing in a higher power, is, what, I, said,
Kevin, you need to leave me alone now,
I hate the paperboy.

The searing pain inside my brain
makes me want to right out a poem.
She moved in so close I could
feel the electricity there within .
The words would fail me
like a lovers lament will do .
The kisses were as crispy
as the laptop from which they flew .
And everyone knew you were
looking through the bay window
of your time .

The paperboy delivered
much more than my morning news .
And Cathy moved to New Orleans
with Danny as it was
her will to choose .
And the nighthawks few in the lights
it was a sight to see .
Ken kept slinging beers
while he dreamed of dreams
that would never be .
Still I see it all in the window of my pane .

I sometimes dream of Judy
and the reasons we could never be .
There's a Red Mountain resting underneath
the apartment holding me .
It was up hill , downhill ,
and it was unreasonable
so it seemed .
Anytime you had complaints
they would surely scream .
I see it all now through
the windowpain
of my mind .

At first, I caught a delusion...
Of what simply needed to fade away
The paperboy comes here with his pay
And seems to stay here all day
He signs all my documents with a rubber stamp
And brings back my drugs like a champ
Temporary placements...
Deciding not to burn out
I went outside to hear my neighbourhood's point on doubt
All of them had varying opinions
And each one of them had to shout
I smiled and said "Don't shout, don't pout!"
I was determined that it would never happen again
And now the same person comes here with a blood drop on his lense
He said he slipped and fell and cut himself on the sharp edges of the fence
I told him to use soap, rinse and cleanse

The wind whispered softly along
As if not to bother the sleeping child in its cradle,
The angry trees about to lose their beauty,
And the neighborhood paperboy on his bicycle with his scarf wrapped tightly around his face.

The wind caressed the crystal flakes that fell from the heavens
As if to console the father whose son was sacrificed in distant war,
The daughter who was destined to walk the aisle without a father,
And the excited mother-to-be whose child was stillborn after months of tender love and care.

The wind calmly strolled down 8th Street
Where the early workers stood in line for a bagel and brew,
Where children gathered near the corner filled with vigor and youth,
Where tall giants of steel and stone shone with haughty pride and modern couth.

The wind whispered softly along
The curves and wrinkles of my face
As my life forever changed,
But it was just another day
To the wind.

To avenge the little worlds in which we live

How far off our dreams are from coming true.

-

Your sound logic breaks the sonnet's symphonic sophistication

Turns the lilies and lilacs back into stone.

-

To see you walking down the lane causes us to cringe

What bad news you always bring.

-

When, for a moment, we're elated

Reason and logic and reality crash down with each of your footsteps.

-

Each stride you take toward us, as you advance, we fall deeper into despair

-

You're the bringer of bad news

You're the screaming paperboy of our lives

Beating your war drum and sounding your bell

Making our lives the true definition of hell

-

When we tell you our hopes

You tell us our flaws.

-

This fire burning deep in your throat

Brims at your lips and pours out

And duly it breaks into our unguarded hearts.

He doesn’t stay late
after school
to hang out
or try to be cool.

Instead, he pushes the pedals
faster than the others.
His heavy bag
pulls him back
and to the right
as he rides
through his route
finishing up
before daylight
descends
and the night sky
beckons him
to peaceful reflections.

Slight streaks of
black ink
stains his hands
and if it rains
the newspapers
are wrapped
in orange
plastic bags.

Newspapers slung
seldom miss
the points
he intends to hit,
merely brush by
the sentinel bushes
that guard his
patron’s porches.

Mycology the sole source of joy
Caps fill my head, wind up this toy
Pass out sheets a real paperboy
Hallucinate happiness so coy

Pull me in while the vapor dissipates
Can't see in the cloud only anticipate
Memory fragments, fragment the weight
Disperse the pressure allow a steady gait

The reality in my head made real
From my dreams, happiness I'll steal
As fog clears I see before me what's real
Existence so unpleasant that pessimist feel

But still, I persist unable to never exist
When I can I visit that place lost in the mist
I must find a way to live with life, coexist  
Or in misery, I must resign to subsist

Happiness a toxin to my sanity
Giddiness breaks down my reality
Joy consumes my heart I'm an amputee
Sadness flows into the hole an endless sea

Even when I know it's meaningless
I just cannot accept it

The fight remains inside me
I go down, but go down swinging

Death is like an old paperboy
He comes ah! to collect it

I meet him on the porch
But his paper I am flinging

            Sacramento No!

Trying to pull my thoughts in
from the shivers down my spine,
getting it together one more time.

And so I rose
blew my nose
did what risers do,
just trying to get through
another day.

The paperboy who's sixty-eight years old
whistled far too gaily as he shoved my
daily Daily,
through the letterbox,
but
everything's a ****** when you're trying to
get a wiggle on or trying to pull your thoughts
in from the shivers down your spine.