SHUTEYE

IN THE LAND
OF THE SACRED
COMMONER

& other poems

110 pages, 7.00

self published and available today on Lulu

(book preview on site is book entire)

~

some poems, from:

~

{untitled}

the robot is a ******.

the baby
it goes
from baby
to baby
with no
message.

-

I want your work to matter.

~

{keep}

the laziness animals have, that kind of panicked longing…

and brevity, the faith
of insects

-

my shadow, of course, afraid of its borrowed blood

-

that barn
in the middle of nowhere’s haunted eyesight

-

the invisible
after-hours
birth, and the woman

who keeps the baby
despite
its perfection

-

this quiet in the redneck’s
library
of forgiveness, this thunder…

-

the agony of the boomerang’s maker

~

{******}

the cigarette
the worrier’s
flashlight

the past
a widow…

deserted childhood, electric eel.

if poor
put mouth
where mouth
is

~

{untitled}

the baby contorts as if it might become a chair

its mother is saying

wind
I will pray
for you

-

its father is fashioning

from some god’s
idea
of a stripper
pole

a dollhouse

totem

-

the baby itself is nonsense

its head
bruised
by a rattle
would brain

a parrot

i.

Society keepeth their amour' in a box
Hidden, unrevealed, secretive, locked;
Me and mine Jane, shalt be open as a flame,
As on mine knee's I peck upon her toe's;
Again and again.

ii.

In the midday hour's when her back and neck get's sore
Mine fingertip's shalt caresseth her epidermis;
With sultry emollient, from her head to her feet.
I rubbeth in deep, as tis she shalt falleth asleep
As the best massage she's ever hadst,
Put's her into a trance in mine hold:
In peace she slumbereth,
Into a romantic kingdom
Stacked with ourn affection's gold.

iii.

Over an hour-plus thirty minute's,
Mine sweaty Palm's art tender;
Though it was all worth it
To mine queen mine soul surrendered;
Entering in her shuteye, I entered in locking ourn leg's, head's, arm's: closely cuddling-pillow's feathered.
Here at this moment, nothing else in the world mattered.



©Brandon Nagley
©Earl Jane Nagley dedication ( Filipino rose)
©Lonesome poet's poetry

When I was younger
I slept in the top bunk
over my older brother

- Pretty soon we’re all going to die -
he was fond of saying
while we listened to Credence
Clearwater Revival on an old turntable
with a penny he taped to the arm
to make it sound like a $100

Pretty soon he got me saying the same
words, like moon, mosquitos and darkness
were in his ear, he’d have dreams of
naked women washing his feet
and sparrows looking out of his eyes

He hollered at old man death
when he was wanting some shuteye

- Nobody on earth is like me -
he’d wake up shouting not meaning
to disturb my sleep

He said - I am the white piano
they threw off the bridge -
- the snake bed and the shade tree -
- I am something, yes-sir-eee -

- I’m something not everybody wants
to believe - he’d say sipping on whiskey
bought from a woman up the holler

He told death to - kiss his white *** -
then holler at me to get out of bed
and go trim the grass around the stone
angels planted up in the high pasture.

I don’t mind, not at all,
just place your head on me,
let yourself become
immersed in my comfy haven.

Every night I am yours
you are mine, a relationship
that has lasted many years.
Many more to follow.

We never talk, we just lie
enveloped in darkness.
I care more than you can know.
I will never leave,

cheat on you when I have had enough.
Do with me what you like, turn me over,
drool over me, move me into
whatever position you fancy.

But then you leave me. I become
cold and alone once again.
Not to worry though, because I know
you'll return when you need me.

We're stood on a blacked out highway going to who knows where. A floodlight shines on a group of workmen in road, slow. A passive aggressive sign says "Slow, My Daddy works in here". Gaz, Frank and Jim are gathered under the floodlight.

"That ****** lads dad never worked ere! That's bosses lad!"

"Mmmm..."

"Anyway, what's this hole for do you reckon? Gas? Telephone? Electric? Dead bodies? Haha!"

"Hope not"

"Hopeless more like! Why ARE we digging it anyway?"

"We? I'm digging! You're just talking ****!"

"******* Frank! What about owd Jim over there? Old ****** never does owt!"

"Grunt"

"Leave Jim alone! He's seen it all and done it all a million times! Poor guy must be knackered! If I still have to work at his age I'll ope you young uns gi mi some ****** respect!"

"Respect?! *******! Who's getting respect ere?! Not me! I'm in the middle of nowhere at night digging an ole in a highway for god knows what reason!"

"Look, Gaz, 'oles need to be dug. It's not our job to fill em. We just dig em up!"

"Yeah, but don't you wonder why? Like, we seem to be diggin up constantly! Same ****** area of the same ****** highway! Dunt anyone plan it oot so thi can do it all in one go?! Water, cables, all of it?! Its like we're makin work for t sake on it!"

"At least you've got ****** work! There used to be 20 odd of us on this stretch o road. Are you gonna dig or what?"

"Keep yer air on frank! I'll ****** dig, but I'm only doin it for you!"

"Well ****** me! I'm honoured! Shut up n dig will ya?"

Scrape, heave, scrape, heave

Sigh

Scrape, heave, scrape...

"Yer know what else...?"

"Oh, for ***** sake!! What?!?"

"These shovels are ****!"

"You're ****!"

"Nah mate! Look, handles are loose and shovel bit's weak as ****! If you lift too much thi just bend! It's like thi want us to ave to work twice as ard for t same bleeding job!"

"Well there's no worry o that wi you is there?! You lift ****** all!"

"Whatever..."

Heave, scrape, heave, scrape, heave ... crack!!!

"Told you!"

"Shut up smart ****!"

"Don't ya get it though?! We're nowt t them lot! Thi just use us n **** on us! Wi dunt even kno' where this place is do we? We just get a lamp post number and go! Where does this ****** highway go?!"

"Look, I don't give a ****! I just want to dig this 'ole then go ome and watch some TV and maybe get a **** before bed! There's a ****** sign over there anyway..."

Sign reads "He..."
The rest of the sign is broken away, probably hit by a car.

"Jim. Jim?! Jim!! ******* I think Jim's dea..."

"Consarnid!! Thundering eejit!! I int banna be deed, tha ****** loony! I wor banna geet some shuteye! Tha lod banging on abaat ****** why thar ****** shovlin *****?! Carnt tha led an owd bloke sleep?!!!"

"Sorry Jim. Just worried mi for a minute there. Are ta alreet?"

"Nah am nod! I wo avin a reet dree-um befoore tha wakened us! Megan ****** Fox wor sat o mi fay-us!"

In unison - "Hahaha! Tha owd dog Jim!!"

"Sorry Jim, It's Gaz, e's got more questions than a ****** 3 year owd!"

"Shut up ya miserable get!
Why do you reckon we're diggin this ole Jim? You've been doin it a long time."

"Aye... I wor yer wen thi started fixint roo-uds. It wo differnt then. Thi gi'd us reet too-uls n ad t reet ideas. Thi jus wanid us to dig reet. Bud thi dint like us knowin moo-ur than them lod! S thi gid us ****** all n wi started wokin unner leets i t deark. Nah ****** con see us then. Thas askin t rong quetsion lad! Ids nod why aar wi diggin t oil! It's why aar wi doin id int deark?!"

"Why are wi Jim?"

"Because we're expe...."

Beeeeeeeeeeeeep!!!!
Thud!!!
Vrooooommm!!!

"Oy!!!! ******!!!!"

"Es dead Frank! What the ****, What the ****, What the ****?!"

"What?!? Jim?!! Did tha get 'is number?"

"What the ****, What the ****, What the ****?!"

"Gaz!!"

"What the ****, What the ****, What the ****?!"

"**** Gaz, yer reet! ****** this **** I'm not diggin any more! I'm off ome!"

"F..f...fr.... FranFrank?"

"What Gaz? That were ****** up Gaz!! Jims dead!"

"B..b....bu... bury J..J..J..Jim"

"Gaz, tha'll ave t do it tharself, I can't dig anymore. Sorry. Im calling t ambulance n goin ome. You should too! Bye Gaz. Good luck."

"B..b....by... bye J..J..J..Jim..."

Scrape, heave, scrape, heave, scrape, heave

Slow. My Daddy works in he...

(-)

it’s all in your head.  the newborn we had on a mountaintop.  the word it knew from memory.  its hand that stuck to everything but the dog our dog ate.  the cold our dog died from.  the tent we called aquarium.  that we filled with diapers.  that was never full.

(-)

poetry and god share the same quick death.

I’m on what you’re on;
the eighth day of the world.

(-)

existence is the wrong inquiry.  I was destroyed by an angel

for having
taste buds.

a pinkness has always gone on without me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNJXt4Gn0ZA

he said you little girls.you little girls.
dont do pretty things no more. your eyes are full of lies.
and you laugh at us with empty pockets.
he said. you little girls. are filthy. no.
dont know how to treat no man right. you spread your wings
and throw us on the ground and leave us behind.
stupid stupid little girls.

and I said little boy let me tell you a thing or two
about what us women have to go through

since the beginning of time us women have been robbed
of dignity. of sanity. even of insanity. you robbed us of everything.
you little boys. you little boys.
you tied ropes around our neck when we committed adultery.
although that crime for you went by very smoothly.
you killed our daughters and slaughtered our babies.
you banged our heads against the wall when we didn't bare
you a male off spring. You ***** us and used our body as
personal jewelry. You had no mercy when your attraction pursued you
our eyes wet and our tears ******. no you little boys.
you set no boundaries.

a woman jumps of the roof and commits suicide. She was kidnapped.
she is being *** trafficked. Some over weight pig tries to shove his
**** in her face. She jumped because she rather save her dignity before
she catches AIDS. and dies in a cell full of other women who cry every
single chance they get every single nerve wrecking/shattering day.

There is a little girl with big blue eyes, and light wavy blonde hair.
she is 6 years old. She has no idea where she is. She see's a man
sitting at the end of the room. He puts his glass of bourbon down.
he thinks of his wife and his daughters, picks the glass back up and chugs.
he trails his finger along the child's thigh, he tells her its okay. the is stained heavy with the smell of old carpet and hotel sheets.
your mommy and daddy told me it was okay, hush beautiful don't you cry.
years later that woman is a ******* because when she was 6 all she was
taught is that her body is a tool. Her kidnappers showed her love they told her
her mommy and daddy didn't want her anymore they are her new family.


little boy little boy. let me tell you about the girl who was sent to
the asylum on her 23rd birthday for trying to **** herself with a bottle
of pills and a bottle of jack. She woke up one morning with re surfaced
memories of her father molesting her when she was young. She starved
herself and would not leave her house for over 2 weeks. Now her sister
knew why she was a lesbian. Now she knew why. Her daddy would come
to her late at night and rub in between her thighs. Im sorry to be explicit
but you say us women have gone crazy and little boy I am telling you why.

so before you decide to judge a woman take a moment and try to figure
out everything that has made her cry. Look deeply into her eyes and
you will see all the goodbyes. You will see mentally how many times she
has died. You will always find some innocence and if she really likes you no
matter how many people she has been with she will still get shy.
You will see how many times her tears have ran dry. Because I guarantee you that ever woman you meet has gone through endless night of heart break and no shuteye, has heard every lie in the book and been defied. Listen closely
you will hear the ghosts from her past nearby.
The definition of a woman is something that is unbreakable.
something that when thought of you cant help but sigh.

if you believe that you truly are a man
then to you my heart expands
it is hard for me to see you after all these stories
but I do try the best that I can

so make no excuses, when defending a case speaking badly of women
because emotionally we are distraught more than you can imagine
and still seek to find the good in every ruin

20% off all print books, there, thru October 3rd with coupon code of SAVETODAY

my latest self-published (on demand) Lulu books, as such:

[earth is part earth and there’s a hole in the sound I made you from]
9.00
98 pages
published December 2015

~

[MOON tattoo]
9.00
114 pages
published March 2016

~

[shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner (& other poems)]
7.00
114 pages
published June 2016

~

[FOUR]
12.00
340 pages
published June 2016

~ this is a combined publication of these four collections: earth is part earth and there’s a hole in the sound I made you from / MOON tattoo / infant cinema / shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner [& other poems] ~

~

[depictions of reentry]
9.00
146 pages
published August 2016

~

speaking of books, and of talking to myself, I said some things about two recent, and excellent, books of poetry:

Nothing Good Ever Happens After Midnight, Sarah Marcus, GTK Press

thief

I can live knowing it goes missing. but, it being here, toppled from its rightful place…I can’t live knowing there are two. that it has no plural. that I have to say it twice. that I am asked on my deathbed about deathbeds in general.

–

bear

can we talk about bears. no, can you. that’s what I mean. I mean I want to listen. is there a bear I can learn about apart from the others?

–

panic

can we say muscle memory is the orphaned narrative of a bilingual body? that a house is so clean its rooms disappear? can we say home?

book, even?

the empty room released into the wilderness.

–

reader

this book by Sarah Marcus. while you still exist.

“Find a midwife whose name sounds like a spell.” – from Do-It-Yourself

“…Water
finds a way out. When I enter a
room, I locate water.” – from I Didn’t Know

“I research how to remove a body: a strange erasure, an omen.” – from Fetching Water

“Her dismantled den. Her dismantled den.” – from Den of Thieves

~

marshland moon, Eleanor Gray, **** Press

“(it is nothing, is nothing

…and so, where fables began)” – from [Lady’s Slipper]

After reading:

if there is no card

the flowers
are
from loss.

I didn’t know how to end things. I threw a soft doll

at a bullet.

I was trying to be quiet
but silence

it has
a safe word.

The way swimming plays with my shadow. The prop

high-chair.

~

During:

The missing child learns a new word. Not from me. Not that I remember. Our favorite program? A previously ruined nostalgia.

“a nameless sensation which perpetually haunts the body” – from [and then, Monsters]

I have a look I want to give loss.

“I want to say goodbye, I want
time to say goodbye” – from [Skeletal, Furred]

In my dreams I am ugly. In my dreams I am not differently awake.

“and so, what then of
colossal sleep, “ – from [Zero Beauty]

~

Remnant and Root:

“there is no language that can articulate what it is I suffer by, or do not suffer by- like all the sufferings suffers I am…” – from [Inactive Currency]

“/ do I even know of longing / I know of being held / “ – from [Wormwood]

“how do I
…love the very gnat of self” – from [Plox]

“holy, holy the black asterisk of wound
for the child I never was” – from [Languid Limbo]

“ ‘murmur’  I had forgotten the word
ash without meaning, death without purpose”

“-I am
a song, an urn, a stairwell” – from [Susurrus]

~

This is a book. The title, to me, is very alone…and, intimacy, the most distant of permissions.

15% off all print books and free mail shipping at Lulu today with coupon code of MAYMAIL15

~

some poems:

~

[raise god]

it’s a nice enough baby with an inability to emit. the adult world worries but no more than than it does for the television’s volume during bouts of ceasefire. parents divorce or parents agree on the same support group. siblings form a circle around a one trick pony. some believe the jack-in-the-box is broken while others believe it’s patient.

[taunts]

death is never early. take the first bite of every meal in front of a mirror. chase the kid while pulling a plastic bag over your head. invent a sibling schoolmates blind. know poverty, know moon. shampoo the elderly from a distance. baby no one. they have looked like hell since before you were born.

[pathos]

our fighting
determines
which of us
is more
sonsick.  

relic child, town crier.

I take what I’m given, beating.

cerecloth, snow
on snow
before and after

it buries.

me of course
as I position
myself
to hum

above
a basket.

me as I marry homeward
and kick

ball, stone, stiff
bird

stiff bird in death
doubling as
the rat
of an angel

yes
kick
for reasons known
to another’s

pet cobra

skin to skin
in an unmarked
life.

[costume]

we’re here to ****** the head of the boy who put a clown’s red nose on the girl playing jesus for stopped traffic. if I spoke your language, I would tell you.

[poor lighting]

a plastic doll with a human right hand distracts us from the parrot’s empty cage. we have been writing in unison instead of eating. our poverty is so advanced it keeps a fake diary and a real diary but hides them in the same spot. we are dying in two of our mother’s arms. our mother is elsewhere repeating after the man who does our stunts.

[collapse]

how
on a clear day  
my father
is the face
of absence.

how what I mean
cuts the finger

my mother
sips.

how porch blood
is not the same blood
the body
faints with.

how copperhead, how rattlesnake, how lisp

says I myth
my sister
who is still

vanishing
to shoplift
god

from the thunderstorm
we gave her.

[southern treehouse]

as my sister
inspects
her *******
in the white
piece of paper
we both
refer to
as the one
and only
ghost
mirror

I fry
god’s egg
in the plastic
shovel
I took
from a sandbox
shaped
like a coffin

and shiver
like the psychic
who with
the controllable
sobbing
of her hands
gave our seizures

to animals

[bait]

I didn’t see it
like some kids
saw it-

pain
as clay.

a swat here or there
to the back
of a mother’s
mind.

a man who took a bowling ball
into a closed garage
had no sadness
I could pray
over.

...Santa smoked on the roof
of my father’s house
while I
with a noiseless
stomach

touched
that hunger.

[how to live in the country dark]

toss frogs
into a fire
your father made.

find a woman
who’s abandoned herself
to being led
by a stick

let her blind mongrel
lick your palm.

bury a handful
of gravel
call it
the moon’s
grave.

hide in houses
hidden
from road.

make at least one friend
whose night vision
is a glass of milk.

double your body
by walking
drunk.

[outside the body it is always procession]

I may have lied about being pregnant but I know my ******* kid.

her father quells *******.

ants are quiet.

-

his teeth make sense.

our yell is I’m gonna shoot you in the blood.

-

elsewhere
is a light dusting
of downfall.  sleepily

legal

are the sunbathing sad.

[crown]

i.

a hand towel
over the lid
of any
stubborn
jar-

a mother to a father
or less frequently
a father to a mother
I don’t know why this is
but either way
a gentle admittance

to couple

as if passing beneath
the singing voice
of statue…

ii.

that stage
where a baby
is all
head

[mendicant]

this doorbell
is for the inside
of your house

-

to some
you’re the giant
you’re not

-

hearing isn’t for everyone  

-

a fog-softened man
with a baby
might experience
a sense
of boat
loss…

-

hurt

what you know

[crystal]

a foster boy using an alias teaches my son to shoot.

it’s the tooth fairy on a sad day finds
under my pillow
a handgun.

you know your father
is a night owl.

[dog years]

the longer
I grieve

the more

~

below is an unpublished companion piece {shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner} to my recent chapbook, infant*cinema (**** Press, April 2016)  

as such:

~~~~~

[shut-eye in the land of the sacred commoner]

~
poetry and god share the same quick death.

I’m on what you’re on;
the eighth day of the world.



~
it’s all in your head.  the newborn we had on a mountaintop.  the word it knew from memory.  its hand that stuck to everything but the dog our dog ate.  the cold our dog died from.  the tent we called aquarium. that we filled with diapers.  that was never full.



~
existence is the wrong inquiry.  

I was destroyed by an angel

for having
taste buds.  

/ a pinkness

went on
without me.



~
if touch is all it can manage

the hand is poor.

I am the new face
of baby
doorstep.

when lightning
has emptiness
to burn

feed
the fasting
doll.



~
I am old and nothing brings me joy.

I did
good things
but I
was asked.

drunk
outside
of a dog
shelter
I am likely
to remember
a library
pyros
love.

my uncle
he is probably
still
west of me
able

to open
a bottle
with the mouth
of a living
frog.



~
and what
would forgiveness
do?  

my kids were never born.  yours
they hide
from the number
of people
god
made.

when dead, I was not
a bird
yet
my mother
asks
what kind.

I can’t tell
by looking
if he’s seen
the future
or seen
the future
again.  I strip

when my stomach
hurts.



~
it puts me on my stomach

this grief
you have
for the switched
at death

-

god’s color has returned

-

the male
animals
in the grey
barn

knew

-

first



~
I want to say it is yes yes

puberty’s
painted
egg, the island

clock, the genitalia

of alarm…

I want to say it is orange

like bees
like
not all

the hymns
not all

condoms…



~
he says we are men
not because a raccoon
chased a bone
into the factory
of shadows.

he says it’s me
or the bag
of trash
and gives me
a knife.

he says before I was borned
we took
the same
bullet.  he says mouth.

I kick
he says
in my sleep
and it puts
a belly button
on a bird
one
bird.

he says them animals
ain’t so wild
as a dog
in drag

and your mother
is the outside
world.



~
the robot is a ******.

the baby
it goes
from baby
to baby
with no
message.

-

I want your work to matter.



~
subtitles, ghost
pollen / I sit

facing
my father

he strokes
a large
bumblebee…



~
eating behind the mirror’s back
it was all
hick lore
to me

a scratch
in scar’s
nakedness, a loss

of infancy
awarded
only
to the deaf
who dug up
the ears
of god
for nothing
more
than the sound

of depression
going blind
in the garden
of the hairdresser’s

hair



~
death
my way
of saying
goodbye
to god

-

had you lived
or enjoyed
amnesia...



~
when asked
I say
I see
on the floor
of a mudhut
a *** toy
having
a seizure.

I kiss the feet
you’re the future
of.



~
not
for devouring
the mannequin
but for eating
the seeds, it was

(in a coloring
  book
  for cigarettes)

beaten

by a baby
a baby
could love



~
I go with dove to high

dives / I am on

the pill
the swimmer’s
pill / for nine

months
I’ve hidden
a rabbit
from no one’s

hormonal
christ



~
it was for healing the hand of the plain hand
that I
was touched / well blood

on a bread
crumb
massage me
a brainwashed
worm / well comb

all you want
the eyesight
of god / swallow

a hair
in the house
birth
built…

-

can’t
this once
a thing
die
in the sanctuary
of its double




~
hell is a book.

she reads it
in a room
that’s alive.

attic or no, I want
to miss
my father.



~
nakedness,

give it time
to recover



~
into something from his childhood
a man
is born.  never

far off
what crawls
her way.



~
she reaches into the same hat for the rabbit he’s made disappear.

I sleep and the dark takes me for the bone

lightning
straightens.



~
church of intermission.  church of the rolled-away church my fever follows.  church of it ain’t a baby until it spits.  church of the lawnmower left running.  of the space you give the grieving horse.  church of you when you die in my sleep.  of musical suicides.  church of the disinfected high chair.  of the false bruise.  of how to become a balloon in the church of touch.



~
in the library’s dream, the abortion clinic is no bigger than a fingerprint.



~
this is me
praying
for a photo
of my father’s
last meal.

me

praying
to have
the allergic
reaction
my mother
faked.

for proof
of animal
suicide.

a mirror for my toys.  dirt for my brother.



~
and we touch to abridge doom in the bed of a headless man.  and we struggle to hear a father verbatim.  and we ask in a fierce wind a phone booth to please be a fireplace.  and a starfish consoles a handprint.



~
/ I was spotted covering my eyes by a dentist whose childhood had stopped disappearing.  how big is your family and who wears the mouth?  is it true your dad sold to a city gargoyle a spray-can of ****?  that your mom had no baby tired of being born?  that their suicides filled a madhouse with cubist maids?  

/ year nine:  your birthday spider is put on film for biting.  your sister takes one look at my brain and remembers what to feed and how to clean a cricket.

/ year eight:



~
my son doesn’t want the circle he’s drawing to touch the circle he’s drawing.

the dog
is a heartbroken
wolf.



~
she checks her teeth in the door glass of the oven.

the egg is dropped
and the owl
******.



~
when
did your caterpillar
become
a syringe?

I want to hide the clothes I’m wearing.

something touched
is something
mourned.



~
the woman had the suicidal absence of a man who’d just broken to his body that his blood was not the rooster patience devoured. if I peeled a potato, I did so in egg’s hell.



~
praise headgear, worship eyewear.

adore nostalgia, forgive

memorial’s
constant
vigil.

say god
three times, then

say mirror.



~
this is what you mean, kiddo

what you mean
to a bomb

/ it doesn’t help god

that god
is awake



~
for what
does the torso
pray?

the cocoon is music
to the mannequin’s
ear.

sister
she ain’t
been calm.



~
when grief
was password
and not
codename

when gift
horse
was horse
fly

when baby
little baby
shorthand
went all
stork-****

(on who)

to remember
god



~
outside the dream, I had written the most heartbreakingly clear poem about brotherhood.  inside

was this boy
was discovering
god’s thumb
is never
clean.  a boy whose mouth

was never
here.  all those I’ve met

I’ve left
alone.



~
asleep in the pickpocket’s bed, the baby is a mirage.  

I’m so fat
I’m fat
in the dark.  I compose

at my lowest
a crucifixion
story

from the basements
my father
wired.



~
putting the meat
back together
in an unfilled
pool

we yawned
at the same
time / brief

painless
the unmothered

between



~
as overcome as I was to be gifted a hospital gown, I had nothing on the angel whose brain / for visiting the eye / was banished…

we are the dead
we’re here
to return



~
by death I mean nothing was beautiful for a very long time.

that, and when did you know.

Everyone is waiting like
angry Buddhists
for the washrooms
to become vacant again.

I'm waiting for
my mind to be vacant
impatiently, like an angry
bodhisattva,

so I can get some
******* shuteye.

Nothing more intimate than sleep
wake before dawn, go downtown
prepare for tomorrow, come home from work late.

Most cities prosper undisturbed
sleeping peacefully
while the tide goes out.

Are we asleep or are we dancing,
surrounded by buildings,
a primitive fertility dance in the forest?

Sleeping in my clothes,
sleeping in my underwear,
two dead leaves, then a breeze!

Fall asleep by the river,
in front of tv,
soon I will know who I am.

In the last days you may be found sleeping in the laundry mornings,
or sitting in the holy spot
gazing at a crescent moon.

Get up early but gotta nap,
winter afternoons or summer heat
Thanatopsis, Big Comfy Couch.

Sleep in the bed next to your wife
that way when life ends
someone misses you.

That sounds harsh but we’re matter of fact
about the fact of death.
Death is most of all like sleep.

Doctor, engineer, lawyer, soldier,
writer, poet, that’s the pecking order,
get some sleep, get over it.

Not the kind of gal who’ll have *** twice
on the first date. When that happens
marriage, babies, graduations, tragedies, sleep.

Headache, surgery, through it all
there’s sleep, a haven, heaven, hovel, cave, raven,
a place to be with eyes wide open.

Don’t have a hissy fit
or case of colon cancer, get 8 hours
shuteye in contiguous array.

If not, listen to a TED talk, they like explaining things
Selected Shorts solves insomnia,
The Moth Hour, the peaceful father, mother.

Sweet pleasing Sleep!
in Hades
where the lights are always blue, gentian actually.

Every third thought doesn’t have to be about death.
Sleep together, get laid.
Sleep. How memories are made.
Sleep. In the palm at the end of the mind or on another plane.

i’m sitting in my empty room
where dreams run dry

i’m tossing in my empty room
so desperate for shuteye

i sit here in my room so cold
with heat turned on
by the glowing moon

i’ve seen this moon too many now
i often think we’re friends, oh wow!
but musn’t i be dumb to think
or ponder what my new friend speaks

or does he speak
for he’s the moon
he speaks to me
a silent tune.

30% off all print books on Lulu thru the 24th with coupon code of LULU30

some of mine are there, including:

~ shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner [& other poems]

~ MOON tattoo

~

poems, from:

[ally]

the robotic jaw
lifting otherness
from a hole
in a body cast

no litter
of bewitched
kittens, no wild

crop
of soundlings
angry

at the wrong
life

~

[tocsin]

the singlemost mother has heard of a skin cream can turn one into darkness.  

a bar of soap that reads palms…

-

on display for the poker face of birth, you are the vision footage dies for.

-

you have this father
leaves
no stone
unseen

this brother

haunted
by surplus
aftermath…

-

before it was an ear, it was where

she scrubbed  

~

[On contact]

hold kitten
like a rifle.  pop

a paper sack
at your father’s

ear.  ah, your father

who was made to kneel

for two
maybe three
things

(god, shrapnel) a flying saucer

from the wreckage of his church

~

[purlieu]

a bruise, a school

of fish.  a caterpillar

crossing

the floor
of hell.  a thought

sick
to a son’s
stomach, a winter

glove
in spider’s
nightmare.          

~

[notes for eggshell]

beneath the tethered astronaut of his dream

the impossible boy
misses

something small

the human ear, its recent
brush
with whale

~

[domain]          for Katherine Osborne

falsehoods
I was sure
to say
to a horse, things like
god is sending
his middle
child
to collect
a drop
of my daughter’s
blood, or

it’s a sin
to be
1989, things I felt

I owed
the horse, that were
horse-like
in their stillness, that went
nowhere
when nowhere
was

come fly
or flat
earth

the dark’s
*****

20% off all print books at Lulu today with coupon code of LULU20

/ from [shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner]

~

[untitled]

hell is a book.

she reads it
in a room
that’s alive.

attic or no, I want
to miss
my father.

~

[untitled]

she reaches into the same hat for the rabbit he’s made disappear.

I sleep and the dark takes me for the bone

lightning
straightens.

~

[entries for giants]

not a thing born
nor a thing
howled at
no
you are not
again
these things

the baby
it continues
to purple itself
where it can

it crawls, but is mostly stunned
by its own
vocabulary

the dog has the tongue of a cat

this is new

~

[the exact]

father became the man his possession foreshadowed. mom had a purse full of spoons. brother bathed any form quiet enough to make the kitchen sink. I began to believe. I began to hear in the rock

the thorn
it spoke for. over the nest of a bird,

the nothing to eat.

~

/ from [MOON tattoo]

~

[catastrophe]

I am differently
afraid
of each
cigarette

-

thematically, father hopes

to operate
on a clown

-

compared
to his

my hunger
is having
a flashback

-

wheelchair, oh

to its dog
door
bliss

~

[moon tattoo]

birth, or god’s
way
of erasing
our memory…

this
more than you
will hurt
my neighbor’s
doll

11/04/14
Brought screaming into a blinding world,
WE CRY
From nothing, Into a painful life we are hurled.
WE GET BY
Dancing through the days of light,
WE FLY
Sleeping through the darkness of night.
WE SIGH
Each moment passing in the blink of an eye.
WE TRY
We learn to live, love, learn, and lie.
WE LIE
Seeking that one thing to make us whole,
WE DEFY
Trying to find our destined roles.
WE MULTIPLY
Not once able to stop the cycle,
WE JUSTIFY
Fighting a lifelong battle.
WE CRUCIFY
Suddenly we reach our final moments,
WE RECTIFY
With no time left, we reminisce.
WE DIGNIFY
With one last breath,
We SHUTEYE
We are lost unto death.
WE DIE
©

from [shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner]

~

it’s all in your head.  the newborn we had on a mountaintop.  the word it knew from memory.  its hand that stuck to everything but the dog our dog ate.  the cold our dog died from.  the tent we called aquarium. that we filled with diapers.  that was never full.

~

when asked
I say
I see
on the floor
of a mudhut
a *** toy
having
a seizure.

I kiss the feet
you’re the future
of.

~

church of intermission.  church of the rolled-away church my fever follows.  church of it ain’t a baby until it spits.  church of the lawnmower left running.  of the space you give the grieving horse.  church of you when you die in my sleep.  of musical suicides.  church of the disinfected high chair.  of the false bruise.  of how to become a balloon in the church of touch.


~

and we touch to abridge doom in the bed of a headless man.  and we struggle to hear a father verbatim.  and we ask in a fierce wind a phone booth to please be a fireplace.  and a starfish consoles a handprint.

~

(all print books on Lulu are 25% off thru July 11th with coupon code of LULU25)

25% off all print books today on Lulu with coupon code of LULU25

~

my most recent self-published (Lulu) works are ‘shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner [& other poems]’ and a compilation publication of my last four works called ‘FOUR’, which kind of gives away the ghost.

please checkout my Lulu author page if interested.

~

some previous poems from my self-published (Lulu) works:

[segue]

the feeling
we’d not
been here
before

–

doom’s little hiccup

–

my brother
dead serious
that we pronounce it

hick
gnosis

~

[footfall]

a newborn wants to be a hand.

there’s the dream I have of heaven
and the dream
god lets me
bring.

my boy
has a crow
for a backpack.

~

[domestic inquiries]

the *** of the first person in hell

the number of animals
giving birth
in a field
where emptiness
burns

the logic of
if ax to tree, then scissors
to kite

~

[the explanation]

my brother the mud wrestler wants to know if we’re any closer to finding our father. I examine the droppings and say someone is feeding you in your sleep.

~

[ataraxy]

it’s a bit early
to be
reincarnated

son, this illness

it takes
our death

For all love is born out of a dark, out of a letter,
the persecution that spreads amidst the drained holes of choice-
out of a weary separation of head thrown back, neck craned against wood,
the true likeness of stone. The dark is an imperial gaze,
dandy, strapping and strong, munching metal-noise, truly noice,
obviously strung for a price. Dark can’t level, only analyze
the distinction between tears and tropes, the limit of a gimmick
that was clipped on a string, drenched and adolescent.
Dark is not the choice of photography but who has his mad eyes raised
to the fortune of automatism, to the terrace where blank steps hurtle ahead
to reach for a dusk that can be raged; over time,
strange accounts are opened. Office becomes a blade,
a staple with the scent of a lover trades itself for impression
(Love against the wall, tacked with thumb, pressure against the edge,
merciful arrogance, cocky cocky boy with whom I color my tongue
and my body, by clutching your neck closer and becoming the toucan,
in our dark and our ether, in our mouths and our births).
Soda gulped down the throat has its own morbid thought,
but not for long, not until the straw builds our house,
with a ceiling made of arms.
Rather, the risk has been framed, the blinds through which
horns intrude for duty summons remain winced as an eye with
dark circles, dark bringing for itself the juice of intent-
intent that splurges into love, intent that splurges,
far-reaching, intent that snuggles inside a blanket speckled
with strewn cloth, inside being the warmth, the heart, the shuteye

Philosophy has answers
Questions about life
Not answered by life
Nightlife apart from life
Alive and Dead
Heat of the Moon
Felt in the room
Awaiting the Sun
Rays Cold filled with hope

Dust settles on time
Time punchual with Dusk
Clock keeps its date
With the night
Day after Day

Time to Settle
Thoughts Unsettled
End of the day Tired
Dawn of Dusk Wired

Simple Answer Sleep
Body Mind to Rest
In a state so Deep
Break from reality
Mind runs a story
Running like a stream
Packaged as a Dream

Dream as a term
During the day
Signifies a entity
Far and Away

Quoted in Future tense
At present doesn't make sense
Odds of happening
In the word lies the meaning

Clock ticks slower
Deal made with the Stars
Brightest aspect of the night
Glittering a visual marvel
Truth of life unravels
Sense of I
Temporarily blind
Mere sight of the galaxy
Perspective of human entity

Stridulation sounds
Wings clapping
Made by the Cricket
Screams Whistles Barks and Shrieks
The sounds of the Owl
Ducts and pipes
Expanding and contracting
Define the night
Blind to the eye the
Silence filled with noice

Nights plugged
Amplifier in
Decibels increased
Searching for the sound
Endbound never found
Physical form to music
Easier to find logic

Finding Sleep
Inner peace
Up to the brim
Shuteye not a problem

Awake and Alone
Waiting for the Sun
Long dark wait
Slow Motion of Night

Darkness of the hours
Brings forth the fears
Inflated and Corrupted
Thought process interferes
Mind playing Poker
Alone with the loner

Beds filled with calm
Facing life face to face
Sleep their balm
Tire of the day
Balanced at night
Law of nature
What a sight
Deep sense of jealousy
People who notice not the night peacefully

Disillusioned with illusions
Tired of being awake
Created noises fading away
Real voices holding sway
Days divides the night
Twelve hours in hand
Till Sun leaves the land
Merging into the sea
Done its duty duty free
Spend the day
Just like yesterday
Day dreaming about
Sleeping at Night

Could not say
Goodbye to the day
Wishing good night an option
Only when you can get some shuteye
The day said Until Later
Didn't wait till i bid adieu
The shadow it left behind
We all call it the Night
Darkness its theme
Silence its voice
Nature' giving you consent
Rest and pleasure sanctioned
First thing in the morning
Used widely by everybody
First thing in the night
Haven't heard that till last night
Liberty to cross the line
Endorsement given by the Night
Brings with it tranquility
Triggers the minds loquacity
Aurora flashing Amber to the daylight returning
Coming in with all the chaos
Time to shut it out and start to focus
Daytime gives you identity
Invading your identity as the moon floats in
Man made rules or nature's gift
If its nature's rules means you don't have a clue
Different music played
One for the night and and changing the side
What if the same played
Either way?