The first time a man ever pointed a gun at me and asked me to love him was at Granny's Kitchen in Greensboro, North Carolina.

The waitress, a soft spoken white woman with her hair pulled back in a bun, had just dropped off my plates --- a simple mix of scrambled eggs, two pieces of greasy bacon, and a short stack of pancakes. Now, no matter how cheap, I always feel like I'm cutting loose at breakfast places for the sheer abundance of plates. While I'm sure the eggs and bacon could have shared real estate, each component had its own china.

The waitress lingered at my table, her fingers fidgeting with straws in her apron. I made eye contact. Well, my eyes contacted hers; she was staring at my lips.

Sure I can't get you something to drink? she asked.

This was approximately the tenth time she'd made sure. She was uncomfortable that I had supplied my own beverage -- a Big Gulp. But even more than that, she was uncomfortable by the deep red stain taking over my lips. Contents of the Big Gulp: merlot, boxed.

(That is an unnecessary detail. I've only written it so I never do it again.)

Before Greg hopped up on a table and announced to the restaurant, If I could have your attention, my name is Greg and this will only take a second, blah, blah blah, I poured a copious amount of syrup on my pancakes. Then I moved the bacon to my pancake plate. In my experience, very little in this life is better than syrup on bacon.

I shut my eyes for that first bite, just like the commercials. The syrup dribbled a bit onto my beard, and when I opened my eyes, I discovered it had also landed on my shirt. I grabbed a napkin. Heard a chair slide backwards. I started with my beard, peering around the diner, making sure no one saw. I think I heard someone gasp. But I was busy, working that napkin then against my shirt. Jesus, I thought. My grandma, who's got a splash of the Parkinson's, could eat with more grace.

If I could have your attention, my name is Greg and this will only take a second, a very official voice boomed behind me.

I turned around to see if I recognized him as one of those cuffed jean-sporting, wild plaid-loving NPR hosts. He wasn't one of those. He was a sunburn with mop hair in a black tank top and hemmed jean shorts. He did, however, have a cleft chin. That's actually worth noting. Don't see a lot of them these days.

I know you guys are busy, he said. I know that like me, you guys are probably broke as hell. I mean no offense Granny's, I love this place, but it ain't exactly four stars. Or three. Anyway, all I want from each of you is five dollars. If you ain't got five, give me four. Ain't got four, three. And so on.

He started with the stringy Japanese couple on the west side of the restaurant. Nobody really seemed scared, not the freckled brat in canvas sneakers, not the liver-spotted gentleman with a copy of that day's paper.

My old friend Jerome used to say that white folks are the only romantic criminals. He tacked it up to that whole Bonnie and Clyde crap. Greg, it seemed, was privy to that information, too. He smiled and thanked each person as he robbed them of a few presidents. The victims, smiling back, seemed to be thinking of their names tagged at the end of some newspaper dialogue. A few even gave more than he asked.

Here, take fifteen. Times will get better.

Aren't you just a charmer.

It was all very moving.

So he gets to me, and of course, I don't have any cash. I carry a debit and an arsenal of credit cards like a normal American. I don't know how he made it to me before running into this particular problem.

No, I don't have one of those iPhone card swipers, he said. Well, you gotta give me something.

I offered a gift card to Harold's Clothes for Men, it had like two bucks on it, but he wasn't interested.

What's your name?

Henry.

How much do you weigh?

Enough to keep me prohibited from most amusement park rides.

I like you, Henry. Well, let me ask you something. Have you ever loved a man? he asked, pointing his smudgy revolver just past my ear.

I shook my head no.

Me neither. I've always been curious, though. You been curious?

There was a time when I was thirteen -- Blake Hinton was changing after basketball practice -- and I remember thinking, that is an incredible chest. These lines just sprawled from his sternum, lines leading to these almond *******, and I specifically remember wanting to eat them like, well, almonds. But that hardly counts as curious. So, I said, No.

To which Greg responded: Get curious, boy. You're coming with me.


In the spirit of honesty, I was in a bit of a haze before Greg made me climb into his beat up Cavalier. Not just from the Big Gulp brimmed with merlot, no, I hadn't slept in two days prior to the whole gun-in-face incident. Reason being, I was, as Greg would say, broke as hell, and the rent was due. I stayed up both nights conspiring (and drinking). So, really I was pretty thrilled to be kidnapped away from the whole situation.

I had visions. I guess from the lack of sleep. Maybe they weren't visions, maybe just dreams, or fever dreams, I don't know. All I know is I blinked, and we were in the Appalachians. And there was a grey longbeard in the backseat rattling on and on about how change is easy, movement is easy; it's that whole nesting thing that takes courage and strength, blah, blah, blah. I told him to be quiet. Greg told me to get some sleep. I blinked.

We were in a karaoke bar in Madison, Tennessee. There was a gin and tonic in front of me. I took a drink. There was a water with lime in front of me.

Greg asked, Where did you go?

I told him, your dreams, trying to be cute. He turned and asked the bartender for a Yeager bomb. Reaching for the server in -- granted -- an overly dramatic gesture, I said, Make it two. We made it three. We made it four. Seven. Then some vague, but perfect number, because my head rang right. The words came right. And I was a journalist, asking Greg all the right questions.

I'm not a criminal, he said.

I was just bored, man, he said.

You see, I was in a rut, he said. Last month I put up a personal on Craigslist. I know, it's pretty ******* desperate. I've read the kind **** people put on there. But mine was different. I just wanted some time with my ex-wife. Some couch ***, you know? We hadn't done it on a couch since I dropped out of college, and I hadn't even really thought about it until a couple weeks after the divorce. Then it was all I could think about.

A black woman, whose teeth glowed under the black light, began singing "Wild Horses." Then he read my mind, I think.

Yeah, she answered it. Did our thing on her sofa. It was nice and all, and like all nice things, you just want more, but she said I couldn't have no more, this was a fluke, a one-time, or no, a one-off thing, she said. Had to relocate, so that's why I did that whole thing at Granny's.

You ever get it on a couch? he asked.

No, I said. I've see a bra though --- two actually.

He took that as a joke, which was good.

Though wild horses couldn't drag me away, a gasoline horse could.


He handed me a courtesy breath mint after I finished throwing up. The Nashville skyline looks perfect, he said. Especially at night.

My stomach was gravel in a washing machine. Masculine love. At gunpoint, I had agreed to indulge it. I was going to make love to a man -- not just a man -- a criminal. Not something to write about on a postcard.

Mr. Winters, my esteemed landlord,
Apologies about the rent. Got kidnapped by a *******, and I'm presently banging and being banged by him in Music City, USA.

I blinked.

We laid on opposite ends of the queen-sized mattress.

I always liked Super 8s, Greg said. I don't see the point in spending so much on a hotel. A bed is a bed.

And I tried to be funny with something about the confidentiality of dark bedsheets, but it fell flat.

Greg cried. I love my ex-wife, he said.

Can I help?

Will you hold me? he asked.

The air conditioner kicked on in the already freezing room.

I'm sorry. You don't have to, he said.

I scooted against him. He smelled pleasant in a family-vacation-kind-of-way, like a fresh pretzel covered in salt. I put my arm under his neck. He buried his face into my shoulder. I blinked.


The front end of his Cavalier was held together with copper wire and coat hangers. It was a two-door. Both doors dented from, according to Greg, hit-and-runs. It had a Vermont plate on the back. It was red. I mention all of this to say: if we kept moving, we were bound to get pulled over.

In the parking lot of 3B's Breakfast, Burgers And Beer, Greg asked me to retrieve his revolver from the glove compartment. You kinda have to uppercut it, he said. And I did.

I don't want to do it again, but we have to. I'm not staying put, not until I hit the ocean. But don't worry, I'm not going to hurt anyone.

He showed me the revolver. No bullets. I nodded, in approval, I guess.


The second time a man ever pointed a gun at me and asked me to love him was at 3B's Breakfast, Burgers And Beer in Bellevue, Tennessee. Of course, it was the same man, Greg, but the circumstances were a little different.

I went with two orders of biscuits and gravy --- or B & G as my dear friend Chance affectionately calls it. Four bites in and I'd yet to hit biscuit. For a moment, I wanted to tell Greg, C'mon man, ***** the ocean. Tennessee does gravy the way God intended. Nobody would find us in this suburb. We could be sharecroppers. Do they still have sharecroppers?

Do you like fresh corn? I asked. It was the first crop that came to mind.

Greg didn't answer. I noticed his plate of hash browns and eggs -- sunny-side up -- were untouched. You okay?

He was, he said, trying to get in the zone, that's all.

Alright.

Our waitress looked like a poster child for ******'s Youth. She couldn't have been much more than sixteen. She had blonde -- almost white -- hair. Her eyes changed color with the intensity and direction of light, a gradient between seaweed and dark ocean blue. She appeared to be an amish girl gone defective, and I was about to inquire into that very supposition when Greg stood on the table, and said, If I could have your attention, my name is Greg and this will only take a second.

Tennessee is not North Carolina. In North Carolina, they got a healthy aversion to firearms. In Tennessee, however, once a babe can walk, the *******'s got a BB gun and an endless supply of empty soda cans for target practice. I say that, to say this: when Greg stood on the table, so did three other men. Their three guns pointed right at him.

Lower that gun, brother. You ain't gettin' any money out of us.

Hate to shoot you in front of your boyfriend.

Coffee spilled and ran off the tray our waitress held. She shook so hard, it wasn't clear how many women she was.

Greg's cleft chin centered on one gunman, than the other, than the other.

Just drop the gun, *******.

We don't want to ruin no one's breakfast.

Fellas, I said, he doesn't have any bullets in his gun. We need a little money that's all.

That ****** is just trying to protect him.

I'm calling the cops, a purple-haired old woman yelped from under her table. Silverware clanged against the floor. Then the buzz of a fly. Then the pop of fries drowning in grease. Then the bell chimed as some idiot walked inside.

Greg's arm was shaky as he pointed the gun at me. Do you love me? he asked.

I blinked.

And I was at 3B's in Bellevue, Tennessee.

I blinked.

And I was at 3B's in Bellevue, Tennessee.

I blinked.

And I was at 3B's in Bellevue, Tennessee.

I put my arms up. Slid my chair back a ways. Stepped on the chair, then unto the table.

Do you love me? Greg asked.

His breath smelled like last night's alcohol and that morning's coffee. He was a child, a sunburnt child with a cap gun. He wasn't going to hurt anyone.

I put my hand on top of the revolver and lowered it. He crumpled, as if I were scolding him. They still pointed their guns at us. But for the first time in my life, I felt secured, tethered to a space.

I lifted Greg's chin up with my index finger. Covered his eyes with the palm of my hand. And I kissed him. I kissed him, keeping my eyes closed tight.

poetry is photography:
the photography of your soul

it begins as an observation captured in stuttering syntax:
the lens of your soul pointing towards a subject, a metaphor, a line
within you, within the world, within the two.

if vague and smudgy this image at first,
the lines rearrange themselves, the grammar settles,
and the image comes into focus - sharp and still.

as you would a camera, approach things at angles,
you flood your poetry with perspective, with self, with distance,
stamp yourself onto it, and you know it belongs as yours.

and you know you have captured that pearl in an oyster,
those millions of dying stars exploding within you,
an image of yourself.

yet, sometimes, you're out of film and however you click the shutter,
your words fall off the lines, burst into dissonance, or finds itself unwritten.
like photography, you do not expect a stable yield of inspiration.

then, with the years, you lay your poetry on a wall -
chronologically, alphabetically, thematically, or anything -
and you will step back to see a montage of your life in eloquent snapshots.

if poetry should ever be photography - then -
it would be the photography of one's soul.

I try to live Here. Here is humid-sticky-underground-dance-hall hot. I’m caught tight in a mess of limbs- bodies stretch and sway from this to Eden. I have never been more lonely. Together we inhale metallic Old Spice. Together we exhale stale tap water hymns. I am breathing all alone.

My tired tongue kicks awake to cheap nail poison as I tap each fingernail against bottom teeth and lightly push three times.
(Four times or eight times. Ten times in one quick, heart-drop minute but who’s counting?
Me. Of course I’m counting. There’s not a beat, rhyme or giggle that hasn’t busy-bee buzzed around my foggy brain. Each thought its own color, each touching down on a different set of crumb-glazed quilts or a different tower of gutted magazines. Each bee is long and thin, pointy in a terrifying way. Each bloated and dripping with a grand idea- which they leave like droppings and are so specifically intense they will never make any sense a breath apart from this moment and this context which crumpled and blew away while I dully, dutifully checked my pulse. I'm alive but my thoughts took off. I can see their exhaust but they fled fast, like they knew I could only begin to gnaw on them. They were born to quickly, maniacally live and die- in and out and there then off and gone.)

Here. Here the walls are chipping off one hundred years, one hundred lives of lead-based paint and are dripping onto the frayed denim of my ****** cut-offs. Impossibly long hair, absurd to call it mine, hangs heavy and wet. The strands shed drops of atmosphere on my (and their and your and-) bare feet. I’m my own sumi brush- my calligraphy is not words, but a footprint-marked path to treasure. Braided bits cling heavy and soaked to the curve of my neck and then billow like sheets hung out in the wind. My sharp, slick scapula must be the laundry line. It’s one of the good bones. Good bones only exist while jutting. The scapula is the beautiful ******* of my skeleton and we finally have made nice.

Here the music is so loud. The bass ignites my dental cavities. They sting and pierce as a reminder of how terribly I’m taking care. Lights blink, the room quakes and I need water.  I’m throbbing and flickering and faces attached to bones slither between each other and grind up into my own perfect focus. They’re smirking.

One at a time they appear with a warm, grainy hand on the small of my cold-sweat back. Each face of bones lean in close, dry and cracked lips that graze my own fever-hot ears. Goose bumps sling up and down limbs and the lips, all smudgy red lipstick and cigarette breath, whisper something to me that is absolutely crucial. It’s something beautiful or something hilarious or something crude but I can’t hear it. I’ll never hear it. They throw their bones back and cackle-laughing so hard it must be painful. All I can hear is my eardrums cracking and breaking, laying the bass for a high pitched dial tone.

One by one they do this and then, with a huge play-dough smile and eyes as deep as I feel, they slowly back away from my flimsy, electric body. I know they’re relieved they didn’t get stung. This goes on for forty straight hours. I feel like the Queen bored and still as they file through to kiss my ring. I feel like I’m at my own wake. I am beginning to erupt. I am lightly vibrating with the burden of militant creativity. I think I'm melting from the inside out. The bones still laugh and the bees, diving like war missiles, are screaming that it’s time to flesh out that novel, string precise words together in a huge, monumental way down golden strings that will change the world for the better and forever hang on God's graceful neck. It's time to record that beloved lullaby and sculpt that masterpiece or put on black clothes, sneak out and vandalize monuments. It is all absolutely crucial and so very urgent. Everything is wailing and I’m nodding slowly because if I do not do it, ALL OF IT, now- right this instant and quickly- I will die having said nothing. I will have wasted my opportunity to matter.

Here. Here the bone-bodies continue to mock me. The room stays dim and damp and I don’t think I’ll ever get clean. After twenty minutes or seventy years the crowd thins out, lights switch on illuminating exit signs and the room slowly, sadly, empties. I am sticky and aching and have never felt dumber. The bone-bodies left their blurry sweat, their empty bottles and their void inspirations like blank fortunes trailing across the bar top. There’s a real, fur, calf-length coat and a fake Birkin bag in the corner. My feet are filthy.

Here. But I’m not really Here. Here is bougy and exclusive. There’s no list but you probably can’t get in because actually Here is utter *******. Here is the moldy bricks and pre-war ceilings inside my head.
Leaving Here is too easy. You blink and you’re gone. Then I try to remember what party I even went to but I’m sitting Indian style and cramped on rough carpet and my back is in knots and everything I’m thinking is slow, melting taffy lose and inconsistent.

The sun starts to rise up pink through broken bedroom blinds and I know that I went way down deep and danced and gripped tight to flurrying ideas and made a big mess and now I’m stuck ripping papier-mâché, three inches thick, off coat-check walls and trying to read the graffiti-ed bathroom stalls but the Sharpie is dripping and I might be illiterate.

The Somethings I came to flirt with are hiding and won’t answer ‘POLO’ no matter how loudly I scream ‘Marco! ******* Marco!’ I’m reeling and under-breath begging ‘and please come find me and let’s make stuff and we can’t waste this and I can’t be a waste.’ But below all the pacing and knuckle-cracking I know that there are no Somethings listening to my panicky prayers. They sneaked out while I was braiding my hair for the sixth time, humming something old and Johnny Cash-y that I remembered and liked and had to Google and perform eight times for a mirror. I sneeze and I want to cry. I don’t think I know how to read. Edges start to blur and the alphabets a mess.

In defeat I’ll wash my face and slide under one light blanket and quickly sweat through it. I’ll lower my heavy, thick-thought and dizzy head onto a stack of three pillows. My vision will fall away from me and stars will explode in a chatty whisper that has be immobile and straining and sore. I will treat them like a sky full of fireworks blazing just for me. I'll ooh and ahh and my heart will palpitate under the weight of them. (Really I do know they're just amphetamine snowflakes falling slowly and burying my wasted night.  I swear next time I won’t waste it.) But at that moment I'll watch the show and feel safe and small and inconsequential, at last.

The soda can rumbles in the bowels,
tumbling into the gaping mouth
into which I enter a hand
to protrude my sugar rush.

sssni-kah, then the slurp of an obnoxiously pleasing sip.
I let the carbonation tickle my tongue,
reveling in the effervescent sensation.

The smell of old tires,
malodorous oil and gasoline,
and stale cigarettes fill the air.

My vexatious sips go unperturbing the dense atmosphere
that thickens outside the small air-conditioned office
and into the gas station,

where the mutters and sputters of drills,
kakadoo, kakadoo,
the squeaking and squawking of rotors and axles,
the interjections of swears and grunts
fill the air.

I peek through the ***** smudgy glass window in the door
to see grimy overalled ants meandering
under the body of our red mini-van
hiked up into the air like a figure skater,
suspended by the rusty clawed accompanist,
not a tremor of strain, unflinching,
letting the greasy men crawl underneath, hiking up her skirt
to examine her anatomy.

I walk outside and sit on a dusty tire stacked with others
on the side of the building--
some growing forlorn in tall grass
weaving in and out of the aperturous rim,
the fingers latching onto fissures and pulling it down
into the hungry earth.

Another slurp and I set the can down
to step onto my skateboard--
rolling across the gritty pavement,
snapping ollies and pop-shuv-its
to add my timbre to the cacophony
leaping out of the open garage doors.

I look over to the barbershop adjacent to the station--

The off-white single room squat allowing the cylindrical swirl
perpetually pirouetting atop the door-frame
to dazzle in a placid manner.

It is there I get my close trims
and pull a lollipop from the cavernous bowl
sitting atop the counter.

The barber, working silently behind his dull gray mustache
and dull gray eyes.

Outside the barbershop to the left,
Leicester Highway ambles onward,
diverging at a fork just ahead of the lot,
and the road adjacent that winds down my neighborhood,
Juno Drive.

I've never embarked down either divergent,
and I wonder which one is the less traveled.
(Frost, guide me.)

I go to the mailbox teetering on the edge of the highway
and hastily grab our mail,
the wind slapping at my *** as the cars whisk by
in their infinitesimal haste.

I feel like time slows once you step onto Juno Drive.

I turn around and saunter back to the station to see Billy,
my Working-Class Hero,
who I mostly see strolling up to the driver's side window
of our dull red mini-van
to loosely rest his arms crossed atop the window frame,
resting his sweaty forehead on his sticky hairy forearms.

Leaning in,

his blackened hands with his greasy smile
behind a scruffy scattered beard caked with dirt and grime,
atop a dark red leather face--
but eyes bright and merry.

His laugh, a phlegmy two-pack-a-day sputter
hacking and pummeling through the van,
all the way to me in the backseat peeking around mom's shoulders
to catch a look at this superhero anomaly.

And his southern drawl wrenching out of lungs
caked in tar and exhaust fumes,
that torpid slur that executes like the garbled hum
of an Oldsmobile engine chugging restlessly--

His laugh, an engine that won't turn over, sputtering to life
but falling right back down into the dirt,
lying on the oil-stained cold concrete floors ***** boots slipping over
and sticking too like wads of gum.

The charismatic mechanic who knew the answer to all things,
always ready to flash me that crooked greasy smile
stretching across his ruddy leather face.

I step back onto my skateboard, with soda in hand,
mail in the other,
and silently say goodbye to my Greasy Eden
before making my way down Juno Drive
towards the first house on the left,

following the road as it snakes past the trees,
alongside the creek, around the bend,
and out of sight.

I.
I lift my eyelids.
plipliplip.
The rain invites me to play.
Her cold fingers curl around the doorframe,
"Come on, come sing again! Sing, just like you used to!"
She burbles gleefully.
"Come on, old friend.
We used to be ballerinas, whirling and laughing.
We used to be one
one and the same."
Her fingertips inch through my solid oak door.
I frown and shove the door closed
throw down the lock
yank my curtains closed
Closed to the scent of moss
to the wail of the wind
to the percussion of the weather.
(I prefer the smell of coffee
the sound of silence
of security.)
"I used to be a lot of things," I call.
"But then I grew up."

II.
She knocks at my door.
Again. (memories are persistent.)
Teasing me with her calm voice
whispering lofty and cool.
I sigh
begrudgingly I follow
sliding into my raincoat
tugging up the hood
drawing the string tight around my jaw.
She dances in watery windchimes
sluicing across the slick sidewalk,
she pirouettes
leaps
beckons for me to follow.
My galoshes are not as forgiving as toe shoes; I trip.
I reach out my hand tentatively
curiously
feel a cold ***** of water slide down my index finger.
Icy. Biting.
I gasp and flick it off.
The world is a box of watercolors
but all smeared together in shades of earth.
Shadow, cornflower, lilac, mud
muddy colors I identify straight away.
They bring a smudgy comfort
a hesitant nostalgia.
I feel a note catch in my throat
like trapping a dragonfly in a glass jar.
It flits violently to escape,
but I dare not let it out.
It is sunny under my umbrella.

III.
Late late night
midnight and a half (to be exact.)
I hear her call
frosting my windows with condensation.
I etch into my foggy breath,
feeling the panes hard against my pale skin.
"Come." says her voice.
"Listen--" I protest.
"Live." urges her whisper.
So I fling back the door
let the coolness trickle down my head.
Silver bullets sparkle in the moonlight
I tilt my face towards the crystal beads,
watch them pour across my face.
I shake my flimsy nightgown
sodden with tears never shed.
I twirl, laughing across the yard.
"Old friend, how I have missed you!"
The rain calls to me.
My tears melt with hers
tumbling down my neck.
My words burst forth, a crescendoing horn
swelling across the rooftops
resounding to the deepest roots of the trees.
"I don't want to grow up."

the farewell of the magical-masque
           the dance of the whirlwind
           the twist in valediction
a pantomime of comedy dripping in life’s heat, its tragedy blooms forlorn
silently the mountain-ranges stare
the sky-face won’t relent and contemplates the open-disease in homes*


1.
disguised as simple relief – rescue lies cooing in the palm
     crumbling in blue-ash beside your grinding-palate
     you reach for pen and paper to appease an entity unknown
shrouded in grey, no scavenger can touch the head of one
who carries blessings in the scabbard – the present worthy of now

stairs are slippery, fish are mouthing, anger grows
     symbols hop along outrageous, so stylised and signs come in decisive
     all at once, almost
there is some purchase in the widening-valley
when climbing-feet need to rest on your narrow angular-will
and wait.. (before them chips rain down)
until the merry-turnstile comes in view


2.
the worm-wheel goes blank a while
and out tunes a dastard-and-devilish prank, courtesy of blunted-fate
sacred-fillies get hacked at by small silver things and they lie slaughtered on stark-plains
and the orb dips in reverse this time
a sooty-traveller from the western-flank
               glances out at massive-figures at supine-rest
               gets startled by the rude ***-fire
eyes slit and pates distort in hostile-fever
at the starling-ingénue in mock-fatigues and fake-epaulettes
but cheering up with wry-humour makes your feet
           a touch too slow to react in time
           and the halberd comes crashing down
well, the last thought you hold before your next one
is how utterly beautiful she looked at the station
long, black hair – silky-shining in your eyes and gay-dancing in the wind
when she passed you all her sweet-love from eyes so wet and smile so quiet
and selected dried-fruit in redolent-parcel
                                   a sealed pelt-skin of unmixed-whiskey
along with fresh-baked raisin-bread in cotton-cloth
                    coarse-sliced and buttered so generous
and
a semi-rusted dry-tin rattling its bounty of macaroons through that smudgy, ***** window
what sweet-victuals to keep alive . . .



man, that journey is a long one!


                             (I’M STANDING HERE        oh, you just know I am here

AND YES -- I’M WATCHING YOU                        
                                                                ­               and no use looking round now..
      YOU CANNOT SEE NOR HEAR ME  
                                                                ­               or begging a purty-release
                                                                 ­                                             
                                  oh easy, boy.. EASY!!)                                                          ­                            
                                                                ­                                             
                   ­                                          


3.
once more, the worm wriggles in microbial-distaste
and the season’s wheel comes dangerously close to being undone
IT DOES
and seconds later, cogs fly hard in every fool’s direction
and luckily.. you catch some in your face.. mouth agape
        crushing your tongue
        splintering all your dental-treasure
        smashing half your reason
no time for moaning.. or eroded-regret.. or even to feel your lips in ribbons
for, when they turn their backs, you will know
what to do..


because you’ve picked some pearls the hard-way..
that atonement could well appear in spells
of any shape
or size



not so?





S T, 30 dec 2013

a stripe of asphalt on the blanket of green

I stare wordlessly out into other people's lives
peeking past the violet-tinted windows of the freeway
as your chat-chatter spills from your coffee cup
filled to the brim with handshakes and impatience

You clutch your earpiece tighter, scowling
as I trace the horizon across the glass
smudgy fingertips that sigh boredom

and the Mexican workers in orange vests
peer back at me curious and wave
turn to their left and shout something in Spanish
tongues dancing, slick with dust

I smile as they crumple their lunch sacks and
pitch them down into the rubble then hoist
brick by brick, stone by stone
no natural-made boundary
into the chalky air and perch for a while
to mop the sweat from their brown
creased faces and sing rowdily to their neighbors
and the immobile in the SUVs

You lock the doors fast
and pat your hair into place
I've got no time for this construction
you say, can't they build this highway somewhere else?
as you drum your fingers along to the siren song
of CEOs and business connections

You're just the same as the rest of them.
Man forever building bridges
that will only topple down.

Lying on the bed
I think of what to write...
....words don't flow out
of my pen
my mind is clogged
vaccum surrounds me
I've ****** all the noise
into my self.
It's waiting to explode.
I realise I am too conscious
of myself,
I realise I am trying to pretend.
My pen leaks out
a random flow of ink
shaped in words
I strike them out
they don't manifest my feelings.
I don't want farce to appeal
to the eye,
I want honesty to touch
the heart.
I am waiting
for my words
to strike a chord
with the strings of my heart.
I am longing
for clarity
that will give my writing
a sense of purpose
and shorn it
of its randomness.

Lying on the bed
I think of what to write....
....my mind is a clean slate
I want to colour it
with thoughts
and feelings,
I want for it to
lose its barrenness
and be fertile
with imagination.
I want for it to
be bereft of fear
for it is,
the place
where revolutions were conceived
and philosophies were born;
the sole reason
for Man's greatness.
It boasts of coveted freedom,
which,
feared tyrants failed to ******,
it is a guiding light
to the often faltering humanity.
It has been
subject to manipulations,
deceiving history
into changing its course;
scripting moments
of momentous change,
all, of course,
owing their occurrences
to the enchanting influence
it wields over the body.

Lying on the bed
I think of what to write....
....my mind is deluged
with a rush of thoughts
flowing in and out,
a haze of colours
mesmerises me,
letters, words
dance before my eyes,
songs play out in a loop,
a multitude of
smudgy-outlined faces
gazes at me....
....And I realise
with an epiphany,
It is this very train of thoughts
I shall elaborate on!
Lying on the bed
I think I know what to write on.

All through double science Sheila thought about the boy shed seen go by that mid-morning break not that hed looked at her too much or responded to her shy smile but she thought of him even to the degree of inking in his name on her small palm John scribbled there in black smudgy ink and she thought he had looked at her he seemed to look at her the way he had turned his head indicated to her at that time that he had and the science teacher talked of something to do with gases and she copied what he had written on the board into her exercise book in her minute scribble with her head to one side has she did while writing her arm at an angle her small hand gripping the pen in an odd fashion he had smiled yes she was sure John had smiled as she had smiled she sighed softly her eyes lifted to the blackboard to take note of what was written her hands scribbled her mind wanted to think of the boy with the quiff of hair the smile yes yes he had smiled and she wanted to stand up and say HE SMILED AT ME as loudly as she could but she never would she was not that type of girl a elbow nudged her the girl next to her nudged her and nodded towards the blackboard the teacher was pointing out something and asked her a question and Sheila had not heard him ask her the teacher was staring towards her expectantly she blushed sorry Sir didnt hear the question she muttered looking at the board and then at the teacher who seemed put out then listen girl listen he said then pointing to another to answer the question he repeated and Sheila still blushing looked at the girl next door and shrugged her thin shoulders the girl looked at her blankly and looked away she looked ta the blackboard and read it through slowly as she could taking note what had been written about gases and she stifled a yawn and looked back at the exercise book and what she had written in her scribbled handwriting she looked at the inner page where she had scribble John and drew a heart-shape with an arrow through it she held the page open just enough for her to see it then opened the book to wait for further instruction regarding gases the teacher walked along in front of the class pointing to the blackboard and indicating a diagram he had drawn Sheila wondered if the boy allow her to hang around with him after all she had seen other girls walk round with the boys either in groups or singly why couldnt she? she asked herself sitting up and staring out of the windows at the grass and the blue of sky over the way and what if he said yes how would she feel then would she walk with him or would she feel too shy to  and then all of a sudden she panicked what if he wanted to kiss her as shed other boys do with girls actually kiss on the lips sort of thing and shed never ever kissed a boy before not even her brother Bert a panicky feeling crept into her stomach what then? what if he wanted to kiss her a piece of chalk pinged onto the desk in front of her and the girl next to her elbowed her again SHEILA are you with us today? the teacher asked bellowing her name out of frustration she nodded and blushed again have you been listening? he asked yes Sir she said what did I ask? he said she stared at him blood pumped through body as if she was on fire and she shrugged as words wouldnt come see me after class he said and walked along the front of the class and asked another a boy with his hand raised she watched the teacher and listened to what he was saying about gases and types of gases and the affects and effects and so on and she felt the need to yawn but put her hand over her mouth and let it out secretly as softly as she could she smelt her palm then gazed at the word John scribbled there and with her lips kissed the inked name as if it was he she kissed her lips on his and she felt spittle on her palm and wanted to leave it there so she could pretend it was his spittle and not hers she looked up at the teacher and tried to give the impression of paying attention to his every word the boy had his hand up again as a question was asked and the teacher nodded and smiled then just as she prepared herself for any potential question that may come her way-God forbid- a bell rang for the end of the lesson and a sense of release flowed through her despite having to have stay and see the teacher afterwards there was a movement of books being put into bags and chairs being moved and voices and talking and the slow moving of bodies towards the door but the teacher was eyeing her as she moved towards him her book tucked away in her bag her palm clenched into a loose fist to hide the scribbled John in her palm she stood before the teachers desk and he stared at her sternly Sheila have you something on your mind? she shook her head feeling the need at that moment almost suddenly to urinate well you certainly were not paying attention to the lesson were you? he asked something worrying you? he asked she was going to say something but she didnt know what to say she couldnt say she was thinking of a boy and about if or not he was going to want to kiss her so she said nothing just shrugged her thin shoulders and gave a vacant expression-an expression her mother said indicated a near death experience-you must pay attention the teacher said I am paid to teach you as well as the others the sciences and I feel it is my duty to do my best to do that do you understand? she nodded taking note of the leather patches on the elbows of his jacket brown and sewn on maybe she thought by his wife or mother now please listen Sheila or youll get behind with the lessons Ok? she nodded and he dismissed her and she walked towards the door wondering if the boy would be on the playing field during lunch recess and if she had the nerve to ask him if she could hang around with him and if he would want to kiss her and o my God she thought panicking what if he did and she blushed at the thought and moved along the corridor amongst moving throng of other kids on their way to lunch or home and a bite to eat and she stood thinking of the boy gazing at her black shoed feet.

When the gore began, it was just a flowing river of reddy blood.

Out of an aquamarine fireball of yellow out of the Sahasra,
I was nowhere but inside my head.
IT was pale green and bright indigo all around.
Crowded.
Enchantress Revealing.

Twists and turns did not stop the telepathy.
With a pastel smile on a pale beige brawn, everything blended in flesh and blood of my dreams.
Were it mine?

Or was it that of the girl from the screen?  

For more than a hour, I loved everything that I despised and the other way too.
In fact, I was even one with the smudgy blades of the cooler fan in front.

When it ended, I knew perhaps the rainbows and rainclaps on every planet across the cosmos.
A day after, everything is monochrome with a dash of anger.

1 - Coming Home
You can see the smile of his tiny face already
Before the door has been pushed to;
Feel its cooling warmth.
His ears are up, silken with chocolate velvet
Dependable amber lamps beam at you
Lit delicately
Eitherside a perfect, blackened nose.


#2 - Back From a Walk**
Garbed in the dirt of the arduous chore
Head to paw
Contemptuous smudgy cartouches;
A sickening brown on the cold floor
The chore continues, it unravels
He remains a flaky, filthy burden.

My lips are thin
like the cheap sheets
we slept under last night.
Noses cold and pressed together,
transforming the AC into waves
and ourselves into nobodies.

Nobody sees me punish my lips
for being so small and disappointing .
Tiny pale flakes lie lifeless
on the barely pink slits;
a testimony of my brutality
and the precision of my teeth.
..........................................................­..

Teeth clenched and eyes wide,
I hold the goods in my palm.
Firecracker, Ravish Me Red, Red Door Red.
Ravish Me Red sounds like a good time,
so Ravish Me Red it is.
but I wish I had a fourth.

Four minutes until I see you.
You're always exact.
The clock pleads for me,
but I'm busy glaring at
the familiar rouge strangers on my face
that I can't deny are mine.

My teeth try and fail to resist
The taste of my scarlet-smeared skin
they gnaw and gnaw at their treat,
dressing themselves in Ravish Me Red.
They refuse to be satisfied
until they taste blood.

Blood doesn't match my ruby lipstick
It's smudgy and ugly and I am ashamed.
My face is wet when I open the door.
You ask what's wrong, but you already know.
Through your smile I hear,
"Red isn't really your color."

Color now on your wrists and nose and knees
The red marks you as mine.
It fades from me to you
and leaves my lips naked
but you kiss the tiny pale flakes
that I used to hate.

Last night is blurry in my sleep fogged mind,
through my smudgy black eyes.
But I can feel the ghost
of the awkward,
stumbling,
kisses we shared,
the faint tickle of your hot breath
that whispered down my neck.

Did it really happen?

It is getting colder: deeply, deeply.
November carries a fog as thick as guilt
to set heavily on my brow like a crown.

I piece recollections in a daylight mosaic,
bits of broken glass with ragged edges,
but the colors are dark, the faces unfinished.

A row of bruises on my leg has cropped up
overnight like small brown mushrooms,
I feel the tissue deaden beneath my skin.

The fog comes at dawn like a merciful nurse
to remove me from my own history. It presses
cottonballs against my eyes. The bruises remain.

The bar-lights remain, smudgy windows grinning
out from under their shrouds, dark streets, they
too remain, waiting like a trap under deadleaves.

But did I break myself on him like a bottle last last?
The fog says YOU DID YES YOU DID
and reflects to me the shame of my own face.

"How was your night?"

Drinking,
as usual,
to numb the constant,
dull hum,
of emptiness,
crying by myself,
at the back of the club,
watching my beautiful friends,
with the perfect faces,
find somebody to hold
and love for the night.
Going home by myself,
staring out the smudgy window of the taxi,
wondering if I'll ever make the journey with somebody next to me,
a hand to hold.
Getting into bed as dawn breaks,
just as my heart does the same.

"Fine."

some sit silently.
soaking in the sounds of bells.
acknowledging it.

others, teary-eyed,
watching a bad year subside
into better years.

another, smiling
eyes ablaze with fireworks
of the bright past year.

ev'ryone with pens
and smudgy resolutions,
mapping their future.

buildings shed clothings.
sheets, curtains change like seasons.
posters, promotions.

and it seems:

flipping calendars
unfathomably transform
us happy creatures.

me? if ev'ry day
can be seen as a new year:
oh, happy planet!

Your scrawls slants rightward, with g's that look like s's.
The stamp is always square with the envelope's corner,
and you include the time of composition beneath the date.

Three months apart and I can hardly picture your hands anymore,
the way your left palm must drag behind the pen, leaving this trail
of smudgy footprints that tiptoe around your words.

I read of your dreams: to drive an old convertible down I-15,
listening to Tom Petty– the pinnacle of American existence, you say;
to have a daughter; to still go to concerts at age 40.

You tell me how you designate different books for bedtime
and for doing laundry. Sometimes you secretly listen to Colbie Callait.
And you've found yourself praying lately, most often for us.

You say you are thinking of taking up the banjo,
but will I ever get to watch your fingers wander its strings,
your tongue resting on your lower lip in concentration?

As my eyes scan the lines and I draft my reply, I find myself
wishing for more than a pen-pal-lover; that you would show up
at my door and I could hold the hand that crafts these words.

Your bedtime story version of us begins, "Once upon a time,
there were two extremely attractive, smart, funny, people..."
You wrote that you hope it has a happy ending.

*I hope so too.

Walk not my little dear
on the land so muddy
lest your clothes smear
by the soil smudgy.

You are not born
for the lowly task, like me,
your life is adorn,
instead,
with mirth and glee.

I feel so ashamed
of my sully hands ***** of mud,
how can I wish to touch your cheek
and cuddle it if I could.

But my little princess royale,
my sweetheart, you should know,
that the sapling I sow today
if yours when you grow,

The most precious rose
for my most precious dear
and I care little if remembered
as a mere gardener.

A pair of phantoms hands
clasped and held to center
Symmetrical as Hell.
They pull apart and in their wake drift embers sparks and calcite.
Colors where these hands just were make-out and roll around; they leave their imprints and their stains when they are done.
Out of the unwashed we arrived
A symptom of passionate cries.
None comes from creation besides the thing that we made, just pray that it is ugly in all the right places—we pray, but not I, me, I make eyes at the mirror and punish myself until Hell's tides become shallow ends against mine—then frivolous, yank myself from sinking lifeboat to cloud-nine,
Let helping hand erase my demons, baby, I must be omniscient because I just personally faced damnation and swift rapture all within one bathroom trip.        
I am my own savior
You are the deity I suffer for.
For whom I could create under conditions of such self destruction and from you only disassurances to fuel my flame; watch it ignite
then go out,
Me in a panic,
Rolling newspaper together, heaving in the embers—making winds to toss that heat around, frantic cause I feel the maelstrom tossing inside me and it is quiet, nervous, commonly occurring. You can avoid all of that if you just GO.
No destruction required.
No promises of plans gone unmet if you never promised.
I only exist if you see me
Now shut your eyes: this is the remedy for lame creations.
I will still see you, Deity
You will still make fun of me if I am visible; I will sell fragments of my truth to the same machine that I loathe, and it will churn that truth to muck, my spirit to a discard pile, while my heart and the entirety of my body will belong to you.
Watch dust gather on my lashes as my eyes wait for a clever opening.
Aren't my thoughts eerily possessive?
I think I want to be one of your things so I can watch all of your successes from the shelf, and cover my eyes when you have visitors
Pretend I am a man to you
Not just something that your curiosity alone birthed. What is this blind responsibility I throw at you?
Myself I do not fully recognize, but I won't censor what seems logical to me, though visibly unhealthy.
I'm just trying to explain because avoiding didn't work: you are all that I think about. So much for NEW, maybe improved is still within me.

Ok.
I'm sorry for all of that. Believe it or not I have been trying to be less dramatic lately. Honestly it has been a very long time since feeling comfortable in here. You raided my thoughts long before I ever considered finishing the ******* thought
And then you left, so everything I ever/never said (or read or showed or wrote) to you was wrong and I had to change myself accordingly.
According to every flaw that I could find in myself. Income trouble.
Kids my age aren't supposed to go inward, they are programmed to ****, **** up, and forget. Success is just around the corner!
Don't worry, I'll go back to poetry format soon because this reality **** as it turns out is pretty depressing.
I think we need the
many moany broodings of a teenager who is white and straight—can't even write straight with this inky, ****** pen. That joke works better if you can physically see my notebook and the smudgy black Hell that it embodies. Seriously, it looks like some grabby octopus with parkinson's and seasonal mood swings tried to write the word "parkinsons" in here and then spent four to five hours sobbing about their meaningless existence and self-harming—just deep enough to make the ink drip out and fall into a pattern, maybe good enough to read aloud in public spaces which I would consider an honor in and of its
wobble and of the nerves that fire in like some unsteady chorus.
Still not good enough to sell. So bruised, so heady, Please Howard almighty I am ready
To be shot down in wave after wave of this stupidity. Oh how embarrassing it would be to face a firing squad if she could see; how could I ever imitate your immortality or even just your shine...
Here! More Pretty Words!
Pressure builds and compresses the body performs more or less—a little shaky.
The DANGER is in the mind right next to the safety.
Beneath the skull there is a small office-room plastered with disheveled documents, maybe important, the ones that I hired to clean up in there are actually four well fed cats, using the pages for their waste and spending their days pledging to untangle an endless, brain-sized ball of thread but—you know. at some point.
Right?
Like once they figure out that their cheap new carpeting is getting redder and redder the more that they tug on it. And—also they need to learn the color RED right after we have a professional explain to them what colors are.
Oh! Also. That they are ******* CATS!
Wait—don't leave. Please don't leave!
Wait.
I'll be relatable.                     Wait.
I will only say handsome things.        Wait.
I'll pretend that I am not thinking about you even when your breath is pumping somewhere within the same enclosed facility as mine is.        Wait—
I will shorten my sentences significantly.
You won't even know it's me
Or that my lips could be so sure of anything
While my tongue so eager to betray.

Pencil love
before I saw Flairs
as a child
yellow sticks
smudgy hands
scratching cars and dinosaurs
on plain white paper

Mattress shifts,
Body stirs,
Rousing aromas,
Sizzling bacon,
Roasting ham,
Toasting bread,
Chase scents,
Passed portraits,
Peculiar lady,
No eyebrows,
Oak table,
Four plates,
Polished utensils,
Before meal,
Daily stretching,
Muscle bulge,
Pumping blood,
Refreshing air,
Lake preserves,
Stilled water,
Bouncing beams,
Admiration disrupted,
Distant beeping,
Labored breathing,
Hazy glimpses,
Smudgy edges,
Finally spot,
Collapsing machine,
Tangling cords

i definitely told you at the right time

cold new lips i kissed you at the right time

two years on and i kissed the same place so many times

i lost count of how happy it made me.

i swallowed your tears in so many different lights

a waltzer of a moment, i heard **** jagger

i heard the melody of mens voices, i heard every key and every shift

dazzled and dizzy in light and dark and in mud and rain and

smudgy warmth

i heard a buzz so loud it turned into vision

and everything was a spinning top

i heard everything i’d ever heard and seen everything i’d ever seen

and i held your hand like i was about to get pulled away any second

in the avalanche

i saw your beautiful important face so many times

shouting at the sea, in the palm of my hand, in grass

in pillow, on the back of everybody i ever meet

in love i licked all the salt away every time

i couldn’t tell whether it was the rain or the sea spray or tears

and i thought about this every time we kissed

and i thought about how it didn’t matter to me at all

we lived in an electric moment that fizzled ultraviolet for half a second

and i painted that second

so i could prove to everybody i met

that it happened

that this is kind of how it looked

to be on the tip of a hurricane looking down at the chaos

and being happy just for the excuse

to hold hands

Leafy Labor Day and Summer’s Last Dragon*

In a happier world, children this day,
Barefoot children, running about in play
Would pause now at the end of summer time -
New school supplies from the old five-and-dime

Write those first smudgy lines with a new ink-pen
For tomorrow the new school year takes in
And count their cedar pencils, one, two, three
Then out again to the Robin Hood tree

A wooden sword, and a dragon to slay
In a happier world, children this day

(Their Robin Hood wants to slay a dragon,
and so a wrathful dragon slain shall be;
Little children know best about these things)

carved or etched or pencilled
carved sounds more committed
deeper than the usual
to etch into metal sounds difficult
use of a pencil sounds soft and smudgy