"So how do you feel about
Not being invited to your sister's wedding?"
Such was the question he had asked one Saturday in his kitchen.
It was a tactless premise to
The dispelling of his unwanted wisdom
For such was his manner
Of seeking ways to tell us all how best for us to do
"Thus and so,"
Even in matters that he knew not
Hence the thoughtless question
Which yes, he actually asked
Causing them to flinch in pain at the recollection
That they had been so wilfully forgotten
By someone whom they both loved dearly

"Darling Guillaume, grace me with your presence for a quick moment?"

The man beckons, inviting warmly with a graceful tone you've come to recognize as a safe place. "Yes?" you speak before reaching him, the sound of your voice somewhat faint to him as you turn to enter the kitchen, your response lingering in the hallway.
The windows are open. The air is fresh, clean and cool. The breeze is swimming in, tugging ever so gently at a lock of the man's hair, golden strands hovering for a moment before falling back into place.

You are seventeen years young, your skin is tight around your neck and your wrists feel no pain. This is your apartment. There are fruits on the counter, some of them you don't remember buying. That's because you didn't.
The red grapes- next to your preferred white grapes- are his. There are also slices of watermelon in the fridge, along with some strawberries and a small jar of cherries that seems to never empty.
He hardly ever bakes anything and when he does, it's always something that can be eaten cool. Nothing too warm for him, though you've seen that hot chocolate is an exception to that rule. He loves fruit and cold drinks, has a terrible sweet tooth and is absolutely shameless about it. He smiles often and when he laughs, you feel he is the very embodiment of joy.

You brush a lock behind your ear before he turns from the counter quickly to face you. You both have similar hair; his is a few inches longer, curls less than yours, and is a visibly lighter shade than your dark mane. Yours is shorter, curling inwards as it rests on your shoulders.
The man gazes into you; he is never afraid of eye contact. You aren't either, but given that you consider him in many ways a stranger still, it's slightly unnerving, and gives you the impression that he has a certain power that he well knows cannot be subdued. Confidence some would call it.
As for ****** similarities, there are some, not that they're very pronounced. You both have light eyes, but yours are a deep blue with chestnut and chocolate overtones, often appearing emerald green under certain lighting; much more earthly than his- an almost unnatural, true green that shines harlequin under dim lighting, like a cat's eyes glowing under the moonlight.
He seems particularly happy right now, and you can't tell if his cheerful demeanor (though not unusual) is him being in an especially playful mood today or a hint of what's to come. That is to say, another lesson.

"Hold this egg for me, will you?"

You do as you're told, looking around in an attempt to distract yourself while you wait. You don't know what you're waiting for exactly, but you assume it will only take a minute. The kitchen is illuminated completely, very bright. It's a lovely day, sunny and perfect for a walk, you think. Maybe you'll go out later.
You hold the egg for exactly five seconds before realizing the man is staring at you- smiling beautifully with what some might mistake as bedroom eyes; but you know better.

"...What?" you ask, your voice small suddenly. A smile slowly tugs the corners of your lips and you resist, both out of embarrassment and stubbornness; you don't want to submit so easily. It's quite noticeable- you couldn't hide it well, but he isn't offended in the slightest. You are, after all, so very young. He expects you to have this kind of- rather charming- behavior, and accepts it fully.

"Feel it."

He speaks quietly but with sparkling, eager eyes, like he's about to let you in on some grand, fascinating secret, and you are reminded of a dear friend.
Being a memory you visit often, it takes half a second to remember it clearly- your best friend- running towards you, tie bouncing on his chest. He wears his school uniform, it's lunchtime, and he is eager to tell you how he's found the perfect spot to relax (or study, if needed) during this hour. "You both make for a funny sight, you know!" you'd have friends tell you often. You weren't very eager to admit it then, but it's true. You can picture it now- tall, lanky, grinning class president next to short, grumpy, quiet you. Ah, the memories.
You've both been busy, settling into lives completely independent from the help of your parents. You make a mental note to call him when you have the time.

You stroke the egg with your thumb, gazing at it intently. There's something the man wants you to know and he's not going to give you the answer on a silver platter- it's not that easy, you've learned that by now. He's played games like this before where he begins a conversation suddenly- often starting with an odd, seemingly-out-of-place question- with the intention of teaching you something.
He is strict in his belief that answers should not be given but found, and if one wishes to teach something, one should guide the other to help them understand, but never lead the way. Leading would result in the thought that lessons are a destination- and that isn't the case at all. To simply give you an answer is a sin to this man, and maybe this is why you've learned so much with him.
You want your answer to please him. Yes, and that may be difficult- because at this point, there is simply no way for you to know what the correct answer could possibly be.
No matter. You'll have to work with what you have at the moment. That being, not much.

"It's... smooth."

To that, he smiles with his eyes. You don't know it, but he's very happy with your answer. Partly because he never asked a question in the first place, and your attempt to answer something that has yet to be asked is, in his opinion, a sign of a good student- one willing to learn.

"Mm. It is." He takes the egg from your hands, holding it a few inches away from his chin and observing it for the entirety of two seconds before turning his gaze to you.
His face betrays the look of a father determined to put his son on the right path; a look that says "I will not let you go until you have understood".
But he's too gentle for that. You know he'd let you go if you ever spoke of wanting to stop a lesson. Not that that's happened before. He's always so tactful that you never have reason to feel uncomfortable around him. You appreciate it; you're not terribly tolerant of tactless people, even if you do feel quite guilty about it, especially when they do seem to be trying. C'est la vie.

He is silent for a short moment, his voice replaced by the distant laughter of children playing outside. It's then that you notice the cherry.
The single red fruit, small and unassuming, sat just behind him on the counter, closer to the window than him, and you wonder for a moment if he was planning to eat it before calling you to talk. You're vaguely alarmed at the thought, for cherries aren't something he will eat often, and you've noticed that they seem to be reserved for what appear to be private special occasions- he will sometimes eat a single cherry while deep in thought, staring out the window (you've caught him people-watching a few times like this), and you wonder if he was thinking about you this time, and dropped the cherry to have some sort of urgent talk with you.
However, that doesn't seem to be the case, so you push the thought aside, unconsciously replacing it with one of your favorite memories of the man-
"Cherries are dangerous," you recall him explaining one day, "they are toxic in their excessive sweetness. Eat no more than two a week, or you'll be taken by the cherry man!" You never forgot that conversation, although it’s whimsical charm wasn’t the reason why- it drilled itself into your memory the moment you realized two very interesting things.
The first being that by "cherry man", he meant the Devil, and the second being more of a doubt than anything else- cherries are not that sweet. His argument would make more sense if he was talking about cake, for example. Whenever this memory surfaces, there is always a vague sense of confusion and wariness hidden just under the more pleasant feelings you prefer having. Nevertheless, the general sentiment in his words is that excess can be detrimental to the soul. "Greed is a terrible sin, you know." And this is why the cherry jar never empties.

"Hellooo..."
Oh- goodness, he's waving his hand in front of you. You blink a few times, responding with a rather ungraceful 'Huh?', blushing slightly from the embarrassment.

"Where did you go?" He's chuckling as he asks, and you can feel the warmth on your cheeks.

"Ah, nowhere."

He smirks with a small "hmph", before giving you a proper smile, pausing to let you come back to him fully before continuing, egg held up in his hand:

"What is the egg now, Guillaume?"

You look at it, held between his middle, index finger and thumb. What is the egg now. What a strange question. Of course, it isn't as strange coming from him; you don't think you'll ever get used to his odd lessons, but his behavior when teaching you things nobody else would is something you've come to expect by now.
What is the egg? It isn't an elephant, it isn't square. There are many things it isn't, sure. You search in your head for a possible answer, one he'll deem correct, 'till you decide on-

"It's nothing."

-a dishonest one.
For someone who's not very tolerant of tactlessness, that sure was, well, tactless. Why did you say that? Insincere and blurted out without any thought. He takes notice immediately, and you wordlessly apologize profusely, combing your fingers through your hair and avoiding eye contact.

He's much older than you. He's also wise- wiser than most people his age, you think. Whatever the man wants to teach you, it's obviously something he already fully understands. The fact that he knows more than you however, does not mean you are below him; he never wants you to do anything for the sake of pleasing him and what you've done just now is exactly that. He can, however, sympathize- he's a perfectionist himself and understands the desire to do things right. There is a time and place for everything though; an order, and what you've shown now is good intention misplaced, which is a potentially dangerous thing.
He has no concerns regarding the acceptance of chaos when it is necessary,
that isn't the problem. The problem is that your dishonesty is chaos in a situation that warrants order.

"I don't want you to try to please me, Guillaume. I welcome incorrect answers so long as they are entirely honest."

There is a pause, and he sighs before remembering just how young you are. He realizes you might have accepted him as a parental figure or mentor of sorts by now, and it's an honor, really- you're a bright boy and he enjoys your company very much.
Your accepting him as a parental figure however, does not give him the right to scold you; no, that would horrible. If you will learn, it'll only be because you will allow him to teach you. He must never force his way into you.

"Look at me." His voice is firm but gentle.
You hesitate for a second, but whatever you were feeling is gone the moment you notice his expression- warm and inviting; "try again" it says. You are willing to now.

"You can see the egg, can you not? Surely it isn't nothing if it's still a part of your reality. You see an egg, and that still makes it one."
He hides it behind his back, and you are confused at the action but eager to understand. You give him a questioning look and he smiles before giving you an answer.

"What is the egg now?"

With a question, anyway.
You think long and hard, silently focusing all your attention on the creases of his shirt. You stare at the man's chest for a full minute and a half, determined not to make the same mistake again. You will answer honestly, yes; but you will also impress him- and possibly yourself- with a good answer.
The subject isn't exactly new or difficult for him, you're sure. He will sometimes leave the house and not return for a day or two and when questioned, responds with an inconclusive "Mm. Studying." You still aren't sure what that means and you feel it's best not to think too much about it, but surely it has something to do with these lessons of his, no?
He's obviously studied this before, you think; you are operating on a much lower level than him and have a vague awareness of this. It just isn't as pronounced because the man insists on treating you as his equal. As far as he's concerned, you are both students capable of learning from each other every day. You hope to one day teach him something, and not by accident, as it tends to happen. Soon, perhaps. Maybe now.
You look up at him with a determined look on your face, satisfied with your conclusion.

"An idea. The egg is an idea-"

"Why?"

You barely finish saying your answer when he's already questioning your reasoning. You'd be nervous if you didn't already know that his bluntness wasn't the result of annoyance, but of curiosity. He is eager to teach, yes, but he is more eager to learn. After all, a good teacher hasn't accomplished much if they haven't learned anything from their student.
New ideas need to exist. In conversation, one should always aim to walk away with new information, a new perspective. Sometimes this information is given to you, other times you must take it; something he's given you is the ability to think more critically. He's all but trained you to do so. It's much easier now to get into this mindset than it was when you first met the man. You're glad to have had the chance to practice this sort of thing at all; you don't think you could have done it with anyone else.

"Because there is ultimately no way for me to know if the egg still exists."

There really is no way to be sure.
The egg isn't a part of you any longer. You can no longer see it, or touch it. You can't hear it, either. It isn't there anymore and having seen it being hidden, all that there is now is the suggestion of it's existence.
Your answer was truthful and concise and you feel nothing else need be explained. When you search the man's face for any signs of contentment, you find none. No, what you find is something quite different. An absolutely luscious smile, and those bedroom eyes.
His voice turns low and he speaks clearer- a calm tone of voice that would make anyone submit if he asked them to.
He's challenging you. Both begging and demanding you to win.

"But I know the egg exists. I am telling you it does. Am I lying?"

His voice could be very seductive sometimes. Especially at times like this, when daring you to step further into his world.
His world. One that was always bright and pleasant and hid something underneath- a barely audible humming that you've managed to ignore until very recently. If there was such a thing as feeling a lack of light despite there physically being none, you felt it every time the man dared you to chase him into his labyrinth.
There was just something very visceral that would bleed through sometimes; in his eyes, his hand gestures, in his voice.

"It doesn't matter." you tell him, your words quick and blunt.
He is amused. Shocked, even. You push away the rising bravado before it fully shows; don't want to jinx it now.
Eyebrows raised, he gives you an impressed "Oh?" and you continue, clarifying to back up your risky (despite yielding good results) answer.

"Assuming you are holding it in your hand right now, it's still an egg to you. By the mere act of touching it, it becomes a part of your realm of understanding; it exists to you, right now, as what it is- an egg."

You can't see it of course, but he's mindlessly stroking it with his thumb now, much like how you did at the start of this conversation. Both his hands are behind his back, resting on the counter he leans on. He listens intently.

"...You tell me it still exists, but that doesn't change what it's become to me. It stopped being an egg the moment you hid it from me. No matter what you know to be true, that reality isn't always going to be a shared one.
You have an egg, I have an idea."

There can be many correct answers, he thinks. He doesn't believe in there being a single, ultimate truth about anything. If the self is all one can know, why is one's understanding of the universe not considered a reality in itself, one separated from what most consider the only reality? Your explanation follows this concept and he's thrilled tha

the rain sifts through my attempts
to grasp it with mere hands:
one cannot understand
without going through its constant
shift and change of faces.
As to another, one learns
to ask the right questions,
naturally, at the opportune time.
Like in all things
Every conversation
Which pass through us
Were never truly there.
Those that do stay are bereft
of meaning.

What remains often
is the damp, moistness
of the late -ber month showers:
regret, loss, a tactless remark.
They share the same fate in all
of this, the slow, uptake for words:
closure, a second chance, a bad joke
like the heavy traffic we always have
to endure - a cartload heavy
-laden with stockpiled souvenirs
with no particular use except
for reminiscing, a flickering hope
for the last bus ride home.

One day, you will
miss all of this.
And the only thing
that is left to endure,
is memory.

14 October 2017

You have one headphone in the left,
the radio in the right
as a stranger drives measures in clefts of night.

Kiss him how your feet kiss sand or
a soloist breaks off from the band
until the pianist beckons him back,
tuning deft fingers to a single track.

Open your ears to sound’s wordless talk,
beats in a measure a half-step off.
Blue’s lips tactless, ******* you down,
Blue’s lips fastening ankles to ground.

Then sudden and brace;
a rock in the road,
an anchor thrown
as you're caught between verses and words you don’t know.

Then sudden, the break;
pianist's mistake.
Notes shift under toe as the ocean lets go.

My auspicious and audacious assault augments the annoyance of aged accomplices.

My bodacious broadside of boffolas berates and buffaloes bros beneficently.

A classy crusade Clownishly chiseling and criticizing childishness.

A devilish ******* of dillydallying dullards; devoutly denying dimwits the dulcet dream of defiance.

Excessive, exuberant edification, ebulliently eliminating education-evictees.

A fair-weather frolic in flippancy with furious fools floundering in flawed foppishness.

Gregariously grating glum guys gleefully, growing grander garnishes of gripping gallantry gaily.

Heckling hooligans highlights my heavenly humor.

Irreverently irking irritable, iniquitous idiots in inestimably infuriating and incredible instances.

A jolly, jocular **** joking with jerks.

A kreiger kicking kleptomaniacs in the karyotype. (Cut me some slack, this is 'k', after all.)

A ludicrous, laughing lambaste of lollygagging lunatics, loftily loosing luscious lunacy on lucky losers.

A magnificent masterpiece of malfeasance, a monstrous, malevolent mission of massive misfortune for the minor minors missing no malicious missive.

A noxious, narcissistic niggling of nitwits, niftily nixing the noisome naivete of niggardly nobs.

An offhand, off-color outburst of outlandish observations to outclass the obnoxious overtures of obsequious offal.

A pragmatic prediction of possible platitudes or platypi, a placid parley of pyrotechnic pleasantries provoking Pyrrhic protections by prurient prats.

A quixotic quibble quarreling with a queer quarry.

Ribald ribbing, ruining the robust reality of the repreachful, repugnant, and rapacious with risque ridiculousness.

A silly, slighting slander of sluglike slavishness, succinctly sinking sloppy simpletons sourly.

Tracing the titillating talent of towing tyranny to towering terrors to tactless, togless, terrapins of the times.

I have come to succumb to a certain cliché, a cache of questions that so often seem to scuff the dance floor of adultolescents. “Who am I?” of course, a major inquiry but more importantly, “Who do I want to be?” and what am I becoming and when I become it, will it become me or will I not even want it…like a portrait of my mother…tattooed to my ***, her dear old face like some wretched rash (truly I’m not that crass). So I am scared of tomorrow and uncertain of now but everything used to be fine, so allow me to go back just a bit, to when I was, say about… FIVE.

I remember reclining on my grandmother’s couch in Hoboken, New Jersey watching star wars, I believe it was episode FIVE. Her apartment smelt of ***** and rice and beans and that reek of regret that rises from the corpses of broken dreams, and I can still see the light from the T.V. screen illuminating every corner of her living room, from the bookshelf, to the door with the welcome mat--an ironic greeter--to the picture of Jesus perched over the heater smiling down on and blessing the liars and cheaters who so often filled that room with soiled consciences and beaters. So there I was, I was FIVE, and I can clearly recall what I wanted to be, who I wanted to be in that moment: A Jedi! Oh it was a long time ago and it was far, far away, but I can still see the look on my grandmother’s face as I raced through space with my light saber broom beating Sith with a stick, protecting the room from Vader’s invaders making storm trooper stew, my weapon—my whisk; my rivals—my roux; the force—the flames, to boil the brew and the voice of my father at forty FIVE years of age telling me to quit messing around. And I said with a wave of my hand, “No, you quit messing around.” He said, “Why don’t you be a Firefighter?” I said, “no!”  “Why not a football player?” I said, “no!” “Jedi’s can’t marry. Jedi’s get lonely.” I said, “I want to be a Jedi and a Jedi only!” But like fire and fog and old Ben Kenobi, ideas like this must eventually fade.

So I grew to, I’d say about ten years old, that’s FIVE plus FIVE moving on to grade FIVE. Picture, if you will, me—the shortest kid on the little league baseball team, with grand aspirations; huge heaps of vivacity, and a strike zone too small for those poor umpires to see and I knew—I KNEW who I wanted to be: A baseball player! And an actor. A writer, crime fighter—the Jack Bower type who’s always in danger—a **** Tracy with *****; a heterosexual power ranger. Oh and an astronaut chef with a part time job as a rapper who talks about ******* and death and riches and **** holding the mic in my right and my junk in my left a protection of the kids in the crowd who might see my ******* brought about due to... back up dancers. Oh, and the president of the United States as well.

Now let’s jump to fifteen, that’s FIVE plus FIVE plus FIVE, I was a freshman in high school and still a freshman in life. But neither of these were important you see, and I rather gave up on the prospect of “me.” I traded my goals for an xbox which came with a discounted dose of apathy. ‘Cause high school is brimming with a bizarre batch of habits. When forced to attend one must endure or adapt it’s those tactless tactics those impractical practices; each pupil’s polluted with perturbing antics. So for much of that year I stayed home ignoring the mornings who tried to tell me I was alive and forgetting the spinning of the earth in its lonely slow dance to the daily tune of nine to FIVE.

I did outgrow that depressing stage. And now, here I am pushing twenty. That’s FIVE plus FIVE plus FIVE plus…it’s hard to believe but believe it I must. But these fingers that wipe away tears when I cry and fight, call for peace, encourage, deride, make decisions, rock hard, and swat away flies, shake hands, ask questions, and give high FIVES are so ******* familiar. So you see, I have put a great deal of thought into this and I think what I want to be is… FIVE.

Don’t you remember? When wherever you lived was the tip of the world, every rock you found was a glimmering pearl, and every face pointed at you grinned with jealous geniality. When Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, Jesus Christ, and easy money all had proper places in reality. When bunk beds were marvels standing miles from the floor and the little things were the greatest things on earth, and “stupid” was a swear word, each trip was an adventure, and every pocket was a candy cluttered purse. Grass was green not “getting too long to maintain” and skies were blue not “looking like they might bring rain” There was no need to feign a demeanor, there were no chains. You were unbound. And pain was a temporary hiatus from satisfaction…not the other way around. Everyone loved you, whether they loved you or not. No one judged you for your blindingly ignorant smile. You were pancakes and balloons and Saturday morning cartoons and guilt-free, care-free love—you were a child.

I don’t want to go back to that time in my life. I have no desire to swap my mind for comfortable bliss. What I want is to close my eyes for just FIVE seconds and when I open them again, the world will be new.

I know about lying on broken bones, beading into my back.
She was missing something.
She was lying on hands searching through the trench coat of a bathroom romance, watching butterflies melt,
She was becoming herself
At four thirty am I write her account, embroidered in a diary of lullabies,
“this is what death must feel like, being  left alone in a street screaming of footsteps and blacked out whispering.”
She threw deliverance, caked over old vengeance, out of the car window with daybreak’s kisses. She writes,
“I sit in the heavy sleet of the delta drowning in resurrection, grime from age wipes over me once,
twice,
The broken blood pools out of ‘I love you’s’ and islets.”
She slept with the darkness.
“Prayers don’t come for me anymore.”
She glitters, shivers, tactless as a teacup in an earthquake,
She is awake.
”I am awake.”
She documents God- "I feel God,"
- in herself. "In myself.”
There is a silence.
A burning, left, cold to dry alone,

This is for her.
Call it, my face, swathed in the impenetrable darkness when it is no longer my own, call it an aunt’s love when a mother’s doesn’t suffice any longer. Call it,
cigarette buds and elevator rides to death’s door. Call it power bubbling up from the violation.
This is for you; call it Cuban cigars, show tunes, and Marylyn Monroe;
call it misery. Missing, call it hues and paint, my life prostrated on a disgruntled canvas. Call it fate.

This is for you.
Call it liquor stains and tarot cards in a fit of ecstasy. Epilepsy, call it the most intricate balancing act of existence.
An unseen performance, a lyric with no voice,
“a cry in the night”
”a scream of supplication”
The hunters’ march to death, the Holy Grail’s melting between your fingers, civilization pouring through veins,
“death, destruction, life, happiness, Azrael, Abbadon, blood, Rome!”
“I don’t want to feel this!”
Call it whispers of unspoken meetings and witches in the night, threatening,
“I know you!”
“No you don’t! Leave me alone.” Recognition. “I don’t want to listen…”
She writes,
“I loved you…
On purpose and…you left me,
with,
myself.”

embarrassing

my mistake
rolling from under
trapped sheets
exposing
my lady bits

my mistake

so tactless
to pretend
we had been
intimate

so tactless

my mistake

embarrassing

These autumn sunrises bring a remnant

Of cool spring mornings we spent
In 
moments of content, encompassing silence.

What is the foundation of this feeling

You once claimed to brand me with

Inside other lips?

The truth comes out,
coated in masks,

And unknown hopes,

That we have already proved to be wrong.

Can we rewind?
Can I bring your mind

To understand the beauty of the present?

Will ghosts always follow the trace of footprints

You left when you took flight from me?

But this language of ****** magnolias dipped in salty water

Recognizes the impossibility within her pleadings.

How selfish I become with the possibility of magnificent love.

Perhaps all I do to you now is inflict pain upon the

Wary navigator who sails the ocean of your soul.

I feel the weight of your ship sink into the water well of my mind.
I let it sink into my numb mind.
This juxtaposition fills my veins with anxiety,
For all that places itself in my hands
Quickly dissipates, melting under my overbearing love
And insecure need to be fully loved.

This has led to a natural novocain,
Which I am unable to keep from filling my blood,
And infecting the dear heart within my ribs
With nothingness.

I sink into the comfortable, encompassing black
With a blank stare and shiny scars.
Reminders that this abyss,
Often leads to insomniac slicing.
Watching my own blood leak out with happiness.
Sickfully joyful to see my liveliness,
Praying the physical will call upon frozen passion.

This is the secret.
This is how I could bear to look at you for years without emotion.
Your love sang too true for my many masks to survive,
And my fear of feeling became cold, guilty friendship.
Perhaps, my guilt hoped for your understanding.
I just couldn't commit you to my own insanity.
Too many times have I tried to find fulfillment in lips,
I would never permit inside the lost water well.
You were better off without my tactless attempts at love.
Perhaps, that remains the reality…
Doubt haunts determination.
My difficulty in recovering our old language
Begins to overshadow my bright hope.

So now I contemplate the truth in my journey.
Am I merely chasing down your ghosts
Fighting to show you the value of your own love,
When you are so pridefully aware of its worth.
I wonder if you have ever truly observed my own love?

It existed, long ago, once within childhood
And then transformed into trapped, teenage hubris;
Prideful of my naivety, and what I then called fate.
But almost all evidence has been destroyed,
Out of selfish preservation.
How could I expect you to understand,
I only continue to breathe to rebel against these violent memories.

Yet, my fearful pride continuously tears at my honest ambition.
So, I call upon rhythm to release me.
Bon Iver breaks all my honor,
Evoking all memories of my ******.
Moments of time I keep deep in my silent sorrow.
Only this particular pain,
Allows me to isolate my words,
And continue singing.
I realize I have become lost in the water well.
When will this precarious ego finally shatter?

The silence returns to the mountain night.
Frigid, soft breeze breaks my blank stare,
As I fight with my twisted nature.
I continue to hold out my hand,
Shaking and trembling,
As you stare at me with shocked confusion.
I am no good with promises of the future.
So, I remain in the present,
And believe,
In the vulnerable emotion,
You unconsciously paint upon me.

I want to fix everything all the time
Maybe that's why I'm greying early.
Anxiety only feels good when I commit crimes
Ironically, because it's always there in me.
I think when I'm thirty I'll be bald
Alopecia will hit me by the time I'm twenty five
Can't breathe with palpitations, or so they're called
With these heart murmurs, I'm amazed I'm still alive.
Nostalgia makes me laugh and cry simultaneously
I know I take myself far too seriously
I'm tired of holding and losing things near and dear to me
Like acid drops and alcohol my blood's relatively
A relevancy and tell me, do I look infected to you?
I hide behind pastimes and impulsive rap lines
But nothing in the world could be farther from the truth
With smashed cats on road sides and fast forgotten rhymes, I
Wake up to Jim beam smiling over me
Cover leaves and evergreens childishly wind chime
I two-time everyone I meet to some subtle degree
And I've told my mom to die one too many times
But it's cool because without these angst phases
I'd have no words to express the connectable times
Which are the worst times, remember what I say
LSD and new Mexico make me want to fly away

Do I have a clue what I'm doing when I'm drinking at six thirty in the morning?

Today, around noon, I met true doom
On the train tracks of my Oklahoma culdesac
There was a dog split in four separate pieces
And though it was full of countless diseases
I thought Jesus, no one needs to see that
Considering the fabulous place we live at
So we picked up his leg and his two ******* torsos
And his head was twelve feet away from the track, more so
Rotten his teeth crushed, his spirit forgotten
Sought for life out of the fences he was brought in
Though we looked, no collar was around
So we put the poor ******* three feet underground
Brian cline built a cross (he was tossed)
And lost and crossed the best friend he fought
And I forgot for a minute the duties I hate
Because for once I did something that needed no reinstatement
Mourning wood does no good and frankly neither do I
Because when mom drinks she drives, and it puts suicide in my mind
But I got other options left to use
My throbbing ******* is sore, my bush blue and abused
Tattoo bleeding through, misconstrued my good graces
All these racists are faceless, playing miss Ohio's nameless
At full blast, backward, like present turned to past
If it were that simple, God knows maybe I'd last.

Do I have a clue what I'm doing
When I'm drinking at six thirty in the morning?

Bible belt majority, getting snotty and disorderly
Conformity torturing me, the owls hooting quarterly
In minutes, it's finished, let'***** it and stick it
This sickness is missing a home and I can't ****
Coffee in my *** is uncomfortable, but a necessity, like a
Suppository, strapped down the old man, the orderlies
Are ornery. I'm ***** but I'm tired of ***
Wishing I could love someone I've never really met
I can't rest at night with these relentless dreams
Waking me up with cold sweats and hoarse screams
My mind is reamed by the thought of Lucy in the mail
All the while hoping my friends keep themselves out of jail
I know this isn't hell, but I still feel like I'll fail
Chasing my own tail out of the fear that this isn't real
And don't tell me these restless moments are just deja vu
I know I saw all this coming when I was dazed in my youth
Swollen lymph nodes in my neck and in my back
Blowin smoke right back, who will be the first to act?
I'm tactless and laughless, and hapless, this mattress
Had lasted, in fact it's madness, this last kiss?
I've wracked it and cracked it with no decryption key
With all this frustration flying around, no one can hit me
But you scream all the way up the staircase
And I hope to the devil I never forget your face.

Once upon a time, there was me:
A simpleton of no account,
A dunderhead by word of mouth,
An addle-pate, a cracking crock,
A crazy who deserved a lock.
Not pretty, brainy, or well-bred,
Bespectacled, a short redhead
With hands too small and far too pink
Who’d trip or fall as soon as think.
Not many prospects, they declared
With such conviction I was scared.
But the cast was short one role,
The one who’d make the halfwit whole . . .

Once upon a time, there was you:
A lord of state, of high esteem,
The answer to each maiden’s dream,
A strong man, raven-haired, and tall?
No, not this person, not at all.
You had glasses just like me,
And freckles where your skin should be.
Your clothes were rumpled, torn and tattered
Not as though that even mattered:
You walked on set and came to me
You got down on one gawky knee
You took my pink hand in your red
And, as you fixed your glasses, said:
“I love your hands, your height, your hair,
I love you up, down, everywhere.
And I hesitate to ask you this . . .
But could I maybe have a kiss?”
And, for once, my tactless lips
Did not resort to stumbling slips;
I gave you one, I gave you two,
I gave every kiss I had to you.

Once upon a time, there was us:*
Two simpletons of no repute
Two dunderheads whose names were moot:
Prince Not-So-Charming and his *****.
And much as cynics tried to drench
The flames of addle-pated glee
I found in you and you in me,
As much as they enjoyed pretending,
They could not harm our happy ending.

if god is dead,
then poetry is nought: but suicide.

could it be the evermore question, a year from now
the same autumn will rinse the lands of once budding colour,
and stretch, as the eye can see, the witry skeletons,
where once the birds nested their young in bulbs of harvested
twigs  bundled up? for what if the wintry tree, if not
the last remnants of the airs of spring,
a lizardly womb of flight...
   so the paupers of Rome argue
about the benefits of monogamy,
as they might about monotheism...
and they say monogamy is not "natural",
but what is? why take the burden of
a widower swan, why extract monogamy from
swans and later find the harem of monkeys?
and then simply say: it be unnatural... why?
we were never gracious enough to mirror
swans, hence the brothers Grimm and the
ugly duckling mistook...
        oh wagers of the translated Graeae
of Scotland, where it Hamlet on the couch,
or where it Macbeth?
what matters is how populist media makes
a franchise of a form of athletics that cannot bed
a guised look of despondency -
      puritan saxon conference on sexuality
that gone beyond the ******* use:
***** therefore thinking,
            flaccid therefore not thinking...
you can utilise language to a point where mathematical
certainty is given, as is the missing blemish of
woad... no wonder the Saxon maidens
    retain their virginity at home,
but treat themselves for a nibble of the Magdalene
on the isle of Malaga... puritanism disintegrates
2 weeks in...
                   and still they bemoan,
if they have been growing more and more depressed
since the second world war...
                why allow them to create this viral infection
that's like a virus ingested by unsuspecting
       victims... are they not the ones
prescribing premature depression since they
heaved no foetus in their womb?
          and having done so, are clear of the command:
remove that alien **** from me!
   aren't they?
       if god is dead... all those who write poetry
have committed suicide...
           i once made a lament statement:
given that god is dead, then so is poetry,
i don't which is more lamentable...
but i'm sure to spot a few more eager-beavers of
kneeling and prayer than i'm to see poets...
and can i return to the heights having sunk so low?
      evidently i didn't sulk on my way down,
could poetry ever be tamed with no populist
acrimony? no *auld lang syne?
      i doubt it...              i very much doubt
a care for anything else sing-along astute than that,
for all i can compete with, is, some sort
of individual... a shadowy statuette...
         it's what's called the reverse of having a heart
for the cardiologist, a brain for the neurosurgeon,
a pathology for the psychiatrists,
  an ambition for the philosopher (mistook them
as humanists you have, for those that are simply
relegated from the realms of language by linguists) -
  for the oncologist that's hardly an ontologist....
swans epitome monogamy with the widower...
apes are Islam with the harem...
          and they say gods do not exist...
but if one sees no god, how is one to replica
a god's existence, if man borrows from the purest
sense of plagiarism that hides no legal documents
enforcing a slack on plagiarism, namely that of anima /
animal? man cannot grasp a concept of god
by sacrificing himself on the altar of imitable animal...
swans have their monogamy... man too presumptuous
also chose swans as the guiding beacon...
softened core, a mongrel of mammal and lizard
that the birds became... furry but borne from
a cracking of the eggshell... man too presumptuous...
he looked elsewhere to no visionary guide since
Narcissus: for mythology is the guiding hand of
new poetry, should god be indeed dead, and poetry
akin to that statement be merely suicide...
then at least mythology is equivalent of history
for poetry... at least there is a logic involved..
   for assuredly should god be dead,
and chlorophyll as pointless as the logic of bio:
be that of life outside one's own graphic or within
one's graphic... should life be nothing more
than the tactless usurping of history that is merely
a blank hole between the omni toward a speciem,
then why have we bothered recording history?
of all scientific theories, of all that rampantly
degrade all human dignity, why create a despotism
within science, that constantly repeats itself
to be overvalued, for reasons that suggests:
en masse applicability due to its pictorial invigoration
for a cruising simplicity? i gather this be a reason
for the emergence of technophobes, or men equipped
to war armed with nothing but sticks!
it's one thing to popularise an idea, later morphed
into a theory, then morphed into an ideology
(an idea that recurs persistently and has no
theoretical basis to not succumb to its theoretical
premise of becoming dodo - the theory of evolution
doesn't take into context the notion that it too can
become extinct... surpassed by something more
invigorating)... later morphed into a shiva
construct that destroys itself...
          we've seen 20th century's pinnacle of this
idea... we've seen eugenics emerge from a pristine
monkish background that said: how best
to economise the case of: the accurate *****-count...
is Darwinism the zenith of invigorating man?
              i find it's too arrogant to even imagine
a square tilting into a rhombus...
       suggesting a rectangle...
       but the days of roaming the Savannah are long gone
and past us... the dependency on oil and gas
and central heating has created a prison-like Akeley...
from what we've inherited, toward what we can
expect, or with suspicion: demand.
            and to think having begun erasing history,
and to think, having erased history of what's noteworthy,
we turned the slapped cheek into a cubist abstraction:
it seems pointless naming pubs after Charlemagne
(shar-le-maine) let alone singing about them...
let's all celebrate running ****-naked on a Kenyan
plateau... and rather than dealing with the past
on a poetic scale... rather: on a literalist scaling of things...
it's almost like biblical literalism kinetics....
     in either case: everyday poetry dies...
or as the case is minded to refresh the argument:
    with the death of god, poetry committed suicide...
i don't know which is the more tragic evidence
of what language has become...
                     this doesn't even invoke an analysis
of the marketplace use of language that politics is...
god forbid it should ever come to that...
  aren't we supposed to feel something otherworldly
at some point in our lives?
                     it's not that i can't rationalise my existence
into this world alone... and feel all the contentment
i need by mere concern for thought trickling into my
being within it...
            it's just that i can't rationalise my existence within
this world alone, based upon a hierarchical
          symptom... much akin to Guy "Lucifer" Fawkes
tried to state by blowing the houses of parliament...
which doesn't suggest a need for a celestial conjuring
of dictator... man has already encouraged that
with English 24/7 c.c.t.v.,
                                                   and as might be suggested...
the point you reach when catching yourself trying
to persuade or enforce a point...
         that lacks all emotive sensitivity hoping for
a romantic excavation invoking the zeitgeist of the times...
neo-romantics are on the rise...
                            we do live in a time of neo-romanticism,
as a few might have suggested: globalisation's
and the audaciousness of militant Islam's offspring:
lying dormant, like a speech by Pope Urban II:
     it just lay there, under a fog of submerged Calvinism
and secular sensibility... waiting patiently
        till the nibbling stopped and it had a chance
to counter... it truly was a case of Damocles' seconds...
tick-tock, tick-tock... and thus the guillotine dropped;
you could feel the carcass stench in the air
         or what cultural-marxisim would make of
an economy that attacked its own economic model...
  it would be deemed dead economically,
but culturally? resurgent...
         you could sniff it out in the air, that rotting
carcass menu: providing a wake of vultures,
                                  or a comedy house of hyenas.

When the urge
to react to the
tactless clowns,
and
down looks like
up,
and life's teeth
are sharper than
a steak knife,
breathe,
and take a
sacred pause

Language
is one of my favorite things
for which I displayed
an early facility
I toyed with foreign languages
but went no further
it wasn’t where I wanted
to spend my time

I wanted to save the whales
improve education
fight poverty
protect our environment
a whole host of causes
I visited in a repeating cycle
whirling faster and faster until

I created my own vortex
and then found myself
at the far end of a wormhole
with no idea how I got there
much less how to return
and found myself observing
every time I behaved badly
in excruciating detail

A tactless comment
a thoughtless act
each small transgression
building stone by stone
until I created a fortress
walling myself within
this invisible shield

When we touch
is it you or me
who feels remotely?

All dissolves into Oneness.

17 July 2005

toss away the memory of me in a disheveled mess of cleanliness—

like a lost treasure, bury me in your bedside drawer.

No one will know that I once stood here
Lets be clear...

I was never at home with you.

So when you feel frantic and lost and you’re searching for the things that help you disassociate, instead of finding that thing or two, you’ll find me, staring back at you.

i tried my best,
or at least i thought i had.
with tactless fingers, i grasped the bricks
and jammed them
together.
days oozed into nights
five days, four nights.
it was awkward, imperfect but it would do.
but someone tore it down
he appeared from nowhere, with a hammer
as large as a lion. the bricks feel in one
clumsy sweep.
i tried again.
but this time with bricks and barbwire.
i placed the barbwire on top of the bricks,
in front of the bricks, under the bricks.
slicing my skin open once or twice.
my blood marking the territory,
i grinned in satisfaction
until another destroyer emerged
he knocked and banged. he hit and yelled.
so close. so close.
but not quite.
cracks in the bricks, the barbwire tore here and there.
more, i thought. more. more.
so then came the sheets of metal.
my muscles sung as i lodged the walls into the dirt.
i bathed in sweat but
i couldn't stop until i was done.
the walls secure, the bricks more or less together.
the barb wire sharp and deadly.
i stayed in my little house. my little cave. my little sanctuary.
with too many books and cat hairs
and i was content.
except for the hole clearly visible on my chest.
each day it widened.
i threw baggy clothes, blankets. it grew and grew.
you came along suddenly
you knocked politely at the front gate.
you whispered pleasantries and
begged to kiss my eyelashes.
i refused. i yelled. i shook my head until i rattled.
you persisted. you wanted my fingers, my insecurities,
you wanted it all, placed in a pile beside you.
crumble. one piece of the wall broke.
crumble. another.
crumble. and another.
and before i knew it your hands grasped my wrist.
before the tears escaped, you licked them up.
before i could speak, your tongue muffled any sound.
oh, the hole.
it closed, and closed and closed

"stop acting so brave," you whispered to my chest.
no walls. no walls.
but always tools nearby. just in case.
just in case.

Zoom
Clank
That sound you hear
When trying to cause fear
And doubt
Within me
You threaten
And tease
Torturous
And ******
Tremendously tactless
Terror
Zoom
Clank
It goes again
What is that sound
You're hearing
You're fearing
It's an omen of what's to come
I have always been patient
Can you say the same?
Your patience is similar
To how you love.
It's fast, and burns bright
A shooting star
It felt so right
But I realize
You've done this all before
The only difference is
This time you have the ultimate weapon
You have my daughter
You will not be forgiven
You will not be apologized too
You are the embodiment of poison
But beware
My power has risen
My future is clear
Vast are my choices
I am no longer scared
Zoom
That's a bullet
fired by you
Clank
That's the bullet
Striking true
You fire your guns
But I'm bulletproof

More more
Tactless, mind of brute
I wish I could call myself
Separate from this

Still, I run and run
Faster than my wisdom
Stimulate
Stimulate

Is there some elegant closing
To this wild expression?
Not quite
More salt instead

I fall asleep
With a numbness
I wish I hadn't
Welcomed in

I have waited in certain landlocked towns,
Near and far, and far from here.
And I have sailed and been in low ports found,
Their inlets clad in salted air.
And I have dreamed on oft spoken of starry nights and on largely unspoken starless nights,
Of select places with opportune and tactless new found faces.
And I have lain out restless and uncomfortably awake,
Hearing human voices shriek and drown,
In salt clad harbor towns,
And heard those specific siren calls of those particular siren girls,
In those inlets, salt clad by the sea.
And still awake I have heard, in those waiting-space landlocked towns,
Curiously, those curious sounds,
Of only human and yet inhumane calls.
Dressed in that specific gauze of an agony-tone,
For that specific landlocked home,
Where drinkers go,
That drunkard’s throne,
And been sullen at that once and forever shoreless drone.
And I have also been, you see, in places left unknown.
And in a daydream I would hear and be heard by almost gasping voices,
From waking and still somehow sleeping and unbelieving men.
Grasping out onto air that has been made thin and further,
Been gasping.
Searching for woefully inaccurate words,
With a woefully inarticulate tongue,
And I have danced and been set atremble by the timbre of your breathe
And then enamored by the resonance of your gasp,
And I have gasped with a tongue set dancing behind lips all aflutter.
In those unutterable places with specifically unknown locations,
I have listened,
Through rock and metal,
Between those landlocked towns and those salt clad harbors,
For the full sound escaped from your trembled lips.
And I have listened, through daydreaming mist veils,
And through known and unknown places,
For that voice that speaks through space and time and rock and metal,
And I have only heard that curious sound of human and inhuman calls,
And I have heard those particular siren calls of those specific siren girls,
And that cry of human voices that shriek and drown.

I just got a letter from my old Uncle Bert
and I'd like to share its tragic contents
with you here today;
but I'll edit out the ***** bits
just in case you are shocked
that an old man could still
have thoughts along those lines
or so as you don't throw up on your cornflakes
when you read them over breakfast.

"Dear Edna (he wrote to me)
It's not all that bad in the twilight nursing home
if you can bear the stale smells and moanings
of the other ****** inhabitants
and their bad breath fumes
plus the mashed food which all is pulped up
into something not unadjacent to catfood
for the sake of the toothless ones
who **** it up via a plastic tube
provided for that purpose.

"At least I take a bath once a fortnight
even though I don't like sharing it
with that Pakistani fellow Mr Ali
who always reeks of curry
and lets off stinky air from his back end
in our bath causing brownish bubbles
with a touch of follow-through vengeance.

"That reminds me of what happened
only last week when the ministry
sent some ****** health inspector round
who might have been a homosexualist
from his mincing walk I thought
and he came into our ward
you could see his beaky nose wrinkle
in distaste which was tactless we thought.

"He asked what the toiletty smell was
not knowing it's what we have to put up with day in day out
(and I know say you can't really afford
to pay extra for a clean private room for me
and not many of the others families bother either
its not as though they're the ones who suffer is it,
so let me suffer here after all I'm only your uncle
and you aren't in my last will and testament
as I never liked your mother much
fat stuck-up ***** from what I remember).

"The male nurse on duty that day
(he's the one we call Old *******
because he's so ******* bossy
and full of his ******* self)
asked all of us who had let the side down
and wet himself (or herself, it's a mixed ward
which I dont approve of as I don't want
to see anything disgusting anymore).

"Well no one owned up so Old *******
went round sniffing at everyone's rears
until he came to Mrs Jones squatting in the corner
and the he said why the **** hadn't she owned up
that she had done one in her pants today
and Mrs Jones said it had happened yesterday
or it may even have been the day before that
she couldn't really remember.

"You know, Edna, I still love miss my dear Linda
I even wish she was here
in this hellhole of a place
waiting for death's release
and not mouldering in her grave
but at least she avoids the squidgy mashed up food
which goes in one end and out the other
barely stopping for a rest halfway down."

You know, I couldn't stop laughing
for a full five minutes after I read this
as I knew, just knew, the old *******
had cut me out of his will -
well, let him rot is what I say
and that ******* about objecting
to sharing a bath with Mr Ali:
Bert's problem has always been
that he's allergic to soap and water
how well I remember the miasma
following him around his old house
before we had the **** certified.

Mister Nut Bag circled the shop
spouting off mindless diatribe,
like he was a ******* gear-Einstein,
but he didn’t know ****.

Everything he said was
total & utter malarkey,
that means some serious *******.
He looked like he hadn’t climbed since birth,
like when he climbed down from his mother’s womb
& been eatin’ carbs ever since.
A complete carb ****** he was,
certainly not a ******* hiker.

I wish I could’ve been
not politically correct,
tactless & unsavory.
I would’ve said to
Mister Know-It-All,
you fat ****,
**** a bag of *****.

I guess everybody's got their place,
arrogance has none
in our place.

Why does the right hand get all the good jobs,
like greeting visiting dignitaries
(such a pleasure) ,
or blowing farewell kisses to the one you love
(such sweet sorrow) ,
or playing the melody while the left
has to oompah along in the bass?
Right-handers get the best adjectives too.
I mean, we’d all like to be
adroit (as the French have it) .
So why do we poor southpaws have to be
gauche or, while we’re about it, gawky?
Tactless, without grace, ungainly, awkward,
physically and socially inept, that’s us.
And Latin’s no better.
We’d like to be dextrous too.
What makes us
sinister? Was Dracula
left-handed, or something?

Even when we can hammer
or saw or paint or drive a *****
with either hand equally,
or cut the nails on both sets of fingers,
they only say we are ambi-
dextrous, which is a bit of a left-handed
compliment, treating the left
as if it were an honorary right,
as if it had no right
to be skilful
in its own right.

I suppose my left hand ought to be grateful
(in this respect) that I was not born
into a tradition where it is laid down
what each hand can do. It could have been
condemned to a lifetime
of bottom-wiping and not much else,
and becoming cack-
handed in more ways than one.

Empty words pour over one another and we bath in it
I want to *****. Pinkies crossed, keep my own blood promise.
Clasp raised hands, you're just two ******* grand.
While the empty crowds and fake personalities go crazy in the stands,
And the non-imaginary friends rally to take a stand.
Judge me, judge them until you're at full self esteem
Shiny train wreck tracks, two tons more and full steam
Ahead, altered image in your head to fit the rhyme and time before we split
Apart into the tiniest of atoms, I wish you'd shatter and splatter already,
70% water and you're still pretty **** heavy,
Though if by mass or volume remains a mystery.
Open eyes, twisted spine, take your shoes, give you mine
The top of the pond is warm, but just wait until the dark fills the lake,
And the hopping waterbugs overtake and your body is no longer your own.
Queen, **** it, King, sit on my throne,
And look at the useless fruitfulness that I have grown.
Trust you as far as I could throw a stone and it landed among the seeds I'd sown,
Silver puddle reflects to me that the you I'd known has left me all alone.
Friendship without sun drowns us in a matter of hours
***** fertilizer and weeds choke out the flowers.
And all the while this ***** dreadful night
Can taste the lightness of our fright, and be remembered as the day,
That the privlaged beggers finally picked a fight.
*******, we used to care about one another
Though I won't say we've grown up or apart,
Our dimensions seem to have warped an awful lot.
It could be that this is art in the rambling, symbolic diary sense,
But let's have some common sense, no props to those
Who cheat and repeat, force the burden of meaning on the helpless seedling.
Abstract art and children separated by a mirrored glass wall to encourage real work
And here's to the curses written inside the bathroom stall,
Embraced and erased, then forgotten years later
Memories wiped without a trace, this human race
I'll bet you can win, but I still run faster
You tricky ******* set up traps along the track
Encouraged by the sadistic master.
Paper, tin and plaster;
Save the past so she remembers the tactless *******
That was presented as a present and in the present now presents
A trickier problem than he could devise if he had tried.
Perhaps he never lied, but looked at the fingers, little miss
Scarlet tips, tried to deny but the die is dyed with fine metallic mist.
Gleaming puppy-dog eyes pour remorse, of course,
But given another pure, white sheet
Would prove even more efficient in "accidental" deceit.
So row, so row, goes the lame claim that my words manage
To stay same in your brain, gain an image of the pain and strain.
No love, never then, never again.
Continue talking, and walking apart
I'm sorry, screamed. What's that you say?
Hate and love splatter tiny red dots on the scatter plot
Flash frame, freeze for a fraction, minds captivated by action
Divide and multiply the fractions and traction,
Keeping the same, grown apart, helplessly together,
Until, comparatively, even static falls apart.

Moving shapes
Of hulking, blackened,
Highlighted shadows
Going every which way
Without the slightest
Clue as to
Which way
They’re going
Or coming from
And they’re painted
And draped
And covered in straps,
Shreds,
Trails of furs, leathers,
Plastics of every sort,
And it gets hard to sort
Them out,
The monsters
From
Their
Costumes.

How much depravity
Is enough or too much
For the depraved
Before the irony
Is too clean
To waste on themselves?

I’m standing in the
Midst
Of a mist
Of sweat and ****
And my jeans
Are soaked to the
Shins with *****,
Or sweat,
Or ****,
Or hopefully blood,
And I’m staring into
A shifting cloud
Of tall, thin, cold
Glasses of water
Waving skinny limbs,
Twisting and flailing
As the show
Is put on for the
Other bony, ragged
Appendages by their
Androgynous semi-owners,
Draped in furs
That are just as
Flea bitten as
Their desire to
Create substance
Through the flagrant
Display of debauchery
And purposeful
And tactfully
Tactless
Effort
To prove
A lack
Of substance.

My mistakes
have a sad habit
of coming back to haunt me.
Their ghosts
waking me in the night.
Whispers of
"You're not good enough
you never will be",
ringing in my nightmares.
Walking in my memories.
Replaying the past.
Every tactless word
like a broken record.
But dreams, like insanity
are impossible to escape your own mind
Even if I tell myself
"Don't listen to them,
they don't know you",
the dreams will keep coming.
The ghosts are still there.
Not until I realize
that to rid the spirits
I've got to leave the
Haunted House.

"Uuh, dude, your Hubris is showing.
Watch your ******' tongue, man.
It's cool to express yourself,
but now you're just being a ****.

Hold thy beloved charientisms,
thy ****** knives in velvet sleeves:

You don't exactly seem to understand
the true power of those Words
you propagate so 'knowingly,'
as if a monkey with his own ****,
but, if you do realize what you say:
you're a ******* *******.

Well, which are you:

a tactless, spiteful,
foolish hypocrite,

or

an affectatious egoist
of a hypocrite?

I'd wager
an unhealthy balance
that it's both.

I've seen it for years.

You assume a lot
for how little you know.

You step on other people's sentences
with a mastered matter-of-fact tone
regardless of how true
those facts you spew
even ******* are.

There you go again,
borrowing other people's ****
without expressed consent
nor explicit intention to return;
we have a word for that, I think.

Either your behavior and morality
totally adapt to your surroundings,
and/or you're a ******* Hypocrite Fool.
Either way,
you cannot be trusted
once a back is turned.

Honestly,
if I had to guess,
I'd be hard-pressed to give you
the benefit of the doubt
by assuming the level
of consideration required
for maliciousness.

You just want all of your stuff for you,
and all of everyone else's for you, too,
and the crux is
you'll feign being pleasant
just until you get it,
then you come out of your ******* cocoon
and get all high and mighty, entitled, and condescending.

Last one on the bandwagon,
first one to throw a stone;
you're a real ******' winner!

All you tend to do
every time I chill with you
is berate others- oh, I meant "advise" others,
who may well be better off than you,
for having many problems
which you either could not understand,
or with which you find yourself,
you ******* Fool.

Every time I wonder
if I've become too indignant
as a direct result of your antics,
you remove my self-doubt
and reaffirm my reservations
by eating all my ******* cheese
or talking **** on my friends
behind the back of whoever it is
who has their back turned at the moment.

When will you learn?
When will you mature?

I guess nothing changes
if we tolerate **** in our faces.

Tread lightly, Elephant,
for you tread 'pon thin-*** ice."

Once again I’ll blame the weather
that I can’t get it all together
and wrap the tethered, skimpy shawl
of concentration around my mind
Frustration penetrates in the wind
and chafes away with hourglass Time -
who falling tactless through the illusion
tries to
                         b
                             u                Me          
                           r                                  alive.
                     ­         y

You were the tactless happenstance
I had the favor to stumble upon.
So lost in clouds of judgment and secrets,
That you forgot yourself.

You are the ocean,
So different in each of the four directions.
I was swept away,
By the one that mattered least.

Turned me into a shipwreck,
Uncovering my deepest secrets.
You saw my fateful dissolution
As a priceless treasure.

Now that I’m useless and shattered
You flung me back to shore, away from you,
In your final tsunami,
Your tsunami of thrills, masks, deceptions─

Your tsunami of lies.

Affinity for the sharks attraction to the squeeze
Apotropaic lyrics cure an ineluctable terminal disease
Traversed time repent and rhyme
For every dollar exists a crime for every penny lost cured with wine
I serenade the world with lore threadbare and cloying but earnestly transcendent
Linger longer in evanescence so I can see the rainbow’s intent
Confederate putsch subverted by transnational push and supreme wonder
Tactless assault on the unadulterated truth a sheepish blunder
Ennobled and regal they gentrify the legal
A European tyrant fishes the sky to capture the preeminent eagle
Kings of the jungle turning us gradately into desert
Desiccated promises elicit the thirst but **** myself they can be so curt
One eye to see them all
One conqueror beyond the confines of linearity hogs the ball
Shoot the three when two will do
Missing every time when the sky is completely blue
Shrouded in the clouds are souls wafting to the sky
Concealed in the Dow a dry rain turns the dust extra wry
Moments clash with movements and chaos erects a monolithic lie
Sold in every shop consumed by every cop it keeps us landlocked on the verge of flight
Rescue the contempt needed to override the wrong and enshrine the right
Abdicate the war, annex the score and appear to soar
Words cannot corral the present anymore than the future can ignore
The past becoming present presents us throttled to the wire
Cartels own the news but the periphery is harder to conspire
We scour the earth looking for rebirth
We tower over the worthy with a catchy mirth
To all law belongs the defeat of malcontent with a begrudging consent
To any miser nothing is more miserable than avaricious but impotent intent
Invisible prison with visible prisoners beset by bars established by BAR exams that we fail to apprehend
Zero sum collapse contingent on the motives of the tyrants that cannot break or bend
So stand to grow the earth with elapsing sand and synchronize the beating of the drum with the actions of the best possible invisible hand
Choice monopolized by a garbled voice trying his best to be the lead singer of the smartest brand
Wary of the scary and contemplative before the boast
We align with design streamlined in serpentine time and on that sinuous path we coast
So we find time for a dream that proves God is a dreamer
Only to find out that all the teams play for the teamsters
Bribe yourself and renege your own wage
Depriving yourself of the ink needed to fill the page
But many words are impotent
When few will do
All you truly need in this world is an emboldened you and a chosen few

Moving shapes
Of hulking blackened
Highlighted shadows
They’re going
Every which way
Without the slightest
Clue as to
Which way
They’re going
Or coming from
And they’re painted
And draped
And covered in straps
Shreds
Trails of furs, leathers
Plastics of every sort
And it gets hard to sort
Them out,
The monsters
From
Their
Costumes.

How much depravity
Is enough or too much
For the depraved
Before the irony
Is too clean
To waste on themselves?

I’m standing in the
Midst
Of a mist
Of sweat and ****
And my jeans
Are soaked to the
Shins with *****
Or sweat
Or ****
Or hopefully blood
And I’m staring into
A shifting cloud
Of tall thin cold
Glasses of water
Waving skinny limbs
Twisting and flailing
As the show
Is put on for the
Other bony, ragged
Appendages by their
Androgynous semi-owners
Draped in furs
That are just as
Flea bitten as
Their desire to
Create substance
Through the flagrant
Display of debauchery
And purposeful
And tactfully
Tactless
Effort
To prove
A lack
Of substance.