Man life know just set eyes way like young world soul day hunger space mouth earth thoughts ignorance blind things mind knew final moment human creation kind creatures souls high forgotten dream love spoke self existence face holy deep bound think home void say surrender ear forever called held ephemeral red state end shall heed hope edge living waking fall sea wake garden need February thought past wanderer got men page colored tepid terrible **** proudly untitled features point painted faceless box forgot render wild spring splendor  handfuls looking half brain lost torn ancestral  unseen vision inner summer honor mister owned banner save today fear groans wasn't smoke  street fable strange year contrast black years  able pain body spoken word known motion  palpitate reeling nature culture disclaimers  cancer beg attentive frames ****** base profound double remember wholly finger death token  cries continue folk oh fishing form broken true  divides spread ah twas away breathe wait warning hallowed wish closer lens turn eye live  constant current author hung theory dangle  bramble chemical new force changes adderall  anymore giving beneath possess pardon commentaries eternity internal walk reason  long change does idea glimpse consciousness  wandering simply wonder physical dreams war  sleep told rest benign prior begging truth little  2012 born tale crow bowels allegory animal rule  exasperate making horse curse hands ones read  rearrange capture doing command fail awake  aperture seedlings shift steely sir nap spead ****** demons slits clever telling loud spits la-la-di-dah killing slip game reflected nameless ask  lovers rabid bear salivate plunder shameless  famously savior mint rides menthol bully fate traded melodies play misunderstand mammals gentle witless fine utterly savage silt tongue-less  dirt dilutes pure non-sensory taste briefly ravage dismember it''ll shedding ruined curtain  knots offers plot fulfills munificent two-act  relegates boxz bug altruistic wintergreen tossing  callously guise grovels one's singers treachery ashes mid-life mutter fashion parading  ambiguity separatist liars staple steeping neath  guidelines scoffing stitch moans civil wrote  Fictitious undoing fables table effigies serve  sonnets staged remark psalm swoll praise harken  beggar verse bread lines heavily electricity detection snow sack-happy preaching credit  spotted wicked best gravity gun campaign owe  barge choir revelry celebratory satiated sinking  headline pack hound persistently propaganda  gentlemen excluding diminished ******* run idles  occupied levies wolfishly honestly misinformation cuba vehemently dumb grace spectator erasing  toned sage crowded secrets inter-connectivity  loaned prayer hymns grave mistaken magnified  vandals selective jump leak escapes says minister  buckle mass honesty shut tar children's hats  monument doping long-lived electrical ladle  exaggerated cartoons address seconds cool cradle bleak yang's mind-framed hypnotic  walker caps folly treble claim streaks mixtures  swelled interstate elapse teasing spoon mobile  succulent witchcraft borderline fatal 99 temple stacks sups plastics creeps neurotic ills tossed  meek sipping old crack interlock wax alleyway  coughing blown freak clock birthdays societies  slow flashing viscous candy argument toothless  pills cerebral rapt wall bisect lives wheezing  photo kid starter foiled pair saturated self-castrating pre-packed naked uncertainly pill  used came chaos coated reprisal fells wrack  irreverent mirth sickly disinherited proudest  collate wheeze appearance palette disharmony  discontented bastardized emotive bio inhale diction beat spoiled reclamation loudest tempo  totally disembodied matte imperfect shells flat  struck sounding imparts flak origin severance remarked bone walls snared leaflets mocking  hot scripting adjective noun agape seemingly  resistant gawk calamity passage paintings wind  trashcans signings sits cheap makers poetry persist scrap slipping individual talk wonders  leaving questions fold actor fancy parchment  fates engenders flown jaws stripped longer music  sacrifice fakers book boldly frown sigh atop patient hang trade occupation blows spectacular  whispers worthy backward waving certainty danced suppose needn't ‘drawkcab’ second-guessing  boys forget marched motto heads tightly lies two-tone earthbound harp twice turns goodnight  lying ***** internally indiscriminate nickname  drunk convictions myth steep  in-consumption  fitting artist **** universal sick expressions bad  du spell melody big siphon proud learn sprawls song spastic something temperaments utter check  fissures stomp totality blend definitely thrall sing rug voice shade pestilence ties commiserate round devil steady brains emotional certain gate  suckling gates dearth decay weight bounce pound  carrier pangs glass startle contest earthen web  tug pressed air patience flush amassed guest gone apprehension staring empathize captain believe fading in-perceivable deathbed guarder makes surrounds scatter drooling ebb blink cob tome  venom near door lair derision draws host stairs scent parts curiosities spider webbing surprise wares tips stepping ascetics starkness realize picture surroundings dictations grand pillars  deaf limited comparisons greet visual residents  personal settings dismiss alien law stability common earthly shiftless places prelude  understanding mosaic keen trifling embodiments  geared inception whisper visible jowls kiss murky  puddle rank dawn dichotomy single faithful fraying pays tailor veil climb mores pence whim  breath wellspring samara god stony pear  shadows fruiting forebodes moonlit looming  shown passed bog gold wracked faint tongues  noble preachers mirror shifting layered depth  threads jungle narcissus bemused seamstress self-worshiping architect's wore slumber anomalous  opened barren seam lip caustic scene coupled brick gardener's clenches -with forms idle breed  embodied lore starving empathy design illusion  tree coat fabricate lucid mason scatter-all  narrative seeking imbued 16th shivering chemicals 17th 15thrisk improperly dare  deliberate plan purge try brought chapter speed  aide utmost spirit leading intervention felt  recall recent advent sincerity times diary  lackluster piously lasting happy holding hear  stem tasteless whimpers wet spine monstrosity  dripping causes position quite softly claws pallet  answer digging tearing beast satiating circle breaks skips redwoods beckoning rotted hushed  gray lapsing monoliths deities creborus  imbuement hand stroll paradigm rendered chorus shy whispering forest residual tension  surrenders tolerance lull anew sentenced  bearing tide birds dirge divergent rim joined  cogs wood hesitant mist emergent towering offer  awareness confinement inverted faultier stowed  plane sanctified blanketing trusting memory fossil flash twists laden self-indulgent fleeting invitation agony grip shore impetus lingering  crows promise gift union swallowing endless floor supposed ecstasy sensory intent  psychotropic cradling placement interned  jagged connectivity exchange congenial begun  summons singular spiral assumes ambient reciprocates re-entry fruition reached aggregate lifetime limbs birthed instinct  frightening tarry proper entire light  boundaries innocence pursuit ago discover left  youth's unknowing sacred time place meager  simple fact cast ceaseless wide-eyed literal  apparent coincidence create boldness morphed  crooked kempt mere stumble buried shutter fairy  pivotal definitive months worth shear ambition sound required journeyed self-reflections title  facets vague restless intimation gut wanderer's  leap motivate path account boy soon bears faith  question tripped reasons uproot awaited confronted days step heal provocations wisps crushing transcend chronicles instance  directness raw drove occurrence objective-less  real enters slightest confident nondescript  typify  foreshortened interment paradox bitter heart  devoid jeopardy angry sensation confidential guilty arrogance mercy compliance reprieve  vincent deadening factual sign emotion awe  inhibition shackled butterflies absence actual sciences acknowledgement violent stagnant  spiritual American doors roots lack matted fore  gestures society cause streams intensity hair impossible discord lonely hearts resounding  jest  what's flavored pains closed toxic contented  happenstance scientific knowledge yeah  wizardry shaking stifled withdrawn bloom  jitter dreads settle asocial hulton make  predisposed figurative reflections demeanors  wondered affect hulton's projected sense  morning industry arrays ghosts feeling  certainly endomorphic where's partially wrath  passer mornings jovial unease advertized asking  trash onward wished tempers media mentality connect pasts sharp-toothed scramble great colours trial test salvation continually lent  degree secretly subjection social waned  disconnected colors grimly intellectual civilization cash trading baffling particular  digest myths monumental ending seasons winter  repetition introducing agent everlasting  shoulders delivered honestly-- possession funny  continence history unsightly function suffering propulsion profession divulge familiar tugs era  importance capability perpetuation spite inventory words entirety leveling fray insight  date record continues writer getting evermore fellow tongue possessions identical proof accuracy education similar sack admittance  favor unravel conveyance guilt gives beginnings  predicting audacity definition bobby heady eaters frameless learned release stone grandeur sang  speak molds sleeps split built seats people folded  sheer pour evoked playhouse liquid boring  tellers frayed stark walked reality pleas doth  preformed shows beak pride squawks opinions  greatest bold stunning sightings he'd loudly slain  sunk watch legend precipice theater deeper compound commentator civility justly silly sin  reverent seen prophetic moral confounds notion  lacking explain attempt prolific viral estrange proclivity scorn hide blur pious strung eden's  horror cut skin arch cruel twig mother vile  pass lend woods peach shrunken trail man's canopy worn 434 eat warm limb familiar father delete.

You are what your reading lady. Now would you hold this gun?

currently i am not

     sad

        depressed

               lonely
  
alone

     self-loathing

             insecure
  
heartbroken

     nor breaking hearts


and that makes me feel quite
    
out of
             
               place
because i am surrounded by
  scars

     and tear-streaked (beautiful) faces

  bruised knees drawn up to chests

     dark empty rooms
  broken mirrors

     and trashcans filled

  with crumpled lists of mistakes
and if i could, 
i would take all the

  scars

    tears

     and lonely nights

from the hearts that are broken
                  
                      or breaking
and i wish i could
 cloak The Light i’ve found

    (or did It find me?)

      around cold shoulders

 and wash all the tired feet

   that’ve been blindly stumbling

      in the dark

lets go around and tell what we are thankful for
"family"
"friends"
"my home"
"opportunities"
"this country"
i am thankful for the starving kids digging through trashcans while we make a turkey that nobody eats,
i am thankful for the freezing cold that people have to live in while my parents make me wear a coat for the few moments I'm outside,
i am thankful for this world where we have the opportunity to go to college but if you don't go you will end up like the freezing hungry people gathering around a light pole right now,
i am thankful for this food that makes me hate myself,
i am thankful for these people who ask me why i am not like my sister or my brother,
i am thankful for these ignorant people that make me so much more smart.
Thank you, family.  Don't forget to throw all the leftovers in the trash.

Of flashy pictures and subtle texts found
A guy’s feet when I look around,
Of heavy lids of trashcans crude
Images of Paoli in the ****,
Of blood being ****** through the veins
And bedsheets filled with coffee stains.
Of walls and posts and weeks gone by,
Without a single scream or cry,
Of not a bath or a shower
Helpless without any such power,
Of Faustus and Valdes to spare
Othello seemed to have no care,

Tomorrow never dies for me…
For it's tomorrow I will never see.

I left the electric bill in the mailbox. Along with one of those Get to Know Your Community at Christ's Church pamphlets.  One where Jesus sits holding a sheep, and oriental kids sit criss-crossed and apple-sauced at his feet. An advertisement for Great Wall Chinese food rounded out the lineup. How many trashcans must be filled?

But your letter, a mini-salvation at the sight of your name alone, came with me. My octogenarian neighbor with the heavy jowls and purple hair watched me rummage through the mail as her leashed shih tzu ****** in my yard.  Good morning. A nod. No response from my neighbor like usual. She's hardly a neighbor. More like a cop that directs traffic just past her property onto mine so traffic can **** my grass.  The shih tzu, though, that thing quaked as if I might give it a hard kick in the ribs. A satisfying thought.

My great pleasure dissipated when I opened your letter. Don't worry about Tim. I know he cares about you. He'd be an idiot not to. These are things I'm supposed to say. The sad truth being that Tim is a man. And like the rest of us, he's cheating on you. Probably with a thinner woman. A model that still subscribes to ****** chic. Or at least ******.

Before you take a kitchen knife to one of his neglected polos, make sure he's okay. Bizarre advice, I know. My mind only wandered when I did't feel like I was worth a million bucks. You always made me feel like two million. So, I'm sure it's something on his end.

Pour the whiskey until he opens up like one of those cashiers you make the mistake of acknowledging when they've been on the clock for five hours and still got three to go. He'll tell you about the baby he can't feed, the gonorrhea feasting on his urethra, and the titanic loan he took out from mama looming over his head. After he's said his piece, his load will lighten. The clouds will part. Fingers crossed.

The way you described his despondent behavior sounds like the lurking grey of bad luck. A black cat. I'm reminded of the time in my beat-up Cavalier when a black cat began to cross the street in front of us over on 86th and Western. Do you remember that? You have to. I cursed the bad luck. Then my curse seemed to stop the stupid beast in the middle of the lane. He looked straight at me. The headlights reflected off his eyes, and you grabbed the wheel. Turned it right into the cat. "I **** my bad luck," you said as the cat's end was confirmed with a thump. Then you said something like if they don't cross your path completely, it doesn't count. Find the bad luck before it snickers from the other side.

Browsing in the bookstore,
I stumbled across
a journal

crammed with scraps
people found

in parking lots,
school yards,
fished out of trashcans.

Now I throw
copies of everything
I write away.

Vital organs wasting away
On a life of my own,
Shattered to nothing.
Push me out of a moving car
Settle for less than road ****.

Meet my eyes, trip inside
Witness the abuse of my soul.
Shake the emotions of loss
Away, yearn to drown in clarity.

An avalanche will do!
Trampling your mind.
Paralyzing your limbs.
Movement of no kind.

After the terror is lost in the snow,
Remember the horror of
The girl, who was left alone.
Travel with her, place unknown.
Flee from society's priorities that roam.

Drool for captivating mankind,
Bury past loves in trashcans. Take
Whiffs of their boxed-up selves,
Rotting away like the ******* the road.

Realize this universe
Moves in a circle,
Everyone knows nothing.
Emptiness and ignorance suffocating
You, the girl, eyes, and trashcans.

Nothing.

There's Midnight Ravens
along the telephone
wire.
******* suckers
with deep dark
eyes that
see death
before it comes.
These hosts
of the end
pay me no mind
as I pass beneath
their roost.
They rudely go
about their
Raven buisness,
yelling and
******* their way
into the morning.

An unrelenting
bark drums
on from
behind
a white painted
fence.
An insane sound
like an alarm that
no one will turn
off.

I step over a small
cities worth of
ants who are
scrambling
around a crack
in the
sidewalk
clogged with
more frantic
ants.
The great flood
has arrived
in the form of
a timed sprinkler.
And all of
the soldiers
have abandoned
the Queen.

It's early morning
The air has
yet to be
choked out
by the
diesel fuel
and needless
emissions that will
soon began to
smother the
city
.
The faint smell
of fresh fish
makes its way
up the city
blocks from
the waterfront
below.

Old Italian and
Slavic women
stand outside
in their
long day time
night gowns
smoking cigarettes
while watering
the concrete.

I enter the
alley way ,
the smell of
***** diapers,
cheap
laundry detergent
and too
many children
surround an
apartment complex.

As I passed I came
upon the Black Princess
of these streets.
The wisest and
surest of them all
crosses my path.
Her tail held high
and strong,
striding care free,
she looks at me
with her
emerald eyes
and yawns.
She stops near a row
of trashcans that
are lined
up looking like
a modern
day monolith.

She laps at her
paw with slow,
long, lazy
licks as I
pass.
She again fixes me
with those marble green
eyes and lets me
know without
saying a word.
That the alley cat kills
for fun.
Ignores all Gods
by choice
and laughs
at our attempts
to tame it.

We were so ecstatic waiting for the wind
to wind its way through the trees--
there was an electricity in the air,
a charged warning.

We sat on the porch guarded by
oversized hoodies
and a wooden awning--
smoked bowls and snickered
at the squirrels dashing
lightning speed from unsteady
branches into hidden havens.

For hours we waited and watched
lawn chairs, trashcans, and
fields of leaves swirl up into the sky,
finally earning a retreat
into chaos. The newly
boarded windows withstood
the huffing and puffing of
nature’s big bad wolf-

he was not so ravenous this time.
Not like Katrina or Andrew.
Not enough to warrant
a week of cancelled classes
and hours of uninterrupted
news coverage- how quickly we
overreact to even the slightest
threat of rain or snow.

This was nothing more
than a PG rated epic but parents
sheltered their children,
covered their eyes and ears,
rocked them to sleep as even
picnic tables stood their ground.

I send lil paper ships sailing down the curb
as the crows and the vultures attack the trashcans in the suburbs
I watch the rich kids driving there nice whips
but they are a bunch of wimps
one punch in there lip
one kick in the knees
and they'd just limp away
because even though im a poor kid
ive lived more life
even though they call me skid
even though im a skinny kid
id still bust all over your girlfreinds ****
and in the black light she would shine like a florecent lightbulb
while your sitting on your golf cart
im making **** noises on the belly of your women
making her my mistress
making the matress squeak
as my lil paper ship sails down
who would've known what was happening when i was making it
now were both laughing
because when you get home
your gonna be kissing my ****
ha
ha
ha

Moments of total nothingness,
you don't deserve it, just because you're unknown
Your greatest virtue lies within
your inner dialogue between one
Your audience smiles at your achievements,
as you look into a mirror applauding a reflection
Prolific insight woven and painted by your pen
is sadly wasted, unraveled and sloshed by bias
esoteric and snobbish, the twins of bias,
sit on high poetic mountains of celebrity,
while filing away your non-read thoughts into
deep, deep trashcans

White Interceptors illuminate, cry, and leave ribbons of red and blue,
  accelerating north on Featherbed. Streetlamps hang like midnight ornaments.

It starts to rain, turning the tar streets into slick mirrors.
  I can see my lights lead me, sweeping the asphalt.

Kent is still too dangerous to gentrify. The trashcans are spilling
  cereal boxes and empty two liters. I imagine a two-thousand year-old
mountain of trash, corroding and forming this neighborhood.

  Barefoot children walk around aluminum cakes, reaching for the rain.

Skinny cats trot across the street, green and yellow eyes,
  leaking through the dark. I name them after sicknesses.

The humming of my Camry grows louder as I squeeze by
  dripping, patting hands. I now recognize the moon.

Buildings swoosh by faster and faster. Minutes go by and I
  find myself on the outskirts; the trees sway, dodging rain.

My phone rings like a frenzied roach. Picking it up,
  'Hello.'

'Sure. Yeah, I'll be right there.
  'Nowhere.
    'I'm going nowhere.'

The phone bounces on the grey seat. A screeching.
  Coming to a stop; my chest almost touching the center
of the steering wheel. All becomes still.

  A buck with velvet antlers stands in the rain.
It runs into the dancing forest. Much like me.

as i sat cross legged in my dorm room,
the dawn lazily waking,
hugging my solid metal wastebasket
emptying the contents of my bad decisions
into its yawning mouth
lurching forward with each violent reminder
of every feeble drowning
of every bitter memory
i realized

only squares have trashcans with holes in them.

Don't give your words to the blind deaf spirits.
With eyes they simply don't use.
They couldn't care for your naggy rantings.
They ignore you; call you Katy Kaboom.
Hardly worth the look,
they are crust beneath trashcans.
Walking off while you breathe.
I find it hard to look at people, who refuse to listen to me.
Don't treat it kind to by waved away,
cast as the alien kind.
Don't waste a spit on carcass ungraced with noblesse oblige of a man.
'Man-kind' should be a revelation,
but dumb is the man with abused to his senses.
Only fairy tales may glue dumb and kind as one.
I've seen that only wise men may not be criticized.
For only kind men, wise men, will treat a woman wise.

I filled three trashcans, granted the bathroom size, to the brim with crumpled college-ruled cursive, failed attempts at the marriage of language and vision, all the things in my mind I could not put to paper. I couldn’t find the million-dollar words I wanted.

I Google’d the “100 most beautiful words of the English language.”
Efflorescence. I would have liked to use that one. Or maybe petrichor.
Chatoyant.


I tried to give mass to chimeras.
They grew old easily, floating down a temporal lazy river.
Her tissue-paper dreams were torn by the hooks of hometown love.
My metaphors fell flat.

I tried to envision Parnassus, something like rolling hills dotted with vibrant flowers, plants with names I do not know lining the slopes. I am not familiar with Greek foliage. I imagined myself climbing, turning over rocks in search of inspiration.
I found only isopods.

Between 5/4 inch margins I constructed a paper balloon, my papyrus mausoleum. Here is my embalmed work. Blank. Blank. Blank.

Broken glass shines brightly
beautifully mangled and
shredded to pieces.
Before the fall,
its wholeness was not complete.
It lacked the cracks
it sparkled less
and all we could see
was ourselves.

There is concrete around us
there are trashcans and garbage
and babies and flowers.
There is the power and deception
of humanity and
beautiful people to be saved.

We saw ourselves in all
our (untrue) glory
and walked on broken glass
proclaiming that it didn't hurt.
Missing the light shining
from those pieces we crushed.
But that demolition is
where our truth lies.

You carry the kind of ashy witchcraft
I read about in cut-out passages
of out-of-date New Orleans newspapers
discarded in alley-cat trashcans
bums use to light fires that further an
unwarranted air of rebellion.

I don't understand you.
But every ounce of me
wants to fill you in
like a crosswords puzzle
with words that aren't the ones they're
looking for
but still find a way of fitting all the same.

And my brain bleeds memories
I've made up
that stain my shirt like unwashed sweat
and make me feel *****
for getting myself so hot in the first place.

Paintings hang high on walls and in fancy frames
Music blows through the ear as hot wind whispers
Talk is called cheap at blind book signings
Poetry sits patient in parchment fold leaflets atop trashcans over flown
Culture is no longer a noun, another adjective scripting the actor to frown
So beg questions profound, what have we done?
As becoming becomes a stripped scrap of bone

Calamity forever, the individual snared by ancestral surrender
All the while spectacular wonders persist in mocking that which boldly engenders
The passage of their faceless makers, leaving only us fakers
To gawk, jaws agape, slipping towards our attentive fates whatever the base Seemingly so resistant an occupation worthy of the sacrifice, to trade ****** space

I can promise you that
I rarely cry at photographs
This is very new to me
But these tears are true
Just as your photos are true
Your photos are the true America
Thousands of photos
Of lives you only knew
I want to cover my house with your work
I want to imprint your photos inside my eyelids
So my dreams are filled with
The magnificent contrast
Beautiful simplicity
The truth shown through your eyes and the eyes of your camera, held at navel level, as you look into the eyes of your subject
What true art you have made!
Art rarely seen
Until after you passed
I wished I could meet you
A true beautiful soul
Why do all the beautiful souls leave me here?
Your pictures of the poor enlighten me
Your scenery inspires me
I can almost hear your faux French accent

You worked as a nanny
And you hid yourself
With fake names
Always a secret
You locked the doors behind you
For years your art was locked in boxes
Boxes and boxes
And photos of dead horses
Crying children
Extreme human conditions
Photos of trashcans
All was art
You could truly see it couldn't you?
You could see the truth
Of which I wish to write

I hope you were happy
Or at least content
I hope the nights weren't too dark
I hope you are glad to hear
The world loves what you have done
I thank you
We all thank you
And I wish you well

Holiday cheers, the spirits now here to up the downpit moods! Where *******'s go singers, and companionship is far beyond due!

Stringed up longing, stuffed feathered innocent pleasures where the gravy spells of finer of many dinings!!

Bring good tidings you attitude bringer, you dope sick slinger, thine gun has drawn itself to fast!!!! Parties awake the deadened vines, where ghastly projectors contract the powers of unearthly glass!!!

The world moves to slow!, STOP, look ahead fantasizer, the escalated wheels to fast!!!

Sodomatic beauty, input newbie, your thistles are spreading the fences, where trashcans and benches distinguish flawful fate!!!

A fulfillment of vows, a timeless volgate. Proverbial collection's detest the furnaced crucible, where Loophole's are bound and bagged to be stench!!!!

Glider of turbulance, father of remembrance, forget what thine holy teacher has taught you to be???

I.
Sometimes drunken flowers are placed between books and
his lips are clamped shut
while i walk past trashcans and find letters
buried,
like his bones
with forced smiles carved upon each and every one
hands reaching out, grabbing
i could feel its yearning
from a mile away
and i shut my ears and clench my eyes
i can't stand the feeling twice.

II.
My soul was shot;
i later burned it with matchsticks and clouds
sand pricked my feet
as i sit for hours on end at gas stations and sidewalks
lamps were never lit in my house and
i was left
among the darkness.
i never saw you behind the trigger.

III.
I don't trust the black and blue hue
growing on my chest;
they say its from my heart.
I laugh them away and
tune out the rest.
"I have no heart, you made sure of that."
emotions i used to scorn and
cringe at
appear on paper and skin as words
that looked like my
splintered bones and
broken footsteps.

can i talk about the time when scarecrows were making torches and chairs
or will someone realise that i'm talking to thin air?©

It's Libra season
and I forgot who my friends were
                           I think they forgot me too

I said no to a pity party this year

so instead I drank a bottle of champagne

plus some
plus some

It hurts so much when you call, it hurts so much when
                  you say you miss me
it hurts all over when I throw up the next day
and no one rubs my back

no one kisses me anymore
no tenderness is afforded on my body

and my weakness is seen as weakness

I get no
relief for hours, the day after

I wish underneath my sobriety I wasn't scared
     I wish I understood love the way I understand drunk speech
and mixed drinks and lonely afternoons and trashcans

family shouldn't
shame - because
shame lumbers in the belly like a bad ham -
it burns into intestines and spills
hot green stomach acid up your throat while
you're asleep peacefully at the television -
no, family shouldn't
point fingers like a winter's frost, scowling
like a midnight alley cat between trashcans -
no - family
reflects in the
social mirror, and breaks
itself down first

And then I thought
If only for a moment
Your voice inside my head
Would find another to torment
After you said that we will never try again
But oh how wrong I was
If anything your voice became more profound
And I don’t know how I can rid
You out of my crinkled mind
That begins to form a paper ball
Of words that I write down
But never seem to get right
I've got trashcans full
Miles upon miles
Of words about you
Words you'll never see
Or care to see
Not like I'd let you if you did
But sometimes it's nice knowing someone cares
Even when you don't need them to care
Even when you just need to lose your mind for a while
Losing your mind was hard enough, however
You gripped mine with your eyes
Splitting my body out of it
Having me do cartwheels just to attempt
To get it back
But somehow
You've still got it
And now you don't want it
You're just keeping it until you need me again
To keep your head up when you just need to fall apart
And I'll put you back together and send you on your way
Hoping, wishing nothing more than the thought that maybe this time you'll stay
But you won't
You can't
It’s true you don't know what's bad and what's good for you
But you keep me around so you can help yourself when you need it
Because you know that I'd find you at the end of the earth if I could simply put a smile on your face
But that'll only matter when the time comes
And I'm hoping it never does
But at the same time
I'm hoping I can see your face light up once again
Like it used to when all I'd have to do
Was intertwine your eyes and mine
And smile an "I love you."

The small gods of mediocrity worship me
In glimmering shades of opaque vanity
And a quantity of quietly suspended sanity
For believing in me is me deceiving in thee
Cos’ nothing exists inside an empty mirror
Everything is but a shallow showy business
An’ vanity’s the perfect anaesthetic to criticism
It has a certain cachet of symmetrical insecurity
Which protects one from the whips and scorns
Of the too, too solid clever clogging creatures
And their insistence upon a useless authenticity
And several types of other irredemptive features
If thickness was a virtue they’d be geniuses
As things stand they’re an average ordinary
Overburdened by the extremes of modernity
And the necessity to dwell in the sin of originality
No such burden afflicts this untempered soul
A pickpocket in heaven is a smart career move
There are so many treasures in eternal garments
Looking better on me than any famous other
They may have originality but I possess the sin
Tailored to perfection of a finely cut deception
Wrapped in the vestments of deceitful beauty
So befitting on this prince of thieving vanity                                            .
If you have been where I have always been
You could’ve written the Faerie Queen
And several iniquitous verses in between
The fame and fortune of writing anything
It’s a difficult business being someone else
At least on paper and preferably in private
An’ don’t you just love an innocent abroad
Loneliness is always my singular attraction
And sadness isn’t without capricious merit
They’re the essential requirements of being
A phantom haunting in the raiment of deceit
I could shake the scene but only for an hour
Why does everybody know that second-rater
Or some warbling barbed wire singer-songer?
The blowing wind of his twice solid injustice
Denies me my princely literary inheritance
I’ve got more Faust than a beggar’s banquet
I could be them, but they could never be me
So who is the real genius at the literary feast?
That’s the question that they refuse to answer
I’m the prince of all the borrowed tomorrows
And the silver-buckled trampling of history
Who are they compared to me, the thief of faces
A genius at my very own seditious practices?
Skylarks, nightingales and ****** red roses
There’s no purchase there for a born deceiver
Pirouetting upon the landscape of deception
My ancient trade, a slave to modern ambition
And isn’t wealth so comfortably in fashion
Filthy lucre for filthy booker is my very passion
A flattering self obsession can be so expensive
Plundering souls to satisfy a scribbling ego costs
Much more than your average literary bargain
Writing’s cheap and writers are even cheaper
That’s why I became this born-again deceiver
Transient fame and eternal blame’s my passion
Who cares about fifteen minutes of ignominy?
I’ll do it all tomorrow in another stolen name
Addiction thrives by being exposed to shame
Any fool can pen their play or scribe a novel
The romantics always scribble in their hovel
Whilst the past is a very lonely day tomorrow
And written failures drown in present sorrow
But my notoriety is a timeless endless furrow
Ploughed and planted in each passing season
Harvesting the festival of my sweetened treason
And I’m compelled to a very summer’s day
An’ winter springing another written disguise
Favouring my fortune by a winning surprise
Beggaring the belief of a charitable donation
To the swollen coffin of my self infatuation  
Ferreting in the trashcans of the famous
For those half-forgotten reject slips
Nothings too worn or useless for my audience
Even less for my insatiable appetite
To be appreciated as a literary genius
Even if it lasts for only fifteen minutes
In the company of an utterly innocent audience
I’m neither proud nor even vain glorious
It’s just part of my addictive insouciance
I just love that moment in my significance
When I can be seen as someone not average
Not much to ask and even less to deliver
It doesn’t take a genius to be just clever
That’s a joy that I can always joyfully deliver
Twice on Saturday provided one’s a matinee
I will venture on this shadowy way forever
Harming no one except a ripped off author
They should be grateful for the plunder
After all it is a kind of literary flattery
I have standards in my taste for literature
I’d never rob your average written writer
If they’ve mugged themselves, why bother?
A long lost great or an undiscovered genius
Is more my taste and appreciated flavour
New wine is fine but truth is there to be told
I’ll drink anything especially if it can be sold
To any old innocently paying punter
Desperation travels in the company of deceit
And much of it is right up my street
Not quite the boulevards of the ancients
And there I go along the road of the living
Avoiding life’s cul-de-sac dead end
A place to spend a life seriously avoiding
Even if it means inhabiting other people’s clothing
The wearing and the tearing is a riot
An’ God won’t send me to Hades for borrowing
The silken garments of the truly wonderful
But he sure as hell gets mad if I copyright it.

finally
hope isnt the only concern
and shrinking isnt the only direction
and qualifications are burning in trashcans
on sidewalks, my rings are shining,
my bells are ringing, my finger nails are
sharp.
my eyes linger on trees, my ears fiddle with
forgeting that they ever forgot
my hushed, lulled, chest power, passion put-forth
sees leaves and no bodies and no bones
my belly is a chestnut, my knuckles
are a *****, my knee caps are a cushion
and i am buckling but only to secure,
never burden, and i am a compromise
i am a mushroom, i am a fungus, i am moss
i am electron, positive, negative, charged,
changed, channeled, a room of lights, egg wash,
hardening and cracking, i am a reaction, grout, a mild wind,
a mild salsa, cayenne, dopamine, allergies,
a cat with a cold, the number nine, more&more&more&more
eager.

Upon my life you
assume I’ll fight,
how ignorant are you?

You think you are so ugly
you’ve got to express it
through your broken
ego?

Only a bully would be
so shameless, a troll
wants nothing but attention,
the best way to stop it
is ban it before they
say anything else.

Don’t take the trolls
seriously, their just
jealous and ashamed of
their own selves they
have enough problems.

It’s not about you.

Trolls, this is for you…

How low is your IQ?
You can’t relate to others?
Oh wow! you know that
makes you the true problem.

When you’re willing to
dish out the trash you
should be willing to
take it out. We have
trashcans for a reason
you ugly fool.

If you don’t like something
I do, why do you even care
about what I do when you
have a life too?

You’re wasting your life
by waiting for the tolls
to pay out, for one day
it will run out and You
will pay for such evil ways.

So don’t pay the trolls
ban them instead, throw
away all the ugly hate
learn to love yourself
and stop worrying about
everyone else.

Acceptance is the key
to success and prosperity.

© 2020 By Amanda Shelton