Stones in my pocket, dirt on my face, in my lungs
I couldn't quite respond when you first smiled at me
Such pale eyes, you sat in your blue room
among wilted wildflowers & bamboo out the window
I felt so perfectly awkward, shy as a child
Reading in the corner, the silence spoke for us
You smile for wind chimes & laugh at the sunrise
Took my hands & traced your tattoos with bitten fingernails
Sparrows in black & white, held me there between collar bones, rising & falling
Held me when I slept, somehow our dreams were in step in the morning
I write this today, the bamboo long gone, your touch a memory
From a blue room, nothing more than paint chips on the floor
Perfect days wasted between your pale arms, somehow I
can't forget them

Some days the sky hurts more than the rain that falls
from it
Broken pots on hand wheels, smoked cigarette butts in the
gutter
Half sipped bottles of Beam and Cognac on the
floor
I found a lovely ray of sunshine today
Smoking in the half-light of dead buildings
We used to drink here, remember?
On cold December nights when the lights were
waning moon, dim
I grab at mornings slept in
I grasp days unattended
Wasted days like empty bottles
Pour out the rainwater on dried up
plants
Nothing much left to do but
light another
For a while at least..

I always thought one day I’d write something worth reading
So far, just lines and lines, used up catchphrases
I slumber in the pine needles and breathe in the scent of cut
Juniper
Bathe in the shadow of sundials as the day fades, turns smiles to
moonlit slumber
In the green grass among the dead leaves I lay my head and listen to
leaves changing color
On the cold sand I listen to high tide turn to low, the rolling of the rocks and the
breaking waves of foam
The birds in the trees sing of bamboo forests in her backyard, blue room where she
collected rocks and lucky charms
Books with pages torn out, arrowheads she found in the field, a feather in
her hair
Pale blue eyes which reflected my dullness, reading Camus by the door
She used to read to me, when the sun was sinking and my head was spinning from the
last cigarette
And hold me like a child, hold me with my eyes shut and my lungs screaming to speak one
simple phrase
To grab the pen, to open my eyes and speak symbols onto the page, make my ballpoint
sing
To read a word worth reading, to write a line worth writing, this is my desire

Another drunk poem between headphones, static & blank screens
surround me
Awoke in the morning with a gamblers smile, like seagulls flocking,
resting, gliding
Broken, crushed, words like quiet jokes until that last whisper under
***** sheets in a cheap motel
Yet we sip our poison and smoke our cancer, brothers and friends crammed
into closeness
Smiles spent on the eyes of those to lovely to smile back, yet their
hearts were warmed
By gapped tooth grins and young men with dirt under
bitten fingernails
Last night the headlights behind me made silver halos
in the mist
As I walked down gravel roads with mud stuck everywhere, my
constant companion
Some days I forget I’m human, that I exist, sitting in the passenger seat,
watching the world run by
Two kids with backpacks and a stray cat, asked them where they were heading,
“Hitchhiking to nowhere..”
Nowhere sounds about right right now, looking at the
state of things
A place of fragrant trees and uncut grasses, stones unturned and
clear running streams
The broken limestone memories of my childhood call
to me
Not much left of that anymore, just fragments like a
smashed tooth
Can’t even think some days, easier not to I think, easier to let
it all pass by
I saw a darkness today, and I closed my eyes to try for
light
Standing under rusty bridges, flicking dead embers
away
Between blue lines on the page I spill thoughts like
spoilt milk
Scribbles and scratches, wasted and unwanted, lost between
memories
Memories I claim, not sure if they’re even mine
anymore
Twenty two years old with a death wish by thirty
Dots and lines, a splash of smiles and laughter, stains
in the carpet
And we sit here like corpses, the two of us, cigarette butts between
twitching fingers
Stilled by the last exhale, the moment between
inaction and locomotion
Our still waters stirred, clear blue skies filled with rain clouds, still
blue above them
Your room, surrounded by rooms full of people, washing dishes or
watching their dreams die on T.V. screens
None of that matters to me, just your breath and hearing your voice for a second
before sleep takes over
I left a note in that book you told me you’d read, guess you
never got around to it

Lilies  bloom in the shade of broken teeth and crooked
smiles
A life spent between blaring plastic
headphones
Smiles like cheap neon and artificial camera
flash
Capturing a moment, destroyed like hummingbird
heartbeats
Synchronized silence worldwide, a breath
exhaled
Musical stones rushing back to oceans
beckoning
Rushing in sand and salt water, forgotten
noise
Her smile broke me
My smile gave the lie away
From the heartburn and ***** came
solitude
Half finished bottles of ***** on the
floor
And smiles exclusive to
inebriation
I dreamed of your touch
But coldness prevailed
I sacrifice my heart to sunflowers
Dead words whispered
Dead words hanging from stalks in the field
Crooked backs and dull tools
Stories of my fathers, and those before
Dead men with echos like
thunder
Crushed aluminum cans on the floor
My secret sickness, a breath of cancer
exhaled
Ashes like snowflakes on my worn
boots
Words like blue tears crumpled on stiff
paper
And we die for our words
And our words will die
with us

Bills in my wallet folded into wads, unsorted in their random cacophony
Smiles on the faces of those ignorant enough to ignore suffering
Cuts on her feet like symbols in the stars
From her voice I was told the taste of kiwis and ginger root
From her kiss I was sharing nicotine and half exhaled cigarette smoke
And from our silence there is an overlapping ambience of dead noise
From our comprehension we realize our ignorance
From our comprehension we realize out insignificance
It is reassuring to know that you are a compilation of subatomic structures
It is comforting to know your matter is just recycled stardust
From a smile between crooked teeth and chipped molars I find comfort
In knowing that your heart is like a sponge absorbing all my poison
And somehow you exhale such radiance, a phenomenon
I marvel from my spot in the yard, watching sparrows chase
crows

Silence is the beat of a dead man’s heart
Raindrops have never felt colder, at one
in the morning
A cigarette in the thunder and darkness,
destroying me
Satellites rolling from my shoulder blades
down my spine
Transmitting quiet thoughts into my
eyelids
Refracting memories at heartbeats a
second
This ambient sound engulfs
thought
And the pen stroke outruns the
thought
A few brews deep and you’re already thinking of
tomorrow
But those days are beyond your grasp, forget them for
the present
Where the tangible become reality, and reality
becomes livable
Reflecting a thought on the edge of
consciousness
And from our awareness comes
discontent
And the falling, heavy, raindrops, forget
their impact
Shattering like liquid glass on the tongues of
dying men