Died inside
for the
last
first
time

Collarbone cleft lip love locks, high socks
  A stone in your back pocket
Finding our pace, our place, ******* loose lace
  Lost cute space case
Divining fate with roaches and half burnt cigarettes
  Exhaling minutes
Waiting, getting really good at waiting
  On you and you alone
Hot liquid metal toenails, I want to lick your teeth
  Shrine shrine, fine shrine
The imperceptible deep, gradients of darkness and brine
  Eyes turned skyward
Caffeine and caffeine and caffeine and
  Smokesmokesmoke
The clouds are cold today, but the air is warm
  Let's go home
Teeth chewing living organisms
  We exact such suffering and expect forgiveness

Living life with everything you own stuffed into bags, two of them, dragging yourself
along
Living for that hour on the phone, once a day where you can really breathe
again
By blind luck or some odd chance I stand barefoot on this cold, tile, floor,
tonight
Coughing out the last drag of a cigarette, waiting for the last load to finish spin
cycle
Crammed into rooms of what were once strangers, now brothers, more so than
blood
Brothers through mutual suffering, who have stood by you in the rain & sun, we slept
with our boots on
I fill the page with thoughts, but crumple them into ugliness, only to try again, my
definition of insanity
Awash in unnoticed silence, bombarded by ignored white noise, that is truly
inescapable
To experience that silence one must sleep, dreamless, but does one even register
that blissful absence?
Or do we simply drift in & out of these days, unconscious of our own consciousness,
simply breathing?
Someone once said “we are all alone together”, truly we are simply alone,
nothing more
When you step back from it, life becomes almost comical, a grand production,
on a world scale
We are so trapped in our plastic & concrete lives; we have forgotten the feeling of
dirt between our toes, in our hair, under your perfect, pink, fingernails
To stand naked in the creek & watch the sun burn through lazy piles of
clouds
We try to remember those things, but it is tarnished, like cheap silverware, stained
like her cheap china plates
We toil & we sweat & we sign our lives away to walk into a coffin, all that’s left a
pile of bones & pictures on the fridge
To fit a mold, to achieve some sterile, dictionary definition of happiness, a tie & suit
smile & a pack of smokes a day
Drinking to forget the sound of the alarm clock, the feeling of that dull razor dragging
across your face
And this page is worthless, like the words “****” scratched out In the bathroom stall,
faded black lines
And these words are pointless, if I hung it somewhere it would be torn down, if I read it aloud
I’d be laughed at
But I sit here & lie to myself again, push another line out of this careless
ballpoint
The buzzer clicks on & I throw the socks in the dryer, they’ve shed their dirt, but mine
is harder to wash away

Crying on the back porch,
feeling the familiar gut twist,
***** shank,
rib bone raking,
everything taking,
violence the lie of a solution,
moral prostitution,
bury lies skin deep in ink screams,
pages tearing like dry skin,
eyes dialed into the breaking point,
memories of all the places you've slept in your bag,
sky turning its eyes on me,
spinning clockwise off centipede wine

Rapid
responder
pull for
help

Solving all of life's problems
with herbs and
chocolate

1
Airless in the morning motions
Every quiet moment shattered in self consciousness
Like coffee on new rugs

2
Flew straight up one time
Fell back down, found the humble ground
Unsteady but reassuring, press on

3
The next song reminds me
Of days spent in this same spot
Waiting on the next song

Concrete eats shoes
Scarred watermelon tattoo
Taking stitches out in ward shower
Cover the window with wet toilet paper towel
How many **** deserts
How many memories forgotten to this thing
A handful of pills keeps me in motion
It's 3:25 and I'm lost in the ocean
Pigs and chickens on my heels

Two sparrows
Sang shrill melodies
This afternoon

Inhale every sparked cinder
Render all the fat, candles blooming
Dooming ourselves by being torn from womb
Consciousness born of lust
Life tends to rust
little holes we fall through
been lost all this time, who knew?
What do I do now, knowing
What do I do now, growing into love with you?
Feels like everything is pointless, pointed out
Move forward with doubt, the road is twisting ahead

nor does anyone know
what it is that he will
  earn on the marrow,
    nor does anyone know
      in what land he is
        to die

One day he will follow her to the sea
By way of creek breaking through cold pine root
Through stone and sand, through outstretched hand
Through this silent land he laps languidly
Rushes relentless, rests in pools, rolling blue jewels
To the sea, on to the endless sea, meet her at the shore
The salt and the roar, the recession of wave and water
Starlight's son and daughter, mingling in the tide
Drawn out from this great divide, down into the depths

38 playing cards, short deck
Justice for orange juice
Imagine if we were encased in clear plastic
Cotton butterflies, cotton soaks up everything
What does death mean, anything?
The death of the (insert meaning of life)
Six six six
You came by earlier
and drew this, no, Cotton did
computer error, virus
God bless you ma'am
close the store now
No more Jolly Ranchers
got any crayons?
This is a closed unit, LS PC
Secured while foyer door is open
NO PATIENTS ALLOWED IN THE NURSES STATION AT ANY TIME
3.14/Kiwi/Honeydew/Melon
Hurry up and wait
God gave us free (will?)
Until the last shot is fired
Thanks for the pretty butterflies Nikki
Let's play with the one eyed jack of spades
NO EXIT
Alarm will sound
YOU CAN'T BREAK ME

Encompassed in volume, solid and fluid and gas
Eyes in morass, looking glass into hazel candy blinks
Links of steel bending, breaking, jet fuel problems
Went off as a kid to solve them, just figured out what type of animal I am
Trying to give a **** to blank faces and pocket change
Long range, ten digit grid, you think you're so well hid, until you get touched
Bunched up around your neck, bent over hugging rags
Carry your life story in a bag, plastic and fresh and new
Waiting for time to catch on up with you

Rain runs down the windshield, blurring brake lights
Heavy drops concentrated into rivulets
Swept away by motorized arms on the glass
Red brick blurs by in the corner of my eye
Speeding by neon signs in the dark
A worn down face on a bar stool, just a glimpse
Of a tired lonely life, drowned in a bottle
When he wakes up in the morning, shivering under sheets
The chill of sweat soaking the mattress
The pounding in his head like hammers smashing bricks
The smell of last nights sickness, cloying & rancid
That spot where she used to lay her head is empty
That spot where she used to lay her body is cold
That spot where she used to touch his heart is burning
Burning like that cheap whiskey he sips with tap water
Burning like her pictures in the fireplace
Burning like the sickness in his stomach
Chained to a bottle & a memory long forgotten
Puddles keep forming, rearranging the dirt
But he's seen enough, for tonight & all other nights
Enough rain & enough snow, he wants sunshine
To sit & sweat, feel the enveloping warmth of summer
When he was young & everything was possible
No one could die & the world was so beautiful
But now all he sees is ugliness & futility
Now all he sees is her face

Pouring myself out of an empty bottle
Pooling between the weeds
Soaking into stone, utterly alone

Night time comes and we check the locks
Draw all the blinds, set back the clocks
The only stars out drip dimly through

It's late, or early, I lose track
Newport light right from the pack
Burn a resolution into your palm

They talk of revolution like it's a song
Sing along, memorize the lyrics
Spit it to the rhythm of gunshots we're hearing

Weeds growing in my garden
Fighting to die, wilting dry
Why even bother

Sit up stare, glance glare, finer fare in your mouth
I have found south, of center, reenter nervous system
Shyster verbal hysteria, mass panic and malaria
we are just trying to breathe

A hemplock of blocked out tired stares
abandoned to space
A time piece on repeat and redial
been a while

I am expanding outward and recoiling inward
what is this
   feeling

Cilantro breath over broken windpipe words
Adams apple crunched between teeth
  dragged over the reef again and again
   the feeling of sharpness piercing skin

   Burn it, every last page, a thought not worth
thinking
   Turn it, every last letter is shattering my
empathy

A dim diagonal dark spot in the road, hitchhiker unload
a train screaming down tracks shaking
   the rain off the juniper you're
    hiding under
A monumental blunder, burning clothing in the dark
trying to find a spark, a moment of recollection
  gone, all those moments in time
   pharmaceutically lobotomized

Lost my air from a parting glance, a split second that haunts my
memories
The crunch of gravel beneath our bare feet, tired arms
around my neck
Dancing drunk in the morning, waiting for the dandelions to unfold dying
arms
Feta cheese and Greek olives, hummus on flat bread, a sip of
merlot
A kiss with dim eyes under live oak branches, a parting breath,
exhaled into open skies
I turn under the disc of the sun, chased by moon and clouds,
the clear quiet of night
I surrender my thoughts to the dead leaves, broken branches,
my holy totems
I lay my voice on wild grasses; let it float down, drip into
running water
I write my words on ***** walls, tomorrow scratched to illegible
nothings
Outlines of small hands on colored paper, hard to believe we were all
children, once

Birds on a highline
Cat tracks and blue twine
We're smiling this morning
T made it happen
The cats are trackin' again
and we sit here happily
waiting on pills

ON POSITION I
OFF POSITION _
Make sure
CTXA loves our vets
STOP
Alarm sounds when door is opened

The wind finds its fingers in the sound of the leaves
a whole space to void
The night finds obscurity in rain, the rain finds
all the places to wake you
Cold stones and water in a bucket drank down
boiling rocks and foaming seas
Find me a solid place to stand in this
rubble of psychosis
A bullet and a brain and a piece of violence
extended laterally
A bubble of smiling faces, shining sequins on
freshly caught fish scales

The distraction machine, our plastic dream, sew last seam through bottom lip
Tipped off of ship, sheet bound tissue is ripped, living form clipped to fish food
Always in a bad mood, waiting on the never happens, inevitabilities stacking
Reef wrapping around your sea urchin heart, leaping off cliffs with no running start
Failure practiced as art, life pushed around in a cart, walking on rusty needles and darts
Hate wheedles silently into our hearts, once that ice starts it keeps spreading
Look at where we're heading, treading ever closer to the chasm's drop
Brain stops with the thought, caught in the dark and you must move across
Ever conscious of where the next step might toss you, tumble and humble and break you
Escaping will make you take two, reflect, we're all subject to the same strain
Fear is a head game that even the sane can't contain, one must simply maintain
We think things are tame, but beyond the flame, eyes strain from a loud darkness

Young man, just a shell, with a sigh of 'oh well'
Ripping up roots with worn hands, wiping sweat from beaten brow
Scratching lines in the field with his fathers plow
Praying for the rain, living for the sun,
only to rot in the ground
But the grass still grows, drying & dying as it always has,
like we all will
Scattering itself among a forest of rusting iron
& oily puddles
You were young once too, before you knew what it meant
to die
You were young once too, before you had to pay your life
away in toil
Now we're old, you & me, the years have run their course
Now we're old and it all makes sense,
and it never meant a thing

Pills and malt brew
A small sliver of the moon
Would you like to be friends?

A handful of heat, coffee tastes sweet in the bottom of the mug
Splayed out, dissected human bug, body chopped and tugged
Catalogue my suffering, patch me together with hemp twine
Ignoring every sign and warning, falling is soaring interrupted
A life defined as loveless, a body bled out bloodless
This mud is sticking to my brain again, no way to win
Don't you hate it when it don't work out
Hanging around until you can't leave
Cried all my tears and can't grieve
Nothing left to even believe

Goodbye dreams, you have left me for the last time
Phantoms in the boxcars of my mind, screeching down track
This first taste of cold is biting at my back, and I can't run fast enough

Green garden, my lovely little garden
over run with weeds
Cracked dirt, no water to be found
broke the spigot
Neat rows, gouged between spiny thorns
sweating, back bent
Such a waste, to throw down this seed
poached by ants
Some day I'll till it all, lovely garden
never work again

These lights are stirring up crawling caffeine in my brain
Trying to interpret a stain in sans serif
Wear it, proudly, hot coffee and that **** humidity
Making you sweat in your white shirt, soaked
To many cigarettes smoked, gone broke for a pack of twenty
Skunk me, out in an apartment full of cats
Sipping sweet tea and slamming sour patch kids
To many lids popped off, the paint all dried up
Cry up your lamentations, then take them and **** it up
Life don't give a **** about feelings

A bee tumbles into my water glass,
rights himself on thin ice cube,
drinks from a droplet,
disappears drowsily
down wind

She wrote, and I quote,

   Star and mild flower
      You are mild girl mild mother
           And much much much more

Can you understand how I love you?
Like a country song on repeat.
   Like a memory under Tamarindo and Medalla

Grass on my clothing while I stare into emptiness
The blankness behind my eyes
Patterns in the hedges
Reflections of a part of the whole
A witness to all

Witness all my savior soul
Sacrifice your beauty for your health
And call more than once a year
Goodbye, call you later

Old Willie Nelson on the radio through the desert,
The sound of cactus blooming in the afternoon
next to the lake
The sound of fresh water flowing from springs
in succulent gardens

I picked these fresh
herbs for you
To make with your breakfast
my love
Could you run your fingers through my
scalp for a while
While the coffee
kicks in
And I find myself
kissing you
like a
boy
all
over

Jalapenos and M67 fragmentation grenades
Little sparkles
On your nails on your nails, full sail hands
Lip gloss lost applesauce type of feeling
Inside me is screaming for that first cold sore kiss among mule deer
The way rocks feel to walk on, we rock on
Another day, way, get yours, pay, me, let me move freely
In my little box
Surrounded by gentle love locks
And you

Males of Dynastes bear two long horns, one on the head, and the other on the pronotum, forming a "plier"; the pronotal horn has reddish setae on its underside. This pronotal horn is absent in females.[3] Some species have an iridescent colouration to their elytra.[4] Certain species of the genus Dynastes also have the ability to change colour.[5] Specific species have been noted to occur with either black or yellowish to khaki green elytra.[5] This variation in colour is due to a spongy layer below the transparent cuticle;[5] this spongy layer is a network of filamentous strands made up of three-dimensional photonic crystals lying parallel to the cuticle surface.[6] When the cuticle is filled with gas this layer can show through, presenting the yellow to khaki green colour, but when filled with fluid the cuticle appears black.[5] This is due to the change in refraction index allowing us to see the difference in colours.[6] This system is known as a hygrochromic effect.[4] Female beetles can change colour but not as completely as males, which is not yet explained as the mechanisms for the colour change is still not completely understood.[5] What is known is that changes in humidity affect the levels of moisture in the cuticle which leads to a change in colour in most cases.[5] Since the change is due to humidity it is a reversible process, however, it has been observed that after multiple colour changes or high stress the beetles will maintain some dark spots on their cuticle.[4] Some hypotheses for why this colour change occurs at all are the ability to blend with surroundings depending on the time of day (black for nighttime and yellow for daytime) to best avoid their main predator, the tropical screech owl (Megascops choliba).[5] Another theory has to do with thermoregulation in the sense that a black beetle heats up faster than yellow and then once they have warmed up theoretically there will be less moisture in the cuticle which leads to changing to a colour which does not heat as quickly so they won't overheat.[5]

Emeralds swimming under low water crossing
Cypress roots give footing to rushing water
Lines and hooks, tokens shook from biting mouths
Striking south, towards sea, would walk blindly
To where brine meets, take a seat, wait for curtains, repeat

Wandering birds in the sky
Watching, always watching
With precision the incision
is stitched into staight line
Flossy dental smile, blood gums
Carbon and CLP, just time
Spent on nothing

Soaring clouds cloak rising sun, vigorous brightness, morning whiteness
Lightness, creeping upon those weeping sightless, dark blindness lifting in slightness
Rightness becomes a non factor, heart like a melted down reactor spitting smoke
Go for broke, break it all, the inevitable fall comes swiftly, will twist thee into submission
Nature's battle of attrition, cruelty ingrained into life like burning brands
Souls sold in cans, tossed as carelessly as the cost, collecting moss screaming
Deeming this a good time to care, a good chance to dare, not to be ensnared
Time cares for those before the same as for us, oxidation of rust, reduction to dust
Why must one must, death is all one can trust, breath blown away in a gust

Dehumanize your enemy
easier to **** them then
not a son or a daughter or a name
One and the same, silhouette,
target, shoulders and T box
darts like rocks raining down
We send those we love to the slaughter
There's got to be a way to work things out
without bloodshed
Find the greyscale in your head
we all paint different pictures
read different literatures
Made it this far since birth
we're all worth our effort
but love is the one thing
that matters
laughter, and
tears
Draw me near and let me fall down
hand in hair, loose, sleeping
like a child

Mid day wake up, med cup, emptied into open palm, balled up
Left, everything just left, like a morning smoke burnt down
Bound to fail, lay low, hail on the tin roof out back of the cove
A grove, cut down, covered in asphalt and heat and us

Cutting branches from the mercy tree
Pouring hemlock into afternoon tea
No retreat, simply flee, chaotically
History, repeated, rebuked,
taught in hollow echoes
Crisp lies, carefully crafted confusion
Truth becomes illusion,
don't trust your own eyes
Die with no reason why
Assembly line insanity, our vanity
A species eating itself alive

I found you in the gravel,
the wet muddy gravel

How far did you travel,
in sunlight or in shadow

River winding high,
receding when it's dry

Reflecting clouded skies,
perceived through panfish eyes

Here chipped secrets lie,
downstream our dreams do fly

All we can do is try
scattered like flints awry

Nicotine and caffeine, burning tire, no traction, in the rain or sun the same
None to blame, blemishless, buffed into brilliant sterility with hot sauce
Arcane toss, dice tumbling, rice pummeled in stainless machines
Bleach disinfects, cleans, the picked scab blood out of sheets
Tattoos on feet, a whole bunch of shiney nothing
From deep we spasm up, cramped leg kicking for air
Only one care in the world, that next one, married to our breath, do us part on death

Cloth wrapping electric wire, big buyer collecting firepower at the arms race
What's at stake, who really wins, violence is a means that rarely justifies its ends
Steel breaks, sometimes bends, but we're made of different stuff, twice as tough
Low hand, bluff, keep smiling until they tax that too, dog mouthed shoes slapping
You're tapping your foot to that same song, the one where we all sing along, wasted wishes
Dishes piling up in the sink, a collection of blinks and cold drinks to wash dreams away
We shape our lives out of clay, 3 hots and a cot every day, we all have voices, something to say
We're all worth listening to

Cannibal soul, eat up everything, push out poison
Convert caloric content into hate, burn with it
Strike out blind, walk reckless in the night
Snuffed out lights in the primordial gloom
Neanderthal watched homosapien pronounce his doom
Sinking into rotten blooms of hyacinth, half hearted resistance
Guess I'll just drown

Arms around my center,
hold me
Eyes on the nape of sunburnt neck,
you smell wonderful
Tamarind and Sativa, I can't leave ya',
but you left me
What else will I see, who will I be,
without you

The grass bends down beneath my feet accordingly, only to rise,
rise again
The waves break on pebbles, sand, only to crash again on
distant shores
Pulled back through quiet memories, the soft smoked smell of
mesquite & juniper
Lying in the heart of a gray metal shell, laid length-wise, molded into
a mad-mans image
Falling through old, tired, lives, with such innocence, clean &
unburdened by life
Accumulating this tiredness, begrudgingly ground down, absently
tossed aside
Never asking why, like beasts led to slaughter, not of flesh & bone,
put principle & ideal
Dreams of silver, fading into tarnished piles of rust, distorted image,
mocking faded beauty
Quiet nights spent in the shade of moonlight, watching the stars go
down with you
Dreaming of sunshine as the dew collects on our sleeping
faces
Awakened by the fleeting song of cardinals, staring into lattice-work
clouds

A tumbling river of psychosis, towing me down the line
Finding the speaking tree, where the levee bends skyward
Eyes open we shelter shock our ***** socks into piles
then flop down in arms spent days in
  shaking for longing
    longing for being held

A strange place to find yourself, down this road tonight
Bright lights on tip toe through the needle sharp live oak
Cough up and choke on the last broken syllable spent
  in a corner store snoring
   symphonies

Beetles on the screen and all it can mean is the light is
attracting them
A stem on the prefrontal cortex was forced more or less
open
Serotonin blue potion puts life back in motion with
little to no commotion


Here we are, finding the time to slice rhymes into watermelon triangles
Here we are, losing it all over again
You and you and you and you

Tired old men with their heads bent low
taking the salt and brine in tow
hooks like daggers
skinny steel
octopus
rings
for
a
fishes
meal

Burning another one down to its ****** filter
The cost starts adding up and math kills me
I'm spilling my coffee cup again, shaking to hold a pen
Inhale, tar and tic tac teeth breaking off at the root
Clandestinely disguised with soot, crawling up from the gutters
One day we all go under, dumping darts or destroyed arteries
Heart disease, cancer, alzheimers, cant even remember her face
It's all just a mess, deconstructed race rigged, sideways shift
Spit into the wind staring at the horizon

God does magic in French
So it says on the board
The board, the black, black board
Chalk line shoesox shinebox
Cat tracks on the hot hood
Graphite gluesticks
Musty lovelocks
Jah Rasta dreadlox
God does magic in French!

Switchin up my smokes, inhale broken hailstones and rhinestones on your cheekbone
Scarred and regal, eagles claw in claw plummeting, no care for ground or impact
Retract all the bad thoughts that keep you from sleeping, turning little top in the corner of the room
A clutch of blooms, rotting and hyacinth and wet on your fingers, the scent lingers
Burning sage in every last corner, one day smudge it all out, feeling about a foot tall and shrinkin

Speak onto the speaking stone
breathe onto the breathing tree
pick up that railroad steel
sharpen it as you walk
rusty shank

Light a fire near the river
on the big square of concrete
read your Quran
and burn her *******
you wore around your wrist

Blah blah blah
here we spin
on this little green rock
big organic meatgrinder
this life can seem so feeble

Matchsticks and broken sunglasses
a handfull of pills
Su Yue Lee painted pictures
that hung over us
as we made love

Grab a piece
any piece
and hold on tight
it might crawl away
and leave you in the dark

Chewing nicorette until your jaw
hurts
A Grateful Dead song as you switch
lanes
Glances in the rear view, making eye contact for the first
and last
time

Late nights on the tail gate
Looking at the same scene
Up and down the road
Found the hidden things
Between my feet
Above my head

And to finish it off
Another haiku I just wrote for you
To pass the **** time