I would like
to believe that all writers
know this feeling,
the one you get when you're in
the zone
and the words flow naturally
and you're in tune
with the universe
and the vibrations
of your soul
reach out into the
infinite
and come back with the
forces of creation
and we become the shapers of
worlds and words
and that
sort of power
is intoxicating
and that sort of buzz
is what keeps us coming
back to our
infinitely unwritten
universes

I heard them
before I saw them.
On a street corner
broad daylight,
shouting at each other
about something or other
involving money
and how she made them
drive down to Texas to see
Pat Benatar in concert
and I really shouldn't
have laughed but
Love is a Battlefield
kept playing in my head
over and over
and over again.

She showed me the lyrics to a song
that she wrote for me,
I don't remember what it was about
or if it was any good at all,
but I know I told her that I liked it
and she said
"Now I'm going to put music to this"
and she said it with such confidence
that it didn't matter whether or not
the song was ever finished,
she said it with the finality
that comes with being an accomplished
musician
and I became so enamored with her
confidence and the idea of music
that I stopped playing my own music
and waited
and waited
and waited
and waited
for the song that she never played for me.

God is no longer
an obligation
but rather a feeling,
an inclination to invoke
when things really start to
go wrong
and you can be born again
because you have now
Subscribed to God (patent pending)
for only $8.99 a month

I've walked by that
park
once in the last
four years
baseball speckled
and bloodied concrete
visible only to those
who lived it
and I can't help but
think of how the world
is awash in great strokes
from the mental paintbrushes
we all wield
in trying to make sense of
our own existences
and I won't ever see
the glory in what you see
but I won't ever try to peel
away those layers of paint either
as we need the artistry of
our nostalgia to cover all the
chips and scuffs that appear
when you're not looking

It was misty
and gloomy
as though we had
lost rights to the sun
because we'd
misbehaved
and I got out of
my car to try and talk
to someone in charge
but the second my door
opened,
huge
heavy
raindrops
fell from the skies,
spat by angels at our
collective sin
and I tried to tell them
they had the wrong guy
but the rain just went
into my mouth and
made me choke
and I ran into the library
newly baptized and shivering
and an old man
all dry and sweatered
asked me
"It's it raining out there still?"

Sometimes you
just let the
bad ****
in the relationship
beat you over
the head over and over
again in the hopes
that you can convince yourself
that the dizziness
and the haze
are actually butterflies
like the ones you
got when you kissed
spontaneously
by your car and
you drove
home listening to
Van Halen's first
album feeling
like you had earned
the right to sing
along to
Runnin' With The Devil
and it meant something.

Everyone knows
what they say
about love
yet nobody
knows
who they even
are
and we all fail
to acknowledge
that we are taking
advice from conceptualized
wise-men
because we like
what they have to say
more than our own
ideas

He drew a graph
on the roll of paper
attached to the wall
that served as a grocery
list
and I didn't need a graph to
tell me to buy milk
and I asked him why
and one of his friends said
from the other room
"he does recreational calculus"
and in that moment I
seethed with rage
and I didn't know enough
calculus to figure out if the
graph was accurate
but being *******
and indignant
is easier than
differential equations.

Write your poetry
like accusations for
crimes never committed
against the love you hold
dearly in your heart
better than anyone has ever held
you in loving arms
and write your poetry
like bottled messages
floating adrift in the endless sea
we call loneliness
and hope that you may bump into
someone out there
even if it breaks the glass and you both
sink
you won't be alone
and write your poetry
like some vigilante cowboy
from days past
and treat each letter
each word
each line
like a bullet that will
always meet its mark
and save the day
so that we can all ride into the sunset
happy and free

at least
until someone changes the channel

It is the silence
between strikes
of lightning
that gives
thunder any
real meaning
but that does not mean
you shouldn't speak

After we had
spontaneously kissed
on a cool autumn
evening
I brought it up
shortly thereafter by saying
"so..."
because I couldn't think
of anything else to say
and she said
"We are more mature than that."
except I wasn't
and neither was she
but at least the ensuing
fallout
was pretty to
look at

While waiting for
my tires to be changed
an old lady struck up
conversation with me
and we talked like old friends
and she told me about how
she grew up near a cannery
where you could buy unlabeled
cans for two dollars a case
so dinner was always a surprise
and we talked about how to
heal the world and she gave
me a book of Catholic prayers
and when we parted ways
we agreed that we would like
to cross paths again but
didn't exchange information
because sometimes the absolute
best experiences are spontaneous
but altogether life-changing

I get stressed out
from little things
like
looking through the contacts
in my phone.

I see all the names there
all the numbers,
tokens of friendships
no longer existing
and I can't help but let
my mind wander.

What if we'd kept our promises?
What if we actually stayed in
touch?
What if I could just reach out
to any of them and try to
talk,
just talk,
and pretend that it hasn't
been years since we sat in
poorly lit rooms
together
and talked about wanting
to bring the world together
in peace.

Instead we all grew apart and
I am left with a pocketful
of strangers.

I used to live
(and I can say that now)
in a town that I hated
where the police were
perpetually parked in church
parking lots
ready to mete out divine Justice
to those who drive a little too quickly
and the people smoking outside the bars
go silent and glare as you walk by
giving the impression that
you were the topic of conversation
and even though you know it's not the case
you still watch your back
lest you be dragged through
the mud of the community Facebook pages
because this is God's country
and you can be exorcised
for cheap

I’m tucked away nicely in the JC section of the library. Apparently, they use the Library of Congress method of categorizing and organizing the library literature here instead of the Dewey Decimal system. I suppose it’s one way to set this community college campus apart from the uneducated townsfolk who still want numbers to tell them where to find their books. Looking at the shelves nearby, I see a great deal of books about dictators and rights and privacy, so I guess this section of the library is all politically charged. Which would explain this headache and general feeling of frustration, but that also could just be from the procrastinating I can’t stop doing. Strangely enough, I have been blocked into this row by a librarian who has her cart of endless knowledge parked in the middle of the political aisle of books. I don’t know where she ran off to, but I’m starting to get antsy. I mean, what if there’s a fire? All these books aren’t exactly flame retardant and the last time I had to jump through a wall of fire it wasn’t the best experience. I imagine these stacks of knowledge burning and I wonder how much it would be missed. There’s a book here titled “Management in the Public Service: The Quest for Effective Performance” and I can’t even tell you what the first page says because the second my eyes landed on the words, I fell asleep. But hey, the librarian is back and she moving her cart of ideas out of the way so that I may procrastinate in peace.

Remember a T is nothing but a cross without a martyr
and when life gets hard you just try harder
because no matter how it ends up we still have a box of participation medals
waiting for you at the finish line.
Trials and Tribulation are just accidental martyrdom waiting to happen.
Don’t fall on your sword, but rather
Take it up,
Tear down Tyranny
Teach those around you the Truth.
Never mind the Tears because with vulnerability comes beauty.
You’re so beautiful when you cry
They said,
You’re so very real.
True to yourself, you said, is all you can be.

When you
found out
that you had
a long lost
brother
born out of wedlock
I wondered if you
were happier to have
another sibling
or just happy to
have finally
found something
to show that your
long dead
father wasn't
perfect.

When I was younger
and perhaps wiser
than I am now
I went on a date
with a young woman
to see a movie whose name
I pretend to forget
and I remember her laughing
at children being hanged in
the opening scene and I knew
that it was bad and that I was
in the wrong place at the wrong
time
so I told her I loved her
because I was a wise boy back then
and luckily she said
"okay"
and we parted ways
and it wasn't until I became foolish
and a few years older that
I realized just what I had
done and that
the children on the screen
were all dressed like me

We were in a coffee shop
in a town perpetually out
of my budget range
when one of my
writer friends
asks me if I've ever
written a sonnet
and I responded with
something beautiful and
meaningless along the lines of:

"I like the freedom
of putting words
to the rhythm of
everyday observations
instead of trying to make
life fit into a specific
model of rhythm and
rhyme"

but the fact of the matter
is that I don't know
how
to write sonnets
or how that rhyming structure
works
since I spend all my time
learning about plants
and hanging out with my cats
instead of seriously learning
how to do
poetry

Blocked and unfriended
blocked and unfriended
blocked and unfriended
is this truly the death
sentence we make it out
to be?

It fascinates me how pervasive
technology has become
and how a friend request
gives way to knowing
every intimate detail
about each other's lives

Congrats on that baby, by the way
Yes it looks just like the father!
(No it doesn't, it looks like an alien
because it is a newborn baby)

But when we cut the umbilical
cords that we have attached to each other
for emotional sustenance,
what are we saying?

I don't want you to know
about my life!
We aren't friends online
so you can't permanently
eavesdrop on my eventful
and much-more-exciting-than-yours life!

And you should feel bad
about that.
You're being left out.
I don't value you enough
to let you be
a bystander
an extra
in my life hoping for a little screentime.

What a creative way to hurt each other.

I write my best
poetry
when I'm at my worst
with the words I am
able to call out
while my head
goes under the
water again
and again
forming a beautiful
narrative that
attracts an audience
who pay no attention
to the person
causing all the ripples
and splashing sounds
casting sharp notes
to contrast the laughter
on the boardwalk
and I find myself
arguing a case
for meaninglessness
because that's the
only way I can
purge and create
these words
that so spectacularly
resonate with
those who need them

I am not sacrificing
myself because I'm
a savior
I'm doing it because
it feels good.

We made love
in our tiny
bathroom today
and the cat
banged on the door
wanting to come in
so she could drink out
of the sink
which to her was
a lot more urgent
than whatever we
had going on
at the time

Waking up
to the taste of blood
and a shooting pain
in my side
which is now the norm
and I dont know what's
coming next since
I hadn't planned
to have made it this
far
but
things are going pretty well.

Its quiet on the lake
at almost one
in the morning
where the sway of the trees
in front of the stationary lights of
the island themed bar
across the way
gives the impression of endless dancing
despite the bar nearing
closing time
and the guests yell a little less loudly
out of respect for the night sky
where I find myself staring at the stars
instead of the bobbers in the water
because
even though fishing is great,
there's always
something better to catch
out there in the cosmos

A **** is nothing but a plant
in the wrong place

go find a flower bed
that works for you

bloom.

I can taste the cheap beer
and hear the people screaming
to be heard over the bass-driven
music being blasted by a DJ
even though I'm too afraid to go
out in case I run into one
of the many ghosts of my pasts

We joke
about the pain
of being hated
by our savior
We laugh
about the justification
of abuse
from those who were better
than from those whom we came.
We sigh
at the fact
that we never had
a childhood,
only a struggling
lurch from one
punishment to the next.

We love,
now that we are
free from your oppressive
games.
We live,
now that we are
out from your control.
We lie,
when we say that
the uncaught crimes done
don't hurt anymore.

Of course they do.

But we flourish,
determined to carve
out our own paths
down empty roads
leaving you withering
in the dust.

He spent all his
time
digging holes in his soul,
deep wells where others could
throw in their coins
and wish for better
things and while
it never made him
happy it did make
him awful rich
and he found that
the key to happiness
was shaped an awful lot
like a 40 foot yacht
and a supermodel wife

I was there when my grandmother
died.
I was urged to say something as she went
but couldn't as I had already
said everything
I needed to say
during our front porch conversations
where she would tell me that kids
shouldn't have to be sad like we were
and answered my questions about life.

The idea of sending people off with peaceful
words doesn't make sense to me.
The peaceful words,
the staggering revelations,
the infinite bounty of love
should be said during life,
not on the brink of life everlasting.

Whispering wonders to the
dead and dying
is about as useful as painting
a broken window.
It looks pretty, but what does it really do?

There was something
romantic
about the hiss of the phone
after you'd hung up.
As though the rapid fire
conversation about my
grandmother's death
existed only in the space
between our receivers.
As though hanging up
would make the conversation
disappear
and the things said
would be undone.

That hiss only gets louder
and eventually starts to echo
with things said and unsaid.

"Good. She was crazy anyway."
"Good. She was crazy anyway."
"Good. She was crazy anyway."

Cigarettes
and
cat ****.
Those are the smells
that remind me of you.
You had a tendency
to call the women
I cared about in my
life
******. (Capital W)
My mother,
My fiance,
My sisters,
and where does
this leave you?
Sitting as a bombed
out husk of masculinity,
a fluid ever-changing
identity.
I remember you when
you were a goofy nerd.
Now you are a Rebel (Capital R)
waiting patiently for the
antebellum south
to rise again.
I try not to look back in
your direction.

I have risen.
I have moved on.

For a while
even the word
poetry
made me flinch.
I had so many thoughts
swirling
in my head
but no courage to
put them down.
My cup and mind
runneth over,
and it's best to aim
the spillage at
paper (digital or otherwise).

It was a friend,
someone I trusted
whom I sent my poetry to.

I asked for her thoughts
and she responded,
"****"

And that was the best
advice I'd ever received.
Too bad it nearly broke me.

There's a faint
tingling in my
fingers today
and my doctor
who I never visit
says I should lay off the
caffeine
but my fingers are tingling
in beat with the piano
playing in the room
below me
with only my breath as
accompaniment to
the melodies
and all I leave are clouds
of condensation in the air
as evidence of collaboration
where for a moment
I didn't feel so
disconnected

I kept throwing
coins into that well
in the hopes that I could
wish myself back into
your arms
until I went
bankrupt from hoping

I read somewhere once
that sailors on the open sea
would often see mermaids
in the water
and I find it so
delightfully human that they tried
to find wonder and amazement
out where no human life can thrive
and perhaps the mermaids were an
anxiety
or a reflection of the lack of humanity
in the open sea
like how we reflect ourselves off of smoke
and mirrors through hallowed halls
of social media and shares and tweets and likes
to give the impression of humanity
where
there is none
to be
found

hello,
why yes,
it is late
or rather
early at this point
no I haven’t
been drinking
I’m just writing poetry
yes, I realize that
that sounds exactly
like an activity for a drunk
person but I assure you
I’m only
down here
because my fiance
is up there
asleep
and you see
she works days
and I work evenings
and
what’s that?
I told you
I live upstairs.
What do you mean poetry
is an inside sport?
It’s a nice evening.
and
what’s that?
well
I rent
from the guy who
owns this chair that I’m
sitting in and I’m sure he
has no problem with me
using it at one thirty in the
morning and
really if you want I can
call him
and

What?
I am not being a *******
and
what’s that?
yeah.
okay.
uh huh.

well,
when you put it that way…
yes my bed is
a lot more comfortable than the
one you would provide
for me.

have a good night,
officer

You never know
if something
is worth it
or if it's slowly
killing you.

That all depends on the lighting
and the score
and the hope that this time
won't be a waste
a lost investment,
but now the finale
is here
and the stars are nowhere to be found
so you run out of the studio
and look up into the black sky
and all the dead light
from galaxies away
all seem to have
gone out.

I had listened to
the song
on repeat
eight times
already
sitting in the
bowling alley
lot
moving only
to restart the
song
as I desperately
tried to get the
gentle carefree
snow outside
to fall in time
with the pieces of my
shredded heart
but gravity had different
plans and where the
snow stopped on the ground
I fell through
until I reached warmth
from the core,
Earth's heart
and mine beat in
synchronicity
for one beautiful
eternity
and at that point

I shut off the music
and drove home