collecting parts like
broke down cars,
and shattered toys
or a guitar string wound
too tight.
pushed back and
affixed to anything shiny and new-
if it glistens in the sunlight
and looks nice under the moon-
then keep it, face the good side out
and don't let anyone look under.
if it hurts but it works, beware your time.
carbon takes copper, like i'll take to mine.

like the blind leading the deaf into collective senselessness.
the ties we always seem to cut,
when one starts to care too much.
fragments in time are void, unconscious
i don't feel real now very often.
echos fading, backwards, slowly
calculated movements, intent repeating.
if we could sit and just be heard i'd never speak another word
of all that's lost, or what's to gain
lives turned fragile down by the lake

we sip wine and feign class as though we could detect the full-bodied flavor and fragrant flowery ******* whatever you said this was.
i remember then the last time i actually impressed someone and what hell it can lead to, drop the act and just chug.
pretend like i'm on a boat and stumble out the door muttering something about bukowski.

pretty far from the ocean.
further yet from the stars.
what i hear sounds much clearer
than what they actually are.

"we're ******* accustomed to feeling like ****"-
one of us hollered in the bar, over the jukebox, the crowd remaining at a dive at 1.30 am.

the other need not respond, the glint of a tabletop filled with glasses spoke for us.

and **** all if i can't quote a dozen people, brilliant in their craft, on the subject of individuality, the creative process, virtues of the lower class and well-read.
**** all if you didn't think it first.

but we won't speak.

shot glasses drained. the moisture of our lips long ago extinguished with your last cigarette.
it's half past last call and neither of us are fit to drive.

this isn't ok but neither am i. and there's something to that.