We lament,
systematically,
our woes,
our naked ring fingers,
and our cold mattresses,
we indulge in our vices
justifying the gluttony
with broken hearts.
My comrades and I
we bond over the futility of love,
the battle that is romance,
and in coming together,
we make one another strong,
condemning the ignorant male swill for their lust,
their objectifying ways,
their Godless, scheming hearts
that leave no room for us,
and we bemoan
vigorously,
the fault that keeps a man from binding himself to a woman
indefinitely.
But the truth is...
I love it.
I smile inwardly as I spin lies that keep me in my cups without question,
and at home in peace without argument.
I nod in affirmation as my acquiantances curse the carnal seed that brought man forth,
but the truth is,
I love it.
Primal nature
is far more satisfying to me
than the boring, blustering outsides
of a man with no personality.
The tedious conversation required by polite society,
and the obligation to know him,
no matter how Nothing he may be...
The truth is,
I would rather create an adventure,
something to truly stimulate my senses,
something to rouse the animal in me,
as opposed to tranquilizing my *****.
The truth is,
when a man releases me from his embrace,
a rush of endorphins thrusts me into the streets,
and I fly through the night like Margarita on her broomstick,
wild and unfettered,
pink-cheeked and laughing,
naked and free...
the truth is,
there's a thrill,
in taking a man,
giving him what he thinks he wants,
taking what you need,
and ending with the drop of a guillotine,
and the blade never dulls,
the game never loses its charm,
and the truth is,
I never tire of it.

Se casse
se brisé
comme des os
ou on verre
alors
je ne guéris pas
parce que je ne suis pas
de chair,
je suis fragile
je suis fait de porcelaine.
Je suis une mosaïque de fissures
et défauts.
On peut dire
je suis né brisé.

One can almost hear the operatic chorus
Cry out in emotion,
As they ascend the marbled stairs,
Hands shaking so in excitement,
That the ornate metal railing cannot be felt beneath them.
Down a hall, feet gliding on the polished floors,
Around the corner,
And there it is,
On the wall like an altar,
Mountain range of colors,
Geometric patterns,
Like gilded windows into other worlds,
And a resting place of alabaster skin,
The calm prairie
Amidst a festival of shimmering lights,
Celebrating with vigor
The peace
The eye of the storm
In her expression,
The Woman in Gold.
Her figure rising from the extravagance
Like the simple and graceful tendrils of steam
From a cup of tea.
Amiable and tender,
In the middle of a bustling cafe.
At once, you are spun onto a dancefloor,
Crafted by Midas,
Twirling and dipping and dancing,
With explosions of royal sunlight,
Before the gentle partner takes you by the hand,
And leads you into a steady, yet balletic waltz.
Say her name,
This secret woman,
She deserves more than anonimity,
Say her name,
In a whisper as quiet as her poised hands,
Or in a glorious cry of admiration,
As cacophonous as the color of the robes
She is swathed in.
Say her name,
Like a prayer,
Or a pledge,
Or a dutiful anthem,
With your hand to your heart,
Say her name,
And never let the memory of the sound slipping off of your tongue.
Say her name,
Like you survived the war in her honor,
Say her name,
She is not just a woman,
Say her name,
No matter her religion,
Say her name,
Because she was forgotten,
But no longer,
Never again,
For you, we’ll remember,
Adele.

“Don’t you want a life with someone you love?”
“Don’t you want a ring on that finger?”
“Do you want to die alone?!”
I can’t get married,
You see.
Married life,
Just isn’t for me,
I can’t have a white wedding,
With a pretty dress
And roses galore,
I can’t have a little suburban house with a swing,
In the backyard,
And a yellow lab wagging his tail by the front door,
I can’t get married…
Because I already am.
I am married,
Sealed and sewn,
To my love
My forever soulmate,
Who has me,
Mind, body, and soul,
Until the end of time.
I cannot give you my hand,
For my whole being belongs to her.
She owns me,
Like the sun owns the earth,
And it’s her tender,
Unrelenting,
Nourishment of love,
That sustains me when I must travel,
And we are apart.
Every day I wake to her beauty,
And every night I drift off peacefully in her embrace.
If I am ever forced to exist away from her,
I’ll die,
Just as slowly as everyone else,
But far more miserably,
At the base of an altar to her,
Surrounded by canvases marked with her image,
I’ll die,
Like a dry succulent,
Slowly wrinkling and withering,
Without the liquid life from the sky,
I’ll die,
Of heartache and loneliness,
If I’m ever forced to be away from
Texas.

I miss people I can’t name,
I lament events I have not seen,
I have memories of things I did not experience.
And I do not know why.
Everyone is like a child to me,
Experiencing life for the first time,
And I watch with nostalgia
And wish for such blissful days of naivete,
Which I cannot remember.
I am robbed of my memories,
Wholly and completely.
I was given a false life,
To trudge about and complete,
Stuck in a green skin,
With faux potential,
And a trim of ink black resentment,
Made to live in solitude while I wish for my old life,
Mourn my friends,
And live in spite,
Watching the world grow old with detest as I grow with it.
I know that our species has a soul,
Some of which is so beautiful,
But I cannot bear to watch it’s endless pattern,
Time and time again.
It weakens me.
It wears me thin.
It makes me hate.
I am not angry with them,
The children,
The newcomers,
The unawakened,
I am simply old.
I have been old for so long,
That I cannot remember being young.
But that is our way, isn’t it?
We age every day,
And forget every morning,
And we pray every night that the next life will be different,
That we’ll wake up to a skin that’s all our own,
To people who remember us for who we are,
Entirely.
I have few wishes,
Because I have learned that nothing you can imagine,
Could be quite as beautiful,
As God’s gentle plan,
But I have always wished, despite this,
For a time all my own.
Where I can be born, live, and die,
With everyone else,
And feel whole, and vital, and real,
Instead of like a phantom in a foreign land.
Perhaps the future will bring a piece of paradise,
And God will say,
“Come home.”
I dearly long
For my final nightfall.
I dearly long,
To go home.

White walls,
No windows,
Perfect square,
Rough carpet,
Same chairs in every room,
That trademark color,
Not green,
Not grey,
But some unfortunate color in between,
Like someone ate grey,
Then washed it down with green,
And someone else opened them up,
And that’s the partially digested color that they found.
Everything gilded in dull alluminum,
Like a poor man’s Klimt,
Cold table legs
And chalkboard trays
And door handles,
Door handles all day long,
I touch the door handles sixteen times a day here,
And I can feel the hands of every sweaty, unwashed  drone
That has touched it before me,
That unpolished texture grating against the tips of my fingernails,
The cold,
The vibrations of the grinding hinges,
And the herds of zombies on the other side,
Anyone touching the door,
Making that loud, resonating sound
That moves through to the ******, monotonous handles
And into me.
Linoleum,
All day, every day,
That God forsaken color,
Checkered with white tiles,
Something like white,
But not quite white,
Not nearly as white as the walls,
Speckled with another color,
Like something that would burst out of a caterpillar if you stepped on it,
In an infinite mosaic from hall to hall.
The mood is set on this liminal stage,
By a series of florescent spotlights.
The same light by which we watch the dreary, surreal dreams play in our heads,
It is this light that illuminates my waking nightmare,
The knocks on the nerves behind my eyeballs,
And I hide,
And pretend that no one’s home.

I’m relieved that you’re not here.
Though I’ve never seen you here before,
I sort of expect you to be,
Because the memory of you follows me wherever I go.
Slipping noiselessly through the door
Into the din of the bar,
With a perpetual cloud of smoke clinging to you,
Highlighting your phantom affect.
I don’t think I could handle it,
Seeing you here.
Visions of you already plague me
Without seeing you
In person,
Sitting before me
Balancing on the back two legs of your chair,
Heavy leather boots crossed at the ankles,
Rocking on your long, lean, jean-clad legs.
I don’t think I could handle it,
Hearing you order your Jameson,
Double,
Neat.
One hand in the pocket of your long black coat that grazes the floor when you sit,
The other wrapped around your glass,
Jameson,
Double,
Neat.
And although the smell suffocates me,
Sometimes I sit out on the smoker’s deck and breathe in the smell of burning tobacco,
And if I’m particularly desperate to feel your presence without succumbing to the need to call,
I order it.
Jameson.
Double.
Neat.
But see,
I can’t actually call you and ask you to come,
Because you will.
And if you ghost through the threshold with your paint-stained hands casually shoved in your pockets,
And give me that gut-wrenching,
Heart-stopping grin,
I’ll die.
Because death is the only way to avoid my incessant need to be near you.
Even now,
Knowing that your insides are just as coal-black as your eyes,
I yearn for the feel of your broad shoulders flexing and rolling beneath my fingertips, my hands running over the expanse of your chest,
Seeking entrance beneath your shirt
As if I can feel the tattoos that lie beneath.
The neck,
The jaw,
The parted lips,
Everything I’ve kissed and caressed a thousand times,
I know I would do the same a thousand more,
If I got the chance.
So thank God that you’re not here.
Because if I caught one glimpse of your irresistible, impossibly soft, dark locks
Falling over your severe, furrowed brow,
Mussed by the wind
And from your fingers running through it over and over,
To the envy of my own,
I would burst at the seams,
God,
It’s a good thing you’re not here.

How do I put this
For the hearing folk?
A shout in the ear,
A jab, or a poke.
What once was a whisper,
A tame, gentle brush,
Distant and soft,
And ever so hush,
Now it’s a SHOUT
From whisper to bang,
From dull, mild thud,
To a clamouring clang.
And it’s not just the volume,
God, if only…
I’d go back to the confusion,
Go back to the lonely…
But there’s the little noises,
Things that I’ve missed,
Like tinkling bells,
A click, or a hiss.
Now there’s more,
A whole colony of sound,
Like an anthill, you see,
From a hole to a mound.
A hell of an acquisition,
As my eardrums burn,
I must accept that I have
A new language to learn.
But in the privacy of solitude,
I switch off the pain,
And retreat into peace,
My silent domain.

“Go to the doctor, sit in a dim room, take a pill,
Take a test,
Map your progress on a chart-
Get better.”
“What did Dr. Doctor say?”
“How much longer will it take?”
“When will you
Get better?”
Write in a journal,
Make sure that you record
Every day
Until you
get better.
Because we care about you,
We love you,
And we just want you to
“Get better”.
But what is better?
What if I’m the best?
What if this is as
Better
As it gets?
I don’t want to spend this life
In waiting rooms
Waking up to alarms
“Take 2 @ 7 am”,
Why do I have to live this way?
No one told me this before,
When I made up my face with a smile,
And cowered in the closet,
While my doppleganger danced and performed,
And if that’s what you call better,
Hiding
Or residing
In a haze of medication,
Doped up,
Sobered down,
Nothing to hang onto,
I don’t need to lock the doors three times,
Because I don’t care if they’re locked at all.
Is this it?
Is this
Better,
Is this what they’ve been asking for?
Tell me,
Friends,
Loved ones,
Professionals,
Is that what I must do to
Get better?
Hide?
Live in an underwater world,
Where everything is slow,
And the music is muted,
And you can’t feel down,
Because you can’t feel anything at all?
Is that how I can do it?
Is that how I can
Get better?

Ma faiblesse
C’est important a la structure de moi.
C’est la chair à mes os...
La faille dans ma structure
c'était ma mort.

In the dark of my room,
I lightly tap the pads of my fingers
against the smooth keys
of my typewriter,
Hoping that the gentle reminder
Will awaken my subconscious,
And the words will come.
The gentle trails of incense smoke
Drift drunkenly around me,
Like a haze of memories wrung out
And overused.
I sigh,
Accepting that I may require refueling,
Recharging,
Replenishing of the nourishment
On which my work sustains itself.
I stall,
Grasp for any last resource,
And when I find nothing,
I sigh,
Finally conceding.
I need it to write,
And I need to write to live,
And though writing makes it hard to stand the noise of human contact,
The ugly distraction of romance,
The sweaty, *****, selfish people,
That I have to smile at and touch.
I suppose I have no choice
But to face the war zone that is humanity
And collect.
I rise from my little desk,
Gather my coat,
And prepare,
Begrudgingly,
To go out and experience.
In the outside,
I must laugh with others,
Hold a man or two,
Taste and feel and drop into every pool,
A pebble of disturbance,
And let the ripples unfurl new strings of words,
Lines and lines of poetry,
Bundles of stories,
Baskets of characters
Floating in on waves,
A long awaited reward
For an unpleasant,
Detestable
Deed.
Forging love,
Flowery romance,
For the sake of pulling and picking what I need
To color the pages of my work.
Back at my desk,
Weary from company,
My hands revive to complete my purpose,
The reason for my distress,
The thing that moves me,
But makes me want to be still,
What a suffocating paradox it is,
The unfortunate requirement of my condition.

Finis, *****.
Nous sommes le finis.
We're done like a bad movie
that's not bad enough to gain a cult following.
Finis, *****.
When you die,
I'll cheat on my diet,
because it'll be worth the calories
to celebrate.
Yeah.
I hate you that much.

The world used to be so quiet
Way back before there were so many people,
The far past,
And when I had a young body,
And my ears didn’t work,
The recent past,
It was so quiet.
But I can’t hide under covers and behind drawn curtains for the rest of my life.
I want to be in the outside,
I want miles to explore,
For things to be far,
So they have to be worth it,
To get them.
And for there to be enough silence
That when a single thing happens,
I can hear it from far away.
I’m tired of running away from the noise all the time,
Being chased into corners,
Locking the doors behind me quickly,
Earplugs,
Earbuds,
Sunglasses after sundown,
Anything to create a barrier.
I’m not a person who likes walls,
But they’ve been my friends and family,
For twenty-one years now.
If it weren’t for the people,
I would embrace a world without walls,
Without buffers and veils and masks,
But the people are loud,
So loud,
That even when I feel a small,
Pebble-sized
Sense of peace,
I must tuck it away,
It’s not to be enjoyed,
Because it’ll be shattered by the people
And their voices
And their cars
And their phones
And their computers
And their people toys
And their people games
And even in the quietest corner
Of the most isolated, abandoned building,
I can still hear
The people noise.

Late fifties, early sixties,
Maybe somewhere in between,
I died.
Can’t explain how it happened,
I don’t think it was a big deal,
It certainly didn’t feel like it.
Besides, if it was a tragedy, shouldn’t I remember it?
It doesn’t matter anyhow,
It’s all over. The point is that I lived,
And now I can’t remember enough to sustain myself on memories.
I’m left with that itch you can’t scratch until you put your finger on that word,
That face you forgot,
The name of that restaurant,
Figure out what it is you’re hungry for,
Bring that specific thought to the front of your mind and picture it,
Feel it,
Recall what you need to…
Instead I’m left with half-thoughts,
Words and figures I can’t finish
Because it was long ago,
Looking with a different set of eyes.
Here I am now,
Out of place,
Uncomfortable in my own skin,
People noticing that I’m not quite right,
I don’t quite fit into the landscape,
And there’s nowhere for me to be.
Because it’s not a where,
It’s a when,
And you can’t take a plane to a when.
You can’t drive your car or bike or even take the bus
To 1958,
Because wherever you go,
It’s still going to be a place in Now.
Everything Now is a bitter reminder that I’m a foreigner,
An intruder on a new place that deserves new souls that love new things.
Even the good things are a slap in the face,
A kick to the shin,
A bright light in my old eyes,
That bring my attention to the calendar,
The clock,
The dress on the streets,
The technology in the hands of every man, woman, and child with two thumbs and a pocket to stow it away.
I want late nights listening to those smooth notes pouring off the stage like mist on a cool morning,
Everyone on the dancefloor losing themselves in it,
Instead of losing themselves in brightly lit screens in their laps,
Fingers shaking with anticipation for the next tap and scroll.
Where’s the addiction to long drives and the yearning for a simple joy?
It’s disappeared into an addiction to little black boxes and all the noises they make and information they stole from books and brains and the tongues of real, live people that died with less attendees to their funerals than attendees to the opening of the new Apple store.
No one listens to the old folks,
Too busy resenting the things they left behind for us,
Even though they couldn’t control it either.
Good things that last take more effort to destroy
Than the flimsy new things take to create,
But we destroy them anyway,
Instead of honoring the way they earned their place in our world.
Artists with the ability to remember and record are distracted by politics and ugly things,
And forget their responsibility.
Fifty years from now,
We won’t have anything beautiful to offer our children and their’s.
Is it too late for me?
Am I destined for misery?
I’m an old thing, too, does that mean I’m fated for a dusty closet or decaying garbage bin?
I couldn’t have been made alone.
I couldn’t have been left on my own in this new place,
There has to be someone else,
Maybe even more than one someone,
Because anything less is too cruel.
And if there is,
Where do we go?
Can we make a new place out of Then?
Or is it too late?
Is it impossible…
Impossible to make a where out of a when?

In the folds of romance,
Lingering too long,
You made a passtime
Of treating me wrong,
Returning endearments,
With apathetic remarks,
Exchanging devotion
With inconsistent sparks,
But I clung to you fiercely,
And gave you acquittal,
I felt far too much,
But at least I said little.

Without books,
There would not be love,
Without poems,
There would not be love,
Without art, and literature, and music,
There would not be love.
Humans like magic and fairies and giants,
But science is a terrible sound,
And it wakes us from such fantastic dreams.
But there’s something close to magic,
The closest thing we have-
Love.
We can still dream about wild,
Unconditional love.
We can dream that there’s only one, true soul,
A perfect fit,
Two people designed for one another.
We can still dream,
About love.
It’s in every written word,
Sung note and brushstroke,
And every artist breathes it in through a mask,
Refusing the oxygen of reality.
We reject the uncertainty of our world in favor,
of the mysticism of that near-magic, love.
It’s a masochistic affair,
Worshipping that feeling that lives in our art,
Just out of reach.
I do not accept deceit.
I do not yearn for fiction to enter the tangible world.
But I do long for love,
For I do love,
I love art itself.

The days drag out,
Unbroken by sleepless nights,
And a bone-deep,
Brain-deep,
Gut-deep
Weariness.
Restless,
Uncomfortable,
But too tired
And too spent
To give to where I am and what I’m doing.
After the sun goes down,
I pace, despite the fatigue,
And let my imagination run in the dark,
To satiate that squirm beneath my skin,
Even if only briefly.
I gently place the needle on the record,
And strip down to a slip,
The sound of vinyl humming over my bare skin,
In a caress as intimate as the satin I wear,
And there it is-
Apparent,
Immobilizing,
And I know-
I have to satisfy it.
At first, just a sway,
Side to side,
Left to right,
Rocking front and back,
One foot,
Then another,
And spinning,
I’m swinging,
Rolling,
Working muscles that hadn’t moved
In what felt like years.
From my bare toes,
To my stiff neck,
To my tingling fingers,
I unravel that itch,
And dance.
Leaping
Twisting
Grinning from ear to ear,
I move like it’s the first time anyone has ever moved,
And I shake off the whole day,
The whole week,
Every worry,
Every word that weighs on me,
I dance,
Until my shoulders feel no burden,
And the ache is thrown from me,
In the shake, rattle, and roll of dance.
My feet don’t stop until the soles blister,
And my arms don’t still until the sockets are weak,
Until my fatigue is true,
And not the creeping,
Crawling
Drain on my bones,
On my soul,
On my everything.
Until the tired makes me smile with gratifying exhaustion,
And my sheets are a reprieve
And not a ritual,
And my body can rest,
Now that the itch is gone.

Fighting every step my feet take past the heavy, wooden doors,
my own sharp, shallow breaths the only sound,
interrupted by the scrawl of my name on the gilded book.
Tunnel vision,
it's a real thing after all.
I can't even tell if there's anyone else here,
I can only see the blurry faces of the dejected couple
who grow closer
as I will my legs to keep moving,
moving closer.
I'm not sure if I want to see.
I heard it was horrific,
how are they going to cover that up?
I pause by the couple.
I'm morbidly curious about the way they look,
exhausted,
faces blotched with the discoloration of relentless sadness.
I peel my gaze away at the sound of a familiar tune.
From the soft, dusty speakers in the corner plays a song
one I'd tried to forget for the past few days.
As the strumming of a ukulele layers over the breathy voice,
I close my eyes and allow,
briefly,
the image to appear fully.
There he was,
colorful,
grinning,
seeming to bring a light to the dimly lit wings of the stage,
plucking at the little instrument,
and crooning away.
Around him, gathered, would be his delighted peers,
their usual, foul teenage spirits lifted by his magnetic presence.
Opening my eyes, the colors fade away to the dull browns of the pews and the oak box before me.
With a shuddering breath,
I advance.
Despite the numerous times I've done this in the past,
it never disturbs me any less.
And this time,
I'm extremely aware that just moments ago,
we were children together.
It's wrong, the image of him emerging over the edge of the box
as I come nearer.
It's wrong,
seeing the most active boy I've ever met,
lying so still.
It's wrong,
seeing a somber expression on his face,
already crinkled with laugh lines.
It's wrong,
whispering my goodbyes,
when I've always shouted to him,
from the stage,
from the audience,
across the courtyard,
cheering,
laughing,
singing with him.
It's wrong,
to see him in his stone grey suit,
his ashen knuckles clasped around
black and white rosaries.

Let’s be happy,
Real happy,
Get happy,
One after another,
Let’s just line up,
And take some happy,
Get it in a little plastic cup
Wash it down with some water,
Wait for the happy to kick in,
Hope the happy doesn’t have any side effects,
Go see a professional
And talk about how to get happy,
Spending time with friends,
Only pay attention to each other
When we can give each other happy,
But no one wants to see the stuff behind the curtain,
Because we don’t know what to do with anything
That isn’t cookie-cutter,
Perfect form,
Follow-all-the-rules,
Make your mama proud,
Textbook,
Poster-worthy
Happy.

Take me,
Human,
Take me where I am,
Or take me home.
Have me on your couch,
On your bed,
At the table,
Do it with your elbows on the counter,
Or sitting in a chair.
Take me,
Human,
Like you’ve never had another before.
Hidden behind the shelves in the library,
Parked in your car,
Somewhere in the dark,
In the bathroom,
In a closet,
Anywhere,
Everywhere,
Open me,
Take me,
Have me,
Read me,
You deserve,
The company
Of a good book.

To be held,
Oh, God,
By Her,
Is to be home.
The air is sweeter,
The lights are brighter,
And the world outside seems full of potential.
When she holds me,
Oh Lord,
The music comes from the Heavens,
They sing out,
“Allelujah, allelujah,”
And my heart leaps in my chest,
Because in Her embrace,
War is far,
Hate is fiction,
And I am deserving of love.
To be in,
Oh, God,
Your Church,
Is to be home.

Tip tap, tip tap
Tapping, tapping, tapping
With that incessant sound,
That pleasurable pressure on the nail beds as the fingernails press down,
Down on the keys until the words come out,
Lifting momentarily to snap, pop, and crack those knuckles
To relieve that stiffness
Loosen them up enough to lift the bottle,
Fingers grasped tightly around the slender, delicate neck,
Swing it up,
Get enough leverage to do it with one hand,
Because you can't spare the other,
It's typing,
Still typing,
Typing nothing,
Nothing Important.
Bottle up, up in the air,
Hard swallows of that sweet, sweet poison that tastes better when there's more,
Dim lamplight casting dark green from the bottle onto the walls,
Like a mockery of a dappling light through tree branches in a forest.
The jagged thoughts that don't make sentences,
Only angry snarling,
Smooth over as the poison drips down,
Sinks in,
Melts those granite thoughts down to a rich,
Decadent
Oil
That slips off the fingertips into the keys,
And bedews each word,
Dripping that life into them,
Satisfying, satiating, saturating,
Until they are plump and vital,
And fingers are falling on the keys like knees to the floor in prayer,
And those words are being worshiped,
Exalted and revered,
And instead of the words being creations,
The words are the gods of the fingers,
The fingers the creations,
Throwing themselves down in ritual,
The raw, chafing flesh of the tips pounding against the keyboard like the mutilated backs of the self-flagellating worshipers of other gods,
And they go down and down and down
Until they can't do it anymore and the poison is gone and the words are dried up again,
And the gods don't seem real anymore
And the hands fall dead in the lap
Only stirring to lift that last swig of the poison
One last sip
And that's it
Death to the hands.