eh

The volcano died
it was sad
It'll return when the rabbit does
sometimes these things take at least 30 years

the sand is cool and damp
and stillness condenses on the
bottle

the ocean
the churning, tidal,
moon licked mad
ocean of our collective
dreams even stops
mid lap

We got off with
half the time
and all the gold
and songs are
still sung about
us I'm told

glittering tea-lights fill
the sea, and soon it's
brilliantly lit as
a vanity mirror
and I feel my face being washed out
in the glow and the warm
beer and tonight's expectations

The broken screen snapped back into place as the indoor cat slipped out into the great wild world. I did not know this. When I heard him meow I thought it was just a friendly exchange. This went on for a while, until I recognized the growing terror in his cries. Your fucking filthy, don't ever do that again.

And butterflies are still strewn dangerously over America

Today marks 4 years since Walking English first put pen to digital ink. It's been a wild journey, of poetry climbing up from the roots of broken wine bottles and dingy brownstones and the Jersey dirt. I don't know how else to say it, but you still break my heart every time.

even in August
that hot fog lingers
irreverant, like a question,
between bodies and the landscape

10/6/08

Folding panties on the tele with my old man yelling
bout my civil duty to vote
same fight every time
speaking to me like his old man spoke to him, of that I'm sure
Got a top drawer full of naughty things, panties and stockings
mushroom chocolates
at 23
and a room mate who's consumed more lsd than one could dream
Thinking of coffee and a friend of mine
and wondering about my life
making things right
And my old man has a mortgage and watches the news obsessively
waiting for the anchor to announce the worlds over.
He complains about my bed being too low to the floor
and how he wont lick my pussy anymore until it's on a frame
his theory, it's closer to the worms
he's paranoid, like really
He wants to talk about the heavy things in life, things dark and scary and real...
He doesn't want to listen though
He claims he doesn't know me and it drives him crazy
He knows.

"Tell me a secret" he asks. "A real one..."
The phone dies then
and I don't call him back

something subconscious

Oh darling,
your intentions elude me
Are you feeling crowded in this crowded room dear?
You turn the lights on and off
Walk away, scream a name at the top of your lungs
and hang a tired head
defeated

That's what I know
weather I know it or not

Well I've stewed up some theories, seasoned justifications
in response to your actions
I let you get away with it
There I claim fault
and we dance around the room
ignoring what we can not

That's what I know
weather I know it or not

Yet when your skins crawling
in the bruise of morning
We retreat between the sheets
Where your heart is safe
and sorrys left for the mirrors face

That's what you know
weather you know it or not

So you flake away
more and more day by day
and you try to kill the pain
anyway you can
but it grows back like a rose bush
beautiful dangerous
When you sit down by me
pricked fingers bleeding
I wont mind when it hurts
and i wont hide if it gets worse

That's what you know
weather you know it or not...

Waiting with bated breath
Needing to leave it to truly feel like im in it
Remembering California burns
from pages of memories lost or walked off with
And the American River and every river
Where someone set stones primitive

The only thing between us is you and me
and cigarette triggers
and burning down businesses
Stained, glass memories
and of and old lover
lost to opiate cloud cover
Gypsy kittens
and dogs swimming after sticks
Cutting your hair
your face in the mirror
And catching your eye
in lightening moments

There is such power there
Raw in the morning
and in the darkness
Discovering
you're sleepless, your nightmares
you're bold and your shyness
And your heart I would feel
Through fingertips and tongue slips
and in the notes between the lines

Sentimental junkie
you touch me
Keep singing darling
and living your dream
and when you need
there she'll be
behind you always
a light shining
softly the melody
Smiling

another night

flawless idiot in perfect stride with souless music
girl on girl redundence got the crowds bored instantly
population bordom and the alleyways hold all the evenings entertainment
but only for those of us with the right angles and the kind of eyes that dont miss these sort of things

sunset high over Chinatown
as linens dance on rooftops
and the next street over is empty, save
for a lone bicyclist leisurely weaving
down the silent movie brownstone engulfed streets
and on the next block men walk beneath babeling signs
while high above

pamphleters calmly pamphlet
and strangers hearts are tugged
while the streets hiss like burning tungsten
and a man bangs his fist on the table
upstairs a woman is undressing in the thick summer air

America is blanketed in thick licks of purple and orange
and the poetry sings from the recesses of this city

I realized I always see the city against the crisp sky
which means it's never just the city itself,
only it's role as foreground
while the world spins drunkenly
towards the morning's glow.

a scene in some story

last night,
sometime between the wine and dine
a lovely stranger asked her,

"what would you do if you had a remote control and you could rewind and fast-foward periods of your life? whatwould you press?"

that drunken question
playing over and over again
like a record skipping
as she's walking along
cracked sidewalks
feeling the after effects of the wine

and she thinks back to when
he said he didn't love her
and what she would do differently
only coming to the conclusion
that perhaps he pressed rewind
during their time,
reminiscing with old flames

she nearly trips as
she approaches the intersection.
glancing down her old street
she hesitates,
desides to keep going
straight ahead

Geniuses

we don't write on fine
vintage furniture
we write on moldy
curbside couches
we fuck on second hand
mattresses
then we dream
second hand dreams
where we create
revolutionary ideas
that are gone come morning
we wake to a half pack
of smokes
and a warm beer
on the night stand

how much happens in this square of pavement
eighteen inches of the world if that

ishmael takes his cigarette breaks here
amidst clamps of high heels

careful lengths of hair
upon shoulders in the sunlight

Because the world is round
round, and nothing is real,
nothing has to be real,
no one is looking
so everything
is
all right
right here
but next door
a few feet over
the stress
factors