Plastic Wolves

He asked if he had to behave

She said yes & he didn’t.

Broken glass alongside her bed,

his heavy hands and breathing rushed.

Every drop of sweat that crashed onto her body was...

Somebody had to have known by look on her face.

Driving his car to find solace in familiarity

Just imagine you are driving home

The quicker the better

Just imagine you're back home with good friends

with your best interest at heart

Glance back in the rearview

and see his sickening smile.

It was stretching with pleasure.

If she took it, she would make it

No negotiations.

“If you don’t do this

I’m jerking the wheel.

We will crash

and if I live, I’ll walk away

I’ll tell the detective

who will tell the coroner

who will tell your loved ones

You stole my car.”

If it were her way

She would have run miles ago

Marks left at the scene of the crime

Only she could see them

Evidence of a price paid

She was then just a product of the road

One day he’ll have a daughter

He’ll understand

She’s wiped her slate clean

& from now on

she got out and walked

it was still uncomfortable

perhaps even worse

but she’d rather have her chances

& be with the real wolves in the desert.

was it the Maker's Mark?
was it the wine?
they say you shouldn't mix,
but i don't listen.
i never listen.
was it the air?
raw, Philly air
or the way the city lights shined
on the icy pavement
or the way my trench coat draped
over my body?
it certainly wasn't her fuzzy hat
i drunkenly threw over my head,
hiding my wild, jet black hair-
that would be silly.
was it the drunk flush in my
cheeks
or the way i bragged about
all the books i read
to an uninterested guy
on the couch;
the same couch i later fell into?
maybe
it was when you looked
straight into my dark eyes.

i just don't know.

i do know there was a moment-

when the wind blew cold
and your fingers ran through my hair
your wine stained lips
touched mine

and nothing else really mattered.

The Beats Never Liked Being Called Beats

It’s not an ego thing,

but I do like to be reminded

that the things we do matter;

That maybe our thoughts

do hold water;

And that words

can shape the world

(for better or for worse).

It’s corny

but the pen may really be mightier;

and that makes us

one of 300 strong.

Us/Canada Border, 23 October 2010, Approx. 7:30pm

He asks me if I’m a writer,

as he searches the contents

of my backseat,

and I’m unsure of what to say.

“Yeah. I try to be.

Poetry, mostly. Some short fiction, though.

Been working on trying to do more short fiction.”

His response:

“seems like it.”

A conversation to

pass the time

ensues

something about

Cormac McCarthy

and I’m sitting there

not really listening

settling into the idea

of actually being

a writer.

A Time Remembered and Imagined

I can see that vast expanse of land

to the North,

walking to your favorite spot on the lake,

bottle of Macallan in hand,

two glasses,

and a dog with no leash.

I can taste the nights out and

the trouble we might get into.

I can feel my heart

beat hard in my chest

when I think about

all that holy, wide-open,

horizon,

skyline,

and highway.

I can see your eyes

shining at me in the dark.

I can feel them on me

when I’m half asleep.

I notice the way they change,

somewhat greener at night;

but sunlight bringing out

the baby blue below

when under cloudless skies.

I can smell the coffee,

the restaurants,

all the clean air;

and I can see for miles,

all the potential

there

waiting for us

to come ‘round

and pick up

where left off.

Chuck is the Way (what was supposed to be a reminder to write a poem that became the poem)

Something about Bukowski being right

about how the Drinks toll

comes for every man

and how that relates to me

that’s what I was supposed to write in this space

and maybe I will

or maybe I’ll just take the time

I would have spent

re-writing this reminder

I’ve left for myself

as a poem,

maybe I’ll take that

TIME

to run to the liquor store

or go to the bar

and get a drink

and think about writing more

poems

The Seasons in Me

There's a night I was looking for
I don't think this is it
It could be here anyday
If maybe you'd bring it
Yesterday was summer
today fell into fall
I keep beating against the mornings
I keep sleeping through my dreams
There's a taste of death with breakfast
and a hint of peace with supper
I love you when you hate it
I hate you when you move
but I'll get by
I'll set myself a proper pace
and collect my bleeding head
When tomorrow is winter
and you still feel like spring

To Craig Voss

sometimes
in the tense trepidation of the hours of the night
laying awake in the throws of insomnia
I ask myself
"where is Craig Voss"
the 1974 Springsteen look-alike
discovered for me in Punxatawney
all too many years passed
I hear he's getting married
not sure if there's a kid
but I can be absolute in the observation
that his life has been void
of a Joshua Fink
for some time
so world, or looming ethers,
or perhaps a benevolent presence
deliver me my tattered friend

Just like yesterday

I can remember waking up in Connecticut
Like the back end of a dream
Drunk and on a southbound train
In a winter wonderland setting
Warm light flickers off the snow falling

I remember being lost in Boston
The cold ripping through my clothes
Waiting for your call
Stumbling Cambridge roads
And yer voice when it finally came
through a painful tone
dead drunk and even more
lost than I was alone

I remember shaking your mothers hand
In the hall of the house you grew up in
And all the letters we exchanged planning
the whole thing, just to keep us sane
the sun on the snow on the windowsill
Sparkling still
the roads you drove, you knew well
they haven't changed
You hadn't changed

But I don't remember why you brought me there
And I can't remember why I came
Cause I couldn't leave you in the cold
Like you have me time and time again
The easy way wasn't in
falling for a charade
Made it that much harder
to look back then walk away

Still there I was in Boston
there on that southbound train
Finding time to fill the spaces
Where you should be instead

If you'd ask me now
I might think twice
Sratch a head
filled with questions
running restless
Hold my breath
Heart beating out my chest
just like before
I'd fall right back in
like it never happened
like you never came
like I never left

Left unfinished on purpose

Chasing cheap wine with whiskey
Ashes with sand

A rattle snake sleeping on a bed of nails
Looking for some form of home

Leaving well enough alone
Thinkin I'm already gone
On a chain of cigarette smoke
Pulled out an open window

Runnin from the devils
Nipping at my ankles

The night like a nightmare
Caught you in a deep stare

And we end in a beginning
The only one left dreaming
You brought it back to me
Without even knowing

It's a windchime
A whistel blowing
A stopped watch
Time slowing
just enough to catch yer eyes
with mine

plotting from the backseat
fingering strings
Leaning into me
high on traveling
Wild restless
Confessionless
Your light touch
left miles between us....

Lucid in the Meantime

You kissed me as the door spun
While I tried goloshes on
And through the turnstiles
Wet and wreckless miles
Once or twice on subway trains
Then again before heading 
seprate ways in the Brookyln rain
And back again
After long nights spent
Wandering
In our heads and out
In cars and not
You kissed me as you dropped me off
Looking at you I thought
It's best you keep the sunrise
hold steady down the eastside
While I fly back west 
To catch the sunset
We can't be too close you see
the dream becomes reality
reality turns into history
history, a mystery
and admit I must
i like it best 
where our subconcious meet
Kissing eachother in our sleep


 

Ryan Adams,
Autumn air,
Raw throat,
Steam seeping out of the
Coffee cup

untitled

Last night I went to the bottom of the ocean

& laid in the sand with my love.

The way we bid our time near an old, dilapidated ferris wheel

& OH! The way he held me

It was purely magnificent.

Where dreams & reality collide,

that's where you'll find me.

The Poison Dream

If I'm to dine on the fruit of your vines
you'll be the sweetest poison in me
the brave flavor on a cynical tongue
to savor as my body falls victim
as I wake with you and turn your cheek
to see the newest tear
I know you come from killing clouds
I know you're here for seasons
these portals we dream through
keep us mortal in the ever night
and corner us in normal boundries
seeming formal to the sleepy eye

Noontime Chores

I was digging up a dog today
Hoping he’d still be meat
The sweat and heat beat me
So I took a needed seat

I snatched up my bottle
And took a dramatic swig
Bleeding from my cuticles
As I spelled your name in twigs

My over-alls were dusty
As I pulled off the covering clay
I was discovering the beauty of things
Hovering just above decay

Looking down on this mongrel
Wriggling with hungry worms
I thought of your indecency
When you laid out your brutal terms

I figure now that oversight
Had rigged me sick and vexed
When you’d triggered in a bigger love
Perhaps I’ll dig you up next

Grayson Bartlett

blowout

fist pump your way to the lime light, climb the 15 minute ladder to the champagne room and find you're ghetto repunzel at the top of her ivory tower giving hand jobs for shots shots shots...and come september some how theres more trash heading up the parkway than they left in the sand.

got a cousin in hell, an uncle on his way to join him. president says bring the boys back home and he aint even left yet. you got friends in the desert taking bullets over oil? you got family in the ground paying another mans dues? fox news balancing out what's fair and jon stewart keeps us all in stiches while we sweat it out at home waiting to lose our best and brightest. its ugly, heart wrenching and pointless defending the american way, cheeseburgers and amstel light, fighting for cable television and the right to shop for trinkets from your living room. we built this city onbullshit and send strangers to die to procure more. thanks for the courage fellas, i hope when you save some for when we actually need it

What Counts

Eventually you'll take her home
Forgetting your allergies
You'll walk through backrooms stinking of cigarettes and whiskey
She's spinning now, stumbling even
slurring words, thoughts unfinished
You help yourself to milk crates stacked outside the corner flower store
as you try to convince her
her best option is to vomit
She doesn't disagree,
but insists it's not time yet

Your house is far
Hers further
Together you conclude that the wisest move is to drive once
(although very drunk)
to the closest destination only
You need to let out the dog anyway
She agrees
You toss the milk crates in the back seat

Home now she brushes her teeth
what little she did eat
Still remains in her stomach
(it's not time yet)
You send some drunk emails
to some cute online girls
Knock your new computer off yer desk
by accident
She's in bed sewing, eyes bearly opened,
She comes out running
Together you fix it and climb back into bed

You roll around a bit
She's unusually silent until she let's slip her fears about a very sick friend
how she loves him
He's family
You think, she's really drunk tonight
And she knows it
You ask gentle questions
she needs to get this off her chest
She let's you see her cry
You make her laugh
Together you laugh hard and long
And as if on que, one of her favorite, your favorite albums comes on
By track three you're both asleep
She doesn't dream

When you wake up you kiss her
She smiles, her head hurts
The night before may be all a blur
But you spent it together,
as friends would,
and that's what matters

sometimes
cover bands
break into
a set of
rage against the machine
and a bar full of collard shirts
full of top shelf drinks
full of twenty something college kids
throws its fists in the air
and chants

fuck you, i won't do what you tell me

and they will all pay their taxes

she's been on the corner
of bedford and north 8th
for years i heard
selling whatever trinkets
costume jewelry and wall hangings
sometimes numbers come to her
in the bustlin city
she plays them later
in her british accent
she'll tell the story of
her WWII vet husband
and repeat "war is hell"
with a feeling in her voice
that only comes from
living through old wars
living through honest wars
and she'll sit on the corner
and sell trinkets and age
and tell the story and
disdainfully speak of
the new neighborhood
waiting is hell
war is hell

so here's this preacher
runnin youth groups
and buildin skate parks
in new brunswick
i knew from carnival days
and sunrise surf sessions
he wandered just to
far from the path
found jesus in the mushrooms
let his hair and beard
grow long forgetting
the world doesn't like a savior
for the freedom and the fearlessness
a moral high ground affords
but women always will
and mary magdaline stares
from across the bar
from above a gin and soda
but that doesn't make
his father the broker
feel any better

and the preacher understands
his parents never wanted him
to do the right thing
they just wanted to teach him to
then get blown off

and the preacher and i
catch 4 ft glass a frames
once and a while
i ride a 9'6" single fin log
he rides a retro twinny fish

and there is only room
for one man and god
to pull into the pocket

as an orange sun brings the wind

candy was
dread headed land locked
and sleeping
in the heat of upstate new york
married

dreaming her and i were
on a massive ship to iceland
cutting the frigid atlantic
we saw a narwhale
and i tried to leap to its back
at the last momnt it reared
its horn comming upward
and she saved me
by leaping first
her arm becoming impailed
we both rode the narwhale away
through northern lights
and cold waters

the narwhale horn isn't
really a hon at all but
a rogue tooth with grand
desires who at an early
age turns upward and grows
through the top of the
creature's mouth and out it's face
and takes on the appearance
of a horn

early viking traders would
hunt and kill these aquatic
mammals cut off their
horns and sell them as
magical items to europeans
claiming they were unicorn horns
the europeans would sometimes
grind them into powder and
sell them at apothecaries

freud would obviously find
overwhelming phalic symbolism
in candy's flesh being pierced
by the narwhale's horn

so the dream of my married
ex-girlfriend is wrought with
sexual imagery influences of
capitalism undertones of deceit
and unfulfilled hopes

but its still the sweetest thing
anyone has ever told me

i write motion poetry
about characters
passing through
towns and time

but now i'm still
in a city that moves

and that is
to new
a concept
for me

jackson browne
sings like
the salt in the air
of an off season
shore town

the piano is grey sky
seagulls arcing against
ambiguous clouds

this girl
her name already evaporated
vibrant
she nannys and runs pharmaceutical
grade marijuanna
to pay rent in little italy
but is moving to china town
cuz she needs a
bathtub again

bought her first air conditioner
on the 28th of the month
a daring move
in the city

looked spot on irish
all freckled and red hair
but was
lithuanian
and sat on the hard wood floors
listening
to 40's jazz and blues
in the dying light

as a
calico cat
mover over
the furniture
backs

i like her best
after 3 pints
in the afternoon
when she looks just to long
with half buzzed eyes
says things are "fantastic"
and laughs
like she was youth
and it was spring
for
only
that
moment

i roll over
i am thirty

in the last ten years
i have danced
wildly

witgenstein
thought
most poetry was bad

but some captured the mystical

precisely by
avoiding it
all together

morning
red city
they all are at this hour
the sun
and brake lights
sleepy

she wakes up in bushwick,
gloriously hood

i commuting and uniformed
am lonely on crowded highways
buying coffee at bodegas
lose the point
in the bustle of

morning

red city

anthropologists
will tell you
that the specialization of labor
could only have occurred
in cities
built on the sweat
of post agrarian
society

but the hard asphalt streets
of new york city
kill artists
silently
as they're dazzled
by the lights
as they stare upward
at the impossible
buildings

all caught up in the surviving

the girl
in love with
airstream
motor homes

loves to show off
the city
to
anyone new

coulda been an actress
coulda been a dancer
coulda been a model

her feet fall softly
on wet
brooklyn
asphalt

the lonely
in brooklyn
ride single speed
bicycles
through early summer night
full of bridges
flirting hard
with fat red moons

to dinner parties
where everyone
helps
cook

saw a photo
saw myself
next to a giant
plastic
cactus
at south of the boarder
thought of yr sad smile
thought of every
girl and boy
i drove far away with
thought of america
in the rain

there was a feeling
on a highway
in the freedom
of the wind
between points on a map

northern brooklyn
sad rain balcony
afternoon
bleeds into evening

hipsters and mexican mechanics
drink beer inside
from glass bottles

they meticulously
disect
kafka as if he
had changed
into the roach
analyzing
lines and names and
word order
assembling
critical essays
or end notes

performing
a romance-ectomy
of academics
as they say everything
left
un
said

and reaffirm
the line between writer and critic

under a
fat enough
moon
the world's calm
is unifying

we are all specs
drifting
in the hopeless
currents of sky

moving with
the worldly weight
of an artist
on her
uniformed
shoulders

she reminds
that destiny
is a sarcasm

One star, bright lights
below all but drowned out,
fixed watchfully in place

The Vacation

I was in Ft. Lauderdale
drinking in a cheap motel bar
the fans had misters
spraying damp air at the clientele
trying to beat the humidity
the bartender was a gorgeous blond
older than she looked
and as the night was ending she eyed me
so I lit her a smoke
and asked her name
'Grenadine'

so fake names and bullshit stories
brought her to my suite
ten beers and some pot she smoked
got us on the floor
at the bed side
I laid down a quilted blanket
and we got to it
she was scratchy/rough and pleading
for bite marks
I facilitated all requests
she dug her heels into my back upon climax
and we smoked
hours with wine on the floor
and as she smiled and took my hand
I had a fisherman's blade
and I put it in her neck

her pupils went wide and she got serious
her hands spelled words and thoughts
I was sparking up my last menthol
as she clutched at the spewing wound
I looked and smiled
told her she was beautiful
and killed a corona bottle quickly
she was burping blood
it matched her lipstick magically
and as the wound's gush lessend
she was clutching at the sheets on the bed
graffitto-tagging them with bloody hand prints
and I pressed my smoke into the pillow

the morning came as I sat poolside
with the finest singapore sling
check out's nearing but I'm all packed
all I need is a real feeling
as I enter the room the cleaning crew's leaving
Luis grabs my arm
says, "your chica's on cycle"
I mouth a 'yes' and yawn
the quilted blanket from the floor
crumpled in my luggage
I grab a cab and fix my shades
an hour at the air port bar
then take off has me saved

The Will and Testament

fry me up a last meal
let it be greasy, hot, and dripping
fix me up a last drink
make it a double; I'm not sipping
knock me down one time
'cause you got this one last chance
split my lip tonight
knock me loose of this trance
cut yourself and accuse me
break a bone and say my name
kill a loved one you don't love
put my prints on blades for blame
I'll take all the vices
I'll take all the sin
I'm walking off set finally
I don't really need the win
I've been dark, vague, and despserate
I've been one long bitter tale
so clean me up when I go still
but lay my epitaph out in brail

A Beautiful Thumping

this big funk sound
has us in dance seizure
flipping legs and bouncing elbows
and between sips we make time
to casually kiss
like it means nothing
maybe it doesn't
maybe my radar's fucked
but eye see you eyeing
I see the color in your cheeks
when I slide my fingers over yours
and your smile is high and giant
your an evolution on this floor
a higher being to which we must adapt
and the stragglers have our pity
but you're no top shelf elitist
you're no Coach bag hanger
you are eyes and mind
and words over words
and no one can pay enough
to buy a better trait

Diana

If I could find you now
I'd tell you that all we had
was just as precious to me
if I could bring you up
like out of a dream
or a thought
you'd be that first sight
like you were in the park
while I was drinking milk
writing on my porch
looking like a dick
you'd be new and undiscovered
I'd be curious and unbroken
by the cynicism of a man living
this short drag life
and I'd once again
offer you my hand
and we'd walk six more miles

I call it Voiceterbating

I'll hum and click and sing for hours
keeping my fingers busy
dice or jewelry
loose change and trinkets


humming clicking
playing with the sounds, holding them

mouth
throat
chest
nose

nonsensical syllables
chopped up and delivered
into rhythms
that go on for minutes
that wind along like lifetimes
and get shot through
with bursts of birdsong,
crystallized howlings
and whooping exclamations of joy or regret


I couldn't tell you what I'm thinking
starring blankly at busy fingers
dice or jewelry
loose change and trinkets
voiceterbating

Plea to the Popular Universe

a little mercy, please
just a little mercy
on your latest violent offender
I've never set out
to leave anyone in pain
it's always meant to be
blunt
swift
and ending
a little mercy, please
a little mercy
for the hopelessly lost
I've not found anywhere
where I felt I might stay
I've not screamed
to be taken back anywhere
all I ask
a little mercy, please
while I continue
to destroy myself

hangover,
breakfast sandwich,
Barry Manilow

jukebox blasting classic rock
dancin'
drunken chatter and laughs

it doesn't matter if we
hardly hear
each other's
whiskey scented words

baby,
it's our eyes that are doin'
all the talkin'

those lonely Brunz nights

the record stops playin'
candle lights fade
just a drop of wine
in the bottle

i take
one last drag of my cigarette
stretch out across the floor
and the stillness
of the room
slowly seeps in

waiting waiting wanting waiting

A still shot torn
left on the cutting room floor
cigarettes on your voice

Small Wonder

a tiny ship on a vast
expansive sea
sometimes there are
many ships
usually there are not
sometimes the weather is golden
often it is not
sometimes the roundness
of the world is made apparent
and sunlight makes the water a mirror
of heaven
holy and reflective and transforming
but usually it is just lonely

To prevent the moon from disappearing
Stare at the moon
Never blink when others are blinking
and always think
about the moon

idiom anthology of volumes 3 and 4

So i've begun making the idiom anthology volumes 3 and 4.
I'll probably make calls anyway but if anyone wants a new bio put in this book email it to me. and if you weren't in the last one send me a bio because yer probably in this one. theidiommag@yahoo.com

Im hoping it will be out by the fall and will have a book release party and if you wanna read at it let me know.

I will still be drunk when I wake up

I will greet the morrows sun like an absent lover
and welcome it with tea and silence
like a tired friend
hanging on

stood on the edge
and curled her toes
if the wind came by
it'd cut her loose....

When I am too drunk and missplaced
I put on your shoes
walk around a bit
and we become pieces
no one yet has eyes for
forgotten
walking
home again

tis better to be thought a crackpot than to open your mouth and drop a fucking a bomb

pardon the interuption, this will take all of your remaining time, but leave you shaddowed reminders of what men are capable of undoing. spoil all your genius, let it fester rot roam aimless, your better off reminding yourself that you did the right thing when no one knows what you did. free form kentucky moon corn from a thrice used jar scored with too few x's will keep your ideas warm while the rest of the world keeps on moving along trying to sample the happiness on your tongue, al who, theyd say, and you could relax knowing all the explosive treasures locked in your head belonged to you and wouldn't be out sourced to extravagent cities in japan.

They had their chance
to clip yr wings

It's a Saturday
in June
and the sun scorched the
brightest parts of the sky.
I felt my way along
the cold, splintered ground.

It's morning and yr blood pumps
thick into this weighted tissue.
Your limbs jerk in pneumatic motion.
The sun is beautiful but deadly,
wreaking havoc over
the morning commute.

It's noon and I'm begging for change.
Just today's worth. Just to get me
through until I can maintain.
This is the end of the world,
what better time to stand
on ceremony. You may still
have a flag to raise. You may
still see heights to
ratchet yourself up
towards. I'm a civil
servant struggling to keep
the peace.
I'm a box truck driver, loaded
with jewels being smuggled
in the pocket, then right towards
the river.

Some of these guns are loaded
and others just feel heavy.
Next door they're taking
side bets on Judgment Day.
The sun keeps bleeding a little
farther down the line.

Provenance

The Ocean claims provenance of potential to be a never ending vision linking lands and providing a platform to float until the madness recedes into the past and each day renews itself as dawn turns night over to the new day fLOT

2.23.ten Santa Cruz, CA

One By Three

One By Three

I’m not that type writer

Deleting doubts

Selecting emotional sure-shots

More like I’d subject you

Into celebrating natural selection

Focused directions westerly intimating

Tables hold things and chairs hold people

Ideally, one page feeds at a time

Avoiding jams of traffic, raspberry and paper

And fish of cats and dogs and

Monks with bowls turned up or down

Permeating skin surface dreaming

Under all the misconceived ideas

I have ever imagined inside one dream

Or one day of calamity clamoring through

Then no more ever

Only questions without fear of retired retributed

Crossed purposes and redirected ingredients

Listed one by one because

nothing is ever one by two or

one by three

sitting standing walking lying

on a rug, like a rug

cutting said carpet with culinary academics

cleaned up or corrupted out

if you like misdirection

I am her leader

Clearer and without all the insincere

Without tears and with a sense of

Urgent sense of common matter

Not tense or insensitive

I’m culminating months like

A sandman makes glass

Sculpturing air into wind

Pine into knots

And would be’s into yesses

I’m fulminating right now

Jumping silently writing down how

And if indeed you need to follow

Choose yourself

Empower the hollow feeling

That never burns

Spark the fire

Inside your own belly

I’m not that type writer

Flot ------------- 5.9.77, I mean ten

For Rainy Days

I’m loose change

at the bottom of your purse.

You keep me in a jar

above your bed or

behind your bedroom door,

only taking me out and

cashing me in

when I’m needed.

Or maybe you

forget about me

lying on the floor

of your passenger seat

as you drive out of town

or go out for a night

drinking with your friends.

I’m crumbs

at the bottom of the bag.

When you’re really hungry or

when you’re really high,

you turn the bag upside down,

ingesting all of me;

chewing me up into a pulp,

washing me down with

wine or

beer

or diet soda.

I’m your favorite movie.

You tell everyone about me.

You remember the lines

I spoke and you

repeat them,

never getting them quite right.

Or lying alone in your bed

on a night when you’re bored,

you take me out,

laughing at the right moments;

crying when it’s your turn.

I’m your old pair of shoes.

You tie me together

by my laces.

You leave me

on a clothesline or

in the corner of your closet.

We have too many

great memories;

too many miles

traveled together;

too many nights

soaked in alcohol and

dance-floor sweat.

You can’t just throw me away.

You need me here

to show people;

to tell them what we’ve seen.

I’m the love-letter

you got in high school.

You keep me in the box

on a shelf in your closet.

Maybe I’m under the bed.

When you feel ugly;

when you feel lonely or

upset, you go to your closet;

you kneel down,

lift up the apron

and reach blindly,

feeling for the place where I’m resting.

You crack open the top,

almost expecting the contents to glow

like the soul of Marcellus Wallice.

You cry when you read me,

whispering the words on

my pages so low, that you

can hardly hear them, yourself.

And you’re left there

wondering how someone

could have loved you so much

and how you ever could have let them go.

a tweet

wine drunk face flush

Some people swim gracefully through the calm waves
while I wade
awkwardly
each thread of the wet hairs on my head intertwine
and all the beautiful curls I desperately try to hide
finally shine
boldly
like the mid-summer sun

Doing imaginary favors for strangers

in an empty super market
super well lit
I smile
you shyly smile
and for such a small while
our eyes

but besides that
I catalog your face
and your pear and that place
late in a super market
when the produce misters go off

you wear red well
and like pears
brown eyes, hair and pale
it was only for a little while
our eyes

Walking away without consequence
buying single servings

I don't like the way that you move: Spider Tim
I don't like the way
your arms buckle and your legs crack
I don't trust the way that you swing
your big gray sack on your big stupid back
I don't like the way you move
spider Tim

That Thesailie Sim

Thesailie Sim took thirteen days
to get to the bottom of the big red gorge
Stomping on Shrubs and snakes
letting his beard get long

He chewed on the end of an ugly empty pipe
The pipe was black with teeth marks on it
his teeth were white with pipe marks on them
and he smelled just terrible

The Frankin-lover

He is a gauze wrapped mummy
A hackneyed premise
tilting and lumbering
ungraciously towards me
with both arms out
like a big dumb equals sign

Still sweating something out
Perhaps the pounds you've added onto this heart
To make it heavier than rock
So I'm weighted and chained down
Instead of feather light with love
I'm a tethered stone falling to the earth
A kiss on impact
Cannon balls and heart attacks

moving on

I could become some mans way 
To carry on his fathers name
Is that what love is?
Animal instinct
My blood and your blood 
Making new flesh
For old bones

We were higher then we've ever been
Counting time with cigarettes
The stars are just reflections
Your smile, burning embers,
Dieing fires, simple pleasures
Another day you won't remember

Motels with high ceilings
Kissing while we're sleeping
The weather outside teeming
might've well been dreaming

Another bridge, a flooded street
Caught off guard, don't claim defeat
We could drown here on this island
If we can't find a way off it
Anyway I'd be just fine with that

The parkway, turnpike, leaving
Elevators, trains, revolving doors in
New York city, saintly wisdom
Graffiti bumps and king pins
Sneaking into buildings
Singing, smiling, let me down again
Get me outta here
Let me outta here

I just want to be
back in your passenger seat

Two people sit in a room saying nothing to one another
Their silence is thick and tence like thunderstorm weather
They don't even bother 
He doesn't touch her she's afraid to touch him
Some things should have ended long ago
Some things should never begin

Turquoise Turned The Turtle's Head

Turquoise Turned the Turtle’s Head

Turquoise turned the turtle’s head

Dog-like in conveying his lack of understanding

The beauty of this jewelry

He slowly passes and

It’s nothing like this turtle has ever seen before

Perpetually slow, saved and surreal

Forever remembered

The first fragile time

Turquoise turned his mind

Slow to speak

The turtle turned his turtle head

Slow to speak and turning he slowly said

“This stone I see

Commands my attention

I am connecting to it

Like no other connection”

Turquoise, turtle, time and place

Turtle, turquoise and a slow pace

Like some example of rapt attention

Focusing on a certain selection

A slice of sunshine in a slow, slow life

2.10.ten

The Bass Rhythm to Being Belittled

I got another piece of maybe
it's stuck to my shoe
she said, " today is your day
I got tools just for you."
and we were dancing and hopping
and leaving the street
for our heads and our hearts
and the reasons beneath
so when I fell backward ugly
and I injured my head
she sipped at her dry wine
said," you're hurt or you're dead."
I never told her how much I'd agree
but she danced her little seminar
all over me
and when the walls were shaking
and the pictures fell down
she was clawing and quaking
I was pinned to the ground
the noise fell off
in the cold of the night
so when she lit me a smoke
my chest got so tight
I tossed my pants
up on the bed
I was searching my pockets
for my mouth or my head
that's when the bathroom door
stole the room's only light
I took a drag from my cigarette
stepped into the night
as I stepped over cracks
and hopped over curbs
she was under my hat
with all her sharp little words
and I could swear the street lights
were burning me blind
everything that I'd lost
all that I'll never find
beneath the smog and rain
and the pain of a night
where a girl crushed my conflict
and fractured my fight

The Trick

"bang on the table hard enough
and every one will be listening."
she always had a way of making
my passion seem stupid
she could always cut me right on the vein
until I just started breaking things
a trick I picked up from the old man
toss plates against the wall
smash the mirror with the lamp
then breathe
angry heavy in the silence
now she's dying for it
now she needs to know
what pearls I've got tonight
and that's where we leave it
you can't whore yourself
that's when you look her in the eye
tilt your head a bit
" how late does that chinese joint deliver?"
try and cut that up, sweetness

Heaven

I was in this joint
downing my shitty beer before it got too warm
when a man next to me said
" I'M IN HEAVEN."
so I looked around
If heaven is in a filthy strip club
where the fuck is hell?
heaven is where you're over charged
for beer
and anything else, really
and dick teased for hours
with no satisfaction in sight
girls with c-section scars
pretending to love you
until you're broke
or broken
heaven

I'm fascinated by people
but most people
I've noticed
most people aren't really fascinated
by much
most people want to be told
told what they're interested in
what they care about
I can't see the fulfillment
in never really being shaken by something
to have something tingle your nerves
are you listening, people?
This is really fascinating stuff.

RED WIRE/BLUE WIRE

when you're still awake for the sunrise
but angry for its rising
you feel my every morning

when you can't find the difference
between yourself
and the characters you spin
then you've found my madness

I can be a blank canvas
ripe with potential and beauty
or I can be
A home made time bomb

Just when you want to kiss me
And, yes, you'll want to
That's when I finally burst
spraying you with deadly debris

when you've shut your eyes
and begged my lips to find yours
you'll be torn apart
nuts and screws and carpenter nails

razor blades and thumb tacks
whatever I've collected through the years
whatever's been lobbed at me
As I was making my way to you

Atlantic City Majesty

For a place with so many lights
it manages to stay so dark
Beautifully dark
A dollar here
A hundred there
Pulled upwards into these high rise fortresses
shined up nice
Complete with bells and whistles
and all the mind numbing vice you can handle
So it leaves these streets
barren and desperate
and dangerous
He had a condo here two years ago
now he's asleep under the boardwalk
pretending he was in Vietnam
All the savings
All the college funds
they're all in these high rises now
how else would they ever
keep all those lights on?

It comes out of me warmly
It spins me in all directions
Like a gyroscope
I love the light
I love the tones and places
I find
Out here in the inside

She only wrote the last one to share it
there was no therapy in it
NO
NEED
no unresolved inner conflict
outer conflict
stellar conflict
she has the luxury of words
hardly the torment
she makes whispers blast like shot guns
she makes stanzas loom like high speed
permanence
her plot devices like torn crumpled steel
bending over a mutilated cutlass grill
she's a literary muscle car
in high gear
with the windshield
painted over black

The Ballad of Punxatawney Phil

We loaded up our warmth
and threw it in the trunk
A couple smokes burned down
A couple whiskeys sunk

We hit the long road early
searching for the thrill
of finding a country legend
named Punxatawney Phil

Blowing through the mountains
charging through the state
Our stomachs were aflutter
for all we'd anticipate

Barely sitting still
as we pulled into the town
Rushing out to stretch and breathe
we began to ask around

A waitress at the diner said
she'd heard he'd gone to jail
sent up for a robbery
three million dollars bail

A store clerk said, "He's out at sea
to find uncharted land."
Rest his bones in the sun shine
expire in the sand

We'd about lost all hope
when we made it to the bar
and found a burly biker
drinking whiskey from a jar

He spit on the floor and put out his hand
We all felt the chill
I shook his hand and asked his name
he said, "Punxatawney Phil"

He was shorter than I pictured him
with a pair of jagged front teeth
wrapped in old leather and dirty denim
covered in fur beneath

We sat and drank with Phil all night
He regaled us with his tales
The women he'd given children to
His escape from county jail

He sat there posed and solid
chewing wood chips into splinters
said, "I'm heading out west tonight
'cause there's six more weeks to winter."

A shot gun slung over his back
he never paid the bill
On an old rusty Harley blasting away
was Punxatawney Phil