Christmas

When I was a kid, we would go to the nearest Catholic Church each Christmas Eve for service. We don't anymore. Other than a wedding and three funerals, I've managed to avoid the Catholic Church altogether for the last 10 years. My first Christmas as a married person, I joined Becky's family at the church where 10 weeks earlier, I was married, for a Christmas Eve service. It was the last time I went to church so close to the holiday. I miss it, I think. As I drove from Virginia Beach to Fredericksburg alone yesterday (Christmas) evening, I was happy to have spent time with family, but I was feeling incomplete.

It may have had to do with the bruised face my nephew had after my sister-in-law's dog had a brief freak-out. It may have had to do with how people were really angry, like really angry, despite apologies. It may have had to do with the lack of good sleep I'd had in the previous few nights. I think it was a combination of those things, but I think those things were are reflections of the lack of grace, and more importantly, the lack of JESUS in the holiday. I don't expect some corporate discussion of Jesus and His importance to the world, and His birth being the whole reason we have this season. Truly, the fault lies with me. Before anything this morning, I should have isolated myself, or maybe Becky and me, and read the story of the birth of Christ (Matthew 1, Luke 1, John 1:1-5). I should have gone into the day with that on my heart and my focus rather than my desire to see my daughter open presents and drink coffee and eat food. All great things...there is no feeling like watching Ariella open a gift and realized, "This is for me..." but not THE MOST IMPORTANT.

Thank God for grace.

I love you.

Gun

simply put the shell in
pull the thing, then the trigger,
and if the safety's off,
you'll be able to tell quick,
because you won't even hear the click
just the shock and recoil,
the ear-splitting ring atop
the thunder-like explosion,
and soon you'll see holes in
something,
hopefully what you wanted.

life

Look here, see.
This sign says change,
or hope, but frick man,
I'm standing cold,
no cash of my own,
just this soup kitchen
that makes me listen
to sermons about a life
I may be missing,
what God wants of me,
well where the hell is he?

Look here, man,
my shoes' soles show
more sock and toes and
i'm feeling more and more cold,
and as I grow older,
I'm finding more and more
charity fades
and the friendly faces
they've been replacing
with scrutiny, as if
I was doing this to me,
as if I wanted tosleep
in a tent beneathe the trees,
as if if I followed God I'd see
that there's a bed for me,
well, I tried that.
and I think I have to die before He
relieves me.

Well, maybe that's okay.

Just believe me,
I believe, but still
I live on the frickin' street,
but see, it's not just me,
there's people who need to feel free,
there's people who need to see,
need to breathe again,
deeply,
wholly,
completely absorbing everything,
and knowing that this shit life
if temporary
fleeting,
soon to be but a memory and
treasures in heaven
are awaiting despite the things,
the sickness,
the drugs
the choices,
the life,
that put me on the street,
it put me on my knees.


I hope to help that story form.

Mission

Lend me a morning, and I'll teach you to sleep,
Think I'm self-destructive? well I've done learned to weep,
I've done what I can, and God, I'll do it again,
Yeah I'll give up on home, and head for the road
if that's what you want me to do,
yeah is that what you want me to do?

Hold me til morning, she said soft in my ear,
I'd love to but can't, for tomorrow is near,
I've done what I can, and God, I'll do it again,
But the sea keeps on calling, and the sea won't give in
and so I'm off in the morning
to spread the good news, yeah, the God's honest truth,

and heaving ho, my love
I've got to go
It's a calling again,
And I can only submit
To the message of a king
the world just struggles to see,
and oh me,
oh my, We must forget about me
oh me, oh my
we must forget about I,
for if in the end,
we give in to death,
we'll find ouselves alive
when we've forgotten of I

zero

Am I doing a good job?

Am I in the way?

Swearing, Kicking the Dirt, and Myself

You should have seen your faces when I tasted my own shoelaces, I was...
stetched so thin, you could see through my skin, see where I end and where I begin,
see the parts of me that rarely see anything but the underside of my pale wrapping,
I am sorry that I spoke, so God help me, if I don't choke, you'll know
I'm slowly learning from my mistakes, I'm slowly learning from my hands shake
so much from such and such and acting tough and no one saying anything but
enough's enough, nothing but barbs and twists, and no lifting up,
no, I could have done better, I could have worn a sweater when it's cold weather,
but I don't.
I just slide, slide, slide, and feeling always inferior and pushed aside,
I hide, hide, hide, and smile because I heard that is what's right.

But every time, I...

Man, I don't even know.
I'm tired, but I'm happy,
mostly, but lately,
I feel like all I do is let people down,
down to the ground,
and I'm being ground down,
it really hurts to
have no self-worth,
and feel so much remorse
for every single word that springs forth.

And I am alone.

Encourage

Tendrils of thought lash out like Indiana Jones' whip and wrap right around you, they hold you tightly and softly, smoothly touch your skin until tight enough and then they pull you in. My lips move like mountains, deliberately but constantly, they speak truth, they make what's gray seem clear and A-Okay. These fingers that you can't see could be so selfish, but I'd rather pull you closer to life than my side, I think I can get by on my own (with God's grace a constant speed dial on my phone). I only want the mutually beneficial, and sometimes that means thinking something different that the usual, you should tell that your clouds have sterling silver edges, not just thunder and lightning like you alleged.

Last Minute Mutterings

I can’t breathe in this suit. The tie, the freaking shirt, tucked in, and my belt…Ugh. It’s on the last available hole. Seriously. I can’t breathe.

Chill out.

You chill out man! You bought your suit like a week ago, I bought mine when I was a junior in college…before they opened a god-forsaken Pizza Hut across the street.

You look fine.

You can’t see the rug burns where the pressure of my waist line is shredding my skin every time I turn.

You’re being dramatic, man.

Dramatic? Do I look like I’m acting? I should win a damn award for this. This takes dedication. This is like when Christian Bale got all skinny for The Machinist. This freaking suit is going to be what I am wearing when I die because if I don’t breathe soon, I am going to die.

Here she comes.

Oh my God. She looks beautiful. This is the beginning of your new life. Congratulations.

and then there were none

and then there were none.
no feelings whatsoever,
no cold, driven by rain
like ms. daisy, cranky,
crisply tapping at these bones,
stripped of what was known,
and left alone, but now,
that feeling is gone.
no warmth, softly soothing,
speaking its soulful
solution to your open ear,
its supple lips inclined
to kiss and make you
want only more and more warm,
but that was before, and now,
that feeling is gone.
no happiness, no sadness,
frankly no feelings at all
gone. numb. speechless, dumb.
and then there were none.

I Prefer Pens to Palaver

My adam's apple gets caught
on words and cuts them up
so that when I speak I stut
ter, and when I speak, I
repeat myself often and
also frequently. It's
also annoying to me, believe.
I sometimes contradict
or say what some say's a
Freudian slip, but it's just
that words stick like
spit to my lips.
Yeah, they stack up like
cars at a train track
and when they see the caboose
and work their way loose,
they come out in every
which order please they,
sense make don't they.
I'm sorry to say, I say
things better this way,
with pens and paper and no
adam's apple or lips
to turn whats black, whats white
gray.

What If?

What if Hollywood died,
and Paris, 1915 came back to life?
What if literature
paved the streets instead of stars
in microskirts and plastic breasts,
fancy suits and provocative thoughts
like who's in who's bed?
What if thinking was cool,
rather than believing everything you see?
Oh shock and awe,
how frivolous you are!
Oh, I know, it's the same now as then
just put in new, plastic packaging,
but I can paint the past as I like
and paint the future hopefully,
with that same paint brush in mind.
Ideals.

Music

Some people think in thoughts,
but I, I think I think in thirds,
fifths, flat fifths, and intervals,
not to say from time to time,
but all the time (and in rhyme).
Melody, my lady, come slay me,
put me in your record player and play me,
I'll give you my two cents worth saving,
One for a beat, two for a feeling,
rub those two cents together
to make a sound and you'll feel me.
I don't hear a clock, tick tock, tick tock,
but a rhythm, tick tock, let's rock,
I don't hear a phone ring, but chords
and still...what are you just sitting there for.
Pick it up, pick it up, pick it up, my friend,
put it down, put it down, and I'll call you again.

A Glass

Pour me a glass of your best water, mister,
I'm parched and in need of something clear-ly
refreshment, clearly uplifting because
this weight-lifting is taking a toll
on my shoulders, so, oh, i need
you to pour me a glass, mister, please

Drink and you won't be thirsty,
you said, and eat this bread,
and don't want, yeah, you said,
yeah, you said, and yet
here I am dried up and starving...
...but its not you, it's me.

Make straight the way,
Make these cracks and traffic fade
Fill each valley in between
With mountains bowed on bended knee.

Pour me a glass of you best, waiter, I'm waiting,
and probably in my haste, I'll spill it on my table,
because I can't be bothered to pay attention,
listen to a whisper when on TV there's explosions,
despite this guy beside me who knows what I'm hiding,
I've dropped the glass more times than I'd like,

Pour me a drop of your best water, father,
and bring me the bill, i'm the gratuity solver,
but please forgive my rude behavior,
I've only recently started learning to be patient,
I've only recently ordered what I needed and drank it.
I've only recently ordered what I needed and drank it.

What If?

Someone...something is always saying things you believe. What if you didn't?

What if I had an alibi
For all the times I lied,
and clothed in excuses,
I posed for pictures,
and all my prior abuses
were like scratched lotto tickets,
worthless and forgotten?
What if I had a necklace
of plastic pearls to give you,
to make you envy a facade
and a lifestyle that would never come through?

No Sound? No Change.

V1
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends and fellow countrymen,
Please stand up,
raise your voice with questions
Sisters and Brothers
All you neighbors and cousins
Listen up,
come out from under cover


Ch
Left, face, salute, walk away
Wait, I have something to say
About, face, speak with voice raised
God knows the status quo is not okay



V2
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Comrades and fellow discontents,
Please don't rest
raise your voice and question
Elected Officials
Representing your interests,
Working on
Campaign ads to scare us.


Br
Americans and responsible citizens,
it's time we had a voice again
This is not a test, This is oh so serious,
it's time we questioned what's in front of us

Br2
We seek improvement,
and that may mean a revolution.
We seek salvation,
and silence is not a solution.

But Never Silence

the thumbtack cuts little slits in my fingertips
and so i leave lovely little fingerprints
in every little thing I brush against

wouldn't you think i'd bandage it?
wouldn't you think i'd handle it?

Pin the notice to the wall, white striped wallpaper,
like theses in a church door, staring your way, sir,
Waiting for your look, waiting for protest or favor,

the thumbtack, clear and all but innocent
serves its purpose as i slowly push it in
securing my petition to the wall for all to see it

i'm not gonna put my hand down
i'm not gonna put my hand down
sir, i'm not gonna put my hand down this time

first, i will not be silent
i will not be quiet anymore,
next, i will entice every blade of grass to sing
and only then i'll concede you may be listening,
sir, this is a position worth dying for,
and i will not be quiet anymore.

Too Late

Last night, a voicemail on my machine,
the bi-minute beeping kept invading my sleep,
until finally, I abandoned my dreams to see
the dreadful message left for me.
"My friend, by the time you hear my voice
through your phone, black and cold against your cheek,
I'll be floating down the river
like the pieces of trees we used to watch
and make believe they were boats on their way to sea.
Oh maybe I'll make it before I sink,
I'd so like a gravesite Atlantic, asleep forever in the deep.

"I just need you to know, I need to do this alone,
but I love you so much, you've been my friend through it all,
and tonight as gravity blows my hair back,
I'll be thinking of the times we'd leap from the rocks
to the river down beneath, just to swim,
just to live, but that's not what I'm calling about tonight.

"I cannot explain, but this thinking, ever-hidden,
won't just go away unless I make it,
please don't feel guilty, I doubt that you could
have made it any better, No, I doubt you could,
though as I climb this bridge, struck by the wind,
I wish I would have given you a chance,
just a chance, but

that time has passed.
These words are my last.

I cannot explain,


but these words are my last."

When would you say no?

When would you say no?
When like Job, your livlihood is gone,
and family, house, and cute little dog?
When disease eats your skin
and you're watching the murdering of your kin
and things hurt.
worse than words.
Persecution is just a word,
but bullets and knives and lost lives,
that's...well, that is something more
and I've thought about, a lot about
what I might be in for,
and when I would say no,
but, no I don't think I will.

It'll hurt if I
lose my wife and baby girl and I
have to live with no house, outside,
but I have hope I'll see them again, and I
will not deny or hide life,
though it may mean I lose mine.

The U.S. Team vs. The Other Guys

When I was a kid, I would ask my dad to tell me stories about being in the army. He never served in combat, but he'd participated in training counterinsurgents in Panama, some of which was associated with what would eventually be known as the School of the Americas. He would explain tactics; some of which he learned in the service, but most of which I'm sure he learned from any number of historical authors recounting famous battles from Waterloo to Hamburger Hill.

I would always refer to the opposing forces as teams, as in, "Dad, what team won?" He would always correct me, and say grimly, "They aren't teams. They are armies." I didn't really catch on until I was much older and started reading books about war on my own.

I remember reading Ghost Soldiers a few years ago. It's a book about the prisoners at Camp Cabanatuan in the Phillipines and the Army Rangers who liberated them. The prisoners were survivors of the Bataan Death March, and they were dying under the brutal at worst and severely neglectful at best treatment of the Japanese Army...not the Japanese team.

I wonder sometimes if a lot of people detached from the realities of war have started to think of it as teams playing...rather than human beings killing. Those caskets landing in Delaware are points for the other guys. Hussein dangling from a rope filmed by an observer with a cell phone was like a big three-pointer or punt runback for us.

Its sick.

This "sport" is taking lives, and the ones that it doesn't take are scarred. And sometimes, rather than resting on a bench and getting ready to go back in, these players off themselves. The most recent report I can find is from May of this year. "The U.S. Army reported Thursday tht the suicide rate among its soldiers continued to rise last year, and is now nearly double the rate recorded before the invasion of Iraq." In 2007, the Army confirmed 115 active-duty soldiers committed suicide...19 per 100,000 soldiers...three quarters of whom had been deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. In 2002, it was less than 10 per 100,000 soldiers.

This team isn't doing a very good job of promoting morale, is it? I think the coach needs to think of some new half-time motivator in the locker room.

Killing people just isn't the energizer the movies make it out to be. Who'd have thunk it?

"Dad, tell me when the game is over."

A Lake

At the lake, our pale legs,
dangling from pier's edge,
dragging fleeting forms,
ever expanding across the
sunset drenched expanse of water,
they look owned by ghosts
alone below the blue-green
surface.
Fingers, saturated, wrinkled,
pruney, we'd call it,
flexing each digit to get
the skin to return to its
usual tautness, they'd
stretch and rest,
mine atop yours atop
the splintered wreck of a dock.
Boats like bugs skip,
and they drawl at a distance,
slowly sounding out syllables
as the wind drives them,
or quickly crashing through,
sending waves and yelps
across the distance to me
and to you, and you rest your head
on my right shoulder and forget
yesterday and tomorrow.

Sucker on a Wheeled Chair

This second
is the first chance you'll have since then
to reconnect and begin again.
Pick up your pride and pull it tight
about your lips, so pretty and thin,
like a pillow and breathe it in.
It'll kill you like cigarettes,
slowly stealing your very last breath,
and when you inhale the last of it,
you have a second to begin again.
Bend your knees at your waist,
at your shoulders, at you neck and your eyelids,
and kneel down for the softness of the carpets.
Spit that swallowed pride aside
like little bits of sunflower shells.
This second
chance brought to you not by happenstance,
but deliberate deliverance.

Oh, but I, so high on my office chair,
standing, commanding,
slide my own pride about neck,
a tidy collar, so wide and innocent?
Oh, how quickly I forget,
the wheels on this chair, and how my collar connects
to the banister, and becomes the noose
I hang myself with.

Into This Forever

Oh baby, don't you speak with sterling silver lips,
yeah, your beautiful kisses are giving me fits.
yeah, your beautiful mouth is sounding out glitz
so give me another please miss,
I'll gather flowers from a field if you feel like it;
I'll gather chocolates from a store if you want me to;
I'll comb my hair and brush my teeth three times
and, heck, I'll wear a tie that's actually tied, not clipped,
to my neck if just you would this second consider some sex.

Remember four years ago when we were driving North
Ninety-Five, that god-forsaken interstate course,
just itching for the chance to get in bed,
to get undressed, drink champagne and forget
the chaos of the life we had temporarily left.
Remember January oh seven when we got home
alone and chose to create life - or at least try,
and now Ariella is alive?
oh baby, you still have those pretty lips
and ache as I do for a kiss, I'll get you those chocolates,
or those flowers or whatever. Just to let you know:
I'm into this forever.

It's Me. Not Him.

Last night, I got there early. I turned on an amp...loud, and plugged in that maroon telecaster and played...alone. I let that A string drone and crushed the room.

I didn't need fans, just a pick, electricity, a low slung guitar, closed eyes, and God moving through me...the spirit of sound.

I etched the words you taught me on my hand with pen: You're not in the wind, You are the wind. It was me looking in the wrong places, not you hiding. Oh, how I spend so much time looking for what is there already, listening to hear hidden things in the things I hear so clearly. Instead, I should look and listen. You are there. Everywhere.

And that A drones on. God, I'm so glad I was alone because I listened to the wind for the first time in days.

Papercut: The Final Straw?

Damn you, papercut, Monday evening stupid stuff;
You're a burn but a laceration, you stupid papercut -
Now I'll be sucking at the skin between finger and thumb,
to stem the flow of copper-tasting blood,
you stupid papercut.
And the insult to the injury is the paperwork
now slightly spattered with my DNA, unwillingly donated,
done on a day I requested not to work
my stupid dumb stomach freaking hurts,
and I've only eaten a sandwich and one serving of cereal
since Saturday's epic event of throwing up three previous meals.

Damn you, papercut, Monday evening stupid stuff;
and I can't tell if this ache in my belly is nausea
or hunger or stress or...oh frick...my phone is ringing.

Jailbreaker

One morning when the sun was just above the horizon,
these two guys and I found ourselves finally outside -
heads popping from a tunnel a year and a half long,
dirt disposed of bit by bit so nothing appeared wrong.

I gotta breathe freedom deep
Feel it inflate my chest that's been so compressed;
oh prisoners, it's about time we left.

One evening when the sun was just upon the horizon,
these two dogs came in through the window near where I was lyin' -
teeth bared and gnashing hoping I fly for freedom
and the jailer hopes my flesh and blood'll feed them.

I gotta breathe freedom deep
I've been slave to my sins so long I forget
what its like to take a free breath.

And now they wanna take me back.
Well they can forget that.
Officer, I am a new man. I'm changed.
And sir, you cannot take me away.
I'm safe.

Sensation.

I want a song to sing
to snapping fingers, but
the sensation of sinking's
Sipping at my soul, yes,
sucking down my spirit,
leaving me dry and dying.
The self-absorption of
loneliness alone can consume
this consciousness of
drowning in dry air, oh,
God, Abba, Father, please
spit me out where you will,
I feel caught like phlegm
in your lungs, coming undone,
and while I want brokenness
I also want hopefulness.
and while I want holiness,
I don't know how long I can take this loneliness.

An Exercise in Excuses

watch the excuses worm the wormy way out of your mouth
and wriggle on the floor, worthless little things,
and what do you think? were they impressed with you?
did you represent what you wanted to with the words
floating like kayaks on your breath, sodden with
excuses.

War and Weathermen

my stuttering steps tell less and less
and accomplishment seems distant yet
and oh, i, oh, am so, oh, totally tired
this breast plate, squad automatic, helmet
desert temperatures, can't we just end this?
instead i trudge left right left right

meanwhile in a air conditioned office,
officials offer their opinions on the operation,
no longer surgical but surreal and everlasting,
explosions just statistics and blips on maps
and maps on walls with no faces, just
lines and suspected lines and empty spaces.

like the meteorologist who guesses on weather
from an office covered with maps and degrees,
talking about hope for the end of this storm
just sipping coffee while a homeless man
sleeps hopelessly soaking in the spring storm
his hope in only that his things won't float away,
and that this too, will end someday.

Summer

burn away the pallets
piled sky-high like some shrine
to all things fire
a pillar
a revolution
d.d.dance away the evening
or lie piled to the side -
corpses of insecurity-
and let the soak
sweat out the flame,
then fall fast asleep.

This is NOT a Poem.

This is not a poem. Its a collection of thoughts.
How many times can I check my e-mail in one day?
Nervous habit.
Turn my palms up and look at my forearms, looking for veins
Popping out through muscle strain that won't go away.
I'm bored.
I'm waiting for life to pull back its hand and just slap me
Right in the face, just please leave a mark that won't go away.
Lets do anything other than nothing.
Something.
How many times can I check my e-mail in one day?
Well, I'm nine hours in and twenty two hash marks already
Scored on a lazy notebook, a tally of my boredom;
And dissatisfaction.
I think about skulls, and if I could draw them I would;
Wrap them in flame and picture them crawling up my arm
To twist painfully but so sweetly around my shoulder.
I day dream too much.

Relationship Jan. 06

He says he likes his girls like he likes his handwriting
And she asks if he means unintelligible,
But he states he means thin and angular,
Pointy at every corner, and lacking arcs.
Quick and to the point with no time for elaboration
Sometimes just giving abbreviations for stories
Instead of bubble-letter spirals around the point.
She says he'd be better off alone
Than hope for a girl that's both to the point
And skin and bone.

Anyway, She likes her man to be a scene from a movie,
Always moving, muscles, and like prince charming
Ready to rescue her from slumber with a smile so disarming;
So inviting that she'd have to struggle not to kiss
On the first date.
"In the first place, that man does not exist beyond scripts,"
He whispers, she laughs and says "he does somewhere."
Somewhere, he's preparing to listen as she circles around the climax
Always patient through a never-ending story
Regardless of how boring.
She says he could be like that if only he tried,
And he responds, "Look at me, doll, I'm a guy
I want quickness and immediate satisfaction from everything in life."
She, having had a physical relationship in the past,
turns from his eyes, and laughs, and just says "yeah."
There's something about being male that seems to lack compassion.
He can't respond.

He's sure about this list of characteristics
And he's checking them off, and checking to see if she's on it
And she does the same.
They both ask each other if 5 out of 10 is okay.
He says, "I don't like your taste in music,
and I prefer movies that are more abusive. I like debate,
And when I argue I like to win, but you don't even like to play.
Lady, I think you're pretty, sure,
But I've never been attracted to girls with
the same looks as you before."
And she says, "You think I've looked at guys like you?
Musicians and poets and artists and no-future, just past,
Full of jazz, but not much else, guys like you.
Well, until now, it's not something I ever thought I'd do.
And look at your shoes and hair unkempt. Speakers so loud
I can't hear myself think, and you're careless
You write before you think, you smoke cigarettes. It stinks"

"Yeah, but I've been trying to quit."

He asks if they can just see how it goes,
And she says so long as they bar no holds,
Let the worst of conversation and doubt spill out
Like a bullet passing through a cup of water.
Rapid. Like Niagra Falls.
He asks if they can read together, and she says
only if sometimes they read to each other.
Sometimes from the Bible, sometimes Pablo Naruda
Sometimes slam poetry written by a real brother.
(And, like Derek Z, I mean that like the way black people do.)
He reports back that like life, it ebbs and flows
Builds upon itself, though hardship comes and goes
And she's pretty sure five of ten was okay
Because she thinks she can get a few more by making him change.
He winks and says no way.

The city looks so dirty...

The city looks so dirty in the daylight, and the ocean like a dream tonight
The last lights of the city fade in the side view mirror,
the dizzy feeling of skyscrapers getting smaller disappears
and is replaced by the tiny feeling of vast open spaces;
distances your eye can't measure, and at night, can't even see,
can't even begin to dream.
The engine hums as gasoline pumps through its veins like elixir,
a couple thousand little explosions every minute,
kind of like war with less casualties:
Kind of like the Fourth of July with fewer lawn chairs,
and more purpose:
Kind of like tonight, we drive, and we have no destination.
The Pacific Ocean may turn us, or maybe the gulf or the ol' miss.
Maybe the icy north Atlantic will whisper good morning,
the sunrise on the east coast only rivaled by its setting on the west.
You'll wear flip flops, and I'll wear tennis shoes,
gym shorts and the first shirt from the drawer
(the road offers no fashion awards).
Our friends will sit in the back, leaning forward to converse.
Moonlight will spill across the hood and make shadows on your face,
your curling hair holding the night at bay.
We just go.
We just escape the routines, faintly scribed on our eyelids,
and write new chapters to an ever-expanding memoir.
We just go.
We just hit the road running, leaving behind the weight of sadness,
the parachute-like pull of stress, and frantic speech of unrest.
If we reach the ocean, we'll undress and break waves in our underwear,
wishing we never had to go anywhere or be anything.
The city looks so dirty in the daylight, and the ocean like a dream tonight.

Silver Linings (Cast Aside)

I am the elimination of threats.
I am the one you seek in self defense.
The brass-knuckled friend.
The violence in the end.
I am folded arms and rolled shoulders,
I am the wall you can't knock over.
The oft-broken nose.
The thorns adorning a rose.
I am accompanied by awkward silence.
I am acknowledged only when there's required violence.
The bottled up rage.
The things better left contained.

My First Day in New Orleans

The things you thought:
Gelatin-melting in the sun
A sticky glob _ You'll see
Yesterday fades away like
Memories, good, in New Orleans
Two thousand five.
Six months later, I'm here
for God's sake and
My life may take a different
A different type of way
After a day like today.
Emptiness.
Stress.
Smiles faded like the paint
On the sides of these houses.
The church we stay in cries loud
And the mold on the walls
Alone listens:
The only sign of emerging life.
I could cry.
Or maybe that's the fiberglass insulation.

Sometimes I Say Stupid Stuff

This is in no way related to what I said before;
You know, those angry slips of the tongue
That slit themselves out of my lungs
And spilled all over our used-to-be-clean floor.
I stomped them out, and after about half-an-hour
They stopped moving, and my heavy breathing
Stopped feeling so oh-so-painfully-consuming.
(I wish my inability to control my temper
Wasn't hell bent on attempts to doom me.)
Anyway, like I was saying before,
You have every reason to be upset,
You have every reason to lay your chin
On your chest, fold your arms beneath your breasts
And refuse to speak to me,
But please.
(Deep breath)
Baby, please, just turn around, look at me
I'm contrite and just-like-you teary eyed,
I feel like I'd rather die,
All sticky from pushing all that irrationality aside,
I'm full of broken bottles now,
They used to be jars of frustration,
But now they're shards of glass and bent
Bottle caps tearing up my insides.
God, this can't last.
(Right? God this can't last?)
This is in no way related to what I said before;
Because before I was spilling unaimed
Anger on the floor, like bile and half-digested alcohol.
This is much more like an apology,
From my knees,
Just look at me and listen...I don't want my
I love you.
To land upon your hunched and silent shoulders.

Picture Some Perfect

picture some fingers
plugging the perforations
in pale and growing paler
palms,
grimaces and groans and
a knowing glance, oh God,
grant the strength to go on -
swallowing the cup
giving up, the act of perfect love.

Thoughts on a Journey

if i was big, i'd want to be bigger
if i was a gun, i'd itch your trigger finger
if i was number one, i'd number among the
rhythmic robot, i'm ambition, i'm a mission
i'm nuclear fission, i'm forward motion
the darkness is deafening, enclosing
like star wars and indiana jones,
oh, if i was a hero, i'd rattle your bones.
i'd flip on the lights, if i had a second
free procrastination, minutes beckon,
and television's my bed-time story.
if i was news, i'd want you to find me boring
i'm not excitement, indictment, murder, war
but if i was thought, i'd be enlightenment.
if i was ambition, i'd be american
if i were a robot, i'd be sharing it
i'd teach you to crumble and freeze
and feel nothing and sleep without dreams,
but being human, i'll teach you to love
if i were a bird, i'd be up above
where heaven meets atmospheric pressure
and angels i once thought stayed above the weather
actually don't hesitate to get wet, they're
not afraid of the rain,
but my slicker, yellow and plastic
keeps them at bay.
if i was on tv, i'd say never stop moving
because, though this isn't a race,
stopping is losing.

Song About I AM

emergency
lights and sirens flashing and blaring
eyes alight, so very very like
a night without the chance for life
a parole with nowhere to go.
emergency
with broken bones and scattered teeth
and like a dutch boy with fingers in the levee
life's blood slips through holes
between these fingers' tenacious hold

as things go dark behind my eyelids
i am asks am i satisfied with how i lived
and i am not, no
no i am not.

emergency
the enemy's at battle stations ready
torpedoes out the chute and already heading
i do not want to be alone when i die
i want to close my eyes and wake up alive
emergency
i have not yet written about the golden streets
and starlight, star bright, i'm oh so weak
i am oh so infected by popularity
i can barely breathe, and

as things go dark behind my eyelids
i am asks am i satisfied with how i lived
and i am not, no
no i am not.

i should have stood up and screamed
but only silence
i should have stood up and screamed
that i am is truth and to know is life
and to die is gain.

Guilt.

...then there's guilt.

Dying

in a moment we'll all be the same (be the same)
so i'm so sorry 'bout your pocketbook
but baby, maybe you'll be the exception.
maybe they won't take it when they check for weapons.
maybe you'll be the richest chick inside
maybe it'll be just like this life (just like this)

God I hope not

i say moment because look around (look around)
yeah, i'm so sorry 'bout the time it took
and baby, maybe we'll be the exception.
maybe we'll still be here when everything ends.
maybe we'll be the oldest folks alive
maybe it'll be just us just like tonight

but God I hope not

Bench-pressing Anvils

At the fair there was a man
bench-pressing anvils - his
shirt's short sleeves stretched
taught across his biceps -
strained and sweat-soaked
muscles all curves and cut.
His veins raised
like an atlas of alternate avenues
from heart to sinew,
sinew to heart.
The man grunts with effort,
every molecule exerted
upward. Forward. Farther.
His teeth grit against each other,
and I'm sure he can hear it
in his head, a grinding constant
against the pounding of his heart.
the pounding of his heart.
pounding heart.
pounding.
teeth grinding.
And I think,
"If he should slip and drop
that steel upon his giant chest,
he'd feel the escape of his breath,
the onset of physical emptiness,
and he'd look at me and he'd
understand."

Self to Silent God

***SELF TO SILENT GOD***
Self to silent God,
I'm sick of silence, God
I'm in need of something warm

Self to silent God,
I'm sick of silence, God
I'm in need of something warm

Self to silent God,
I'm turning this transmitter off.
I'm going dark once and for all.

You're not in the wind.
(You are the wind)