the sieve and the sand

I have a box of secrets.
No—a vault.
Locked and securely hidden
In a closet full of skeletons
Guarded by a warped pine door
Just now beginning to open.

And while this box of secrets is real
And all its contents true,
This is more than that,
This box is just a metaphor.
And really, I’m giving you my heart.

Here’s my box of secrets
Exhumed from years of effacement
And finally the cylindrical sparkle
Flanked by joints on your velvet finger
That says I’m not who I was anymore.
Here’s my box of secrets,
Take them, they’re yours.

I imagine that our life
is a lot like a Coltrane record

good strong chords
crisp clear drums
solid as solid gets bass
and some mook on the sax going apeshit

Then the piano takes a solo
and it’s good and strong
and the drums take a solo
and it’s crisp and clear
and the bass takes a solo
and it’s solid as solid gets
and then the sax comes in again
and here he is, going apeshit

I guess you’re a lot
like one of those guys
(probably the bass player)
and well, if that’s really how it works,
I just got one thing to say:

Thanks for letting me play sax
all this time

Furiously would be
a good adjective
for the
act of
ripping your spine out
through the base of your torso
with my teeth.

It may sound messy,
but truth is the very sight of you
makes me furious.

So come and stand quietly
while I eviscerate you wholly.
Alternatively, leave.
There is no other alternative.

oh this morning was filled with disappointments
i awoke too late to have the house to myself
found myself without cereal and therefore
the need to settle for sharing gruel (oatmeal)
with my kid as she ate.

i sweetened it with brown sugar but that
doesn’t hold a candle to my lightly frosted shredded
wheats and therefore pulling myself from
bed becomes a larger chore.

later i was listening to pandora while pouring
myself my third cup of tea (in preparation for my
morning movement of bowel) and apparently
found i’d won 100 free big cigars from some
company called vistaprint.

later i come to find i was being offered free
business cards and for some reason that
just didn’t do the same thing for me.

oh this morning was filled with disappointments
and i would have killed to see the sun.
alas.

A spellbinder of sorts – that’s what I tell myself
And according to me, it’s the only opinion that matters.
With what fluency and elegance he speaks, they’ll say.
The arguments he wins—
The way which he fluently, pedagogically selects every word.
Extraordinary diction!
Stupendous articulation!
Syntax and vernacular unmatched – surpassed by none.
Grammatical mistakes? Nonexistent.
With what precision and accuracy he wins every argument.
A counter for every comeback—
How he persuades the masses,
A general of the mind!
An admiral of the spoken word!
Opulent lexicon!
Sagacity of wit!
As though he knows what we’re thinking, they remark.
He’s right, they cringe, how does he do it?
Resistance crumbles like the walls of Jericho.
Surrendering dresses tumble to the floor.
Speechless but roused to action—
Ready to riot at the sound of my voice.
A pioneer!
A master!
These neophytes have nary a chance!
The power of my language trumps all opposition.
The President and prophet consent to my will.
The two warring parties zealously sign my treaty.
The board of directors submits to my proposal.
Of course I win!
But, in point of fact, I am not speaking at all.

umbrella in hand
i leave the apartment–
surprised by so much sun.

I drink your poison
and relish in the thought of you
drinking my poison, just
barely hanging on to your
very own guts

I breathe your toxic gasses
sucking them deep and choking
while reaching out to strangle you.
How I long wrap my fingers
right around the pipe that
keeps you moving.

and all the while that
acid smile does
wonders to the sensory:
The poison refreshing  as it
 forces an ending on a body.

I drink it down and dream,
lazily and lethargically,
hoping with every slipping instant
that you die by my power,
all while dying by yours.

i could sit here all day
watching you grow,
perhaps wishing that you would grow
faster
or add in a little more
excitement
but still content,
happy in your acceptance
and in your love,
happy in your dependence
and in the symbioticism
between me and you,
between you and me
and in the truth slowly unfolding
that there is no you without me,
and perhaps after all this time,
there is no me without you.

search out the spot on my pants
throw it in the trash
empty said trash.

dont like that friendship?
just open the filesystem,
navigate to “personality”
find the folder labelled “grating”
hit the recycle bin.

whatever your preferred operating
system or analogy
you can agree with me when i say

it’d be nice to delete that about
you. me. this place.

(open wallet, find “empty”, right
click, “create new” -> “benjamins”)

win.

and when your troops land
on dry ground expecting
to find something of worth
remember i was here first
building cities and generally
doing everything awesome
you hoped to do but without
your preparation, years of
hard work, and drained investments
because i,
(invincible me)
am just that good

Starlight catches wind
of pools of water droplets
shimmering like stars

There are not two
thousand miles between our comings
and our goings,
but it takes two trips
to come and go
completely.

Feet blistered hands raw
from running the walking
stick at probably just four
miles or so. We can’t be too
hasty after all.

Someone lost count after some
of those miles but we
aren’t so long in to the
coming, and as far as things
seem to go, the going
may be rather slow,
so maybe let’s not worry so much
about maps and the like.

Maybe let’s take a moment
or two
to stretch, scratch, and
retie that loose pair of sandals

i bashed in heads
apparently my preferred weapon is a baseball bat.
i ran through abandoned suburbs
on sunny days chasing flesh eating
former humans.

i fled to the safety zone again and again
but throughout my dream
(and this is where it crossed into reality)
i left the safety zone repeatedly
to hit the grocery store.

wanting cheetoes (the organic puffy kind)
seeking runts and nerds and french baguettes
and donuts.
beer.
always more zombies for beer.

they crowd in the rotten produce isles
if you enter just right you can escape without notice.

last night i had my first zombie dream.
it wasn’t scary at all.
but now i’m more fearful of an outbreak.
the reality of my unwillingness to stay safe
without beer
is terrifying.

When I run out of all this
hard-earned easy-spent
cash of mine, I’m gonna
end up just like one of them
laid back Philly bums.

I’m gonna chill.
Right on that park bench
with those sunglasses on
and that old suit coat
buttoned all the way,
and when you pass me
I won’t even ask for cash.

Them laid back Philly bums
know just what it means,
I guess.

They get what’s good,
and sometimes with the
taxis trying to kill a body,
and the buses not caring
if they do, I guess a little
live music and sunshine
is good enough for me.

just like one of them laid back Philly bums.

i wonder what it would be like to
pop something like peyote for the
night and entertain myself with
thoughts a little less mundane.

i wonder and find the thought
different enough i’m willing to
settle for having partaken of the
inquisition, and lacked the drug

the day’s last light
slides down the street
soaked surfaces soak photons
reflecting colors deeper
than the sea.

You seem so very hopeful
with that
smile stitched so carefully
just underneath your
nose,
where your scowl is supposed to be
But please, just gnash your
jowls,
I’ve no reason to fear you today,
as it’s so hard to
hit
someone a thousand miles away

And even if that smile
was
as perfect as you claim,
it’s impossible to
touch
you.

You’re a thousand miles away.

pen in hand she screams the nonsense
she’s drawing
narrating her every picture

two years old. an artist. a narrator.
i cant wait to understand the story

Sore fingers slide across
controls, across switches,
they’ve been going far to long
and now they’re crashing
through the atmosphere
and how they’ll ever get back
I don’t know.
But even then, they’ve
got a long, long way to go.