when i see you
standing in the cold-grey
street, my head barely
above a desk,
with your arms like propellars
i will wonder for a
moment where you’re flying
off to until you get crushed
under the weight
of the commute–

then systematically you
get cleaned up off the cement
like a stain on a white counter
that stretches for infinity
for absolutely no reason.

repeating retarded preambles

his living quarters in shambles

his bookshelf lined with candles

about hypothetical rain.
this, with none to gain
but the lull that come with refrain.

and i thought of you, janelle

and having not felt bad for
you yet, i still cringe watching
you play out your favorite scenes
from friends out in public
at the bar
with that nerd
on your arm
who will put his dick in you
finally, while across the
city i write this

and the thought of you was not fond

because the real test, i feel
(and never expressed to the
fairy) is when a person gets
kicked when they’re down that
they get back up and remain
honest

and i believe, janelle

that the first time you pricked
your finger on a bush, you held
it against the allmighty himself
and took up to acting
to get your dopamine
when not working for it like
everyone else

and here i sit, insulting you
in prose

because i don’t believe

in fairies.

you

gotta grease a human’s palms
to get him to do a thing
or else he’ll sit right
by his television,
and it’s deceptive in other
ways, too.

i surely do see clouds
but in my years i’ve come
to not expect anything at all

–

it didn’t rain on the
president

or you

yesterday

i suppose it never will

and in the name of the
great drought
i pray

amen.

we don’t have to live this way.

and i get up
things spread back out
and disappear
and that beauty is replaced
with waves of electrons
and even then things are
beautiful some
times
and lo my thumb hits the air.

the naivity of this year to come

the rotting of the innocent fruit

and agony whispered all the same
cyclical breezes,
migratory patterns,
and what to the man flipping
through the paper on a park bench?
and what

war chariots march onto
the swamps, t’wards the dragons
with eyes watching backwards
waiting for someone to save them

these are the days of our lives

the callous cannibals crowing
for corpses with
the great imperial shield
on each chest
the signature verifying
the combined hopes and dreams of
wall street, main street, cork street

when this ignorance takes shape
of fist
or otherwise
t’wards me
or otherwise
and then yet when his fist
has been planted
and the light shine on him
so he may reckognize the
err in his step
or
otherwise

and yet a second is thrown
or otherwise

i must ask you
why forgive?

to no longer be late
or indebted

whether to grow old
or to let it go

if that is the coward’s
way out
then i ask you
what is the
noble one?

not by design

it just seemed to
amplify
every
situation

so now when winter
rolls around
it reminds me most
of just down the street

ps2 and coffee
and the gentle tugging
on my shirt
every time
i took a corner
too fast
in
the
snow

none of this was by design

but this year i wont
be searching for drugs in my own car
or biking to work
in the cold of mount pleasant
michigan
finding out the car just
won’t start
i don’t think i will feel
lost
or like i need to take a walk

and that’s why i
am glad i learned not
to love you

or, you could say
thankful.

(i just wrote a thanksgiving day poem)

ears ringing,
and somewhere
a metronome
devi
ated

stickman falls
to the
stretching
of a new back
illusioned still

nothing says

more than

anything.

down in the valley of
the land where nothing sucks
there is naught but a
forest of carnivorous weeds

it is the norm of the valley
for there to be no sun
and it is their way of life
to love darkness and eating

so not being one to judge
i avoid the valley
as often as humanly possible
and stay downwind

–

the butterfly in the valley

and once
a butterfly
i saw did
haplessly
flutter
into the
valley

and the weeds did salivate
as it was their norm
and who am i to judge?
looking away as
they devoured her
wholly

how millions of men over
a hundred years built
concrete and steel structured
planes across the expanse
of the entire united states
moving
daily
an unfathomable amount of things

that impresses me

your
bottom drawer wit
and parlour tricks
do not.

which of you will kill me?

these rocks being people, though
after the inquisition i
ran up a hill

lost my foothold and fell

passing through the void
i knew i knew i knew i’d
been right

but i could never know which

and this is how it always goes

no twitching

a relaxed hanging, i thought
is a good one

i felt most human then.

and i won’t take you to meet your friend
“fake gold chains” or get your name
tattooed to my skin in a different language
even though you might deserve it
for how hard you tried to stand
when i walked in

i won’t take you so you won’t go
because you can stop but you can’t stop
thinking about going
so what’s the difference anyways?
so what’s the difference?