Yesterday I cut myself on a piece of paper

But what a fool I was to forgo a bandage

I never should have stained blood
on your pretty white dress

Sometimes I wander to a river
rife with acids and oils
from refineries and other such
machinations and I sit and
watch the fishes float
and the sickly fawns
and coughing foxes lap
begrudgingly from its murky
surface and they choke it down
because it is all they know
and they ignore the taste
of the acids and oils
and sometimes the high-floating
fish is a low-hanging fruit
but in truth this is naught
but poison and given enough of it
every single one of you
will die without hardly living
at all.

I found a truth in a bathroom stall

I cut corners and arrived in a cornerless position

I was left waiting once when the tide came in and everyone forgot I was drowning

My best friend is an animal

and if I’m lucky I’ll die in a plane crash before cancer eats me from the inside

But at least I am happy in my big blue hat

I knew a man that claimed
to swim with Dragon-kin,
to have met the lords of
all Creation

He was a tall man,
and broad,
but not so broad
to have trouble with doors,
nor so tall
to take issue with
tree-branches

He was an old man,
too.

His voice was strong,
yet rasping.
He wore fine boots
and his other clothes
were well cared-for.

He was wily.

And when he said
he had swum with legends
and supped with God,
though it could never
have been so,
I believed him.

They were metaphors,
I’m sure,
his old exalted friends,
and he was truly
just as great.

And all of his stories
were always the best,
anyway.

Stacking skipping-stones
on their round faces

try so hard to keep them up

exasperation with each collapse

eager second try
and third try too

Then only stubborn resolution

four stones stacked,
finally.

Five!

Collapse.

Such exasperation,
alas,
had been yet unknown.

—

So it is with life, sometimes,
as stacking skipping stones.

Jewelry adorned
every extremity
but she wanted more
so she took a diamond ring
and he could not afford
to feed his family.

He would toil
for months again
just to make back a half
of that stolen fortune,
and would pray that she
not wander by again,
and lustfully.

She only wanted more
than he could offer,
even if she said
she loved him.

He would suffer
nonetheless

Like trees left to their own devices
we grow until we run out of sun
and water

Unlike our leafy brothers, we
can kick and flail when the others come
to cut us down

Some are cut nonetheless
and sawn and made to boards
that are made to hold up
the others’ works.

Some cut back,
like me.

I am like a tree
with a chainsaw and a memory.

Bright blue over green
and a bit of flex in the extremities
and thin, and not very heavy

There were many moments spent
back then, and that’s how they’ll stay
and well spent really
on burgers and not bus rides

I really did care, and maybe a bit
too much. I really did walk once –
far too long for nothing. I really
am sorry, though, for a few things.

If someone sees you, I hope
they tell you that I wish you well.

You deserve it.

We could have dashed away
in the deep dark night
and never venture to cross our paths
again

we shared our warmths
instead
and counted headlights on the highway

and I never considered
the deep dark night
again

She never heard a disparaging remark
as beautiful as when he said ‘I love you’
but they were still going to drag him away
and kill him.

Now she sits alone every night and drinks
but it’s not to forget, she
just likes the taste of liquor
and the soft bread she soaks in it

When he comes back she’ll be better
or she tells herself as much
but that cold blood puts a damper on things

Then, she was a bright morning flower;
Now, but a pile of pedals on a concrete floor

It snowed for six straight days
and on the seventh there was nothing
but white and a few
footprints from the bravest souls
and I looked out on the emptiness
and was overcome by awe and fear
and for a moment I
was sure that I was dead

But then a cold blast of air
struck me, as a door swung
wide, and with great relief
I knew that I hadn’t
nothing to fear
after all.

With great relief
I knew that I would live
to freeze another day.

Teeth are chattering in the other room
in worry and also from the awful cold
but their mouths are still grinning

There will be no admittance of fear
nor show of weakness
even as the sun sets on these things
and the wind blows that much
colder

And these teeth and mouths
will freeze and die
on the third day; when they realize
that they were wrong all along
but it’s too late
to do anything about it

We hate cliches
if you ask.
We always thought a story
would be better if
the bad guy won,
or if he didn’t
get the girl,
or she dies,
or

whatever.

But the truth is
despite all the times we
listen to a Pink Floyd album
all the way through,
our favorite songs
have always been the ones
that we dance to,
and that sexy
four-on-the-floor
funk beat,
or glittering synthesizer line,
or a one-word chorus
or

whatever.

Never if you ask though

Sometimes I roll a die
and a number comes up
and that’s my number
and I have to deal with that
for good or ill
and sometimes I lose the game
and sometimes I just lose
everything
but I have to deal with that
and if there’s one thing
that I have learned in my years,
sir,
it’s that if someone hands you dice
and you don’t know them
and they ask you to roll those bones,
why,
it’s time to head home,
to your friends and family,
and make yourself a sure bet

My feet get gold
even through my boots
but I wear them anyway
because at least they don’ get wet
and dry feet are important
every day of your life
and there isn’t any reason
not to wear those boots
unless I don’t care about
wet feet no more
but the lady likes them
so there really isn’t
any good reason
at all

I wrote one about a fighter
with a big date coming up
and he was on top of the world
and that purse was going to
retire him
and partner, he couldn’t be
any happier

And the date was rigged but
nobody told John that
the other guy, he was going
to switch gloves in the
fourth round, and those gloves
were filled with birdshot

so John got hit and in the face
and hard, too. He went down
fast in the fourth round, and
it looked like he would never,
ever,
fight again

And I didn’t write a
come-back story,
so he never, ever did.

If I had been thinking 
straight out of my mother's womb
I would have dedicated myself 
to the art of judging others
and would have started myself
an award company 
so I would never have to achieve
and only tell others that they
arbitrarily
had struck some sort of 

line

and were better than everyone else
who's arbitrary 

line

had not quite been crossed
or perhaps just not crossed 
hard enough

and I would make my way 
in this world not by standing
on the shoulders of giants,
but by tricking giants in to thinking
that most of them just
aren't big enough

Who the fuck are you
with your old books
and your bachelor’s degree
and you’ve never kissed
a girl
or a man
or anything
and I mean
who the fuck are you
anyway?

Do you know what love is?
You cradle someone
all night
when they’re sick and you
pick them up from work
and buy them the junkfood
they’d never buy themselves

and sometimes
when no one else is around
you share a moment
that makes the world
stop

You don’t know what love is.
You’ve never even kissed
a girl
or a man
or anything
and your book is a piece
of shit and your
degree is all of
nothing

and who the fuck do you
even think you are?

Once I crawled through the depths
of a long, dark cave
and when you turned out the lights
you could hear the planet breathing
and though it was cold and damp
it was proper I think
and I felt closer to God then
than I ever have up top
I think
and sometimes I’m tired and I’m
just a little off but then
I remember that time when once
I crawled through the depths
of a long, dark cave
and it was peaceful I think
even if it scared me
every inch of the way

I play the sax,
you see.

It is fundamentally
different
from the valved bugle
(trumpet,
some call it)
with which
you make your
living

I can not flutter
or wail quite
the the same,
Freddie.

I wish I could,
though,
sometimes.

Red Clay was
a killer,
after all.