sometimes the feeling of being so drastically alone
hits you in the stomach at 2am on a Saturday
after all the beer has been drunk and the people
you had spent the day with were all no doubt sleeping
in their various beds in their various houses
and you would almost prefer to choke on something
to take your mind off the throbbing in your gut
and the slight spin that your head is reeling in
but the lights are off save for the glow of your phone
and the loneliness would be stark and maddening but it
is softened by the last few texts you answer and cushioned
in the low growl of the furnace until the thermostat
is triggered by the temperature’s rise and that growl
finally
stops

it’s late and the sound of things you could have done pitter patter across the hood of your car and you’re a little under the weather but nothing you can’t handle and you wish yet again that time could travel backwards but that’s the one thing it just won’t do and even though you saw the red light as far back as your twenties you just couldn’t stop in time although you knew precisely how slick your tears would make the road you pressed the brakes too late and at first you think this is fine, you’ve made peace with the whole thing, but then suddenly you’re not at peace and then in the last seconds time really does go backwards and you wrote a check that your ass couldn’t cash this time but you had saved a joint just for a situation like this just for a final drag i guess that’s how it ends and i guess that’s all it ever was the familiar smell of forbidden happiness out in the garage on a summer day before you struck your head and everything started blinking and then it stopped.

God stands with a paring knife
that has never been sharpened
so it tears when it cuts
through each of us,
through our guts and flesh,
as we are checked
for worms or for ripeness
or for whatever else God
might be checking for

when God makes his checks
we are left to bleed,
to clutch at our pieces
until we figure out
how to sew them back together
so we can keep on living
except the few that find
that the pieces don’t fit
together anymore,
or realize to their shock
that they never really did
in the first place

the color ran freely
and warm and thick
and so much brighter
than I’d ever thought it would

Oh and I had been so tough
and righteous in my ways
for after all mine was the truth
for after all mine was the real live truth

my hands grasped and quivered
trying to keep it in
but there was no stopping
the pooling in the low spots
and the running down the cracks
between the rough-worn floorboards
as paint that had been laid on
as reckless as I

there was a torrent of frigid rain
cutting through the morning black
cascading over sheeted ice filling
every pore coating every surface
forging an unlivable Hell
and we lost our footing there
clamoring for safety scratching
frost from our eyes screaming
each other’s names in the tempest
praying to anything to hold on
but then the lightening started
and when the woods caught fire
on either side and I could see
the curling haze in the distance
I reached out for you blindly
but my hand found nothing in that atmosphere
and by the time the smoke had filled my lungs
I had already hit the frozen ground
and lost all of the feeling
in my extremities

you’ll be killed by a dumb man
who doesn’t know what he’s doing, or why
and he will rule the world

it won’t be good, because good
is smart and smart is an
aberration to god

the king of man must be lied to
for at seeing the truth would
tear out his own eyes

even love, as beautiful as it is,
lives in the moat of the
stupidest castle in the land

it must live there else it
be devoured by all the retarded
senselessness of each passing minute

a stubborn boy, i thought i’d live
to eat each fruit but now i
wretch loudly throughout the jungle

it’s too sweet, i don’t know
maybe poison in the last one
feeling very drowsy now

i guess i don’t know how you hunger
and it may be that i never really will

when i said you’d eat the eiffel tower
from a place where that idea
seemed dumb, i’d not known i, too
one day would want to, in a way,
consume things as well, of a similar substance

too similar to obviously
discern the difference

i mean,
i want to say it’s different
but i don’t know that it is

because i woke up with you
in my head today feeling like
i selfishly wanted every thing that i could
see all for myself and no one else

and i don’t care why

so maybe i should have
listened differently or
you should have
explained yourself better

or i should have explained
you better to myself

oh well, either way
as pain builds strength
so too does
being wrong build wisdom

i am used to missing the
mark, after all

but it’s not about me

the mountain is not a metaphor
but a mountain made of rocks
as you are made of rocks as
rocks are states of energy
seemingly stagnant but a
story an infinite number of
pages long with letters too
tall for you to read.

the mountain is a letter too
tall for you to read in an
infinite story and appears
to be made of rocks as
you are made of rocks are
not a metaphor but just
differing states of energy.

give them no quarter
in your mind and run them
out. remain at a distance
of at least 6 feet, for to
prevent the virus from
passing. take on the mountain
alone, or with trusted few.

this is all there is.

run them out, and give them
no quarter in your mind.
keep at a safe distance
of 6 feet for to prevent
the virus from passing.
climb the moutain alone,
or with trusted few.

there is no more than this.

the devil
lives in my mind

and you can bet on that, as sure
as the tide stays at bay

and you can even set your clock to it

and I won’t die, no
that’s too good for me

i will see the virus wear me as a mask

so sad that i am afflicted
by this virus of the mind
and i don’t know how it
will end
but i know how it began

the truth
makes an uncomfortable chair

He never understood
that tears on her face
didn’t mean torn umbrella
and sometimes when she called
she just wanted to talk
to somebody

steel pulleys dragged the flag
to half staff and clattered
against it in the wind
shouting like horseshoes
glancing off a spike
in a sand pit and
I wondered for a moment
about what almost counts for

It could have been
yesterday
if I had let it be
but I didn’t
and look at us
now

I’d wrap you up
if I could tonight
like a child
against the cold
and hold you
through the sunrise

at least I’d feel
a little better
then

But you’re probably
better
off

I burn my guts
with gasoline
and render them
to mush
every evening
with bright
blue lights
in my eyes

A fit of foolishness
has found them
at the bottom of
a deep dark well
and I can only hope
this fit of arrogance
will get them out again

I remember ever scratch
on my parents’ dining table

I can see if I close my eyes
the chipped veneer
on my father’s end

the puncture from a project
by my middle brother
in the summer of ’03

I can feel my quiet frustration
at the grain not aligning
in the center
when the leaf is out
and sheer annoyance
that the lines don’t match
even when it is laid in
perfectly center

Ever stacked with clean towels
government paperwork
off-brand Tupperware full
of different kinds of cookies

a bag of fresh fruit even
within a few days of the market

and wonder at the dinner
that it could have held
but for a global pandemic
and a quarantine order
from the Governor
that won’t let up ’til May

I have heard
that the changes made
to our ecosystem are
irreversible
or they will be
in a decade or two

But the seas will only boil
after all the polar ice
has melted away

‘pity me’
he whispered in a heap
sobbing on the flagstones
as she looked on
unamused

‘I do’
she responded
and her fingers snapped
and hot fire sprung forth
to engulf him

he shrieked and flailed
with all his might
but in the end
there was only ash left
as she walked back inside
and drew the blinds
behind her

I arrived unsaved
on the wide steps
of your temple
where I begged mercy
in the dark of night
and I wailed,
oh I wailed,
to all the saints
or spirits
that would listen

when I woke at dawn
covered in dew
and dust and bruises
I found my prayers
answered:
no saint had left
notice and no spirit
made its mark so
I departed unsaved
into the wilderness
wailing to the sun instead

Stasis doesn’t stop time
the earth revolving the sun
consuming its fuel ever nearing
supernova

every shop is closed
the stark contrast of meaning
is thrown in our faces
but stasis doesn’t stop time

wrestle with your annuities
and despair in the gaze of God
as the milky way spirals ever closer
to oblivion