poetry

No Words

poetry

There are no words to describe how fortunate I am.
There are no words to suggest any comparison.
There are no words to fathom the immensity.
There are no words to describe what this means.
There are no words to capture how blessed I feel.
There are no words to portray this abounding joy.
There are no words to express my awe and adulation.
There are no words to depict how wonderful you are.
There are no words to convey how much I love you.
And when I introduce you as my fiancée
I can only smile, because I have no words.

Morning

poetry

Good morning
Don’t wake me
it’s morning
I’m busy
exploring
the spaces
just between
the bedsheets
and pillows
or rather
the visions
that manifest
sometimes
I guess I’ll
be busy
all morning
don’t wake me

…one more thing

Good morning

florida monday

poetry

i get my fix alone
in my grandfather’s shoes
in my grandmother’s home

he left his shoes and tore
out his heart
she left her home and drowned
in perfume

i make my way to the
old sea
churning up sludge

i stand there and get my
fix again like all beasts but
think something of it

or think something will
come of it

i write with his pen
i whisper in her words

i let the sun asphixiate my anxiety
i shake the dirt off my skin
like a rug
i run head first into the sludge

i swim

Box of Secrets

poetry

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.

Life Is Jazz Is Life

poetry

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

Just A Thought.

poetry

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.

the sun is rising somewhere right now. but i cant tell you where. sometime next week we might see it.

poetry

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.

Conversations I Have That Never Happen

poetry

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.

Not so much a venom, being there is no injection involved. Though metaphorically, perhaps it is a venom injected directly in to the soul. Either Way, I’m Dying.

poetry

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.

This was not what I intended but somewhere along the way, and despite my best efforts, I got semi-sentimental

poetry

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.

i want to delete that ( a treatise on how i’m glad life isn’t like a computer in most aspects but this would be a nice one)

poetry

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.

for want of english inspiration

poetry

the beauty i hear isn’t in
carefully selected words pieced together
in crafted sentences on ideas new and
novel

all that enters my ear is
words in mathematical order in
equations i understand but cannot yet
utilize, and colors more bland than
my own color wheel

i miss days of fascination where
my pen couldn’t keep up with the
ideas being generated by my more
than creative brilliant surroundings.

i miss english.

ever-living Fire

poetry

droplets vein and
track down the
slicked and glistened
glass window.

their quiet silence and
my lover’s voice
wake me – it’s saturday.

morning thunder
rumbles out of place,
audibly unfamiliar – belonging
to a summer afternoon
still to come.

chugging low crashes
soundtrack the small
chores of the early day and
rattle the panes once
in a while.

the gray dawning is
sublime and mortality
hangs in the air
between our two bodies – No,

it flashes with a
glance and shakes us,
each to each’s core.

If I were an Ancient Wayward Traveler, I would move across the old countries a bit in the same way that a car full of traveling musicians does, albeit with one less drum set. And probably a cooler sort of hat.

poetry

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

Modern Love

poetry

I am walking bare foot
Over chalky concrete
Then it happens-

An unexpected downpour
Blogs, millions of them
Pelt down

You’re by the post office
I can see you
Standing there, brooding

Peeling off my soppy jacket
The blogs, frenzied
Drench my shirt underneath

I’m getting closer though
Not far now,
Maybe a football field

But then the clouds smirk
And down plunge the
Social networking sites

Nothing stays dry
They’re loaded, malicious
Each drop a smack on the head

Crisp leaves soak them up
Soak me up
I’m half way to swimming

A few feet ahead of me,
Vague text messages
Hit the pavement like bullets

A few feet ahead of you
A white wall of water hangs
Dancing like a drying sheet

Smacking shards and droplets
Away from my face
I look out, searching

You’re gone, walked inside
Posting something?
In transit

And I’m there
Sewer rat, dripping
Typetitypetype.

last night i had my first zombie dream

poetry

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.