i want to wake up and break up this lake of hell

poetry

i keep talking
and reorganizing my words
waiting for an echo to sound
just the way i dreamed it would,
waiting for the words to come
back and for the crowd to
applause, to clamor, waiting
for the worms to hit the
streets after my words bounce
off the earth like rain.

he is the next poe, they would say
he is the next bukowski
hemingway
and i would be claimed philosopher king
the only philosopher king to run
through wal-mart like a downhill slalom,
laughing at capitalism,
dodging in and out of clothing racks.

this desk is lying to me (you are not you, you are a she)

poetry

i think my desk is secretly on fire
and it doesn’t want to tell me because
it knows i don’t want to know
whether or not it burns when she slips
into my mind

maybe my desk is secretly on fire because
i secretly am setting it on fire
with the heat of my fists on it’s
fake woodgrain exterior

or it’s on fire because i just
lit it on fire and am blocking out
the memories because i’m losing
my mind, and
it’s keeping that secret from me too

either way, this desk is lying to me.

back when we slept on rocks were they called Rock Bugs? (this is for you Ned)

poetry

there was a man – once who had
bad sperience after bad sperience
with fireworks (one exploded on his foot)

now i’m awed by a man who had
bad sperience after bad sperience
with bugs which choose to grow in beds

but i admit as a child i was haunted by the
thought
asked my father “from whence doest they come?”
to which he replied “he who doth not wash his sheets”

so every friday like clockwork
i laid in bed and feared what might happen
should i choose not to get up
and swap out those threads on which i lay

Confession of a habitual offender

poetry

haven’t I done this
many of times before
and yet I never learn,
never improve, instead
choosing to go down
the same old road,
over and over and over again
making a statement
in my selfishness and
watching the pain wash
over her contorting face
struggling to conquer the tears
and remain strong so as
not to be hurt anymore,
never again;
and so I harden a heart
by withholding my own.

god bless

poetry

you grow your legs, and it’s sink or swim
you throw your eggs at the presidents chin
you eat your grass if your one of the cattle
and bicker and babble over who won the battle
but their building a fence, blocking the sun
and the biggest of the bulls wouldn’t dare run
and the box in the room that keeps talking to you
grows bigger and bigger the more of you it consumes
every single day it’s Obama Mccain
every single day it’s Osama Hussein
every single day it continues to rain
every single day threatens to drive me insane
and back in high school when you gave up your brain
and you put on a mask so you could all look the same
now you spend your days grazing with black and white spots
regurgitating what you eat to see your cholesterol drop.

(Disclaimer: In no way am I comparing Osama Bin Laden to Barack Obama.)

the state of the state

poetry

The Skins on the corner
with their bubble postures
and the Muscles they walk with
swaying their hips
and the Muscles will flex
all their cologne and fists,
the college Punks,
the Emo’s and their skinny
jeans and cigarettes,
the one’s that fall through
the cracks in the dirt,
and the Alien’s,
watching the sun cross
behind the balet of the
clouds
twidling our thumbs.