Sometimes

all I want is

to say something;

but the words…

they

won’t

come;

and the wall

PERSISTSSSSSSSSssss

of places that people go
and the things people say
to sound better to themselves

recalling three members of the
red hat society eating high-
end cajun food at an overpriced
restaurant and saying repeatedly

“tar-jshay” you shop at “tar-jshay?”
oh i shop at “tar-jshay” too! how i
love “tar-jshay” i’m so happy that you
too love “tar-jshay”

of cheap goods we cannot help
but love and loathe shopping
elsewhere when we can buy off-brand
cornflakes for 9cents/ounce

1 dollar
1 box

chew on cardboard but refresh with
off-brand honey by “whose-it-a-honey”

1 dollar
1 bear

of the things i call places
because they make me laugh

recalling two members of my family
sitting in a free car in a wealthy
neighborhood laughing at ourselves
and our fascination with

tarshit
and
wal-shart

My Dwight bobble-head

Makes me laugh

As it nods away

On my desk

Making my office

Not so dull.

there are certain things i heard
in childhood about pine cones of

which i can only say that i hope
they turn out to be just not true

(two distinct viewers of light on a train;

perfecting perfection and the properties therein)

i’ve awed the sweat from a crouch-hidden blushing glove

     jump off just in time to avoid being party to a beheading

but

i’ve admired most battles bested by

   positioning

      and foreseeing

that

relegate blows as unnecessary

Why do you bother me so?

Why do your unblinking eyes never look away,
From my eyes that cannot be torn from yours?

How can you always smile,
When my life is interspersed with frowns?

What is it in you,
That causes my need to erase you?

Why do I look for the wrong in you,
When these feelings arise in me?

I have been trying
for twelve years
to learn Tagalog—

even though it was my
first language.

poetry began because of lost love
or something like it

writing continued because the writer
needs a plight

for reasons unknown to him
he sabatoges his relationships
fails miserably

and finds a plight

writing stuck around because
life was hard
people were mean
hope was lost and
difficult to find

then one day i looked and saw
writing stopped because of
wedding

wedding
stopped my writing

life was not hard
days were not lonely
jobs were not boring
hope was easily found
love was next to perfect

and is

writing started again
because life isn’t sad
its funny

and
writing went on
because writing is where
i can do anything
take a look
its in this poem

an emo without a plight
a punk with perfect hope
and music so sad i want to cry

makes me laugh. and then one day i looked and saw

language is just as beautiful describing
the loss of
a four legged ass
as a two

little bugs
i cannot see
and they are NOT
nice to me

I experienced epiphany
at the age of nine
upon discovering
over a plate of spaghetti
at a friend’s house
that not all American families
eat Rice

with every meal.

just north of guilt
i bought a summer home
with hopes of a place
to run when you’re filled
with
angry

but you send me there
more than i could have
fathomed

it’s just that i
have a short
attention spa

is NOT the space between two points/
distance/is a tearing sensation/
rending hearts and continents apart/
leaving us to say goodbye/like we mean it/
far too frequently

it
is
a
dropping
sensation.
the
falling
feeling

when something old&expensive hits the floor/
when your foot forgets the ground/and is surprised/
by the next step

passive passion is set to see
built from nails red from blood or rust
from the deft and bright sinks helplessly
but watched by those who care in disgust

gift from god a ticket away
handed by those aside the tracks
shovel, conduct, promise to repay
alone with people made out of wax

flapping and jumping all day long
read and remember how it’s done
even sing with arms someone’s proud song
to realize is what makes it fun

dreams from skill and effort end in thud:
if you water dirt you’ll just grow mud

i am an imposter
imparting knowledge

when i have nothing
not even a beard.

she said she said
one more pass through the valley of the moon
one more and all clean

my friend, he does it just thrice
thrice!
thats all and he thinks he’s fine

but i find that shrubbery
a tid bit rubbery

and as hard to keep clean as
booger home with weeds of hair

keep it up till you’re good and done
good and done
i said i said

We stood in the grey halls of
the arena my hand in
yours. the muted shouts of
the crowd, vicious and
bloodthirsty, threatened to
return me to the reality of
the cockfight we had just
left because as a boy of
eight, the blood was much
more red than i had
expected. and in the
shadows we passed an
old man, skin the color of
cocoa, holding a bird in his
lap. with his calloused
hands he carefully placed the
bluish grey intestines back
into its slashed abdomen—with the
casual air of the weary—and
then began to stitch. the
bird—probably the product of
generations of selective
breeding—stared silently barely
breathing. gone, now, all the rage
of the moment before the fight.

gone
now
all.