poetry

Nobody Tells You How Long It Takes

poetry

Every now and then it hits me
like a kick in the teeth

The stinging will pass, sure enough
but the ache and soreness eeks on
for hours afterward

then I’ll go a week, let’s say,
and everything will be just as good
as it could be, considering

but then the truth, like a startled mule
will stop suddenly in front of me
and out its hind leg will spring

Luckily my lip never seems to split
nor does anything seem to pop loose

But my jaw has been consistently stiffer,
these days,
and my gums are stinging real bad now,
that’s for sure

Diatonic Fourths

poetry

My fingers struggle to process input
from eyes that struggle to remember
how to interpret dots and marks
in such a way as to associate them
with a letter, and in some cases
a modifier that when read together
make up the pieces of what would
in the modern parlance be called
a ‘universal language’

it sounds awful as I stumble over
notes that don’t go together the way
that I think they should, but really
these intervals are new to me, or
at least they are as an exercise
in movement, but I have been assured
that even as the tones clash and
cluster, and even though my muscles
feel as dumb as they have ever felt,
I will be better off when these
sounds are under my fingers

I am not sure that I believe them
but I will stay in this woodshed
just the same

the ballad of the penguin and the polar bear

poetry

you’ve got the heart
of a bird
that can’t fly
but you want
to be
the mighty bear

you gather your strength
in numbers
sharing your warmth
and empathy

he’s got the heart
and the skin
for the blistering cold
and all alone
though he longs
to share

he sings his sad songs
into the wind
longing for warmth
and empathy

when the world is a giant iceburg
you see what you think you need
floating among
the shards of ice in this vast ocean
the missing puzzle pieces to
a heart that doesn’t bleed

you swim for it
and you find it
but they don’t fit

some foreign things
are foreign
for a reason

some opposites
repel
too hard to touch

you find it’s the things
that make you different
that keep you apart

no matter how you dream

Most Nights Now

poetry

‘let’s not do anything too drastic’
I say to myself most nights now
and instead of venturing forth
into the darkness with a gun
on my hip and cheap whiskey
in my gullet I swaddle myself
in the folds of a blanket that
radiates with memories so warm
they quickly overwhelm me
and as I lay with half-closed eyes
staring at the wall while
a sad old record hums through
the speakers of my stereo
I wonder if perhaps a spot of
hot hooch and some adventure
isn’t actually drastic enough

I Must Have Been Dead Before Now

poetry

I would spend each night
dreamless, or at least
I did not know my dreams

or if I knew my dreams
they were dark dreams.
They were black ink
that washed across my world

Now I spend each night
dreaming, or at least
I know my dreams

They are wonderful dreams,
too; we are happy and
healthy and smiling

I think that I dream
the rest of the time now, too,
and before I must have been dead

The dead don’t dream so much,
I think, and this waking dream
so often makes me feel
like I’m dying

we run from the easiest answers

poetry

i believe i knew before the dive,
anyway

i knew when i forgot where you were

i mean you know when someone goes
missing

at the bottom of the lake
and at the bottom of everything
you thought you needed to find
and was dead already
with your face,
and your eyes wide,
purple-ish blue
dead long before
you knew it was missing
dead already when
you realized it was gone

so what there is now
left
to hold onto
must endure.

let me know if you’re ever in Wichita we’ll get coffee

poetry

i know you’ll never be
in Wichita
and if you were
we would only
get coffee

we could share
maybe a half an hour
in the local flavor
and reminisce
on times we were
in the same
geographical
location
and what happened there

we could make jokes
so it wouldn’t be
awkward

then like addicts
retreat back to
reality
and dispense
with the dry
niceties

take showers
like call-girls at sunrise
wipe away shame with
our saved up social
capital
and smile,
next we
should meet

but seriously

let me know

if you’re ever

in Wichita

we’ll get coffee

and call ourselves

friends.

chaos

poetry

it’s true that most of us
would hate to have coffee
with the authors on our
coffee tables

i mean
i thought it funny you
had hitchens on yours
when you two have almost
nothing in common

nor i, with nietzsche
or bukowski
i guess

the tuth is not some minutea
it is much bigger
than that

it is that you should
see the world as art
which is to be a neutral observer
stumbling, perhaps
onto your own soul
and then to learn a new thing about it
told to you by someone else

you don’t search the mona lisa
for yourself
smile, smugly when you find it
and walk away content
with what davinci drew
as if it was your idea
all along

No-One Is Listening

poetry

You are a pirate transmitter in an ocean of unauthorized frequencies
that cascade together creating distortion and static

My receiver picks up on a stray, clear transmission every now and again
so I can piece together your path based on your current bearings and location

I know that you have undertaken a grueling course through dangerous waters
without the help of your officer, who left you and your few crew members for another ship

The most of it, though, is hissing noise washed out by other radios with bigger amps
and one day among the swirling interference, your signal will go cold

Maybe I will notice.
Maybe I will not.

But based on my most recent data
I will be forced to understand, unfortunately,
that you have drowned

And that none of us other broadcasters
had taken enough time from our programming blocks
to help you out at all

I can’t stop looking at my phone and computer

poetry

part 4 in a series inspired by Shia LeBeouf’s tweets
—

tell me you think i’m beautiful
even if it is a lie
and let us not shy away from
the utility in fucking
the rent is paid now for sure
but i still feel homeless
i know you too well now to even
have a firm idea of
well i mean the relativity of it all
is the only solid thing
i can’t stop looking at my
phone and computer

even heaven seems really boring

i don’t know what i’m waiting for

this sinking feeling that is bottomless

you can’t talk your way out of this one

hold your breath, count to two

poetry

part 3 in a series inspired by Shia LeBeouf’s tweets
—

hold your breath, count to two
dive into the deep end

remember: you must get out
or you will dissolve eventually

close your eyes, count to two
don’t let your teeth fall out

remember: you need air to breath
grab the firm ground and pull

—

your limp body out
don’t go back until
you’ve learned to swim
dry off in
the light of a dying star
the summer sun
on the floor of a rounded
petri dish
floating like a soap bubble
through the void
it’s just like your mother
never taught you:
find what’s inside
while you still have time
and hold it with your breath
mark the moments
with your counting
open eyes and start anew
open eyes and start anew

davey and judi

poetry

she had no home but
that’s ok
davey had a fast car
and everybody knew it
and she thought she loved marky
but then when she got pregnant
marky just stayed with doretta
isn’t that messed up?
and when the pills didn’t work
(it was too late)
no one would come over
so she panicked,
and she kept it
and then built a home with ronnie
but she always was with davey,
in his fast car
always skinny
always young

if time could travel backwards part 3

poetry

you are scooping bowls of ice cream
it is 1978 and you are scooping 3 bowls
1 for you, your daughter, and your son
in the distance you hear them laughing
at the television as the bright spring
florida sunset beats down on your kitchen
you struggle to pick up the bowls and carry
them to the basement
but you make it just fine
and as you set the bowls down you forget
what or who you were getting them for
because you haven’t spoken to your children
in years
it’s 2016
and your wife is crying.

your life is your life

poetry

part 1 in a series inspired by Shia LeBeouf’s tweets

—

your emotions have
locked you in a box

your life is your life
and your life is hate-fucking
a bad ex-lover
whenever they come around

i’ve no sympathy but to unlock
the door
you can’t hear me knocking,
anyhow

my turned back finds a dusty trail

to follow but wherever i go

it’s like the fucking

hate-fuck capital of the world and

it hurts most

when the faces are

familiar