Nostradamus Rex by We, The Notorious Pronouns

Printed in the United States of America at Queen City Imaging in Buffalo, New York Proof Positive Publishing Buffalo, NY Managing Editors: Jeremy Lessard, John Cuttito, Katherine Kurtz Layout Editors: John Cuttito and Jeremy Lessard Cover Designs: original image by Jerry Longolucco at Sky's the Limit text and layout by Patrick Riedy

The Pronouns featured in this anthology are: Drew Stanek, Kayla White, Vincent Cervone, Patrick Riedy, Bobby Clark, Dan Palmer, Jake Bernhardt, Peter Letson Williams, Alexandra Clifton, Jeremy Lessard, Claire Gay, Andrea Zysk, Akin Walker, Michael Koh, George Georgakis, Jennifer Skelton, Katherine Kurtz, Rachel Vertino, Paige Melin, Kayla Rizzo, Spencer E. Carr, John Cuttito, Heather Jorgensen, Rob Giles, Jordan Rosenberg.

NotoriousPronouns.com

notoriouspronouns.blogspot.com

Facebook: We, The Notorious Pronouns

Living Poets Society

SUBMIT POEMS AND VISUAL ART TO: wethenotoriousp@gmail.com

table.of.contents jerry.longolucco cover image.................................................thanks to Sky's the Limit cover text........................................................................patrick.riedy drew.stanek D…………………………………………………………………….…….1 kayla.white Oh, poetry………………………………………………………………..2 writings and such……………………………………………………….5 you found me……………………………………………………………6 mind a trainwreck……………………………………………………….7 vincent.cervone a transition……………………………………………………………….8 2/21 and 2/22…………………………………………………………….9 adhere to what is………………………………………………………10 being less ………………………………………………………………11 stark light……………………………………………………………….12 patrick.riedy we were kings………………………………………………………….13 bobby.clark beer stein – visual poem……………………………………………..18 silhouette – visual poem……………………………………………..19 a simple spiritual… and…birds flying overhead……………………20 4…and…7…………………………………………………………….21 13…and…one too many midnights..……………………………….22 dan.palmer five poems……………………………………………………………..23 jake.bernhardt ithaca fires……………………………………………………………..24 letson.williams I have more meta-cognitions than I do actual ones………………..29 #4…and…#5…………………………………………………………..31 #8…and…math rock…………………………………………………32 the marble hearted……………………………………………………33 alexandra.clifton marble hearts (ii)……………………………………………………...36 jeremy.lessard an appropriated manuscript…………………………………………..38 completion is no longer……………………………………………….39 sound sonnets 2, 3, and 4…………………………………………….40

claire.gay the drive………………………………………………………………...43 andrea.zysk morning will come…………………………………………………….44 akin.walker colors…………………………………………………………………..46 michael.koh things I find amusing or cute…………………………………………47 another pretty girl I’d like to jump in the fire with…………………..48 how much wiggle is a wiggle…………………………………….....49 george.georgakis for Nikos Sampson……………………………………………………50 jennifer.skelton when oceans overflow………………………………………………..51 peabody street………………………………………………………...52 katherine.kurtz poison…………………………………………………………………..53 hair………………………………………………………………………54 cutco…………………………………………………………………….55 (count)ing………………………………………………………………57 rachel.vertino my clit…………………………………………………………………..59 paige.melin morning………………………………………………………………..61 declivity………………………………………………………………...63 kayla.rizzo courtship and creation…………………………………………………64 [+]……………………………………………………………………….65 spencer.e.carr great pig in the sty……………………………………………………..66 john.cuttito what to do with a bottle of jack………………………………………67 confliction……………………………………......…………………….70 heather.jorgensen rain drop…………………………………..……………………………72 rob.giles it’s delirium tremens……………………...……………………………73 jordan.rosenberg inside out……………………………………………...inside back cover

Oh Poetry, How I long to comb your hair & touch you all warm & radiant, grabbing your ass, rubbing your pink nipples & kissing you Poetry, Where have you gone? I want Morphine days w/ Ginsberg in India to come back home & find America pregnant & swollen, staying high up ‘til 3 on tea & amphetamines contemplating jazz w/ angels Oh Poetry, why have you left me? you use to cum when I was drunk & kiss my sheets, I would wake up to find you gone but your trace lingered still Poetry, I caught a glimpse of you in the brush wild crazy & naked screaming & beating your chest you were beautiful & still are

Poetry, I’m in love with you.

Poetry, I miss your presence your strength, passion, & lunacy 2

driving twisted souls to misery & madness, so deeply lost in your midnight eyes of despair that they put on petty coat straitjackets of rocks & threw themselves into the abyss Poetry, you are w/ me always I see you in the city crowded out of the corner of my eye You haunt me

Poetry, I saw you in a record store, in an asylum, in a hick bar on tuesday You sang blues all night & drank wine out of the tit paperbag bottle Dear Poetry, I still think about us sometimes How you left me naked & ashamed I tried to talk about it but you stood there silent Poetry, Opium told me that you are a philosopher & an albatross Poetry, I’ve lost my way the sun has turned dark & terrifying Won’t you take me home?

Poetry, you are out of focus my mist(ress) of blur, my memory escapes me

the page slips Poetry! Are you justified? you left & why does the ending come in d.ts & dash/es in forests of golden keys?

Poetry, you are Casanova, a sentimental fool, a goddess, sin enwrapped in leather, vocality of enlightenment exalted, natural, illustrious, a wisdom weaver silence simply compounded, impaired, the heritage of idea & strains of moments influx oral

Poetry you are spirit Poetry you are the manifestation of feeling Poetry you are words Poetry you are the poet

& if I say your name one last time will you still be

[

Poetry]

And I’m treated as if I don’t belong yet there is still laughter. The season for fear has come and gone yet I’m still stuck frozen with the charred leaves and dead fish at the bottom of the lake. So I put on my combat boots, fishnet stockings, and ruffles and go down to the beach I have no money so I pawn my dead mother’s gold earrings and buy a sandwich. I am quiet sometimes and sit, I am quiet sometimes and say nothing, the world is moving around me, I sit quietly and drink and talk to no one, sometimes I drink and say a lot and I say nothing and I am quiet. I hate myself I work without words and I want to scream ‘cause all there is is talk talk talk and repetition and noise of boring boxes of products and there’s no soul anywhere nothing that lives or breathes anymore

Ungoverned in the ways of verse, the universe Don’t stand and yell and wiggle your fingers here Can’t speak for the collected voices, well someone must Without limitations we are monsters, With limitations we are monsters. Eyes drupe bags with styrofoam cups with Jack running down mascara streets. I CAN NOT SEE THE VOICES, TOO LOUD r u n n i n g, r u n n i n g backseat driving to Colorado I see planes of grass in the rising cloud air Someone hold me down on top, don’t let me down, choke myself in, please Claws hold no man down

I see good news through phone lines, static I’ve decided that I need to grab some Happiness for myself also. With all its complications and interferences if I could be granted some fraction of that peace… but the first version is always the best And I take pictures of still lives that belong to no one, always on the other side of things I tip my hat to strangers and shake hands firmly, this is what I am taught is the way of things but it is not. I am very happy that you all could make it (I am surprised that you came) I laugh and am made a fool of for doing what everyone does and only later do I truly notice the extent of it. I am sorry that I cannot make myself prettier or smarter or well versed in the way of words and if I could I would do it all over again and make myself… better. Something no government should be allowed to do

And I can’t tell if I smile or not I smashed my compass on a rock and can no longer find North I am searching for someone who cannot be found Who can sit and know without words, or just sit and just be and it’s ok they’re here and I know... That is all I have ever wanted never to be found even in the closest of friends. Everyone is lying They are all lying and I know, I hear and see the truth in my head and am told it is not the way I think it is but it is They hold each other tight and lie. 2 plus 1 is too much and I am divided into parts and s c a t t e r e d

You found me, lying on tile cold throw up on cheap vodka stolen, w/ rolled up $1 and naked. Towel tired dragged bed, lying next to me. You brought me music medicine, not able to look into my eyes, staring at chord hanging on strumming my soul. I mumble words I don’t hear, distant memory of broken I no longer believe but still say, echoing. “It’s just a bad day”, you shake your head unbelieving take arm in hands tracing lines I call empty meaning. Scolding my foolishness, stillness of being taking in destroyed surroundings leaving pain in your eyes, Please don’t go. And we speak in anger and move our mouths in silence and continue for days until I see morning light in clear words you remember and we laugh, and some sadness days still pass (It is not easy) this broken distant memory yet I no longer call it empty. And songs and words fill my soul slowly seeping through eyes that you can see into being bringing a universe of wisdom love of natures brimming happiness in the time, again, where you found me. 6

Mind: a trainwreck colliding sinking in swamps stuck trying to rehook onto the track but holes were left too deep, I can’t scratch them out

deviated

this dementia of comprehension Emotion: this crude darkness dense dumb empty oblivion bewildered blindness raw vile destruction has corrupted me I cannot get this affliction this sickness out this suffering sorrow ensnared my soul: left in ruins prophetic dreams clear as mud Reason: the wrecked carcass destitution of the signified carved inconceivable, although I clutch at madness Attempting to reign the depraved blacken Beast damned I’m ripped to shreds there’s nothing left defaced defiled semen rotting the Body: gone iced restraint trapped the biological cell

a transition from all of those little things equivocal pastures I’ve seen too many times with too many eyes rising with the comely spirit of the bulb set ablaze in the sky my hollow hands grass

underneath body

a place for the soul to grow alongside fever and silence in the trifling chatter convulsing within the wind as it slips

through my fingers

o are

no more

I gaze or imbricate a dwelling to coarse

fixate space nailed ground m a z e s I understand p l a c e s

I can no longer find again tap on my shoulders breathe heavily on my neck come morning I won’t 8

remember or feel remnants once familiar now distant l

a slither become a collective unworthy of

into

fog detection

a transition from all of those little things reverberating faintly beyond immeasurable distance

2/21 ante meridiem - post meridiem timeless saturated absorbed cut-loose exposure to a sky filled with no blinking eyes I forget beauty like this exists here or wherever it is that we truly are. 2/22 sing it, King it’s all gone and our arms will never be open for anyone not even ourselves moving along nameless and complacent traveling to those places out in the open and far beyond our condition the sound is too overwhelming and I’ve no will to orchestrate. 9

adhere to what is focal and direct your attention where it should go when you break under the torture of sleep or the place you envision to resemble the concept of sleep when you are awake counting the ways to make your life stop quicker than cars on Broadway or the BQE after an accident weren’t you there? conscious, when the sky braided your hair and for a moment for a second for a minute you just fell to your knees admitted that it was all a dream you had while you were roaming the streets of New York or Wyoming (wherever it is you lay your head to forget those tides of breath that always swept you off of your feet back onto me) when you whisper I swear to God everybody hears what you have to say and in that way you’re always around I envision you on a train somewhere as it moves through the grooves of cities your hair detached from your forehead eyes blinking under every tunnel hands folded on your lap waiting for the amiable sound of conversation to float across some river and save you from yourself

being less familiarity with situation hand know better on impulse than conceived notion yourself better now than past accumulates person today makes most accurate decisions your person does not connect planning artificial illusion knowing type knowledge faulty (finding typical transparencies moved forward towards voiceless light with no hands to speak mouth to touch partook in course of ever-binding absence overflowing with direction when the eyes are viewed tunnel of sucking wind diverts itself) not a good time for word speaking nothing different about the feeling received (black infinite distorted cavity is partially whole resurrected slowly into a catastrophic ornament serving purpose on nature intrusion not forgiving enough to allow a sentimental pierce from the pupils) routine slants of mechanical function an empty business begging for an insightful moment not suspended (indecency of chance the perception of unwanted occurrences vital distaste hosting itself slithering between unseen satisfaction oriented processes perchance an illusion induced streamed penetrated portion slithering beyond casing of unreal flesh short unrepresented fiber) withholding miracle or better luck next time simultaneously chipped off remaining beats deduced beets selfishly established particular arrangements personal gain personification games pragmatic cycle pithy orchestrations symphony not in harmony a song nonetheless instruments missing tune chords without distinction clear in unwanted verse fabricated pandemic excite nose to hear messages subtly inserted plethora of enticing grasps allow loquacious behavior reverse arms walking cadence (stumps for kneecaps need to stay out provoke synthesis impossibility in literal sense chomping fingers consumed supply of miscreants who better judge than own framed humility short of respectable flip babbled creation slot all parts empty organized columns open-shut pace shh-space monitor panels bonding trepidation boring sedimentation with loss of accumulation) mathlogic experience no correspondence paralleling alongside acute precision conundrum please senses belittle alignments trigger mute panel abstain voice prevail intrusion understanding drenched in meaning and significance desperation makes itself evident pokes its head out of water to remind infatuated all are standing in shallow no worry but mentality sudden loss of intellect coupled with drop confidence quicker than sky bricks hammering cement destination reduced whole into inopportunity fragments snug buried nested below (w)hole as big as sky echoes longs another event consisting itself tiring repetition lines differing intentions no invention specifically inclined to attend party body work between uplifting comments truth bit bullet humanity saved suppose world now a better place for dilly dallying flowers(day dreams analysis foreign spots found mind not capable understanding what remains mid[in the]dle idle contention stagnant collaboration shifting forward backward leftward rightward nightward morningward wardward) sad excuse for sense can’t be here not momentarily not ever forever precisely function sick sad poisoned ready barge in sleepless post mash glass thousand glittering speckles between functions destined overthrow obscenities overarching insightfulness beguiled when viewed bigger embodiment than expected tricked progression trapped simplicity stuck walls oozing residue residing stench tickling muscles fix structure incomplete (morning arrives not a sky-star sight humanity pleased knowing cyclic nature dim spots recurring every blink eyelash loss dissolved) enlightened smiling stirring marginal error outcome not to prosper angelic computational disturbance stapled crunching bones disintegrating corpse assumptions not logical destined however terms set forth strategic enough for conservation liability issue permanently extend needle shaped establishment to god of world apparently omniscient individual somehow missed every 11

stark light exploits the desultory nature your skin clunking underneath those steel doors you beckon disappoint you fret, gills struggle to find water transform

be free

from

me you, must to the whole

fragment

rise

I find shelter in moments brief intervals where time emulates existence in a plausible reality forget for a while where you’ve been those places constructed not in you elsewhere relevance deconstructed is the placement of pre-determined assets shape-shift we will to consume artificial reverberate thoughts confide

worth in forget

every

and breed contamination and word

im afraid my dads lost its meaning even though he hasnt changed im afraid my citys lost its feeling disappeared: brick roads

buz-n-bee noble men no longer

those were the days south buffalo was big now its just white some black mostly blue dangerous ways of finding it bat your lashes wink at me giggle on my piano sing as sweet as your smell make heart beat in my fingertips pour yourself niagara falls between your legs falling on bricks erode earth underneath knew even less than you it comes back in him it flows back on you everybody at some point shuffles onto buffalo have you always been here too? everything you can put your hands on 13

grab disappear slowly still used in schools overshadowed by westerns and space stories left at building columns real working class people educated but not the kind you think and they know how to drink they have conversational prowess heres a mess for me to sort out buffalo get your shit together we better go write a book chew tobacco drink something else or more the same

snippets of your work everywhere rugged american area out on the ocean during the war unforgiving cruel something my father would do im afraid my fathers already dead and my mother means little to me 14

shorty, my uncle, who was perfectly round he usta get along with my ma usta care for my gramma now cares for big trucks pensions retirement funds he musta learned how to forget learned to die slowly lights give bare trees along elmwood some life in winter but its fake electricity a sad attempt at materiality buffalo, i saw you in spot yesterday i wasnt sure it was you you had your head down in a book pen in mouth winter hat hangin off your head you had a grande whatever a plate of crumbs and pencil lead it was around the time i looked at the trees it was about the time i fell in love with you remember when spoken arts was on the radio? we listened to Fred Wah all the fun we usta have 15

sledding on the steps of the knox fishin frozen lakes skippin through books giving me the ‘come here’ look moist lips hard dicks buffalo, get your sweet ass over here we usta own this town own these people own these days own our lives live our lives cry all day laugh all night bleed blue blood kissin our kids we usta love like birds you said and fuck like rabbits i thought we philosophized the french tickled our tongues smoke up snort up shoot up get shot down and pick ourselves up outta bed we usta sleep with strangers live like kings smoke the best weed pretty ladies smelling all kindsa sweet talking our ears off in prose and free verse ending in haikus or worse we were this fucking town we made this city bright we came back once 16

but cant live like that no more cant make this city burn like we usta cuz i said it once ill say it now my dad dont mean much to me anymore and that means you dont either do you? but who the fuck am i kiddin im a tortured soul a poet the yellow bridge or even that tall building will remind me of you buffalo ill think of niagara falls fallin on bricks inspectin your gadget i feel like i got you and thats all that matters now i feel like i have you buffalo dad poetry baby i feel like im in love with you what more can i ask here now then now

we were kings, arent we?

A Simple Spiritual

Open my heart to eternal love pour light on my soul from sky above awaken your image in my breath brilliant beautiful as a dove Oh wise creature from laughter I burst my body is full with divine love Let me drink from your golden wine the sun, moon, and universe are mine through this crazy life I sing and dance fueled by spirits from your fruitful vine guiding reins of infinite pleasure it is with you Beloved I dine Forever delighted by your kiss my being understands wild bliss chanting a simple spiritual a galaxy of violins hiss your happy invitation pleases a once tormented Doctor as this Birds Crying Overhead

The sun is screaming above I can feel my blood burning or is that the world turning? revolving beams of your love Sunken eyes vision collapsed distance delivered in black is this where my love does shack? can it be no time has lapsed? heavy legs falling in row with rising and stumbling is that my mouth mumbling? I can hear the carrots grow Skeleton hand at the wheel rabid mind starving for thought is this all my dollar bought? I sell you the way I feel 20

4. I tell you I didn’t believe my eyes when I went in there for the first time. man eating vines covered the walls from cheek to white cheek—flourescent flowers spaced geometrically along the ceiling wiggling in anticipation. After I made it past the guard—a Vietnamese cobra speaking terrible latin who I vanquished with old reliable—a 7mm toothpick through the scales, I asked the salesman if he had anything for a young girl about the age of thirty-seven. “Oh this right here is my bestseller.” pointing to a tank w/ a stinky towel over it—I peaked under it and lost my breath—it was only an egg. That is it was only an egg until its talons slashed out violently and it opened its creepy red eyes and smiled with six green teeth. “Wow I’ve never…what do you feed a thing like that?” He pointed to a bucket and I put my head over the top and nearly passed out from the smell. That is to say it was delicious—“And does it really need 6 tenderloins a week?” He nodded. “Well have you ever had any behavior problems with these little guys?” He shook his head. I stared at him for what must have been seven years then opened up my wallet— counted on my fingers for what must have been seven seconds, then I smiled, ripped off my face and said “I’ll take eleven of em.”

7. I spend most of my time in a dream and what a dream it is. There is always dancing live music and beer liquor lights flashing multi-colored snowflakes onto buildings with window teeth and freezing hands and cigarettes and warm hands and more dancing with tomorrow never knowing the rainy day women that twist in smoke rings through my mind and coffee table ashes numb legs and beating lungs I think I’ll have another I think I’ll dream another life and its only been 5 minutes hair shaking like scary medusa snakes wearing crooked smiles and all night subways running running running on iced tea and rum from here to downtown and downtown to a rainbow moonshine heaven and I got off only because I needed another beer and I found six and didn’t last very long because my mouth was sucking at anything resembling air but I kept breathing foamy golden waves and did I mention I was dancing and everybody was dancing and legs were everywhere and someone put their arm down my throat and I began to laugh and my lungs consist of tissue and green smoke and they’re still beating hot cold blanket french fry shivers standing up and lying down and dancing and all of a sudden the sun peaks around the horizon and its morning.

13. I have a yellow vision that makes me see everything at a distance lacking proportion to the human universe and so I must say it’s a good thing that I am not human, but underhuman, not to be confused with underwhelming because I am a very overwhelming underhuman and really I just live in the earth’s basement because the sun is too bright most days and my sunglasses are only so strong and so orange although they do allow me to see through burgundy when the moon flashes midnight in a batman signal in the sky and batman never comes but instead a silver water cobra slinks up out of the earth and it’s because I’m playing my magic flute and he hears me and obeys me and if I didn’t have the necessary mind well then my fingers would play the wrong tune and the shadows would eclipse the moon in a fit of dying gasping for some light to shrink darkness back down to the size of a music box forever playing waltzes for Henry the Horse and a host of playing cards doing the 52 pickup in a satin ballroom, except nobody can pick up the king of hearts because there’s a kind sword through his head and streamers of confetti and butterflies pouring out te other side and no one is moving or speaking because theirs mouths and minds are trapped in timeless awe!

One Too Many Midnights Sitting in the sinking shadows hanging from a cloud of smoke burning clocks and crucifying time until the heavy darkness broke and every time I meet the sunrise my eyes are wearing a beautiful disguise

Out there in the howling wind a freeze hits like a cannon blast I’m haunted by cruel memory hoping each thought will be my last and every time I meet the sunrise my eyes are wearing a beautiful disguise

All the night I think and wander leaving invisible footprints in the street dancing madly through the midnight to the moon woman’s pale white beat and every time I meet the sunrise my eyes are wearing a beautiful disguise

In the blackest hour of dawn I am a lonely scarf in an empty hallway but my heart will still be singing to serenade the break of day and every time I meet the sunrise my eyes are wearing a beautiful disguise

1.Untitled Heaven has nothing for me. I miss the devil's music and the taste of cold beer. The celibate innocence is unbearable and the hourly sermons make sleep rather difficult. The blood of sacrificial lambs runs red in the streets and I'm told, the sight is pleasing to god. Here I stand in my place at the back of the leaving line miles long with vague hopes of a partial refund.

2.Untitled The liquor helped. It shifted my focus to the pain in my head Which was easy to get used to. But in the endI found that while I was in the bathroom throwing up my can supper everyone left and I was alone. I broke some furniture-

Threw it in the parking lot and went to bed. I don't remember if I cried. I don't remember if I prayed.

3.Toilet Soap Stuck in the ether today. Floating in the margins of tangible things. So small. No clear thoughts. No new words. 3 days into a new year and I can't tell the difference. Feels like a hand me down. But the good folks on the metro have made their resolutions, and this could be the year we turn it all around. Still, I can't wedge my head out of this crack. And I don't know if it's my ass or somebody else's. Another 12 months without dying and I don't know if it's me or you or the gods who've been cheated.

4.Untitled At the end of every week whatever's left in my wallet, I take it down to the dollar store and trade it for as many bags of plastic dinosaurs as it's worth. Usually 6 or 7 bags which is about 115 dinosaurs. Some of them don't stand up because they're cheap pieces of shit, so I lay them down and the rest stand proud all along the railroad track where after an hour or so they're smashed to pieces. Sometimes I don't even stick around to watch the smashing. 5.Anyhow... What's nice about white walls? Why bring the outside in and the inside out? Plants in the housefurniture on the lawn, a bird in a cage. What the hell am I trying to say? Everything's for sale.

I drove for almost four hours in silence mostly She was there but drifting in and out Tired from a long day, work at night and adventures Up for 24 hours or more yeah more But it was ok, I told her to sleep She said she didn’t want to be rude I told her I’d rather see rest. she'd rather be rest I put on music to help but honestly, she didn't need it breaths were long and drawn in no time gone

record after record Nujabes, Nickdrake When she woke up she said look! the stars and we talked in short sentences Erik Satie lulled her back to sleep We discussed the beauty of the sky

“Welcome to the night sky” She didn’t know it was a quote a sky long forgotten to a city girl and maybe its better that way

And so we drove, or well I drove she rode dreams and things 24

Waking for brief moments when we stopped, turned sharp or thunderous piano hits She was beautiful, hat pulled down, the shine of the dash on her face Her reflection is the window

I made her a collection once solo piano she told me she listened to fall asleep that if she did wake again she could easily find her way back to sleep to dreams to me

this time I think nothing else to do

I thought about hand bands, music, friends, enemies frienemies and, her I thought about what makes the SAD-1 the best and if having two was good or bad No matter what I thought about it always made it back to her bands hands friends Me

Is there anything I can do to change her mind? 25

Why is it that now is a bad time? What did I do to make you distance yourself? how did we end up like this?

When we reached Darien, I turned off all the lights law allows for better sleep I realized we drove the long road Broadway Goddamn

i looked from time to time at how things could be she and me Perfect compliments

Thinking about how always understand don’t like don't know don't like Shite who she is, he she is doesn’t back down terribly stubborn that’s why I love her

close to the end 26

Remembering the night we slept to Sigur Ros the first album if she has to wake up it might as well be that might as well had waiting for the traffic lights end to long nights Looks over to me, eyes almost closed “thanks for getting us back home” “Is it bad that it burns my eyes to have them open” I don’t know what I expected her to say… But not that not that

I go around the parking lot I pull up through the back Viorar Vel Til Loftarasa at her door patted a leg you're home The music made the moment feel so many things some of them were mine I decided I would kiss her again

We unbuckled belts leaned in She turned her head slightly 27

Slightly the other way offered a hug a poor one at that She was weak, tired, sleeping

And that was that out of the car it was a great time Not much else was said

I promised myself to give up To not care To let all things pass. forget about her I had done it before I can do it again twice before twice

I woke up to Sigur Ros and smiley face, for a great night just as easily it had start again

there it is

someplace in between

what i want and what is expected of me now

why do i wait so diligently?

for a crumb

from a table

try to make it a meal

so time and time and time again i want to leave those tears i want to feel it

my friends

not pretend

making pressboard feelings out of sawdust sins

i think soon has a different meaning out east of the road that runs through the state of the known and unknown that eat up ideas like straight jellyroll and here we are outside

the boys in the boat

taking everything

seriously

too

without one single reason to fly or be free gives pause to wonder if i’m just talking here it comes

there it goes onetwothree onetwothree

here to there and back again i used to revel ones i call friend used to be enough but now

it depends 29

and it hurts so much more than i want to

admit

billy was right and he couldn’t have known to him it was him but to me

__________________

so i just put the dictionary back in the hole because it matters so little when i lose

the control

and the time that has passed is such a little amount i’m ashamed to admit that i even keep count it won’t feel the same until i turn on the sound that is distracting so many but

it’s

sticking

around

extinguish embarrassment with blame i cling to the thought like i cling to your name i wish there was more like wishes

to the whole of the thing

could ever be changes

again

i have more metacognitions than i do actual ones to him it was him but to me there is me to him it was him but to me diligently to him it was him but to me a crumb to him it was him but to me to make a meal to him it was him but to me my friends to him it was him but to me pressboard to him it was him but to me feelings to him it was him but to me the state of the known and the unknown to him it was him but to me the boys to him it was him but to me in the boat to him it was him but to me taking everything too seriously to him it was him but to me freetalking to him it was him but to me onetwothree to him it was him but to me enough to admit to him it was him but to me billy to him it was him but to me so little to him it was him but to me ashamed to him it was him but to me sound to him it was him but to me name to him it was him but to me the whole to him it was him but to me of the to him it was him but to me thing changes 30

#4 on thursday january 17 close to four pm certain things ceased the destine began snow fell free took the upper hand early ought two destiny was your plan catch up by early may warmer nights longer days during things to say slurry slow worry way wire woe very stray the things that move to find you when you try to hide if patience is a virtue it isn’t one of mine it squeezes like a vice breathe in once breathe out twice [ ] fall knew you but knowing isn’t clout keep the high cards don’t let them out it’s a long time gone to sit and think about the way your eyes tell truths that won’t come out your mouth how quick cruel and funny are your three favorite tunes how your wide eyes smiling disintegrate a room how you kept all the smiles that i ever gave to you but you still stand wrong when you sing israeli truth

#5 july fifth we’re closer what will change quiet follows silence nothing is as strange face to face with fallen hoping to get caught counting every blessing easier than we thought it can be understood it can be explained most of what the world remembers are the names and the numbers the time before the bright sun shines before the wall gleams black before they take it all back before the last cash grab on the minor land mass with the sun’s tick tack and the brush burn black the light fire from a friend time to hope time to mend wade into something safe but we know safety equals death so we spin pick up the pace fear in sons moving forward they’ve begun less than time before thought she died in the last war if you came too late or you last too long if everything in equals charge wasn’t very strong all things considered we never got that high wasteland of the winter all the secrets had to die

#8 some things sink in some take flight how much hope do you need to decide i heard thirteen songs of hope from a giant who will strain his bloodshot eyes to see the light he knelt he prayed he did it right but somewhere in the distance blame replied ‘you need a ship it’ll take some might’ it may mean more to the husband than the wife you may feel it but you can’t fly sometimes you have to close your eyes to get it right here’s the catch on the edge seeking comfort keeping comfort in your bed you wouldn’t know to see me cry that none of you and none of this will survive curly hair told curly lies tried to make the day seem like the night in the end she couldn’t hide the last thing she did was force a smile some things weak some things shy sometimes you have to close ‘em quick, close ‘em tight blurry skies burning rights i have tried i have tried i have tried math rock is a comedian stepping on his laughs just a figure floating fast pick and past jick licks last the russian novel tuning with a bullet wound occipital lobe vestiges of hope from a time we could cope we counted on things solid gold the end of rainbows that weren’t all that special on their own but put together minds are blown LIES LIES political party platform ties accidents of history by furniture makers drug takers in ginsberg’s sanfrancisco but what the fuck did he know singing and shaking blue black tuxedos great plains tornados shiny shirts and drug abused pinwheel fastened exhumation blues snake fingered hands bottle neck pride twenty two years of fucked up insides headed south to hungry mouths dilettantes make all the doubts fifty star placemats at jonathan’s house of breakfast smoking section ice cream scoops of butter fool he’s the kind of man who would do that to you born to run salley shirtless de la puke soft soled shoes wait what was that the roots don’t be afraid of the obvious the lot of us up against the wall on the SG call it’ll break if it falls you can glue the headstock but won’t be what it was won’t be the same it’ll sound just as plain but never once leave your ark to explain how the onetwothree rut of the early decade makes every attempt to pre tend you saved enough time truth or money to finally sway the world the curls to be looking your way how the lines end up closer as the page starts to bend i’ll be your brother just don’t condescend suite it or theme it the chapter comes after in the highways and try ways of impending disaster can you smell the nitrogen can you believe this chewing gum it lasted a minute longer than it had to you see the eights say things that no one else asks you 32

the marble hearted with their jars taking cues from motion picture stars by letson williams

if someone only listened/only heard/only knew tried to keep him alive what would he do? glimmer

wins

but only at night it’s easy to tell the wrong from the right

it’s not so easy to follow through marbles underfoot oceans too

iknowwhattodoiknowwhattodo i know how to say it

just don’t know if it’s true

this music

it’s making me

you is it telling the truth?

this one’s a smile this one’s a joke this is that one time you convinced me to smoke this one’s

amazing

that one’s apparent the one by the door is simply inherent

what a mess now that it’s all come to naught your sisters, d’ they tell you?

weren’t you taught?

LOOK! this one here’s from ninety-six that one is made out of bitters and bricks that one waited until the drums had gone out this one looks like sam smith’s oatmeal stout the one on the rug is certainly too proud to ever call back or say it out loud and there’s two in the kitchen made entirely of lust and one so well hidden you might think that it’s

the promise you made is the promise i keep every night when

and before i can sleep

when angles are open and arrogance dies when

the hopes/hearts/and dreams

mix with the supplies 34

when the last of the gentle have eaten and gone and your line of defense is a tom waits song it’s the saddest sound that you’ve ever heard without the need

for a guitar or a word

and the pride that you thought would carry you through is as useless to me as

white boy blues but every syllable leaving her mouth is soft and assuring just like the south

hope is fantastic and meaning the word the melody felt not the melody heard the remedy thought but never applied and the lonely ghost of a question

why? 35

Marble hearts (ii)

The marble-hearted live in jars transparent glass balls that when pushed fall, stars from a black sky delicate colours stain the ground: red-green blue-green blue becoming the scene of a crime whenever someone new decides they cannot choose the beautiful heart permanent love-rocks in a pile stacked high mile: symbol of love or fear of what awaits if you fall if you fail time will tell only time will clarify the broken glass and black eyes hope for happiness in wide hiding smiles to gape to peer to seek and spy into another heart a vain attempt to see if they are the same (they needn't)

the marble-hearted know the sight: 36

quartzy skin unable to mask loose feelings within as they wait for the moment the heart

is released

by dissembling eye false flirtation

when

once again

a fancy flight

waiting for marbles to cascade through the body past liver crawl around kidneys fill lungs until until (and until) you cannot breathe replacing the nerves when every foreign touch is fire versus ice, hands frosted cold to the warm touch. The marble-hearted have nothing to hide save jarred hearts which need safekeeping elsewhere — in another house another town — so they can slink into bars and sit in sad silver cars staring at talkative stars – their hidden scars – without wondering if they will vomit beads so they do not fear that the chick in the corner the bloke at the bar is reading their hearts

in a given moment

unlocking secrets openly suitable for mocking.

completion is no longer essential as essence is essentially excrement half a line is still a line completion is a task for an audience. Virgil didn’t want his epic not with vulgar half-lines Postmodernism begins with Augustus -isms are infectious misunderstood and strong chinned Rick says in reply, “My name is Pat” an optimistic apocalypse in the Metropolis an Inception with no answers Ask, don’t answer. Start, never finish. Infections are more useful than remedies, a spinning top will wobble— an audience will applaud… Continuation is a necessary evil equations are unprovocative algebra is easy to forget can an answer be derived? does a limit exist? universal truths have exceptions even death and taxes have exemptions Eliot worried, but we are no longer anxious our suburbs protect us the city is what worries us cloud cover parking meters disposable coffee Rent the old train station rectangles getting home. I’ll see you again, once the metanarratives develop

40 that is what we find in the vast difference of similarity. this is the attempt to bottle, possess, and articulate difference

41 reproduction in a non sexual fashion an experiment for the bitten ears of a poet’s tongue.

42 angles are choices, but curves are possibility images speak. the cliff is falling.

Remembering the past before it happened

We drove in the direction houses shrank: street gutters deepened green turned gold

Joe was smoking on the reservation for migratory birds

Superior instinct is that of the addict I became comfortable with altered perception and at last found

in the marbled madness of Renee’s eyes

there was her refuge her reason her brain storm became the night

Blue wind swept through the golden grass and hair the purpose of this afternoon outing became clear if the children remembered their dreams correctly fate would never be

Morning will Come

night spreads cloud shrouded fingers of doubt across the landscape of my imagining moon slivered slices of intrigue creeping with rubber soles gathering territory deep within my psyche and I spin my wheels and play for time trying to escape rude mental fingers that accuse me of one thing and then another while my stomach curds no smoothness, no butter here only fear that I might be wrong in how I judge you, how I judge us am I living truth by day, delusion at night fright giving way to sway of moon and stars that twinkle without mercy crying “take her, chain her, break her” 44

on the wheel or in the maiden trapped within these iron bars of darkness hope fading with the dying light I’m thumb screwed and pillaged dunked in the river of my own questioning and there is no one to save me as I drown with silent screams where are you when my dreamtime decays into nightmares? and headless horseman thunder through my brain on mounts that rear questions in my direction black as hearses filled with fear and I can’t sleep, can’t fight the noose can’t deny this Achilles Heel that kills me swift it seems by my own curse strangled by goblins I can’t see come and cut me loose tell me I’m wrong tell me to be strong morning will come.

Color #1 What Am I Doing? What Am I Writing? Why Have I Neglected You So Much? You’re As Subtle As A Shotgun. I Want To Paint You In My Angry Room. Smash Things, And Keep Them There. They Are Art. If I Don’t Feel It, I Tend To Write It. I Can Cover Up Pretty Well. Some Say It Still Comes Out Nicely. I Disregard It. It’s Been Done On A Whim. You Might Be My Most Magical Masterpiece. You Come As Instantly As The Colors Form. They Won’t Get You. But I Do. You’re What I’m Working On Right Now. So You Are The Closest To Real. Everything Else? Illusion. I’m Mot Making This Overly Analytical. This New Pension I Have For Color-Release Is Stopping That. This Is How I’m Feeling. This Is My Janelle Monae Moment. You’re My Cyber Girl. Color #2 Who Am I? She Said That Wasn’t Easy To Answer. I Believe Her. She Cancels My Colors I Want To Paint This In My Angry Room What Do We Say To The Boy Who Has Everything But Nothing To Show For It? All She Wanted Was A Kiss. I Gave Her Confusion. My Feelings Are Never Written Down, They Are Often Freestyled. She Suffers For It. I Could Say I’m Sorry, But They Say That Usually Doesn’t Cut It, Like Tension With A Knife. Cause All We Do Is Fight. We Don’t Kiss Or Make-Up, Cause You Hide Behind Your Makeup And I Watch It Run Down Your Face, The Same Way You Run Away From Us. The Blood Trickles Down My Sleeve, From The Heart In Which I Wear It Upon. But You Love To Show Skin, The Same Way You Hate To Show Emotion. Color #3 Back To This Huh? What Are We Doing? Who Are We Running From? This Is No Longer Healthy I Want To Paint You In My Angry Room. Your Face Is Every Color I Can’t Stand Right Now, Yet The Only Color I Can Paint With. I Need To Use Your Fingerprints As My Brush, In The Hopes That Your Touch Will Remember What My Eyes Miss. I Would Relate You To A Drug, But Cliché’s Have Already Run Unchecked Through This Love And I’m Not The Type To Look Backwards For An Original Idea. Maybe This Is My Last Painting. Maybe This Is My Last Color. Maybe This Is My Last Stroke. Maybe? Color #4 Don’t Go Baby. Please Stay, Depression. Say You’ll Be Mine? Vein Paint & Artery Brushes. I Need To Paint This In My Angry Room. Remember The Last Color? A Glass Of Wine Remember The First Stroke? A Shot Of You Remember The Spilled Pallet? A Naked Stupor Remember The Hope? A Night Or Two. I’ve Read This 5 Times, And Lost The Meaning. Your Poetry Is So Fickle, My Heart Is Too Shallow And The Color’s Too Red. When Will They Ever Figure Us Out? When Will You Leave My Head…

things I find amusing or cute I like your face it is perfectly round come full circle to things I find to be cute or highly amusing: hamsters sleeping hamsters long haired hamsters fat hamsters pooping hamsters kittens yawning kittens sleeping kittens jumping kittens pink cars without tires angry people angry Annie Annie twitching while sleeping Annie making strange noises while sleeping a funeral for a clown growling stomachs from pretty girls growling stomachs from not-so-pretty girls pretending to check your phone when passing someone you sort of know 47

another pretty girl that I'd like to jump in the fire with a fragmented loneliness desiring your hand on mine I cannot stop thinking about the time we first touched lips your pink oversized shirt rendered you shapeless like our relationship did you have glasses I forget but your poster bed was the highlight of it all

how much wiggle is a wiggle Alan Watts (1915-1973) the real you is not a puppet which life pushes around the real deep down you is the whole universe you are something that the whole universe is doing in the same way that a wave is something that the whole ocean is doing

FOR NIKOS SAMPSON listening to rembetika tonite Capitan Andrea Zeppo fills his fishing vessel with gunpowder and steers it faithfully to meet a Turkish warship it is dark and he is without crew there will be no octopodi or squid their slippery smell but a different one this evening smell of sulfur and tobacco and from the helm a cigarette while he waits and half a song in his throat dredged from the taverns of Smyrna or the Pireas to keep him company his brief voyage while I recuse on a bed tonite and slowly fill the mind with merlot - choice of cowards who did not make the same history -a Greek for other Greeks but think instead of poems at midnite bats or small birds in the brain flitting on a coward's ceiling wine taking hold firmly the rembetika dolorous now pushes me into a corner with my private excuses - tries to make me fight I'd sing his rembetika in English if it meant something the world would hear if they could recognize terrorism for what it is or where it began or when it was heroic sometimes

note: rembetika;an early twentieth century form of Greek Blues.

when oceans overflow and swell through speakers making waves through a radio it’s a static white noise anthem of cityscapes broken shapes a solid shake voices break when it’s dried salt stains your skin with implicit sex explicit like/love there’s nothing you can do about it except to change the station so the ocean shrinks unsettling stomach tired of the sea sick wait it out in bodies of water five months later just a lake within the confines of a tree park boats turn to benches waves to ripples films to guitars you to him but I still don’t know what I means

red chipped standing tall thick tan brick wall black tar lawn melts mid day sun no rose bush left no love right passing train trembles foundations some times I wish it would crumble to pieces over my head so it can no longer be held there haunted coughing creeps from the floor orange-yellow hue cant make me forget you good bad often ugly rooms where we stand don’t resemble rooms where we stood maps and travel brochures ticket stubs and photographs jelly donut glaze for lips remake history government cheese in cupboard insulin fridge trays and toys no longer get thrown but words are whipped in the air shattering to pieces ricocheting off faux hard wood floor mop behind the locked back door knobs where keys wont fit anymore steep steps to darkened hall ways cause for concern a safety hazard for sure if i clicked my heels three times i would no longer be here the entry way to the junk yard behind return to time when numbers had to be spun french doors separated 60’s kitchen eye level with the counter the mission bus beeps blue brick building center of the neighborhood pre school children sing and clap songs we know jesus loved me then this little light of mine i never let it shine was it ever inside

forever make my way back shuffle my feet to Peabody Street

Poison. when i was younger my mother did not let me buy the quarter drinks at the bagel store you know the ones in small plastic jugs with an aluminum top or was it plastic and ripped off like a gallon-milk top and they did not come in flavors they came in colors like red and orange and purple and green and blue and looking back the opaque liquid sloshed in those jugs like candy-colored acid like if you spilled some on your shirt goodbye shirt the acid would eat right through and forget about the carpet or the wooden floor or your insides they were goners too but it didn’t stop me from wanting to drink the sweet elixir either way she would not allow it often i would beg in the supermarkets and the grocery stores and i would usually get my way but not this no katherine she said that’s poison poison i tell you and no daughter of mine is going to be poisoned while i can help it and of course i was very moved emotionally by this i was very traumatized mom i said mom how could companies make poisoned drinks and sell them to people and kids drink this shit and die i was scandalized then of course one time when my mom was not around i accompanied my younger cousin to the bagel store for a bialy with butter butter because cream cheese on a bialy is sacrilege and watch her purchase these aforementioned toxic quarter drinks to which my reply was you fucking idiot don’t you know these things are poisoned to which she says like hell they are 53

i’ve been drinking these things for months so now i’m pissed for three reasons one because i’ve been missing out on these quarter drinks my whole life two because my mother pulled one over on me worse than when she and my spinster aunt michelle gave me coal for christmas not poison i see now not poison and i bet the fruit roll-ups at the korean market are not poison either that bitch and three because now i look like an asshole in front of my snot-face little cousin and that’s the night i set my house on fire. Hair. i’ve got wrinkles on my forehead i don’t know where they came from but they’re killing me my hair is falling out i see it in the drain and on the walls like a bad scene from the craft it used to be long so long it caressed my waist and laid flat to my head always parted in the middle i wanted it to curl please god let it curl and i still do but in fourth grade i chopped it off to feel older to feel a change but now i miss my hair every day it gets thinner and thinner soon i will have nothing left and then what will i have when my hair is gone and my forehead wrinkles and my lips pucker and my skin sags and my breasts sag the 54

creams and supplements the pills and powders the beauty industry sells crack and insecurity to women like me with my mousses and gels and sprays i don’t think they work but i’m too scared to stop trying because when my hair does fall out for good and my eyelashes too and everyone can see my ears for the first time what will i be then who will love me then if i don’t love myself because i can’t compete i can’t compete i can’t compete compete compete i can’t compete compete compete with the thickness and the length of the blondes and reds and browns which bounce and fall in waves washing me away. Cutco. i was at a knife convention in a marriott hotel in pennsylvania the time i was solicited for prostitution by a man with two dogs from san francisco it was july and i was 19 selling knives to people as a summer job but it was more like a cult than a job and this was the shindig of the season a two-day conference so we had to stay overnight and share a room and a bed with practically strangers and during the day we had to listen to a relentless tirade of boring useless shit like how to 55

harass people on the telephone and cut rope and pennies and leather and manipulate them into forking over $1,000 for knives and pretend to be excited or at least stay awake and it’s freezing in the ballroom and my assistant manager reeks of cigarettes and he offers me his coat which smells i swear like an indonesian cigarette factory like they make the fucking cigarettes right in the goddamn coat and i can’t blatantly refuse and say no thanks your goddamn coat stinks because that would be embarrassing for him and i’m a nice person so i took lots of cigarette breaks and made fuckme-eyes at the top-seller for our region until the first damn day came to a close and i had intuitively brought some pot with me thank god and a bowl so i leave my room take the elevator to the lobby floor and scout the area outside the hotel for a place to smoke a cigarette i guess my flaming red beacon of light must have drawn the attention of this guy he had two beautiful dogs and i wish i could remember their names now i feel like they were cities or cars but anyway he was letting them run around on a grassy field and asked me for a cigarette so i give him one and he chats me up about the whole knife thing what i do how i do it how much money i make and i would’ve sworn this guy was gay two dogs no family with him said he was moving here from san francisco not to mention he looked like a fabio ricky martin but then he mentioned his wife and kids but i thought something was off when 56

he asked me if i liked to be naughty naughty i ask i don’t think so and he apologizes he didn’t mean any offense and then offers me some extra cash if i’m into it and i have to decline well i’m in room 917 if you change your mind and all the while his dogs are beautiful and running around and i’m thinking to myself this guy is not gay and wants to fuck me in front of his dogs and how many times has this worked for him in his life but instead of saying that i offer him a bowl and we find a place on the grass to smoke but then i realize i forgot my weed in my room say bye and take the stairs back. (Count)ing. ( ) to ten. now ( ) to ten again. and again. do it again. do it until your face turns blue. now til it turns green. ( ) until you cry and it swells up like a balloon that can’t fly. ( ) until you forget how to ( ). until you get drunk. til you do something you regret. ( ) til you get high from first and second and third-hand smoke and have eaten a bag of twinkies and a carton of phish food. until you completely lose it and have to start over again. but you can’t because all the other sets you have already ( )ed are staring at you and waiting for you to fuck up again. ( ) til you get to the party, now until you leave it. ( ) til you laugh at the end of each cookie. ( ) until you say ‘cunt’ ‘shit’ ‘bitch’ instead of ‘nickel’ ‘dime’ ‘quarter.’ ( ) til you have learned what it feels like to share a heartbeat and then ( ) to ten 57

again. ( ) grains of ceiling. ( ) blades of sand. ( ) the tiles in the grass, always in increments of ten and then over again. ( ) until you have eaten your heart out. ( ) until you have eaten your girlfriend out. until you’ve cum and she’s cum and he’s cum and i’ve cum and multiply it by ten to the tenth and do it all over again. ( ) until you are speechless. ( ) until you make the same mistakes. ( ) until your mother calls you home for dinner except she is dead and you are sleeping. ( ) until persephone has run out of pomegranate seeds, ( ) the seeds and then ( ) them again and then ( ) the time it has taken to ( ) and ( ) and ( ) me in and ( ) you out of all my future plans. ( ) the children made of freckles holding hands across my nose. ( ) the time it takes to blossom and the time it takes to burn. ( ) the breath you have wasted while ( )ing. ( ) the time it takes to convince yourself the ( )ing was worth it. ( ) and fucking ( ) and realize you can’t keep track of all the ( )ing you will ever do, and get angry, break all your ( )ed shit, and this is what five years feels like.

My clit Needs to sit In the corner For a bit And think about what’s it done What it’s doing What (who) it wants to doooooo It needs a breather It needs to take a moment To contemplate To reconsider To reconvene To re-do? No. I feel the blood Pump-pump-pumping Into my lady parts And I have to tell them To settle down Right now I don’t need to get with you When it’s a competition, & who Do you think you are? You are lucky to Get With Me Don’t you know not to Mess With Me?? I will touch your junk When you show me some respect, ya see?? How it works? It is soooo E-Z A lioness cannot be controlled She cannot be tamed Where is my lion? 59

Where is my lion With his manly lion mane? I am always purring So heavily I feel like an animal Who loves to be pet Pet me Bet me You don’t get me But im only punishing myself? Oh well I am in a zoo And it is all of you I need out Of this cage i need to turn this ugly page filled with ink and letters it never ever makes it better is it crystal clear? so recommend me outta here and my 500 words on why I deserve to bounce did you hear me? did you hear me? and no I don’t’ want a fucking ounce of your greenery or your face I don’t give a fuck if they send me to outer space Nerede esta Rachel fuckin roo Im leavin for another place And I hope you get out too

morning and that your eyes found me is so and truly a glory among gold

but the liquor is hidden and not to blame liked it straight raw

nice and often smile weaving cleaving (and if I say that I just need you --rocks and lighthouses— you break the twigs ever sifting nothingness into everywhere have you been there)

blissful indulgence just for a while

often and nice miles and miles

skylining to heaven we flame neon awakening with possibilities

not morbidities

and dreams often and nice s t a y

all because of a golden smile and worms which root through and out hard to breathe

as they feed

but we move on at light speed you’ve got this song perfect soft

and if I say that I just want you (w)hol(l)y and adultered give me a second often

(s)miles nice and often

that his skin knows me so and sadly a memory

fill any tangy void

and that your eyes found me so truly a glory tomorrow invades lighthouses summon and I know a man made entirely of rock maybe once deep in the ocean and I will swim til breath runs out but who’s to say seas and rum are not one

anymore

we can stand on this shore forever and be nowhere nearer inebriated

stones and sticks and maybe

but for the salt wind nice

if my bones were broken we’d be standing still

with all of time to clear and kill and dreamings just a fickle thing when all one has is all one needs yet the moon insists on everything )

declivity | I like the way that looks but

I wouldn’t feel it for the world

nor would I employ it in paste-haste bind drippings yet it exists in

interstices, fibres of molecules

we most settle in rubble

we all aspire for the apex

but wonder what it is your skin feels like wafer-paper thin and willing

I cannot help

sum me

In an epigraph

something I can live on I cannot ever love

I do not love myself

human

I can only see as far as my arms reach

loathing humanity

past that point the world is, may be, a screen and I

together

I see our roles as one You

of scorched sand and raw sun giraffe’s hide and

t you s

hem

does your skin taste 63

separation

“Courtship and Creation” I met a man who spoke so quickly I wanted to press my lips hard against his and eat words for lunch and silence. He told me “The wings on your lips are not as cute as your sunset ass.” And I replied, “There are redwoods large enough to drive through. Imagine that as you sleep.” We spoke on the appeal of psychoactive drugs and our neurons sprouted a colony of hummingbirds. I went inside and found a column of developed colors swarming and tea making in the cupboard. The six a.m. sky was too black so we curled into each other like a nebula and burst into one thousand three hundred forty one and a half stars.

we are one year of cosmic dust shaking the spine after one rotation of celestial chaos you rooted earth turning soil exposing light buried under

leaves roots swirling water you are a tornado love machine

past life electric wires

glowing behind neon lips

you are the moon

shine vibra-yellow

illuminating skin at night drinking your light

i found

a wild jungle of dense beauty 65

"The Great Pig in the Sty"

It's the involuntary breath heavy And deadlier than cigarettes Carried inert up nostrils in whirlwinds Pecked off feathertips onto mind's highest plane Alive it leaps suicidal into every firing synapse Then sensing metastasis in the lightless cavity The riddled invalid howls:

Let it all end! I'll end oozing Invigorating proximate soil with my cells. Fertilizer before they could even box it up. Sometimes I blame the world for parents even meeting prior to a realistic assessment of Earth's circumstances; for the conflation of primal urges with a four-letter abstraction; and for the so many lonely weeping and acutely aware: What's wrong with it? I take after them in every other way.

But bubbles occasionally break the murk's surface Kelpcovered simulacra sound their approach with drips of viscid swampwater Plants tremble in the wake of a ragged braid trailing from its left fist The featureless drags some body veiled by mire onto the banks Her? head has a gentle sucking in Earth's caress Drawn cautiously to the immobile mound instinctive hands squeegee off a face aged but not unfamiliar The burning lifeform’s eyes smile in acknowledgment as a warmth buds in the guts Didn’t even notice those mud stains that were seeping cold and uncomfortable into the jeans’ knees

START.

Jack's Bagpipe recipe serve in Collins Glass Alcohol 5% 1 oz Gentleman Jack® bourbon whiskey 1/2 oz butterscotch schnapps 6 1/2 oz ginger ale

Pour the Gentleman Jack bourbon whiskey into a collins glass filled with ice cubes, and add butterscotch schnapps. Fill with ginger ale, and serve.

Drink. THIS IS LIKE THE TIME I TRAVELLED STRAIGHT ON PAST THE METRIC SYSTEM THE OTHER DAY MY TELEVISION TAUGHT ME HOW TO MUMMIFY MYSELF USE KOSHER UNSALTED PEANUTS..YOU WILL LAST LONGER JUST REMEMBERED I AM LISTENING TO A TRAFFIC REPORT IN A CITY I DON'T KNOW IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE WE WILL NOT EVER SPEAK

White Man recipe

2 oz Gentleman Jack® bourbon whiskey Coca-Cola® Vanilla Coke Pour Gentleman Jack whiskey into a whiskey sour glass. Add 3 ice cubes, top with Vanilla Coke, and serve.

Just one more Drink! THIS HITCHHIKING SCARECROW HAS ONCE AGAIN LOST HIMSELF ON ROADS HE COULD NOT SEE THIS VICIOUS FOG LIFTS BLACKED OUT AND WE ARE BLANKETED BY THE FALLEN TREES THROWN INTO CHAOS

IN THE BUS LANE

IN THE BUS LANE!

Bittersweet Jack recipe serve in Cocktail Glass Alcohol 38% 2 oz Jack Daniel's® Tennessee whiskey 1/4 oz apricot liqueur 1/4 oz Orange Curacao liqueur 2 dashes Angostura® bitters

Stir ingredients in a mixing glass with ice. Strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange peel.

Are you drinking yet? THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU WRITE IN DARK PLACES

THIS IS SABOTAGUE THIS IS CAMOFLAUGE FOR MY DREAMS. YOU ARE TRYING TO USE ELMERS GLUE ON THESE SEAMS. NON-TOXIC FUN TO EAT, NO CHANCE OF HOLDING THIS PAPER TRAGEDY TOGETHER

Bad Mother Fucker recipe 1 1/2 oz Jim Beam® bourbon whiskey 1 1/2 oz dry vermouth 1 dash orange bitters 3/4 oz grenadine syrup 3/4 oz lemon juice

Stir ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice. Strain into glass.

DDdDDdrrrrrrrrink. KEEP FORGETTING WOMAN EMPTY THE BED I'VE BEEN IN MOST OF IT AND FIERCE I LOVE THE INITIAL MISCONCEPTIONS OF THIS HEART DRESS AND BEG I'M AFRAID OF ANOTHER PLEASURE SPREAD OUT OF EVERY TOMORROW

Borrowed Time recipe serve in Cocktail Glass 1 1/2 oz Canadian whisky 1/2 oz ruby port 1 egg yolk 1 tsp grenadine syrup

Combine the Canadian whisky, port, egg yolk and grenadine in a cocktail shaker half-filled with ice cubes. Shake well, strain into a cocktail glass, and serve.

Drinnnnnnkkkkknmnn EMBRACE I'M ON A MISSION TO START A NEW REVOLUTION PHOENIX TO THE MASSES RISE ONCE MORE AND BURN, WHILE WE CRISP AT THE EDGES THIS LIGHTER SHADE IS UNEARTHED. AN EARLIER GENERATION SET THIS BITCH TO PREHEAT AT SUPERNOVA LEVELS..RELIGHT THE FUSE LAID THROUGH AGES AWAKEN THE OLD GODS NEW LORDS HOLD NO FASCINATION

Seething Jealousy recipe serve in Cocktail Glass alcohol 19% 1 oz sweet vermouth 1/2 oz Scotch whisky 1/2 oz cherry brandy 1/2 oz orange juice

Pour the vermouth, whisky, cherry brandy and orange juice into a cocktail shaker half-filled with ice cubes. Shake well, strain into a cocktail glass, and serve.

Drnininink.

WILL YOU REMEMBER THE RIVER IMMENSE AND BLACK LIKE NIGHT TASTE THAT MOON SCENT WHY NOT LOVE THIS SOIL PRISON SIZZLE THISWANTFUL SKIN BRING RED NIGHT BACK WHEN YOU RETURN IF YOU DO

(Stop.)(Stop.)(Stop.)(Stop.)(Stop.)(Stop.)(Stop.)(You)(Can’t)(Or)(Won’t)

confliction Addiction is an evasive action. Using diction as a distraction, trying to prove it’s not losing traction. Conviction forces reaction. You think it fiction, or an abstraction, but it’s a depiction of dissatisfaction. An eviction of youth, a fraction. A vague prediction of interaction, a sedition of truth.

This sometimes-passion is only a mere estimation of elation. Prone to hesitation and reservation, fascination with self medication, a reputation for mind augmentation. This addiction is evasive action! This attraction to the transaction progresses these digressions. In distress again, needing new obsessions. You are nothing! You are everything! So what? Times gone inconsequential again, a tragic reaction to your own inaction. Proportionally contrary to reality, duality coming to a head again. Lost in moons flow fading silent glow.

Perpetual cycle of unquiet youth, repeat the beat’n path you tread. Sit at the same tables breaking bread and then find deep suede night and yourself. Against the current as usual, 70

a stone upon the shore, worn smooth, dragged by tides pull with not a thing left to hold. This day has sought new reasons To insist upon the distances we keep darkness calls and still I sleep. This is just a fraction of my dissatisfaction a ritual catastrophe of perpetual motion pulling me in different directions with symmetrical concentration

Salvation is the eviction of conviction in convention as is resistance to this existence of pretension We all feel so small sometimes… A depiction of some higher authors’ imagination playing a part while never knowing the lines, a cameo appearance relative to the time span of the universe

nothing, and everything

What song then should a soul sing? Words of the river? Words of night? Give back the sight we lost! When we flew too near the sun. Ate from the tree. Opened a box we should not have. Once we were all gods, by some strange trick we were lulled to sleep. Now we dream the lives of mortals, mortals who dream the lives of gods.

Rain Drop

I can hear Tennessee Williams' words slipping up the stairs the lilt and the languor the bitters and the bourbon and the recollection of a bygone back porch and yesterday's rain dropping like a doll from the fist of a five-year-old forgotten for awhile or lost even until the heart beats in a way you can't hold back the years tumble and rumble and you find yourself sucking in air and seeing a scene from some long-ago eve the characters weaving and we love and we love and we love and we leave and we love and our bodies shake like dogs after a bath the drops covering the corners of our room and there and here we are time a liquid lover in the dark and I look up damp and full of wine and I remember

it’s delirium tremens. crowded rooms, deserted; free ambient gluttony

revision dinner visit.

buzz-cut coconut; mussel shell spoon; beer spilled veins…

sour rouge expensive.

three glance floozy. punch card, duck, pool table waitress

wild flower scotch.

honk. marble eye red monk spring… seat-belt, friend

french roast sex.

wet nose drip. blinding frost shine, deadly sun saturday.

oil, light, glasses.

isolated, lucid music caffeine education dust grit paths

swipe; florescent noon.

join the movement