II

under that peeling wood porch step
where it was dark, and cool.
Like it was his way of transitioning slowly
wetting his feet in the feeling of late evening.
To die alone like he lived alone
like everything does.
Even the simplest creatures know
that company is only company
A kiss can't hold you
That's just make-believe safety to calm you.
The strongest man can't embrace your frame
hard enough to keep you.
Just hope for a touch strong enough to make you believe in it.
You're finite.
You're transient.
That's yours,
and you should make it count.
Are you imaginative enough to deny your impermanence?
Or brave enough to live like you know it well.

Missing Mars

Most of the moon is illuminated 

these days.

 Basking in the warmth of its solar partner

 Bathing in the light of its longest love

 Borrowing constant kisses of heat and bright 

an existence of comfort and convenience

An old love

Sewn of familiarity. 

Though there is a part of its surface

which still lies cold and dark.

A land of eternal night 

who pulls away from the white hot

and strains to pull closer

Into the gravitational pull of Mars.

Where the red dry pallor

Might recognize the darkness

it knows so well itself

A new rotation

sewn from excitement and passion.

The kind of pull that can be felt

but not reached,

By two beings who delight in dancing in shade.

Though the moon knows there always has to be

a lighthearted counterpart

and it braces itself,

 For the promise of the light which always has to come.

the magic prince

I'm willing to bet
if I could see the inside of your heart
there would be little blue Christmas lights
strung up on the walls
and ten pairs of your old shoes
in sizes far too small
that you didn't want to throw away
I bet that if I
could see the inside of the places you find yourself
there would be broken bicycles
lying in the grass
and the air would smell of old paperbacks
I wear you on a locket around my neck
you would never know
I keep it closed.

twilights

make me a place
where a kiss isn't a promise
where the sky is red
the spindle trees are cottton white
show me a path
where age always leads to wisdom
where the lakes are violet
the fish are neon green
I want to dance all night
where a firelight is all we need
where we never grow tired of walking

the seesaw takes two

once I asked for your heart and
without hesitation
with pure blind excitement
you pulled it over your head
and placed it in my palms
your heart
made of black cotton
it smelled the way you move
soulful.
sweet.

kissing like crazy
on the rain slick streetside
we've always had the very same rhythm
a mutual trespass through porcelain gates
into the cavernous mouths
our magnetic tongues would search and search and search
never quite finding
our definition.

back then I was leaving
and you were just going home
I watched you strip that veil of indifference
just for a moment and you said "don't go"

I wanted to ask you why
why I should stay
why we can't be
why I'm this way
why you're so dazzling
but I just told you I had to.


and now I think something has changed
or nothing did and you've just grown tired
absent
absent
absence
here for just long enough
but I'm growing tired too
I can't call out and then wonder
I'm too old to play with sometimes friends

I want to hold on because
we were like red coal
like too hot metal
and I can let it change into something different
I'll still have you near
and that's all that matters
but I've been doing all the trying

my hands are tired from grasping
my voice is hoarse from asking
my ego is bruised
and beaten
to beyond recognition
by your new lack of enthusiasm

maybe somethings weren't meant to last

to keep you warm.

When I close my eyes now
Every time I do I can see you out there
on that vast and churning ocean of cold
surrounded by dark
you keep crying because you're so scared
and I know I'll never be able to reach you from here.

how do I miss a sweet face
when It was never more than a glow
how can I mourn a glimmer

and your little house fell down
because I built it from moldy wood
that was supposed to be your safest place
so you trusted me and stayed inside
and it's only me I can blame
and I do every minute.
and it's only me you can blame
And I wish you would

so far out there in the night
floating farther on your lonesome raft
the only thing you know to dream
curled up without a blanket
is a kiss before bed that I can't give you.
you don't get skinned knees
and tire swings
or fireworks
and tadpoles

Because you don't get to be here
and that
breaks my heart every day.

Transience

Transience

I went searching the streets today

For you mainly

I ended up in all sorts of places

I walked along and let the warm soak deep into my skin first

Tracing

I walked twelve blocks in this heinous hot hot heat

I tried to feel what it’s like not to be able to afford one moments solace from it

That’s dedication

For someone with an aversion to sun

I thought of how I imagine you

A dog with mange

A filthy half-breed mutt who runs the streets both night and day

so I spent some time looking

Down manholes and into alley ways

and I spent all my thoughts on visions of you

Foraging for food

And clean water

And adoration

From any little girl who will take you for what you are

Beautiful dirty damaged limping thing

With a talent for making her feel fiercely protected

It would never last, you and she

You know

The best things never do

Because soon you would whimper and beg

To be let out alone

Scratch through her backyard door

To be left to your own devices

So so so scared

That the aloneness is the most beautiful thing about you

Looking for her

Or just leaving

You would be out again in the blistering sun

Where I’d be looking for you

And when the steam room roads start to suffocate me

Then there are

Rows and rows

Categories and categories

Subjects upon subjects

Of books

That take the liberty of waiting

Patiently in the thick cold air

For you Or I

Or the so many more original than we are

Who read

Or write

For themselves solely

who would be satisfied to lock the end result away

The lesson or the verse

Without anyone ever knowing it was once learned or composed

(and who the credit belonged to)

There are names here

Written by men who speak directly to god

Or criminals who are slowly learning to know better

That you might read

I breathe in their cool-cold pages

Quick and sharp like my lungs can’t wait for the air

I hope that by thinking

“I don’t want anything from you.”

You might show pity and excite me

With

One.graceful.word.

I hold my breath

Fifteen sixteen seventeen

Nothing

Once more eighteen nineteen twenty

I ponder a journey to the Ankeny butcher

Of disrobing a fresh purchase of fatty hind meat

From its white paper and scotch-tape shell

Of squeezing its raw muscle fibers in two clenched fists

Sponging its red blood meatiness against each city brick

All along the walls as I pass

Everywhere I go like breadcrumbs

And you can pick up the scent

So when I quiet the click of my heels

I won’t just fantasize that sound

won’t just be imagining

This time

The scrape scrape scrape of your paws on the concrete behind me

A walk that has grown over the years

Into a lazy malnourished saunter

One that needles up

Hard

Into each haggard limb before you take a new step

Because your nails curl under now

To meet the scorching pavement

It’s been too long since your claws were clipped

But it isn’t a moment with that before I’m here

Back here

with the moist lemony-lime smell

Back in the low diner light

With the green felt tables and only an unlucky few so early

Here where I can order what I used to watch you drink

Stare down at the glass to act as if you just left

For a short spell

Even though I’m sure

I don’t think you’re ever coming back.

Happiness is a girl

Be still
while this change washes you away
to a safer distance

lie down in the cold
let the concrete cool you
to a lower temperature

let it happen
don't struggle
transition and transformation

what was
hot to the touch
will become
something more calm
and won't expire so quickly
once bright and blinding and sure to burn out
can softly light your path and last unto always

...if you trade in your maniac love

you have to forget one
and then you can have the other
that's the deal.
a trade in
probably a trade up
your damaged and rickety something
for a new young something else.
just as sincere
just as serious

even if somewhat less satisfying.

Surviving Adoration

You blink the lights of my imagination
on and off again in the attic of my mind
increasingly eccentric.
What place is there for you and I?
We meet on rotten earth where the ground is unstable
You never stay for long when sinking is inevitable
It's not a question of if, only when.
So what does this change?
We will meet either way
touch
and want


and hurt 
until the ground gives way beneath us

helplessness or ambivalence

And who will be left standing
at the end of the world

Are we even deserving of survival?

your sister has a friend whos names the same as mine

god
you're so fucking brilliant
in the truest sense of the word
like you shine
and glitter
and sparkle
It's the better part of the day that I spend thinking about that
about you.
in wakefulness and sleep
and on my way to both
you're the stain of light behind my sandpaper eyelids
like I've been looking at you for so long
that now you're always there
burnt into me
my most internal layer of skin
or because I want nothing more than to look at you all the time
now my eyes just make you for me.
I could never possibly be close enough
I want to press hard and sweat against you
like your lover or
your twin
I want to taste you in my mouth
I want to fuck you
and be the one that gets to love you.

Something wicked

oh darlin'

I gotta tell you sumthin right now

so listen close

there's a storm comin from over that mountain
and it's gonna hit us right here hard.
we gotta move quick now baby
that mean black in the sky means it'll be here soon enough.
you get them blankets from the hallway's closet
and I'm gonna nail the shutters closed.
you fill this basket with the things you wanna keep close
and I'll call the horses to get in.
don't cry
don't go crying now baby
when the storms come is when we gotta be strong.
we got a storm cellar
we got those canned goods I was keepin till winter
well it's our winter now I'd say.
and we can just sit it out down there.
And I'm gonna be there the whole time with you
just aholdin' you as tight as I can to me
I'll rock you to and fro till you feel safe
just you me and the lamplight
all night if you need it
I can just keep holdin on to you
till it stops blowin and pourin down
cuz damned if you ain't the only thing I've ever done right
and no storm can touch that
so that somethin wicked can this way come
and it's gonna boy
but don't be scared now
because I have a plan to send it right on back.

I fell Over, I'm a Lump.

So I made a wish

it didn't bleed when I cut it open.

see

I've been trying to scrape that boy out of me

lately

because like pumpkin seeds ruin a jack o' lantern

he's been sitting inside my mind

too long

he's been blocking any light 

that might shine behind my eyes

he's been darkening my smile

Bone Machine

They are the bone machines.
The elite, a special breed. They are svelte and lithe,
Their hip bones are sharpened.
They are the consumers of couture and carrot sticks. 
They are the thieves of the scandalous glare. 
They will come first, as they always have. 
They will walk in front, razor hips slicing side to side. 
They have french tip pedicures, and highlighted blond heads. 
Perfect faces and fake eyelashes. 
They wear bikinis and get invited to dance in the cages. 
They are the Ashleys the Megans the Brittanys, 
they are the Tiffanys
They say "Do you have this in a smaller size?". 
They pass on the cake