"They're just feelings. And no one cares about your feelings..."
Troy sucked down another hot and dry swig of his shaggy cigarette, which he rolled himself like he always does. I gazed out the window as midday Concord was pulled into a long stretching blur. "Damn. He's right." I thought. "No one cares about how you feel about anything. No one gives a damn unless it relates or has something to do with them." Troy turned down Claycord Ave. We were getting close to Clints house. I stayed silent for a while, thinking about all my feelings. Thinking about all the things I was afraid to share, all the opinions I kept bottled up, all the people who didn't care, including myself. It was like learning a new word. Or, seeing the World a bit more clearly. We sped by a goofy looking handmade mailbox resting on a long wooden beam. We were close, but I stayed silent the rest of the drive.

The creeping danger of all things
Eager and foamy with red lips
Congregating between the auburn brows
Meticulously sketched up on my forehead

Closer to me seems the crumbling cliff
Sending it's stones heavily into the drink
I become uncertain of a sure thing
That today, old gravity will surely fail me.

My wings are clipped, my beak is broken
These vicious talons are all I have left.
I am an eager lizard kicking at the gravel
My clumsy scales quiver at the Sun

Shame becomes a ill companion
Coughing and beckoning to be groomed
Flipping through dusty crackling pages
In a memory book called Regret

One day I may savagely rule this world
But today, I am afraid.

Tease

Six sided shapes decorate your walls

An old piano in your living room

Your bed rest several feet above the ground

I can tell you enjoy your sex

You're paint yourself from head toe

and drape a loose shirt across your breast

A tight squeeze of denim jeans

The clinky janlging of cheap jewelry

You like to sit real close to me

But your eyes fight to make contact

I'll let you steal a few sips of my drink

As I try to relax into my seat

I think you want just a taste of me

You couldn't handle the whole thing

I want to lick you like you're ice cream

You're just as cold, but not as sweet

One Way Conversation

TO: Jake

Hey, man.

I didn't know you. I don't know you. And given the circumstances I will never get a chance to know you. To fully know you, I mean. What I do know is that we went to the same school, were in the same grade, or at least a neighboring grade, and that you had a wide smile that covered the vastness of your plainly handsome face. I've tried to read your personality through pictures. You're laughing, smiling, singing, and shouting. I can only observe your exclamations in and through silence. You are, were, very much real. Living a life I knew nothing about with mutual friends that I've drifted further from. Now these distant friends post your picture on every social media center, the news has your name bolstered in black, white, and red across the headlines. There are forums with comments filled with opinions about you, about your death, about your killer. And your face is clearer in my mind today than ever before, including the times we may or may not have passed each other in our high schools halls, or more likely, briskly across the senior lawn. I think I remember you were an A's fan. I recall you celebrating with a gleaming smile in the iconic green and yellow coat and hat. Could be a mistaken memory. Could have been another face in an endless crowd. And the same could be said of your circumstances, this could have happened to anyone else, it could have been another unlucky soul struck down by the fierce bite of that bullet. And perhaps you could have enjoyed this cloudy eclipse, gleaming that contagious smile back towards the hidden Sun. And I would continue on not knowing you, not needing to have this conversation with the idea of your poltergeist. So even though I never knew you, and never will, I wish you were here.

Today I Got A Haircut

I am not a poet. But I am inclined to write. 

Silly how distant one can feel from his own thoughts.

As if a thought is anything to own.

Ownership. "This is mine. I claim this."

Certain desires arise from the grip of claim.

"I claim this and therefore it is mine. 

I shall protect it, care for it, and respect it."

Over time:

"This has gotten old. What else is there to claim?

I will neglect this, reject this, deflect this.

Yet my clasp shall remain tight upon my ownership over this."

At least, this is true for me. 

Truth. What is it anymore?

Has truth always remained the same, or

like a pocket of wind, or body of water

is truth defined heavily by it's immediate influence?

I.e. gravity, temperature, the moon, a vacuum between adjacent buildings.

I am no mystery.

There isn't much to me.

I want food, drink, fucking, and popularity.

There is the corner of humanity that fits me.

And though I am not mysterious, 

I keep myself hidden,

Fear...

Staring at the monster face to face.

My own personal devil.

By no means am I spectacular.

I am ordinary, plain white bread, bleached of all nutrients.

Current state: edible but not nutritious.

Current mood: excited but not necessarily excited.

Plagued by a lack of education.

I am an animal wandering the streets.

I dodge cars in traffic and pick at the scraps thrown to me,

with the audacity to be choosy.

I am filth.

Becoming the trash I consume.

I am grim.

The settling murderous black clouded dust.

There is a war within me.

And I am the War.

Victory: Life

Penalty: Death 

Obstacles: Honesty, courage, vulnerability, clarity, assurance, confidence.

There is a long drawn out wire before me.

It is suspended at a terrifying height.

It stretches out and across into the darkness.

And I know something is on the other side.

Will it be wonderful?

With decorated frills and erotic confetti?

Or is there only more darkness, more wire, more suspense?

Who cares.

This is my corner of humanity.

I might have chosen it.

I might have built it.

Either way, I have staked my claim.

And I accept that this claim may only be a phase

an oscillating phase that takes an eternity to come full circle

And this softens the blow

pads the pillow

But I am not a poet

Just a catastrophe with a built in panic button. 

Satisfaction

Satisfaction runs from me

And kicks dust into my face

If I peer through the settling cloud

I can almost see it in the distance

I very much play the fool

who wades in the cooling waters

a dreadful thirst rises in me

But I am too stubborn to drink

A vice to quench the temporary

need to speed the inevitable.

Breathe it in or choke it down.

It comes and goes just as fast.

The boy in me wants sweets and cakes

and to clamor all day long

The man wants love and respect

and to wrestle sumptuously into the night

 

Rust and Ruin

There's a breeze blowing on me

It's whistling songs into my ear

I can hear all my memories

But I can't hold on to anything

I took a walk last Saturday

without ever leaving my home

I thought of you coming through my door

And then I woke from a dream

I've been tumbling down empty streets

Avenues trimmed with rust and ruin

Leaning against tall buildings

I used to play it down, now it's coming round

I used to shake it off, now it's shaking me

There's a breeze blowing through the trees

All my nerves go nerve goes weak

And I go down

to the middle and the surface below
to the trembling streets all torn apart

Down to the trouble ringing out like a siren

Down to the pressure and its folding me properly

I've been tumbling down empty streets

Avenues trimmed with rust and ruin

Leaning against tall buildings

I'm trying to hold on but everything's crumbling

We make mistakes
In each others embrace

You tore up the papers
Ripped the pages from every book
You lie there desperate
Broke but not broken
You took a deep breath
Full of smoke and resin
Forcing yourself into a dream

You drank every single ounce
And it filtered out
Blink once if you can hear me
A head full of medicine
A fist full of questions
Ask and you shall receive
You've conquered everything
Except your own
You make these promises
You say the words
But do you mean them?

Imagine another life
where you were cut
from every sound
There is no other like you
If you could turn it around
Could put it down
for a while
would you?

The Sun will burn out
But not before you
There is a universe
An endlessness
Reach out and touch it
There is a hemisphere
A ring of light
Singing like the sunrise
Reach out
Reach out and touch it

Ok you've proved your love
I get it, you want me
Every phone call, every text message
You're torturing us both

Do you really want me to be your man?
I can be a tireless effort
But I can't tell if you actually understand
Or if you are just as selfish as me

You can kiss me, we can fuck
Perhaps somewhere in there make love
It's my head that isn't there
Nor here or anywhere

I get it, you're feeling guilt
You swallowed before you could taste it
Now there's a lump stuck in your throat
Choke it down with haste

For a while I felt guilt
It lingered in every blink
My legs were set to run far away
But I waited in disbelief

Click

It's midnight in my bedroom
I've got the stereo on
It seems everyone is asleep
All except lonely me

I can't escape the envy
It's the old biting jealousy
How can I not compare myself?
If i could only look away

Often I think I'm better
than every man around
More common I find myself worse
Unstable, unsound

What will be of all this effort?
All this time behind a screen
Mirrors of mirrors, rows and rows
The more I click the less I know

Mountain

The Sun rises over the bluff
And the clouds roll out in mass
I'm aiming for the top
I'm looking through the glass
Heaps of tangled rock
A hindrance on the range
One day I'm going to do it
One day I'm going to change

These alps are crystalline
And white throughout the boundary
I'm not floating in the frame
I'm climbing up the barricades
I can feel I'm at the brink
I see it around the corner
It's drifting closer to me
Then it curtains and retreats

The Sun sets in the valley
And the rains starts to go down
There's a silence on every bank
Widening the horizons gate
I will lay down in that crevice
Press my feet into the dirt
Will my compass cease it's surging
When I send it back to Earth?

I saw your foggy eyes roll like little boulders down a mountain.
Your little shirt kept you subdued in an undercooked attitude.
And suddenly your love hit me like an immense truck.
And all our past began to pepper my thoughts.

We used to be friends
But you don't ask about me
You only talk about yourself
Walk amongst yourself
Take everything for yourself
Its you you you
So have it all
Take all you want
It's free
And In the end
We're nothing
No hard feelings

Some enjoy the drag
the pushing, the shoving
all the talking, the need to please,
their heads under a heavy thumb.
It kills me, the monotony of it all.
I enjoy repetition only in little bits
And sometimes the idea of a regular routine
Actually sounds appealing.
But I am, as I have finally accepted,
am more animal than man.
And animals must be free
without demand or need, but
with pure instinct.
I do take what I want.
I do eat when I hunger.
And this animal hungers
for more than sweet meats
for more than bitter herbs
and plain vegetation.
This beastly, hybrid spirit
seeks liberation.
Liberation of the soul
Liberation of the mind
Liberation of the cold
gritty construct of modernity
and all his economic pressures.
Perhaps scarcity of solitude
pushes this animal on.
For it's very sweet when we have our cave
to ourselves.
And far sweeter when we have the right company
to share within solitude.
But the dog needs not a human.
The cat needs not to be harassed.
The animal needs another animal
with just the right instincts.
A similar reflex for all freedoms.
The taste for inhibited lust.
Yes, some people enjoy the drag,
the pushing, the shoving.
I enjoy the quiet
the stillness
In solitude

Do I show up everyday
Knocking at your door?
Are you always waiting
with open arms?
I do let myself fall into
the mystery of you,
only sometimes like
when I was a child.
I'm older now,
a little more grey
and my heart has learned a thing or two.
Those lessons of the heart,
which are sometimes so swift
yet often so lengthly strung
from romance to romance
are but independent threads
wrapping and weaving the soul.
This blanket of life, this veil, this
pillow
starts only from a thread
whom needs steady hands to help guide.
And they show up everyday
knocking at my door.
Am I always waiting with open arms?

Over it

I'm not your future or your past
I'm the present
I'm not your future or your past
I'm present in this moment
I'm not looking to guide you
Isn't that your job for me?
I never asked you to do this
How could anyone ask such a thing?
I'm not a virtue to restore you
I'm not a creature just because
Even in my skin, I'm an animal
Everything without is within
I'm not your peacetime, I'm the war
Fighting for later, fighting for before
I'm just a message in a bottle
You are the sea to carry me
Hmmm
Over the ocean
Hmmm
Over, the sea
Hmmm
Over the ocean, I'm
Hmmm
Over it all, now I can see
Hmmm
You live in slow motion
Hmmm
You're moving all around me
Hmmm
I plea for the notion
Hmmmm
I believe what I see
Hmmm
It's only cold water
Hmmm
It's thinner than air
Hmmm
A taste of that potion
Hmmm
No two things are fair

Digits

Hey.
I like you.
Kind of a lot.
Seen you around and...
It's cool, I dig it.
You're one of those... modern girls, right?
Like hip and "awakened"
Spiritually, I mean.
You look like you know cool stuff
And that's what I like about you.
You look like a damn amazon princess or something...
Yea, it really turns me on.
Turns me on like in a sexual way but like
Also
In a more...like...dynamic way, you know?
Like something out of the movies or something.
Like, I feel this connection
Even though we've never "connected"
Sexually, I mean.
Like, I've connected with you in the parking lot
Or from across the classroom.
I know you've seen me looking at you.
I was hoping you hadn't...but
I know you've seen me.
Anyway, if you ever want someone to rattle your cages
Call me.

Resist, resist, resist
How can I resist this?
How can I dismiss this resistance?
I am a dog
And I am looking directly at you
Because you're eating
And I want to eat too
I can smell the warm bread in your hands
The aroma of sweet meat between your teeth
I want it all for myself
Resistance.
I am a fog.
And I am hanging directly above you
I see you eating
And I want to eat you
You can smell the dampness in my folds
You can feel me tingling inside your nose
I will make you sick
With resistance.

New old feelings