Piccolo Tesoro

 the intersection of our stars happened on an early October morning

when I laid you on my chest, pink and perfect, and so very mad at me

and the world.

From that day to this we have lived our lives in mutual orbit,

but i can feel gravity's tired hands loosening their grip.

Other fathers send their children

flying into the world like sweet little birds.

i'm sending you out a wolf.

And i know you will eat this world alive. 

Good Grief

i sat with my anger long enough,

until she told me

her real name

was grief 

Mouthful

 i swear

i'm fine.

By which i mean 

i'm eating enough

to keep me alive.

By which i mean

i was born

with rivers and streams

in my mouth

and they don't 

have the mercy

to drown me

and finally end this charade

Most days, the words "i'm ok" live at the base of my tongue like a mantra. Half of the time, i'm repeating it to myself. i'm not sure i even know how to admit i'm struggling more than usual. Even when i can feel the color crumbling from my eyes.

Someone once told me that surviving doesn't mean living. i don't know if that's true or not, but every day i manage to pull my bones from the bed feels like a defeat. Like humiliation. Every day the rivers in my mouth don't fill my lungs i count as survival; i count as life. And life is another day without relief from this nightmare. 

I've been told hell is not only of our own making but it is unique to each individual. This must be true, i am living proof. 

Roadtrip

 How many miles of road would have to stretch between us

before i would stop feeling the distance in my body?

i wonder the name of the street where the signal finally drops.

i doubt it exists.

i just wonder about it anyway-

a dead-end strip of asphalt in some back alley universe

with a hazy, orange sky

and haunted looking trees.

but the moment i turned on my heels

the path would reflower

with the drumming of your name under my ribs.

All roads lead to you.

Sounds Fishy

Do the clouds hold our prayers

till they are needed?

Or is the reason they are never

answer because they fly 

up into the cosmos

if they are not caught like fish.

If wishes were fishes

Looking For Nothing

 I raised my eyes to see the heaven's! And only the Moon looks down! The harvest moon shines down!!- Les Miserable 

Waste of wind,

day after day,

defeat after defeat.

i grow so very weary

of the daily fight 

just to feel.

At what point

does the gambler 

get tired of being cleaned out?

At what point does the towel get thrown in?

i do not fear the end, 

whenever that day comes.

We fear the unknown, 

but hopefully the unknown is 

absolutely nothing.

Imagine something hurting so bad

that you beg for nothing,

absolute 

nothing

Immortal

 Do all cries up go unnoticed?

Do the angels only hear the few?

Certainly not the laments of the dead,

the dying, 

the penintant ones locked away

in the inferno.

Do we stop the pitiful wails?

At what point does the throat go dry

and grinds to a stop

no more prayers to give

no more wind to send up.

What then?

Bloodshot and exhausted,

weak from defeat

after defeat

after defeat

and being told to love it.

Be thankful for the unending blows

over and over.

Be thankful for the pain

while the wicked go on in happiness, 

that you prayed for them to have.

Seems the only cries that were heard,

were for those who needed it the least.

Thank the gods we are not immortal

Alone

 a light almost fading,

cold and forlorn,

i continue waiting...

Monopoly Sux

    This is a different post than most. Just a thought that i had to get down and out. i have been ruminating on present circumstance and feeling and it is all to similar to the months past. Silence, insanity, ruination all around me and being able to control not an iota of it. Other people and their idiocy or flat out evil. No control whatsoever and it has i think permanently made a mark on my psyche that cannot be undone, not anymore. 

Unlike before tho i feel in a place of defeat being the forgone conclusion. 

Have you ever played the board game monopoly? There is a point in the game (and most games about trading and the like) where the distribution of resources has started to crystallize and it is not entirely clear who will win, but it is all to real who will certainly lose. If you have ever been in the position of loser at this point it is almost surreal as you have completely lost yet but you are literally one big 'blow' away from either losing outright or being 'wounded' beyond repair only to be finished off with the next inevitable blow. In the context of the game you have some resources, money and property, enough to hang around for a time but one roll of dice that does not fall your way (landing on a hotel or something) and you are done. Unless you receive a miracle you are essentially the walking dead because there is no way you can chip away to get ahead and you have to keep in mind all the other players are also advancing and growing just as you are, so the relative positions in the game remain the same other than growing gap between the top player and the last. 

You know you've lost. You are essentially on death row just waiting to be finished. Am i attributing alot more to a game that is necessary? Of course i am. If you've read any of my posts that's is precisely what i do. In any event to make a long story short, you've know you've lost you are just waiting for the end.

This is where i am. Or at least where i feel i am. Blow after blow, watching others walk into gifts and easy living (the equivalent of great dice rolls in the monopoly game i described) while i get stuck on crappy 'chance card' spaces and 'go to jail' spaces. i have some resources, not enough to have any sort of life worth living but some none the less. Yet both mentally and in reality that is around me i am one single blow away from being finished off. i do not know what that blow is or could be, or when or how. But i have a feeling in my gut that is coming one way or another and there is nothing i can do to stop it. 

Anyone who has played the game and been in this position knows the chances of pulling yourself out of it are next to nil. And i see the same thing in this everyday life. There is no getting out of this, there is no coming back from this. This position is permanent. Everything i do is completely futile and met with absolute silence. We as humans have evolved to the degree that we are required in order to live a happy life to struggle and overcome. The scientific literature is overwhelming to this fact; which when juxtaposed to the futility of everything i do now i am simply going through the motions, dead man walking. This is exactly like in the game when you are finished, you know you are finished but you are still playing. Going to the motions of the game even tho not one thing you do can change your present situation for the better. Things can only get worse and they most likely will, sooner rather than later. Again this is all up to the roll of dice when it comes to the length time it takes to end your time playing the game. The outcome tho is all the same. That is where i am. That is where i will be for however long it takes for the gods to finish me off, when it seems they are done playing with me and dragging this out. 

This is not a whining session. Life is not fair nor should it be. i never asked for handouts or miracles or even lucky brakes. However i point out observations when i see them and this is an observation. It is all too natural to look for meaning in the world around us or ways to explain it, and i believe this an apt explanation to be honest. Where this ends i do not know, make no mistake tho it is going to end. All games do.

Ego

From soulmates

to strangers,

their ego

just changed 

everything.

For nothing 

Big Old Book

somewhere between hello

and goodbye

a whole story unfolded

but it came to an end

its dusty pages

thrown on a shelf

never to be opened again. 

Burns Of The Third Degree

 i don't think you know

just how much

smoke i breathed or

how many burns i suffered.

But the blame is always with me.

i stayed too long in 

a house that was always

destined to burn down

Genesis

 Diamonds 

are formed only from

pressure

and Stars

are born only from

darkness

Bad Words

 the words don't help,

not like people say

they will.

Every letter 

just finds a way

to spell

your name.

Some days it doesn't matter what i write (lets be honest, it never has mattered), i can't stop myself thinking about you. The words break down behind my teeth and build themselves into something different. Something that looks like you. 

i guess the difference between talking about love and talking about loss is just the contortion of air around my tongue; around you name in my mouth. i guess even if i were ready to let you go, the words don't seem ready to let me.

Breathing For Nothing

 you held me

the way lungs

hold our breath,

i guess

the exhale 

was inevitable.

i've never been able to accept the fleeting nature of everything we are as people; to recognize the temporary, even when things are crumbling in front of me.

i wanted so so badly to find forever in you. For i time i thought i had. But things have never worked like that, at least not for me. We could only love each other as long as we could hold our breath, and i guess my lungs were just alot stronger than yours. 

Look For It

Look for the smooth snow

before

the plow cuts through.

look for the glassy lake

before

the boat slices the surface.

look for the open sky

before

the plane shoots across the blue. 

Just A Thought

i found every poem

i ever wanted to write

in those tiny spaces

between her skin

and mine.

But can someone

tell the birds

she's gone?

They're still singing for her

and it's breaking

what's left of my

heart. 

When Everything Is Dying

 my ruby-throated heartsong will pour from the veins of orange leaves.

When autumn's ember-scented breath changes the late light of summer

into melted gold dusk,

and oak trees admit what they've hidden

under the long sun's green.

Then, might ears twist and hear my copper voice

in a wind-whisked crescendo.

Dancing a starlit ballet with these dead, quiet days

that fall from my hands

like foliage wept from branches

Look i'm A Poet! See? No One Cares

 i think i'm a poet because

my words can substitute for suicide,

because i butcher things from my own soul

and smear them on paper,

and i know that this is the only way i have value-

cut open and exposed.

My hair matted with morphemes

and skin tattooed with the locutions particular to my madness.

i'm a poet because your lies become creeping devils on my pages,

unwelcome but expected monsters,

and i write you as a villain chewing my heart

because you knew you could have it.

And i return again to the perennial reality of my inadequacy.

i think i'm poet because stars fall into you lap

when i unclutter my head,

and you can't hold them

because you're too afraid to burn. 

Not Mine

you were 

never mine

to lose,

but i lost you

all the same. 

Eaten Up

 i know nothing of love but her teeth

and the emptiness that spreads in my chest

every time she leaves.

And i wonder at the way my flesh has been

gnawed by a phantom,

a ghost of all the lies that have trickled off

women's eyes

Hot Coals

 the embers

of us 

no longer 

keep me warm

But they still

set fire

to everything

they touch

You are still here; still in everything. These memories of you are coiled around my lungs and i can't stop them from twisting their way around everything else; from making it hard to take a breath.

i guess what i'm saying is, the past is still toying with the future.i don't know how to love something else without letting you go, and these bones are too stubborn to do anything but squeeze. These embers still know only of flames. 

Gambler

We either bet on ourselves

and create our own future.

Or take the payout

while building that of another. 

 i play roulette for rejection,

betting single numbers to get the big payouts,

and i win every time.

i have amassed enough rejection

to fill six stone water jars,

to fill every nook and cranny of my home,

to tattoo every undesirable inch of my skin,

more rejection than i could ever possibly use.

But i keep betting,

hoping to change my stars.

And every time i hear the wooden clacking

of the marble against the wheel

i brace myself.

i know someone else is going to tell me

i am not enough to love. 

The Liar

 The problem, is that the whispers of our

demons and the counsel of our angels,

are both in our own voice. And unless

one is aware, like the shepherd is of his

flock, one could easily be fooled by the

wolf in sheep's clothing

Not That Far

 i've been spending

whole days in the grass.

falling can't hurt

when you're this close

to the earth, i guess.

But these hands

are restless.

They've been digging up

mud-soaked mason jars

and faded postcards;

memories of how

we could only ever

love each other

from a distance.

Why are you in everything?

How am i supposed to sleep

with a head of relics?

StarFire

 the stars hold

as much promise

as much victory

as the flames i've lit below them

that is to say

nil

the stars beckon

just like the flames

i've lit below them

all consuming

the stars hold

no hope for me

just as the flames

i've lit below them.

How can one watch flame

when stars shine so brightly

with heavenly divinity

and knowing

all of you have ever wanted,

loved

and lost

have come from those very arbiters 

of order and direction

of fortune.

The Stars Incline, They Do Not Determine

 starlight cascades

in endless echoes

across my ashen and hollow mind

i am a builder of labyrinths

without the hope of exit

either these puzzles

of stone and shadow 

are empty save for me,

or they are not.

both possibilities

are equally terrifying

i still blunder in the dark

trance-like in my blind crusade

to find the exit, to find release

endless dead ends

and switchbacks

have ground any expectation

of success to the nub.

How can one have hope

when failure is all this place is built of?

All someone has tasted?

they only drink ever given

was misery and disappointment.

Swallowing that pill has killed

hope and aspiration.

Like the blackest of opiodes

life holds very little meaning to me

anymore

What Are You?

 What are you?

void fire eyes

amethyst hair

a spirit of divinity

unlike any other

once again

i am completely

and utterly

helpless

That's One Hell Of A Full Closet...

 curiosity is both "i want to know" and "i have the capacity to know", in varying degrees of course. Curiosity is how you keep life afloat.

i held curiosity for you

i wanted to know every inch

of your soul.

And although i learned every 

single

inch

of your body,

the skeletons in your closet held 

no fear to me.

Now i have become one, just an ex,

just a number added to the litany of others

tossed aside because they held no value to you.

But just you wait my dear,

this skeleton,

this little skinny scarecrow,

will never be a memory.

This skeleton

is very much alive 

Once Upon A Time

 we were good

you and i

i offered you an outlet

an audience

a shoulder

a therapist

yes i was broken

still am

always will be to a degree

but i was yours,

mind,

body

and soul

i belonged to you

and you saw no value in that

That's Hot

 that which we cannot conquer we tend to worship...

the wood pops and cracks

relentless in its rhythm

a metronome of both

creation

and

destruction.

Reds, oranges, yellows

whites and grays and blacks

colors dancing together

like we used to

beautiful yet fleeting

there

and then not.

What Do You Say?

 What does someone say

to the forest after its been burnt

to the ground?

Good luck?

Get over it?

You step back

and let it grow

you let the scarred earth

return in its own time

to the ocean of green

from whence the flames

had come