snowfall renews my hope, so i believe in Nature more than Man

a single stripe of turquoise might,
maybe, change the way we see the world.

a few falling crystals (God, how she missed her)
do.

and here i am, huddled in my sweater
bleeding
waiting
but i know, i know
i know i know i know i want to
i want to.

so if we can look to the mountains,
play a sweet song
(rip off noah word for word,
and pretend it isn't wrong)
find the best of things
wish for love and wings
(and rip off kyle swartzwelder
anytime he sings.)


... i didn't finish this one.

without his glasses

i.
pretty blond woman with
towering shoes like
towering buildings
that eat her up
(and spit her out)
and she makes the end of each day
pretty and blond, still
but one more might be too much

ii.
she walks away from franklin's park
where at night, just heels
and the morning smog wraps wreaths of
desperation around the winding lines of the homeless
cold, bundled, hungry

iii.
but the stone arches
and the pedestals (both stone and air)
shine in the momentary sunlight
and it reflects off the gold curve of the roof
to remind us all of this
once
great
nation
and then this is where the inaugural speech will be:

iv.
mr. obama, president sir
play a song for me.

v.
we can talk
as we walk
all we want
as we wait,
running late
running not-at-all
running through the mall.

vi.
shadows of streetlamps
though it's bright day
the right is white
the unspoken say
but the masses, the masses
come out to play.

vii.
future ruins.
shakespeare or angry,
we can never win, because just going home
and i saw it again
she fell out of the building, cursing from the church
picking through the trash
hoping for the worst.

viii.
we can preserve the magna carta
it can make girls like me cry
but we can't save this city
if there's nothing left but pity
and nobody will tell me why.

ix.
(but i miss you too damn much
to do anything but sigh.)

x.
we can go back, someday, maybe
to stare at underappreciated art
and throw coins at the men throwing their life away,
catch that
and give it back.

ice

pink ribbon and surprised grins
we win!

goodbyes and new lives
we lie!

waiting for Godot and I haven't met him yet
memorizing Thoreau and playing hard to get
we had an odd sort of ambiance in the
coffee-scented air
and this is where, where
we said our prayers.

i still wish you'd tell me everything
i wish you could understand
i want the world for you and her
i want you to find a plan
i hope you can continue on the path to perfection

well-coiffed is only part of it.

little black boxes hold forethought
which, for once, i have; take this of me.

burning bridges

so you finally saw
the intensity and awe
in her worn-out, broke-down, fall-out world
she's that kind of girl.

since i'm in a melancholy mood
i'll admit this was not as soon
as i expected,
because i know what she's projected
and i know who her "real friends" are

and yet
and yet
her face will be wet
when the fire she's started
and the seas she has parted
crash and burn
crash and burn
but she still won't learn.

i found this scrawled on proof

the pale yellow bag of
California almonds blends
with the desk nobody's
graffitied yet.
his cowboy boots creak
in harmony with the
blond wood chair
and we stare
blindly
ahead
forward
on.

contact

a careful hug
a small pat
a full embrace
is a moment removed
from this goddamn race.

for the record

i'll never lie to you
think it over
cus i love you
and the caliber (42,
or desperate moves)
and you said
you understand!
you've bled and you've ran
and you said that you can
stand
by me, lean on me
and i am sorry
that you were lonely for a lifetime,
but when it's the right time
don't you believe
you can lean on me.

wizard absurd

fucking pinball,
chaos theory, and
what
the
hell
just happened!
BAM! BAM!
BANG
and you're off like a rocket
red glare in your pocket
thunder for a rainy day
not how you said, but what you say

stereotype, shake me like a rag doll
I got gunpowder and I ain't afraid
last chance, would you take the last dance?
all alone so I guess I'm brave

but now, game over
and I'm out of quarters.

illusions and allusions, marked with foam

5 cents to fix the love bipolar
(you don't really wanna stay,
but you don't really wanna go)

Romeo, that modulation
wasn't all it is when she sings
though I felt it could be;
when the devil's eyes
come into our lives, I told you I will
and still, well that ain't gonna change
because miss christina's got one thing right
(and you admit it, twice)

and Romeo, you know what's in a name
and I could count what you've inspired
on my fingers and toes, and your nose
and our list is just a game;

seven hours, eleven days,
it's not in my power to take on that blame
and even the list would be missed
(I am rather sorry
about all of this.)

a line for the perfect color, which I didn't find
had nothing to do with your evening or mine.

if she's too passionate to let herself go
then she'll never find what she's looking for
she is too passionate to let herself go,
and it took a long time to get through that door.

and then it snowed.

the artist and the muse

you are unmerciful, my dear
and i show the same to you
neither of us show our fear
and it's all that we can do.

i've been posed for a good hour now
i've never felt so cold
the music in my head is loud
and the refrain is getting old.

oh darlin', i can understand
why you became my muse
you're so careful with your frozen hands
but so loose with the ones you lose.

now it's in eternal song
like my body on your page
you're not sure about right or wrong
and i'm not sure that i'll fade.

cold/fire/thanks - take two (hoping for forgiveness)

galahad and gwydion could do naught but love
and the High Queen of Corona couldn't tell
while the view of the Tor towered above
echoes only a shadow of Avalon's bell

it burns! witchcraft, sorceress
give me reprieve
from the skeletal remains
i see in my dreams

i give thanks for:
heat
song
pillows
poems
numbers
snow
God
bodies
cemeteries
convertibles
nail polish
bare feet
and every single one of you

tunnel thrice

"a thousand lies and a good disguise!
hit 'em right between the eyes!
hit 'em right between the eyes!"

DAMMIT if i could i would,
i won't go as far as you.

i hope i find that commitment someday,
i hope i can appreciate it before insanity comes my way,
knocks at the sun-baked shattered wooden door
where those outcasts lean and recuperate
and long for more.

this is not my family.

my family pronounces chuck and larry and managed
to be civil this year.

it was weird.

not to not

there was jazz in the background,
a soft sound,
and the clinking of glasses and i
don't think this is where he really lives.
it's just where i thought he did.

his sneakers are slightly blinding,
the responses binding,
like a corset restricting your breathing
and that is not what i want!

i want to talk, to sleep next to you
to sing for you, to sing the blues
and i want to.

i'm not up for this world of words
and labels
and fools
and unpolished jewels,
because i know that i'm better than that.

even, alright,
already.

blackout

the silence of the black
was absolute and back to back
we shuffled through that old worn house
and found a place to curl up
and wait out the storm;

despite a lingering yawn
and the annoyance of such an early dawn
i slept through the dusk and rose ready
to go on;

"happy attack" - that's what it looks like.
stand back, and don't try to be right.
i've learned from their mistakes just how
lucky i am and how
hard that is to understand.

contemplate - if you make me wait,
i can chalk it up to her last date
and you're going to go cry, now
and i can't tell you why, now
and oh lord, i've been down
since she let you down
and you're never coming round, now

so we can; let's wait it out together.
the lights won't be off forever
and sooner or later, you gotta believe
something will rise for you and fall for me
and i'm okay with giving a just little bit up
so you can have your everything.

a rogue verse (the rest is a song now)

remember that week when you couldn't speak
i made you cookies you couldn't eat
and we sat in silence and didn't have to say
anything

passionately happy

i told you they came out PhDs
(and from Harvard, no less.)

i told you i can't stop smiling
(and i can't.)

and i smelled snow
(so maybe it will?)

and the look on your face at the end of that song
(it gets better than this?)

capture it, remember it, and believe everything
(maybe now do you want little kids?)

i am a priestess! i am a princess!
taylor swift gives me hope!
there is nothing left to know!

pink

i stood up and steam dripped
down my face and i imagined a soft
plink, plink
as those raindrops hit the surface of the cloudy water.

and my hands were warm and ran
over my body like hands
running over bodies
like piano keys.

i realized
something i did not want to admit
and it hurt, bit
up that feeling tying me together
(the one that makes me smile like a crazy)

don't let's not say it
i'm hoping one day we can share it,
dare it,
and decide not to.
i don't know what i'll do without you.

kiss kiss

i liked it.
tentative like the first time, the last time,
a rhyme you have never considered,
a smile that's never been bitter.
i turn my head;
he could mean anything and i'd never know and that
i positively refuse to do.

this week i was loose, undone
just looking for a bodice-ripper and some easy fun,
but it just makes you more,
because i remember before,
when everything meant so much and i threw it away.

so our first time was the first time,
and it's just like that every
single
day.

mix tape

absolutely and totally bizarre
beyond comprehension
is the way that you mention
me in passing, the way that the tension
builds inside of me when you're there
the way i know, you know, it's going nowhere.

and it doesn't matter at all, since we
both understand
it isn't the plan
you're not my man, never was, never will be.
and anyhow, that's not really what we want, is it?

exchange that common language of the world with me
i will still run to his arms
you will still sing in bars
and we'll wink at each other on those sunday mornings
and not quite regret that glaring difference between us.

i really don't.
(your love songs could be for me, but i smile because of him.)

maniacal laughter

i didn't let myself get roped in before
because, well
i hate to admit it but i had other things to do.

that didn't keep me from shrieking last night,
skipping up the stairs,
punching the air,
letting political apathy GO
to just be freakin' awesome
for however long this can last.

and a hard rain is gonna fall,
and a big change is gonna come,
and i'm gonna be ready.
we're gonna be ready.
America, baby.
she's back.

(in black.)

laughing dichotomy

dance in the surf and prance in the waves
gotta take what you can these days
keeping my fingers crossed,
knocking on wood.
and trying to do all that i should.

you're so far beyond me,
and i can't even begin to

imagine

what my life would be, split like your sin
tin man, no heart, piano man, no grin
(martyr, no soul)

no.

not even close because you are
stone fences and autumn leaves
worn benches and an ocean breeze
and mean so much to me

the trouble is just when you don't believe,
or when i just don't see,
well maybe, we're not so different after all.

jolene

less the radio, the static, the sun
whistling wind and races
for fun faces,
smiles undone and you're falling apart
if we cross the finish line then we're back at the start.

i read the graffiti in the bathroom stall:
remember who you wanted to be.
I don't remember her at all,
and she's forgotten me.

for the midnight hour, one more waltz,
it's closing time and you're falling apart,
crash into me, only the melody
you're only a memory, i'm only me,
only a shadow of bloody and free,
only the morning for lost mourning queens -

but i'm only me and
this is all we'd ever need.

funky tick groove

we diffracted half
and i bounced back
and nodes became antinodes
and you wept
and i sighed,
because i was laughing inside.

it's one hell of a ride.

child, i sing songs for you
and line my eyes for you
and smile when i'm feeling blue,
and you can too.
sometimes the smile comes true.

don't you see?
we can check out anytime we like,
but we can't never leave.

platform 9 3/4

archway to somewhere
the girls all walked through and came out PhDs

i pictured sailboats on the lake,
boys in the bedrooms,
and mardi gras.

they told me that i could be
anything.
and that possibility
is
just
plain
exhilirating.

dan the bastard

crushing, slowly compressed
and we grunt like Giles Corey,
"more weight" and the unrelated brother Richard
(okay how obscure can I get here?)
has everything.

you blink and miss it and the guilt of sleep
the shudder of pulses and lids
and they want to stay together, forever
you and your prince, dearie.
just give me your voice.

we found the light at the end of the tunnel in medical mysteries,
thrilling tuesdays, casual sex,
sounds just a bit like bliss from way down here.
gotta swim up to swim out,
keep singing. keep swimming.

he's done, but that doesn't mean we haven't won.

stripper strobe stairway

i had a day full of praise
but that's not all i want -
i want the stage.

to throb with the bass,
to scream with the boys,
to run from the chase,
and make lots of noise.
to find i've been shattered
exploded apart
to know that it matters
this beat in my heart
and this heat in my soul

you know you got it
if it makes you feel good,
ohhhh

on HIS legal marriage

they don't talk.
they do lock
the doors tight,
even when it isn't night,
even in the bright
of day when only deer are around.

and him, mine, i guess
he wants days off from doing nothing

and him, his, really,
he's angry about this, but won't say
because, like i said,

they don't talk.

to the father of my children

this is not normal,
i am sure.
and freakuently,
life is a blur, and the constants
and you and her,
and him and them.

and you've stopped asking,
and i know when you're angry
and jealous
and impressed.

and damn, those kids
are going to have three fathers,
and be really attractive,
and really happy.

on our legal marriage

we will have a castle
plastered with bookshelves, candles,
music to make us smile and cry.
we will dance beneath the diamond sky
and swim naked in the pond I know we will have
and laugh about this, and that,
and have cats.
(tempo and ringo, still?)

we will make dinner, and hang laundry, and go out
or stay in.
it's an epic win.
you're my best friend.

my dirty little secret

is entwined in my mind
like your limbs around mine.

i want my parched lips to drink
from the well of your tears and that cold glass
of vodka and confusion,
follow the contours of your face that i know,
so well, well, well.

i want to know why you said, "go slow"
and why that burn is not
fading.

i want to know if i should say, "no"
because if i don't want to know
anything,

then i am nothing.

just another regret.

to have known one dead

you are star lights
and leopard tights
you are dead days
and throbbing nights
you are fighting

for him, for what he is
for what he gives

is black, black
black like your night thrills
black light your right kills
you've scaled the heights
of devotion and he gives
back, back
back with a needle in a haystack
and throbbing veins slowly
black, black
black

i can do that too

the day everyone went fuck crazy
i was climbing up mount misery

the day she swore she told me
i was blast drowning in ecstasy

the day he said he was sorry
declared dead on the word "i"
and me so brow-beaten-broken
raised my head to the sky.

ophelia

if i could,
i would.
oh, i would.

if i love,
then i love,
and oh, i love.

if i see
what i've seen
and i see
what i've seen,
then i see.

and i would love.

i would love you.

jet sunset

when we turn heads
and words
twisted upside down
hanging around for the last sound:
all you have to do

your voice says my name these days
with a little
something special
and i smile -
for hours
and hours
and hours
on end

i'm driving into the light now, into a sunset
so i'm chasing it, and you're chasing me,
and baby, can't you see?
that maybe, all we can be

are our own last words:
all you have to do

kyle

poetry and
love children and
saturday night
open mike

your apology is not accepted!

WE HAS IT

I'm a magic French clown
doing the pelvic thrust in the road
freaks ahead! slow down! slow down!
that hat has bones!

skipping up the side lines
and you laugh at me
and tap the stop watch
and I LAUNCH.

zoom zoom vroooooooom!
(boom boom boom boom)
our blue room and paper chains
get high like planes
this is it, this is it, this is IT.

courtship

they smile at each other
she holds her cell phone, her chapstick
wishes she was holding his hand
i know those tricks.
i've used and abused them.

he laughs (guffaws) and she giggles,
runs her hand through her hair.
i remember being there.

a split second and they notice in the other's eyes
a happy surprise
but for fear, and lies, there are alibis
and it won't happen this afternoon.
darling, i remember you.

bulimia

dying to please
trying to leave leaves
falling to cement floor tiles in the breeze
i know not seems.
- study disorder and chaos
don't wander off, recognize loss
and gain, it's pain
but i entreat you, dear, hear me clear
and wait
it's not too late.
it's never too late.
so breathe.

work

she lights one up before she starts her day
he kicks 'em out before he has to pay
she's got crying kids and bruises

i'm just running myself ragged
doing my job
and i'm a good kid
and i'm happy.

maybe the key is, finish
school before you have kids
and bruises.

discotheque

dripping, dancing, dirty, wet
the lights aren't on; it ain't over yet
broken glass and twisted bones
violence skips and children moan

wander the hallways
take what you can
give him the best of you
make him a man

that's the last one i'll get.
it's over - i'm wet
it's raining and i'm crazy and baby, baby,
boom boom boom boom

shoot 'em up, prance around.
it's not over; don't hit the ground.
we ain't stopping, the guns are popping
boom boom boom boom

all i wanna do is -

sugarland

choose the shade over me - genevieve
letters are burning
and ceiling fans turning
don't run from the sun, baby please
i just don't know what you mean.

that look, i didn't want to leave
such moments are precious,
as rare as they seem and we're all running
stunning
walking on air.
we're giants,
defiant
and earning the stares.

eleven, for posterity, not talent

i wish i had a culture.
a dancing zorba, a rack of lamb

but, really.
this is better.
windswept hair, midnight prayers
swimming bare, laughing dares.

this is our tradition, our position.

our gift.

the boxer

what are we fighting for?
don't you know, this is so much more
than
wrong words. burns.

i'm going to tell you,
soon.

40 mph

hey hey baby,
can't you see
i break before you get to me.
i'm laughing inside,
along for the ride,
unused to serious
frivolity.

smile so it hurts, i still want
everything you need.

forgiveness and your kiss is
more than i deserve this
is more than i reserved
but someday i will give you
what you missed, i promise, this

is more than i dared believe would ever be
possible
more than i bared to him in four months of
nothingness - love
and i can't figure it out.

cosmo/screwdrivers

safety school.
i can't type, and i need chapstick.

you think i'm a fool?
i bet you wish you hadn't thrown it away.

but maybe, just maybe
i can have everything.
so, i asked. i don't need your sass - i
would recommend a bit more
understanding.

yes, you are well spoken.
but that isn't everything.

henna

badass, baby,
i drive you crazy.
flower child, runnin' wild
- gimme a smile.

i got tricks for two,
if that's
what you're into.

lunch

they sit -
grey, cold, worn, wrinkled
they reminisce -
"surely, surely, dear
times have changed."

i wanted to wrap their memories
up in a scrap of napkin
tuck in my pocket
all the years of - well, everything
they've been through.

and sometimes she can't remember her own name.

please tell me, somewhere,
this is okay?

because something about that day

well, it haunts me.

it just pours out of me, darling

i wanted to apologize, because
i want to be the best thing for you
i don't want to make you bleed - i
want to be everything you need.

everything i've got
on my mind
(a lot)
and all i'm really thinking about

well

guess.

night driving

i might have killed four or five toads
driving down green hill road
i couldn't use my brights
and there weren't any street lights
i tried to avoid it
as best i could without
careening over myself.

then i slowed down
and i didn't hit the possum
and lightning flashed in the skies
and reflected off the windshield
and off my eyes,
and i remembered your rhyme.

rock n roll

bass chick
drum sticks
charge the stage

no plaid for me
i was singing
and swaying my hips
to the beat
beat
beat
of the drum
and the heat
heat
heat
of the rum

kohl-rimmed eyes
coke in lines
fourteen guys
and me

that's how i want my life to be.

too many cooks in the kitchen (my favorite people)

we meant well
but we all wanted to tell
each other
what was best
- for everyone.

beyond substitutions
spatulas
contusions
?

i'm nice, so

i'll fold the laundry
and you can make the pancakes.

someday,
we won't use measuring cups.

i wrote it anyway, though it isn't very good (beats)

we started stung, ended strung out and high on the color of the sky and the shape of the sun and the promise of happiness and pink clouds for the rest of our lives. i wanted to laugh and scream, so i giggled and sang, ran in the sand, stood at the water's edge before wading in. i did not swim. i hummed a bit and cast awkward glances at my unexpecting audience and wandered back towards you, whispering goodbye to the sun as it slipped down the last golden rung i wish i could climb that ladder and then jump off and fly -

but i don't think i could handle it, i couldn't handle this, the definition of SUBLIME, too much excess energy and the knowledge of being alive ecstatic with the thought of having enough to survive.

how could you ever think it wasn't enough? i know life is tough, i know life is rough, i have been through the good and the bad and the ugly and the sad but it's all all right. because of that night.

because of that night.

all true

i sat on a swing today
and heard
fairies laughing
men shouting on the rooftops
takin' my time

i thought about what next to say
the truth
white lies
or maybe just a lullaby

but i went for it last night
so

i wish you would show up on my doorstep
and hold me (tight)
since

isn't that what we both want?
and then, after we could recognize that (in each other)
then, maybe, we would talk.

too many one word sentences

don't go that way, after all these years!
it's just what I feared
why I was so reluctant to...
and then I was so glad I did, but it's just...
just...
I like you.
so don't do it.

bare

exhibit A
is when we play
and dance
through the day
romance
away
act however we damn well please

exhibit B?
well, we'll see.
it all depends on how you smile at me

exhibit C
is "the last time I was in a pool, I was naked"
it's not faking it
it's down-to-earth grit
(see what I did there?)
it's bare.

two-day rainfall

i want:
chocolate fingers
gospel singers
bell ringers
welcoming
forgiveness
that necklace
and passion

and i want you to tell me
everything

Pico Beach

i slept with the waves crashing
dreamt of babies, soft sunshine, napping
awoke to the giggling of a too-energetic three-year-old
at six thirty, eh em.
(we read sleeping beauty then.)

and we walked down the beach
and i walked into the tide
it dragged me in and lifted me high
and i felt peaceful inside
but also sublime.

and we swam out to where the waves lick your chin
and the crests and the valleys entice you in
further and further til you're lost and begin
to wipe your eyes and swim
closer to shore.

and we made sailor's braid bracelets
(well, i made an anklet)
and listened to worldly music
and did yoga poses.

too soon, too soon
did reality intrude.

I'd like to mean it this time

Jesus, boy, you can't lift me up,
then tear me down.
Cuz you're not around
and we're both too proud
to make it up to each other.

well, fuck that.
I'm done trying, because I'm done crying
(or, rather, done wanting to weep, or sleep, or eat,
or wait for you some more.)

and I don't know who that hussy is,
but I don't feel bad feeling bad about her
(I'll think of a reason later.)

maybe I was too loud, too rash
too fast for you.
I keep meaning to ask,
but the moments fly past
and I want just a bit longer before uncovering the truth...

green trees crazy woman campground

{written june 23}

The trains out here are a mile long
and I'm running out of ways to put "I miss you" into song
so I'll try a poem instead.

I thought that maybe,
you missed me too.
But finally getting last night
proved to me that wasn't true.
Give me something, anything?
To say I still mean as much to you,
as I think you still mean to me.
But it's getting harder every day
to maintain the illusion that my love isn't
so so so far
away.

wisconsin

{written june 19}

homesickness is like
heartbreak, stomachache
feverish chills
and nightmare thrills.

i've got a fishing lure pulling at my insides,
reeling me in towards home

montreal

{written june 15}

I miss my friends.
I miss my car.
I miss my bed,
and my guitar.

the dragon in the mountain (a haiku)

the road stretches on
the clouds are the mountain peak
the sun glows yellow

in absentia (beat poetry)

{written june 7}

"Goodbye," I lied, twice this time, but can you blame me so much that I tried? It was worth the effort not to cry, but I forgot that sometimes some people make you fly, and you can't reason your way out of that.
When hearts beat in time, when the stars are divine, when everything rhymes. Because I'm reliving my last moments with you - wondering, wondering - and I want you, too.
So I'll remember your heart beating through your back, twist my fingers at the border, let myself become my mother's daughter, enjoy the ride, while it's time.
But when I return, will you have learned? Don't forget me when I'm gone, though the trip will be long and temptation strong and convictions wrong - stay with me. Because when bodies pound in sync I sing and when lovers sound in ecstasy I drink, and Bass pale ale tastes like you in spring.
See, I'm thinking of you - don't forget me.

the never-ending American dream of perfection IV

Let's look in at this well-oiled machine
Established 1984 and still running clean
Metallic shrieks cover human screams
And the robotic process hinders human dreams.
So tell me if you want to be
The lonely last one standing
After surviving for years on hard work alone
And now you collapse on your shattering bones -

The Democratic debate, four nights ago
Potential to change - and it goes to show -
What is change?
God only knows.
A pain on both sides, swollen biblical tomes
Deciding the future of this country of gold

But listen, hearken back
To the warnings of old
When we leave all our history
And walk all alone
It won't be too long before the gold has been sold
China's the victor, and the world has turned cold
Look around then and you'll have to say
"It's too bad this century turned out this way,"
So focused on learning and winning and dreams
That we forgot that perfection is not all it seems.

{ the end }

too far

the room that you left

when you breathed your last breath

still lingers the smell of you

and the place

where your cold fingers grazed

my frozen shoulder

still burns.

but I'm done now. I told myself

I wouldn't let this

get to the point of obsession,

so I'm done.

(but, if you want to keep going,

I won't complain.)

the never-ending American dream of perfection III

O! What hasn’t been done
To ensure that this misbegotten war will be won
But the one overseas, not the one right at home -
Not the one with the secrets covered with stone -
Not the one with misery tied up alone -
Not the one with perfection lost in the poem.

This is the voice of the misguided souls
Of the lost, diseased, mistreated
Of the overeager, standing, seated
Of the confident, the sad, the driven, and the mad
Of the mistaken – most of all
Of those nobody thinks will ever fall
Of those who of course will stay up till the end
Fighting their enemies and protecting their friends
Deciding the victor of the rule over men.
Deciding the voice that history will take
Ten years from now when a bit less is at stake
When perhaps some higher power would know
What needs to stay and what had to go—
What had to change and what wasn’t so
The test of a nation in victories outside?
No – it is at all the failures inside.

The inability of all to see past the pride –
Past years of schooling
Past all the lies –
To the less than perfect student, who honestly tried
To change what he was before forced into disguise.

I think perhaps it's time I changed the rhyme.

her

he did leave me
and her
and life would be really quite different
if there wasn't any anger

but instead she'll use words that hammer into my better half
and respond to a fight with a full glass
of ice, whiskey, and sadness

regret, you know?

love doesn't cloud my perception too much where he is concerned
and so i'm left with a little less faith in him and a little more in her
a little less faith in the whole human race
and a bit more belief in all i know for sure,
which isn't much.
but it is enough.

The never-ending American dream of perfection II

I am the girl who you see getting A’s
And bouncing though life with smiles and grace.
But I am the girl who secretly cries
Since her father went bankrupt and left in his lies –
I am not giving up or changing my ways
But it’s hard when everyone expects perfect days.

And I am the voice of the boy who’s alone
Since his girlfriend got smashed up by his telephone –
But nobody knows what he did there that night,
Since he hid from himself to hide from the fight,
And yet he goes on, day after day
With a smile on his face and the perfect words to say.

God listens not only to those who fear
But also to those with their own open ears,
With shackles and secrets all bound in their chest
And gasoline ready to ignite all the rest –
These soldiers march on to the beat of their drums
And wait for the moment of sweet death to come –

Since by now they’ve been told a few too many times,
That if they go home they’ll be drenched in the lies
Of a nation that stretched itself too many times
To help the young vagrants with murderous eyes
To help the foreign powers of democratic prize
In the hope it would help all the nuclear disguise –

Sadly, what this nation failed to realize
Was the depth of deception on their home lines –
One out of ten is some man who lies
To protect his position and his masculine pride.
But this nation believed in the promise of peace
So they sent these daydreamers to fight to the teeth.

not meant to be a song

stargazing
remember this feeling
suddenly

now i breathe
les 'etoiles brillent

my feet freeze
the earth warms me

the sky swallows me
the stars show me

the never-ending American dream of perfection I

{One of our more interesting assignments in English class this year was to write a poem in the style of Langston Hughes' "Let America Be America Again." This is the first installment of my response to the assignment.}



Hey there, baby, lying in the bed,
Who put that brilliant brain in your head?
Who told you that you could have all the world?
Who gave you that beautiful string of pearls?

(You don’t see past perfection, do you?)

Hey there, superstar, studying the skies,
What luck of genes gave you those eloquent eyes?
What determination gave you the trophy
That you remember you won in your times of great need?

(I am not as perfect as you think.)

Hey there, drifter, wandering the halls,
How can you rise while all others fall?
Given the choice of remorse or the chase
You’d lose everything if you could win just first place.

(I’m just a symbol of cold-hearted achievement –
Over the smoking embers of a life once spent
In misery – do you see that in me?)

Hey there, now, don’t be shy
Are you that one who ran across the sky?
Are you the one who changed,
So that you wouldn’t be under nobody’s claim?

haiku for Mr. Gleich

Thanks to you, I know
All about semi-colons
And comma splices.

fragile is not a synonym for volatile

Part of me demands to be more clingy
To hold on to everything that might someday flee from me
To grasp and hold fast, tight, to my entire world; it can't last


The other part wants to run away
And this is the more familiar feeling.
To force forgetfulness: the truth, yesterday, the confrontation, the negotiations, the sickening sense of knowing that
When you push, and push, and push...
You can't arrange punctuation or the thoughts in your own head.


I just want to be loved, instead!


And what right do they have, to interfere, to wonder
And to bumble into a blunder of such epic proportions
Playing catch-and-release with my heart
Fragile is not a synonym for volatile, this is true
But when all is shattered (or exploded)
I'd still rather be with you.

"Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love."

Except, what else but gravity could cause such insanity?
Could meld this confused melody into a pounding polyphony?
Could disregard the modulation in favor of
self-actualization, inexplicable desire:
"Hold me, 'cause I'm going higher!"

I can't use logic.
And it doesn't matter if the drink is toxic,
or if it's going to make us sick.

I want to wrap myself up in your arms

I want to wrap myself up in your arms
and I want you to want me there
If maybe that scares you
At least, run your fingers through my hair?

I can’t wait to follow you off stage
I won’t wait for you to call
I wish I could feel like I knew all your thoughts
Instead of knowing nothing at all.

And maybe I just got paranoid
Or maybe I’ve gone round the bend
I said it before and I’ll say it once more
You know I’d just do it again.

Since for once I believed
No strings attached
Could work, could keep us safe from attack.
But people want to know everything, don’t they?
Now there’s no going back.