if you get through it...I'm here.
if you make any further sense of you, I am
with that.
if you decide the clouds are someplace
you'd like to know, call me
I'll go.

if I can make your neck fall
back onto your back with the
fingers down the middle of your chest and
down, I will
love you, if I can whisper
the pirate volts of my hungry midnight
poems hot with the need to
scream them into your open and
swelling ear I will
be there.

if the lights pound you down back again
broken into a million melting and brilliant sparks, and you are
without sleep and sweating pure lightning from the twisting
inside of your angry and fire drenched garden, call
call on me, I will shower
your fucking incredible need with everything and every
secret favor and promise owed to me by this
this relentless and magnificent
fucking everything...

tonight ends this...this
most recent this.
exhale the smoke of the scar, hard blink
shut the days and look out
across the white filling in
with pre-color, truth, tomorrow
and now.

the lungs bite down around
the cherry-purple veins in the sunset and the river
grey wrinkles in the clouds, all folding
down into dust in the rising washing
off of this through my breathing.

everything is ready to move, the lights
from that life begin to diminish like a map
that no longer leads any roads left to be remembered, and
with that last look back, let it all collapse
this new now needs nourishment.

because you know what this is, you knew it was coming, you
have known this somewhere all along, you are just waking up
from the forgetting of this, we always forget that
it will wait to start again until
this completely ends, and that is
what this is, the end of what
has been, and the start
of what will soon be.

Chuck vs. Pat:
the difference between me and him.
he had it much harder, the drink was
the only constant clean'pillow
between shit spoiled blood
and piss broken
glass moments.

he fucking choked god, had god cough
up bits of breakfast toast on
his collar while god begged
for mercy.
he, well, he drank
in very certain bars, drank in
preferred and isolated rooms, and after
gods bile and toast stains had washed a bit, he
lost interest in any interest
to have a chat
with the devil.

he was alot more blade
to bleed, alot more just a penny and I can
feed, he played the horses, praying the locks keep enough
to keep the whores scratching at the door, he
saw the end early and was drooling, smirk and was
ready.

im a bit more of the creampuff, full of
love for the rest of you, hope and belief in
the rest of you, and thank god
he is dead.

his ridicule would really
piss me off.

and we are all so trembling inside so
are they talking about me what are they
looking at, when will i be happy, when
will all of this end, when did it fucking start, what
the fuck am i doing, what the fuck am i
doing here...

sometimes the greatest distance exists
between those most close.
sometimes the softest moments carry
the strongest sound.

and i would be jealous, full of envy
at the world spinning all around me, except
i feel the pain in your gears as they turn.
i would be beset by regret, drunk
in pools of mirrors and failure, except
i know how few of you
are at all
happy.

and,
i would be bothered by how great she might look tonight and
who she might look great with and for, i would be
worried with his bank account and vacation plans, if
i was unaware of how they stare into the shadows in stolen
seconds when they think no one is looking, looking for what
no one will give them.

and we are all so beautiful so full of mistake
and paper cuts from the bible, so cosmic
in how our perfect moments are pushed in on
like coal trying to rush out the diamond, and
this makes me hurt less, makes me hurt your hurt, makes
our hurt an opportunity for joy and for this
i love you all, truly
i do.

and at some point you give up
trying to be or find the person
you are trying to be or find.
more time to stare at the sky
and i find myself
doing exactly that.

the romance of the imagination and the
screenplay of memory is quite a terrible
addiction but i have been
sober before and i will be sober again.

you dream of her body, how you convulsed
along the electric pulling you built between
those Venice sheets when you both were still
strangers searching for a warm place to hide.
you dream of the clothes, the parties, the cars, the good
times for everyone, build the business live the life but
there you are, some coin in your pockets, pockets on pants
on a body still wondering what's next.

so, i'm excited for a party that i'm having, bring
all the kids to the campfire, see if anyone has the secret
or at least some new or better
questions.

but there will be some good souls that choose
to make it, and hell, what was not made then perhaps
can be made now perhaps we will even be able
to share it for a night, at least.

of course
it is literal
as literal at least
as literal can be.
its a diary
a summary
a soliloquy
of what i think see
feel and believe.
its a truth grenade
pull the pin
and the fuck it joy
when the fireworks begin.

simple notes in a bottle set
adrift in the oceans of space, rarely
expected to ever be found, so yea
its literal i guess, literal as much
as anyone would literally confess
to, but
that being said, it is a dialogue
with the universe that is
sculpted with the intention, but not
always just intended for the subject, but mainly
and maybe moreso sculpted
for the dreamed upon objective that may receive it,
objectively with no recognition or connection to
what or who has
launched the missive.

so take it for what its worth, what
it means to you, take it for any
worth or meaning it carries,
literally
or not
either is fine
with me.

behind my eyes
i am always
tilting left or right
pulled in wonder
hand on face cradling
with index
finger pushing
up on the cheek, smiling
hmm..

each challenge becomes
much easier or
less of an obstacle
to address...
each
broken heart mends
that much quicker...
each day becomes that much shorter
all forever spreads that much farther
each desire reveals its truth that much faster
all need illuminates its truth that much greater.

and as I listen to my cats claws
tick tack across the hard wood floors i
laugh that i almost threw up
after the gym today and
as soon as i caught my breath
i lit up a smoke.

behind my eyes
i am always
tilting left or right
pulled in wonder
hand on face cradling
with index
finger pushing
up on the cheek, smiling
hmm..

i wonder if i will want any more.
so far there have been two women
that i have loved more than any other
more than i should have more
than either cared for,
at the time, or
cared for as I had hoped
they would.

both so beautiful in the black
and white memories and most
beloved pitctures I have of them.
both so perfect in thier kaleidoscopic
occupation of my deepest and most protected
and beloved self.

i wonder if i will want any more.
so far they both reach out from
crumbling and brilliant free
falls through bliss, asking
for my hand to hold them or
guide a more gentle descent
to
much safer
ground.

i wonder if i will love any more, like
i do them.
i wonder if i have the strength to love
any more, like i do
them.

I am not the one, not at least to
either of them. If so, i would
be.
Such is this, and at least I am
forever grateful that I have left gardens
inside of them, beacons of yes you can
count on me.
but, I often wonder, if
I will want any more.

and against all reason
i would marry
both of them.

i would march
up the aisle, bristling
with bruises of ridiculous hope, laughing
at the steep and
obvious and unforgiving
cliff of tomorrow.

and when i was asked.......i
would say..
i will.
even though i cannot, i will,
even though
they would never
dare
to let me.

never mistake the willingness
to accept the bullet.
never mistake the desire
to accept anything given
from a specific and certain hand
as an act of the unwilling.
There are crazy people in heaven, and
i'm sure we all know a few.

sipping the mist off the outskirts again, must
be careful not to
become a planet no one has ever seen before, or
worse yet, has never
been wished upon ( all
light is relative ).

but,
i'm not the supermodel, the mogul, the genius that
i had hoped to be
by 34, at least not by
modern and scalable standards, but at least at 34, at
a relative half-way point of this life, toes
in the water and no mermaid rising
from the waves, i gotta laugh, yea
it's all allright, yea it's all
just fine.

and so with no wife, no kids, no vast
empire worth a mention, i'm rather ok
with it all, and facing little to show for this
far along, the view seems to broaden,
and the women, the family, the wealth seems to
release its bullseye on the horizon, instead
i see great skies, endless wind, and
an acceptance that is growling full
with deeper promise.

so,
the next step from here is just me, not
what you think about me, not what
i'd like you to think about me, just me, oh
yea and my cat also, this is about her too, can't
levae her out of
the true
big picture.

and i'm not sure why
i am like this.
and i am not sure
why you are not.
and most of all, i am not sure
why we cannot be
this both together.
i'm not sure why i am more often
than not,
happy.
and i'm not sure why more often
than not, most of you
don't seem to be.
and i am not sure why
i used to be afraid
to tell you my secret, and
i am not sure now
why it makes more sense than ever
to still keep it to myself.

if i cannot give away
my happiness, what a useless treasure
it suddenly seems to be.
if i cannot give my soul away
to heal yours, than
i might as well just be god.

but,

i guess i'd rather be
a powerless fool
always easy to find
in a small room, writing, and smiling, than
an almighty coward
hiding in heaven
unable to.

this belly ache
in the center of the earth
dragging orbits
and slowing down
turn times, the
sun
will rise again
but
differently
always differently than
the day before.

and so many of my dearly beloved
feeling so dearly unloved by all things, feeling
the hands of the gods squeezing
the air from their lungs, and
between each i'm sorry
they cannot seem
to catch a breath.

i can see through their faces
behind the muscles, underneath
the nerves, below
the emotions and just before
the soul..
their perfect
and lovely beauty
blinking
and going
blind.

and there is she
so busy
making the outside pretty
that she is now afraid
to go back in, so busy
keeping everything out
that she will not let
anyone and especially
herself
back in.
and there is he, whimpering
in the dark, unable to sleep
without waking up paralyzed, or
punching kicking pushing
all of his dream away, afraid
to rest for fear
of exhaustion.

and i smile for them, sometimes
keeping our tears safe, keeping them
ready.

and after our want
subsides, and after
the prince and the princess
have been found out, have been
discovered to be just still small children, and
alone, i
see how delicate the strength of love truly is, i
need the love, i
am love
again.

and if only love could choose who
among us will choose to receive it, now
that would be something
to write about.

I have a strict diet
of disturbed, delicious,
and dark women.
Like churches conquered by the elements
their
stained glass lies in
broken tears and ripped light
on the floor
around the altar.

and what it must be like, such
bent and sudden power, such
torn and sharp grace, and what it must
be like to be
a distrubed, delicious,
and dark woman.

it's almost as if
my heart weights the weight
of a benevolent forward in contrast
to the weight that pulls
from the rivers of the fractured
feminine and i
beg
to drown.

and so it is
that I cannot move
any love story past
this first chapter, and am left
with abandoned half-books filled
wuth disturbed, delicious,
and dark women.
perhaps one day
I will find my way
into the first sentence
of a second chapter and stop reading,
loving, or writing about
dark
delicious
and disturbed women.

all inside your head, all
inside your head, that black
thunder pulling down
your great skies, and why
becuase I know that you are
so god damn beautiful when
you've forgotten who you are and
your heart is given a quick
reprieve, from all of the hurt
hanging heavy on it, and you
actually
breathe
a breath
between
the terrified heaving
of your breasts, afraid
that you do not deserve
the air they
welcome.

and as I see you
in between
the balck and white shards
of you, while they splinter
into a bouquet of tears
that are too heavy
to plant ( even in
the most secret
of private gardens ).

and I just could not
love you enough to make you
love yourself, that
is my burden to bear, but where
we now meet and where we now can
find such new selves to find, it's almost
like we are new lovers, safe in the knowing
that whispers across heaven
and the winks smuggled between the lightnings clap
are enough, enough to thank
anything that gave us each other, and gave us
what this will now mean
to be.

not sure about anything except everything and
where do we go from here, fields of whoah
spreading in the palace of my belly, intoxicating
the limbs the veins the heart the percussion
surrounding the instinct with so many worlds
playing bumper cars in my universe and only so much
time allowed for this many carnival tickets, i wonder
what awaits beneath the canopy of the next lifetime, and
the cool shoulder-in huddle of and the barely lit postcard 0f an evening
at a quiet winter beach just stepped
into my head
for no reason.

i get
distracted
like that.

but back here in Venice making mix tapes or cd's
what year is it and what new world have we created to thank
this new god, or any new gods not scared by the worship of them, and my
black cat is fine with all of this, knowing the engine of my love
typically blasts far beyond the polite or acceptable standards for emission upon
this road, but we are not on the most traveled road are we, and a delicate
hammock of strings in the song that is now playing just threw me
onto a beach somewhere on a Tuesday at 4:38 pm, swirled in tropical
overcast and a life purposefully forgotten for a full crucifix-lengthed full body stretch
in the sand in a grey-rained paradise brush stroked with raw violet
and fluorescent tangerine sunsets and
sorry.

i get
distracted
like that.

broken glasses again, beginning to think
no frame or lenses
can stand up
to what's looking through them.

blazing with harsh and recycled lies
blinking in breaths before the tornado's rise
and what can we say, when we barely
say anything
when given
all chance.

and sometimes its just a sublte revolt
of the senses, sending
the spirit they surround
soaring, question
is towards what.

and I never have enough fists
to fight off every demon, guess
it's a good thing that
I don't believe in ehll.

and not every poem
is anywhere near
good.
take this one for example.

but when you're alone, trying to fix
a broken pair of glasses
something is better than nothing.