regret

i don't hate you.
i never hate you.
bear with me,
okay?

sometimes you're rather aggravating.
time to man up, i guess.

i've been doing a lot of guesswork lately.

molting

i am ashen;
dry,
a corpse-like complexion crawls
across my skin,
flakes.

and then i pick,
pick away,
another bad habit,
i'll fix it another day.

my body is a scab,
don't you see?
a scar,
a few years down the road.
is this the price of,
what?
i've made no deal.

and yet it peels away,
and though i expect blood
i am treated to a new
layer of skin,
raw,
soon i am enveloped by a new beginning.

but the tenderest skin
is the hardest to maintain.
and in a few days
my failure is apparent - scars, slashes, scabs,
all my own.

again i will molt.
but i am living the same day over
and over
and over.

and over.

1. an attempt to vent something vague that will not offend.

guess who?

is life so confusing that apathy's your only choice?
is the world so revolting you can't use your voice?
because it all sounds the same:
perfect,
planned - to a tee, no less -
and i'm left wondering why emotion can't escape
from these walls like iron grates.
i guess i'm not bubbly,
just a little insane.
but that's nothing.
you,
you're inane.

go ahead:

revel in your confusion and reap the gain,
love your facade of unwanted fame.
it's gotten you...
well,
more than i'll ever give.
because now you're the lover and i'm alone
and i'm trapped in stone.
i guess that's life,
you're better
than me.
confusion,
surprise,
planned to a tee.

i swear

the more i dream the less i live.
i am opposite of what i wish,
and only beyond that door right there am i safe,
away from your comfortable,
unknowing glare.

why am i like this?
suddenly my fingers have gone numb,
numb like they wish to write these words
no matter what.
"what?" and my mouth responds,
i am running in automatic.

i hate most of you for reasons none of us can even
begin to understand.
i hate myself for reasons that, well, i pretend to understand too well.
you probably understand them better.
because you're better.

and i love you all -
don't get me wrong.
just-
no-
it all falls apart.

why am i like this?

lunar eclipse

it's the only shadow i've ever seen
that has made me gasp in awe.

it's the only time i've ever been
the ant looking into the maw.

it's the only life i've ever lived,
and i'll be damned if my heart is never
that big.

a personal study

this stanza does not have four lines,
but only because i thought about it.
who wouldn't?
i couldn't write something original unless
you were there by my side,
reminding me that i should have ideals.

and this one will rhyme,
because i finally have the time,
to think things out and i'm not sore...
but look - this one has four.

time for some
line breaks.
i guess nothing
can be
totally original,
unless you're totally deluded.
but that's fine.

would you know that i was happy from the ending
of the last stanza of each poem?
i guess so.
you could sniff out a failure from a million miles away.

II: dad

well, here we are again.
only this time i'm rounding corners
and taking back
what i never knew i had.

i go past the rows of mourners,
and i rake the sand,
but how can i be sad?
i'll just back to the motel and pack.

i've left my eternal brand -
but i'm never the foreigner,
'cause i'm finally on track,
thinking this were never really this bad.

mom

gas, brake, clutch.
let's put this baby into reverse
and then many we'll break the curse -
travel 'cross the country, learning and such.

drive, park, first.
i've reached for the dreams
but nothing's ever as it seems,
and as for me, i'm prepared for the worst.

it wouldn't do any good to say i wish i were far away,
would it?

how we gonna pay...?

welcome to america,
where the howling goes through dawn
until the wolves all stop and the homeless start
and we wonder where we've gone.

ridden with disease,
my conscious fights to find a spark
to ignite the raw and dangerous feel that
comforts us in the dark.

but now and then
something shoots this way
and pierces through the shield,
singing,
sighing,
crying,
dying,
let's hear what we have to say.

and the smoke clears....

ashes, ashes
we
all
fall
down.

a final marriage of dreams and imagery before i start another day.

snow lined streets -
parapets of powder soft beneath my feet.
if it weren't for the cold,
i'd forget that i was living
and i'd walk off into nowhere
and finally start giving.

me and my planar

the piano pulses,
guitar twangs,
the world around me lets itself
become enveloped in the music of eras ago.

my heart races,
mind sings,
i think about the life head and
know that three years from now i'll be born anew.

what lies beyond?
cliché inquiries are just so right,
because all i can come up with is
the archetypal wistfulness of sixteen years of dreaming.

and you know
what?
it's alright.

inspired by something vague

i dreamt last night
i was over the edge,
drowning in heather and
crying out sand.

then i woke up sweaty
and looked at my hands,
saw the blood of the innocent,
and knew i was right.

frequency

another overcast day,
purgatory in the skies.
i'm wishing right now (as always) for it to change.
and what will it be?
a storm?
snow?

will the lightning crash down,
and will the thunder roll 'round
while i let myself down lightly amidst
the might of
nature.

or will peace come with morning,
in freezing angels pouring down,
that they might blot out the darkness
and remind me how wonderful
silence really is.

or maybe it will be sun.
i hope i'm not setting myself up for disappointment.

string arrangement

i could be working right now, you know that?
but an epiphany has suddenly emerged
from the cacophony in my head,
an ironic little laugh bubbles to a shout.

i think it's time we called a time out.
believe, me it's nothing that you've said.
only the invitations retracted seem to surge
to the forefront of the storm that i'm staring at.

and i can't honestly tell if i've been wronged,
so thorough is your devotion to pleasing the throng.

better than worse

slowly slipping into dissonant serenading,
i entertain the thought of hermitage,
because maybe my preconceptions were always wrong,
and idealistic behavior gets you nowhere in the end.
you really know how to put me in the mood - you know which.

attend the sail.

he could open his windows,
and maybe he should.
take off the blindfolds and shout in joy,
take in the sun!
it hasn't been so bright in so long.

he once played among the willows,
where others sat he stood.
he's a renegade and a knight playing coy,
see him run!
it hasn't been so bright in so long.

spies

the world around you is falling apart -
and by that i mean you are the eye of the storm.
and i'm sorry. but i dream too, you know.
and i know what it is to want more, feel it just out of grasp.

it's a dull throbbing and bobbing and in and out
until you know; even the evil is drawing you in.
am i right? i'd give my left eye to meet you in hell
and to battle it out with the forces that be,

and to forget what we know and let the music blare.
because it's so, so much better when it's written down.