without you

sour grapes. these droopy days are like
guarantors for my insecurity, my insurance.
they'll pay me back, slowly, in red eyes
goose-pimples, unnamed medications
they'll bail me out even as i cling to that
last hope, that inside kind of peace
i want to win, i do. i want to be the king and the court jester.

"try looking underneath this printer."
this room has been left unstaffed, unstocked
since time immemorial and all i want
is to plant a seed, watch roots crack through
the computers, desks, people. i wish
this room would yield something, for once.
wrong numbers, wrong names. i want to feel all of this beautiful numbness.

radioscopy

up here in the north, the rains sweep us down
"don't go downhill
in this weather," caution four angry parents
the basement is flooded and the food has gone bad.
we're used to burrowing in, but
the ruptured light of december is far gone, far off.
i used to drive a volkswagon.
empty leather seats, wide-open plains
down south, the storms are like caesar,
the skies aphrodite.
scaramouche (the car) died in kansas
and i pushed him all the way to the carribbean
before realizing that all i held was a ghost.
there are more important things than cars, but i
can't name many of them.
i have left my singing rains and my sea-sky south
the center of the u.s. of a
and in the west i have found liquor and love to my heart's content.
but every once in a while, i think of you
and every day i wonder when i will wake up
safe in new england
safe in tennessee
safe in bed, and safe from you.

kickflip

the vagaries of time, of me
falling into place one by three
piano keys and broken meters
alone on a dance floor
drowned in a theater
silhouetted prose all clinging to my face
this underground raucous
these worn-out clothes
a place in time, a time in place

we were talking about parapets and guns
when the world changed
deep greens and shallow puns
but we never really knew.

climb on board

do you know what it's like to see yourself
standing in line at the County Community Kitchen
knobs for elbows, hopeful eyes, all dreams
wisps of disillusion hanging so close to your pupils
that they blur out entirely, become
background oppression, the kind that sticks
itself into your best dreams and gives clues to
psychiatrists and mind readers alike
and all the while, you walk and walk and walk
until suddenly you understand
this is the desert, there is no point b.
this is your future.

no, i didn't think you knew.

anywhere

i dreamt of rolling waters, unbelievable
glances of bright white. diamonds in the sea.
summer held its sinewy hand to my forehead
and i was feverish, fake
condemned to fantasies and failures
autumn left me wishing for evergreens,
people that did not shed their skin
or their minds.

one day a year ago will be today.
will i still see clocks?
once, i was frozen in time.

fake tales of the monarchical restructuring of wonderland

sidelined mutinies do not stop seething.
feet pressed against the floor
hands in pockets
deep breaths, meditative rage all
balled up in backs and shoulders
waiting for a flight to come
wishing to the absent ether
that someday i might board.
i am immutable in my ways, as poison is in its purpose.
shell-shocked protesters,
didn't know what they were doing
you can stumble into a corner
and still have no clue
what the walls are made of.
my walls are of concrete and sanskrit
very few can discern
just how dead the writing on the wall is
how impenetrable they might seem.
it takes two windows to force a draft.

how to be an atheist

ask something of the great beyond