I believe you can find it
between powers and peace signs -
nothing so erotic as the geometry itself,
it probably just floats somewhere
in between
I would assume it rushes to meet tangled lips
as I tell my stories,
My stories,
my Stories...
it quick draws the curtain
and the earhole
and the light switch
and even when :it doesn’t:
stop there
you might otherwise find it
on a burnt finger tip
or in the lovesick remains
of :an:nihilated apple
I suppose it’s in any and all of these things,
how lonely I always feel.
“You’re frustrated,”
The words held out their postured fingers
and squeezed the air between us,
causing the flatness of his
proposed arrangement
to shrink and shrivel around itself.
“You’re frustrated and I’m frustrated. Wouldn’t you say?”
I saw his words as a dying pilot light
and the surrounding space writhed
with those wavy lines you see
on really hot days.
“I’m just saying, this could work for both of us.
You’re a smart girl; it wouldn’t work with anyone else.”
He held his beer to his lips
but didn’t drink.
Just sort of soaked the tip of his nose
while his eyes made his glass seem
alive
and somehow sad.
“Besides,”
he put his beer down and wiped his face
with his presumed Least favorite
hand,
“I’ve seen the way you look at me.
It’s nothing to be embarrassed about,”
he grinned nervously and I imagined those combustible heat waves
slowly filling up
the room.
“honestly, I’ve always thought about it.
I just never knew
what your situation was like.”
The group on stage began their sound check;
I pictured our respective
Filing Statuses
humping like animals behind the curtain,
cheering on our boredom
and newfound rationales.
He let out a frustrated sigh
and I figured That was probably
enough.
I leaned in and whispered in his ear,
tracing my fingers down the back of his neck
and grazing my lips over his
lobe hanging fruit.
His pickled pores clamored for clarity
and I obliged them with the faintest hint
of a smile.
He pulled a cigarette out of his pack on the bar
and held it just far enough away from my lips
that I would have to bring myself
to him.
Something in my stomach sank
as I held his eyes, leaning forward,
doing my very best to treat
my old habit like his older
cock.
He pulled his lighter from his pocket
and you can Imagine my disappointment
from there.
what I'd rather be doing is a stupid thing to wonder
there should only ever be an empty sink
with my second favorite glass
upside down on a towel
and my first favorite glass
trailing sweat onto a coaster
(a cork coaster,
not that it matters)
there should be quiet
but not too much quiet
not so much where I can hear myself wonder
about something so stupid
as what I'd Rather be doing
it's an empty envelope
socks at Christmas
it is a seahorse admired
for resembling possibility
and I hate seahorses.
I goddamn hate them.
I was born on flights -
one carpet and one concrete.
Every word I can't define,
the infuriating nicety of pretending that You know,
they form little bumps
on my Swiss Armored tongue
as I slink back and forth
between mediums.
Carpet.
Concrete.
Step
by
step.
I watched two young men play ping-pong tonight.
I watched the larger one cheat
and the drunker one play harder
to accommodate for how badly
he thought he was doing.
And they drank
and they played
and he cheated
and nothing mattered.
Concrete. Concrete. Fucking Concrete.
When my heart loses signal
it rubs its ass on the Carpet.
Electrical storms tear my virtues
a new one
and these flights,
they go on
like well-mannered widows.
Carpet.
Concrete.
Don't
Look
Down.
"What do you think is at the bottom, Brit?"
Linoleum, you goddamned filthy animals!
And a sour lemon
for every word I'll never know.
My neighbor's eyes widened as I pointed upstairs.
"That girl that was with you??" "That girl you were with??"
I nodded with inexplicable pride.
"Don't take this the wrong way, Brit,
but I've gotten Final Notices that were nicer to look at than you."
I stuck my left thumb in my pocket and flexed my right arm,
"You should save them, then," (had my arm gotten whiter?)
"save 'em and paste 'em all over your face.
If you did that, you might be the one telling this story next time."
My neighbor chuckled and wiped the sweat from both ears.
He walked back into his apartment and I was glad I didn't stutter.
I stood against the stairs a while more,
peering up to where I'd been pointing.
She had gone home much earlier in the day,
and while I knew she only liked me for my brain,
it was funner to tell it this way.
The loop began at the top
and accented the crushing
of an adorable
8 oz.
can.
She is someone Else, now.
The Drip may as well
be an itch
or a tick
or a cardboard box
moving east like storms do.
She is strumming a pathetic sort of tune
that will make everyone Still Living
wish they had met her Before
the metallic blue caved in
and the loop began to tangle.
Don't waste yourselves.
There are still drops left.
The sirens will signal my return
and the mattress will hold us
like Red.
I have invited the silence back into my home.
I have ironed his clothes
and decombed his tripe.
I have brushed and pushed
our tiny whites back together
and bound them with vows.
(Forever? No.
Just for now)
I have Thoroughly inspected
the size of the stain
and abandoned my usual recycling;
shattered glass now lines his hands,
though I know replacement
is hardly Guaranteed.
His eyes resemble the effect of chili powder
that very first moment
it hits the water.
Fruit flies would suggest I've left him out overnight,
and maybe I have.
Look.
I'm home.
I have picked back up
my neglected pen
and everyone is invited
to hear it drop.
The fight in my eyes dissolves 10mg at a time;
the love in my heart sits pickled in a faraway jar,
well out of reach from he
who has learned to crush the earth.
Everything collects dust.
(Everything hurts)
My mind recalls our teenage enthusiasm via erratic hole-punches,
stringing together snapshots of happier times
that hang on a slow-moving carousel just out of my reach.
I can feel its warmth
and the frigid reality momentarily gives way.
Everything has weight.
(Everything hurts)
I've learned to live inside these forgotten moments,
like a parasite in the belly of a beast I Swear I saw.
The world is happy to let me love in reverse.
What should it matter?
( )
With a careful spritz of Night-time water
I drape these young limbs
with tiny drops of Maybe,
glistening with a curious shine
I answer questions delicately & deliberately
but my Excluded Truths
are a torn-out page in the book of Rocket Science
to THESE pleasure seekers.
I tell you I could twist my tongue
into a thousand different animals,
contorting my face for the ooh's and aah's
and believe you-me
there would be plenty of both.
So how then
to tell this pocket pooling sapsucker
that the tan on my hand
is Not the world's tiniest bracelet?
I am announced before entrance
And ratted out before my monologue,
Oranges dashed upon a freezing wheat field
and my sticky fingers tell the story.
I have no reason to act out in such a way, I think.
Fungus and Magic 8’s take on Whole New Meanings,
and I can't decide which one I like.
One hand tops the other
tops the other tops the other,
a continuous cancellation of self-indulged prizes
and my sharp gasps of breath
are nothing short of appropriate
as I tell the bartender again
about the cartoon I can't remember.
Kisses?
I remember kisses.
Hell, I even remember the last kiss I was given.
I stood at the centermost point of a very slow intersection
and held out my heart for anyone who would have it.
Several cars whizzed by...
one even slowed down.
But no one stopped,
so I just stood there.
That
was the last kiss I received.
The transformation was sudden.
Veins burst with a "sedentary" pressure
casually mentioned by a shady plastic surgeon.
It's quite the mouthful,
but I tell you,
it happened Just that fast.
I don't wonder where he goes.
I don't wonder who he's with
(or if he's getting better at beating the Snooze)
I don't even wonder if he loves me anymore.
Or likes me.
I'm sure he likes me.
Consider us, then,
Brother and Sister.
Bound by an invisible tie
strung clear through my heart
into those stupid puppy dog eyes.
He's given me Every chance to mosey.
To call up the Ducks and the Cheese and the Hawks
and the Sailors and the Dork Fish and that
Pretty Pony Boy.
And sometimes I drown those thoughts with Real water.
Suppose I entertained this new, young musician?
Suppose a 30 minute lunch break became 15 more than we needed?
What then?
Nothing, I say!
Not a goddamned thing!
Siblings ought not view the Privates.
The cracks of whips still echo throughout the tunnels.
Outlets still massage my heart with fingers that stir and shock and burn.
I swear, somewhere beneath all the dead time pieces
and blotted calendars, I can still see her.
Eyes frozen.
Locked on some boy she met online.
Her hands are soft glowing blurs,
typing in a calm and informed frenzy.
She, like the men she Swore to protect,
is finding new ways to make colors burst.
Tongues. Cheeks. Cubes. Codes.
She is pushing through
One line at a time,
but her eyes Do Not Move.
She lets me borrow her smile, sometimes.
It's the only proof I have left.
i.
While trying to change a flat tire
my cigarette fell and expired
the Cherry had rolled
to a gas drop, I'm told
I just know the damn thing caught fire!
ii.
A beautiful bartender sat me
smiling and looking right at me
she wanted to screw
but her plan went askew
when I asked, "And how much will That be?"
iii.
I can't recall how old he stated
he was when he claimed we had mated
a silly wet dream
he was seventeen
I left the court feeling elated.
iv.
There once lived a Jew Boy from Salem
whose cellphone had begun to failem
he decided, then,
to stick with a pen
I guess I'll just have to mailem?
v.
There was a young woman from Xander
whose husband did not understand her
she rambled in vain,
he tried to explain
she would just have to Lower her Standards.
vi.
While sitting alone in a bar
I noticed two drunks in a car
the wheels had gone missing
yet there they sat kissing
"He's getting unusually far!"
vii.
There once was a girl named Alexis
who made her fame fucking in Texas
she died in the flick
"Fat Dudes Boning Chicks"
when his fat ass crushed her Solar Plexus.
It must be out of respect for the drink
that I entertain these strangers.
It's not that I don't find them attractive,
these fit young men and women who seat themselves next to me.
I just can't understand how they come upon me in the first place.
The bar is like an empty theater
where I go to watch my favorite brews
over and again
again till it's over,
(but) it never fails that my silent movies get interrupted
by some fresh-faced toon
highly animated
and wondering what I'm writing about.
It is purely out of respect for the drink
that I reply, "Nothing, really. Let's talk about you."
He noticed my jersey.
She thinks she knew my father.
They thought I looked lonely, is what they meant to say.
And maybe I am.
Maybe that's why I do my writing at the bar.
In the hopes that one day
a man will peek over my shoulder
and tell me "Mean. It should be Mean.
Not Meant."
A Perfectly simple man at the gym
offered to take me out a few days ago.
His body was living proof of his undying loyalty
to himself.
He was simple in the way 1st grade math is simple.
(If it can't be done with fingers, it probably doesn't exist.)
And I, struggling to catch my breath
my stomach refusing to wash Anyone's clothes,
smiled
politely
and declined.
Later that night, as I sat and drank away Everything I had run,
and Then some,
I thought about what he might be doing.
If he had any genuine interest as to why I was at the gym in the first place
or why I had made such easy conversation.
But these thoughts quickly exceeded my fingers
so I finished my beer
and moved on.
I've been exploring the insane piece of my brain
that has the Gall, the Nerve, the Balls
to wonder who's keeping you company
during this,
time of Uncertainty.
Certainly, you're entitled to pleasurable company.
It's what has us in this mess in the first place.
Not us.
Me.
Me in this mess.
Pleasure yourself?
If ONLY I'd left it at that.
And now I'm wondering
who's comforting you?
The Devil she is.
They are.
I am.
We're not so far gone, though you've Clearly the upper hand.
And after much exploration,
this crazy piece of me
is Still romanced by the ampersands
you leave in every text.
With the bee spit still hanging from my lips
I write with the intention of
Explaining myself.
It has occurred to me that,
for most I keep in my company,
I am a piece of Modern Art.
A calculus pun.
A Spanish speaking Billy Bass.
No one Really understands my jibs and jabber
but they keep me around
like a foreign pitcher
who shows promise
but not citizenship
Before the Highest of Courts.
It's Everywhere, I tell you!
Evidence of my infidelity.
Empty ergonomics,
Whiskered pillows,
Gin N' Phonics!
But this Infidelity is merely
a spook in my boudoir.
An imagined Check-Up
where my Trick Knee is De-Classified.
I could ramble All Night,
making love with Your brain,
our stems twisting and turning
into Sticky Figure 8's.
I think to myself,
How Wonderful it would be
to be translated
and caught
and interpreted for the crowds:
And all would smile
Honestly
at the Cosigning punchline.
The Little Yellow Man in the Square Black Box
invited me to his corner's corner's corner
and for a moment,
I looked back at the Commander
still studying his upside down map
mumbling to himself
about Steve Perry and which way West was.
At this
I took the Little Yellow Man's hand
and was greeted warmly
by all the old favorites.
A familiar tune moistened the airwaves
and let loose happy drippings
in my warm Dos Equis,
humidified that natural wood finish,
and wore the dead skin
off every bronze twang within a 700 sq. foot radius.
On the balcony that looked over the Ol' Granbury train tracks,
The Little Yellow Man and I
took turns seeing how long we could hold our breath
before the recycled environment ripped itself from our lungs
and became a signal in the sky
that we were Far from Over.
As the coasters became more and more unnecessary
and the idea of a closed window was not so risky,
we made a jump for it
but caught on the Black Box's edge.
The Little Yellow Man shoved himself over
and with a thud,
beckoned me to follow.
With my ass in the sky,
hung over that Black Box
I looked once more to Commander
to see him for what he was.
"Not mine."
And my thud
was soon to follow.
The Matter O' Fact Ram on the cap
says I really shouldn't be waiting for you.
That I should be waaayyy past GO
in Alex's Wonderland
but No.
I'm knocking back punctuated advice columns
and sopping cotton in every sense of the phrase
waiting on Commander Quackpth.
Commander, in case you didn't know,
hasn't figured out which way he wants to hold his cutlass,
which makes it all the more ridiculous
that I'm sucking the patience
out of the northern hose
like a newcomer to the fair
in anticipation for how I'll tell him
"Not Tonight..."
2 in the morn now.
Still tastes like cat piss
and the Steve Cruz's on my ass
won't stop riding up.
….for Christ’s sake,
Do I have to do Everything?
"The Gift of Today" is very much lost on me
as the clicking moving picture
starts again and again
The clanging of bottles
play cadences on my lips
and the wheat crop's urine
seems worth the lack of fridge space.
I never did understand these things...
abstract shots set to Looney Tunes music.
A tightening noose around a Baby's Blue.
A wolf snapping at his own wounds.
Though the pictures fade,
they get replayed
sooner than I'd ever admit.
At 10:00 p.m.
Mountain Dew tastes like the soft gummies I had
on a speed boat when I was little.
Whether or not I imagined the experience
I can't be sure
but such a flashback is rare these days.
My guitar (like everything else)
resembles a two-legged bicycle
I'd managed to forget.
It's hot out
so fire wood isn't a priority
but I'm keeping my options open
in the event my shoes follow suit.
In terms of purple swirl
there is a fella I've met.
Upon further investigation
I've discovered that he is the Duck
we set out for in the Desert
those 2 years ago
and the strange thing
is that I am completely unprepared.
The Big One in Black
continues to borrow my nets and cardboard
so what have I to offer this goofy creature?
Drawings of bread crumbs.
True blue water sounds.
10 gummies says
he'll leave in the morning.
Still
the approaching monument
is worth more than a glance.
I've acquired many o' trophy
and it should be noted
that my bike once had wheels
and a bell
and a purpose on my tush.