The Allure of Umbrellas

Trapped behind shutters watching the rain,
he wants to feel the dampening spirits,
to be surrounded by waterfalls.
Oh! an umbrella:
The possibility of play, of observation,
the fearless pursuit of ambiguities.
Yet, there is only rain if he cannot dance.
There is only water without static shock.
Steamless, meaningless rain.
The allure of umbrellas never has tempted him so.

Yesterday's Fire

When we met, you had long hair and you weren't a lesbian.
I couldn't imagine sitting in a living room watching Golden Girls
in my underwear, drinking tequila and blackening my lungs.
You tempted me with secrets when I disappeared to
fuck men from Texas before I realized this city is burning,
everyone smoldering in ashes of yesterday's fires.
Last winter, I forgot how the trees looked with grass carpets
Because we only knew fire and dirt and midnight sirens painting everything blue.
I don't remember the taste of innocence or the first feelings after it was gone, but
I remember the smile you held between breathes of nicotine and Turkish blend.
We weren't the ones abandoning, but those abandoned. Forgotten?
We play with ashes waiting, the only things left: memory and remnants, and
I keep repeating those phrases, letters -- words.
I didn't smoke before Brooklyn.

Summertime Poetry.

Coney Island


I hear your voice on the television set
Reading letters sent back home.
There are whispers on the ocean,
Speaking promises of closeness.
They caught an eel with your name
Scrawled in cursive on its back.
Come back august sky.

---

Obsession.

Smile pretty, baby,
we have to look nice.
Show me your dimples.
Look at your rosy cheeks.
There. There you go.
Stand up straight.
When are your getting your hair cut?
Can we go to Coney Island?
Or maybe that one building. please?
There's this wax museum I read about
Or a garden in Brooklyn.
Brooklyn's so pretty, baby.
Just like you.



---

Replacement.

You hold me like porcelain in your palm,
delicately skimming the surfaces with your
Webbed hands, tickling my hair,
trailing tears down my spine.
I smell the sound of silence.
You left me on a shelf and
I watched you love from afar.
I am silent and unchanging
but not so easily broken as that.
You could not take me down again.
I played your little blow-up doll.
You laced me with pearls and soft kisses and
I never once broke for you.
But you put me on a shelf and
hid me from the world.
You loved again, but how could I know?
I climbed down and saw him
sitting on your bed, holding the lion
That flew 1000 miles to say he loves you.
His mouth is taped. I fall down.
But I am not that easily broken.

----

Coffee Shop

My days are empty but for these promises.
Closeness from 1000 miles away.
These plastic covers turn blue skies brown,
but there is no sun in Brooklyn.
We'll enjoy the picayune limelight
Wrapped in the warmth of our own light.

---

Point of Contact

You stopped breathing until we touched.
The point of connection where my fingers
met your back resuscitated your lung.
I felt your rise and fall,
saw the tundras melting,
leaving dew drops in your hair.
There is no winter in Texas,
but you come from the summerless land.
When we meet, it's autumn or spring,
the point where our summer meets solstice.
My breath shakes the dew from your hair.
Your heart beats in my palm.
The orchids are blooming,
Our leaves turn yellow and red.

Standard

You gave me little. I smiled. Accepted.
Bemusement. Hope. Enticement. Love?
Before we kissed, you told me you loved me.
Forbid me speak when we did.
I gave. You smiled. Accepted. Accepted again.
Time. Body. Sex. Devotion. But love?
When we lay in bed, I wanted to speak words.
Your fingers blocked my lips. The letters.

Standardized loving isn't loving.
But I need standards or I'll find you again.
I will love you again and hope.
Be still my gentle heart, I'm bleeding
For some other broken soul.
One more broken soul.

And we will love until you're through.
And I will love and move on.

My heart is full. Rooms with portraits,
Altars for the love of loss.
And so I love you still.

I fail your standards
So you leave me
Standing, kneeling, crying
on the altar
Where I exist alone
With a faceless god not present.

And I set standards so I
never need create a room.

March

We dreamed of chasing sunlight between
buildings on the streets of Brooklyn,
of laying under the stars outside the
valley of the flooded city.
There were bluebonnets in Texas when
I flew past the clouds to
land in stagnant puddles and
kiss you on the landing strip.
We explored cities I read about, and
we loved. we loved. we loved.
I dreamt about March in Texas
where I never thought about always or never.
I woke up somewhere between bluebonnets
and stagnant puddles in your arms.

Rings

Somewhere between our midnight and 6 am
I learned to never hang up first
I hear me office phone vibrate
5 seconds before it rings and
answer before you realize you called
We say goodbye 30 times before our bodies mean it
We whisper mutual love after sleep affects our thoughts
We're not ready yet for two Claddagh rings.
Soon, though, I won't realize you called before
your voice is in my ear.
Then, then we won't need rings anymore.

An Original Play

One: (Seated with Two)
We have sat.
Two:
We have watched.
One:
We have sat and watched. (Two nods)
For three weeks. (Two nods)
We have sat and watched as people walked by without saying a word.
We are deaf. They mouth what we call words but they say nothing.
We are deaf. (Two nods)
For three weeks we have sat and watched as people walk by speaking but
saying nothing and we wonder. (Two nods). We wonder if we are real or if they
are or if none of us are real at all. (Two nods).
We have sat and watched and seen.
Two:
I have seen a girl in pink track suit walking her dog and saying words to her dog
and conversing with the bearded man in a trench coat who heard only the wind.
One:
We have seen a girl in a pink track suit and a dog and a bearded man.
Two:
I saw the cracks in the pavement swallow words I was meant to hear but never
could because I am deaf.
One:
We are deaf.
Two:
I am deaf. The cracks told me. I am deaf.
One:
We leave. (stands)
Two:
I am deaf. The pavement told me. The girl and the dog told me. The bearded man
listened to the wind that told him I am deaf.
One:
What? (two nods) I leave. (exits)
Two:
(stands) The earth soothes me. (he sits on the ground) I listen to the words
from the cracks. They tell me I am deaf. We all speak but words. I am deaf.

Shutter

 I became you before college through photographs,

still frames of when you were smiling and meant it.

I want to meet that person again some day through

shutter clicks as we run through the burning streets of

Brooklyn, holding our torches to the amber skies and

singing love song to no one in particular but ourselves and

the people who have come to love us fully and honestly.

I see that person behind your smile and realize sometimes

you never really went away.

Bit your bottom lip, maybe.

Slept away some things, maybe.

Disappeared? Not entirely. No.

When Brooklyn burned at four,

I saw that smile for the first time and

I admit I fell in love with a girl from New York.

Smile sometime, darling, we're only frames away from happiness.

There.

When I close my eyes

I imagine my voice

vibrating through your chest.

I bring you orchids,

bandages so you might see

when you open your eyes.

There is always the vision

When I close my eyes.

I Am The Real Edith Piaf

I am the real Edith Piaf

Who sang the voice of Paris

On stages of satin,

Who started on streets,

Passersby threw change for chords.

I am the real diva

Begging rhetoric time and again

"What's the point? What is the point?

If I can't what's the point of being

Edith Piaf?"

Give me the porcelain doll in the window.

I am the real Edith Piaf

Who wanted nothing but the rain

in a circus of starless nights

Where she would sing to the angel

Mother Mary who offered sight again

When she opened her eyes to satin

In a garden where her only mother cried

"She can see! She can see!"

I am the real Edith Piaf.

If I can't, what's the point?

I want the poercelain doll,

Rain to block circus lights.

I want you and you

Who have ever scoffed to see.

I am the real Edith Piaf

I sing to the angel before he takes me

Before Paris falters and I

Fall on the stage of satin screaming

"I can sing! I can sing!

If I can't, what's the point?"

Mother (Edson Imitation)

My mother was a wise woman.

She explained the colors of Texas sunsets, where missing socks go, and the reason for accidents.

I asked her why she wore a ring when she wasn't married.

She said, ringers were invented to block the sunlight so people wouldn't worry about skin cancer on their smoking fingers.

She died last spring.

To Romanticism

You make me wait,
and in doing so,
make me miss the chances.
I should have grabbed his tie,
told him to stay a while longer,
just to confess to him,
both of us livid with cheap wine,
I want him, I want to be with him.
But I wait for you,
the moment that's best for you.
I leave myself behind,
just for you.
Every time.

We'll Sell Our Souls for Paris

We'll sell our souls for Paris,
feed off boxes, our shelter,
live off my trust fund
as long as we can,
buy cheap wine
just to forget our problems.
I love our dreams for their dreams,
our lives for their dreams,
our souls for the dreams
we buy with them.
I love you all,
my Paris.
Je t'aime.

What You Left

"You left something in my room."
"Fuck, did I leave my glasses again?"
"No."
"Movies?"
"No. It's more than that."
"Corkscrew. I'll get it tomorrow."
"This can't wait like that."
"I don't have anything to open though."
You could open your mouth.
"What is it?"
"My heart."
"It's not mine."
"No. It is."
"When?"
"Always."

I Have Your Copy of the Golden Girls

If I came to your door, would you answer?
Would I stand there, waiting for you to wake up,
to answer, just for me to walk away again
without you hearing anything I'm trying to encode
just to make you understand, in a romantic way,
all the things I could have said days ago when
I first felt them and you were completely oblivious?
Would you?
Would I?
Please...

Two Throats (Gilbert Imitation)

Remember the tilted television set
When we held hands,
Threw wine on the sheets
Watching life in black and white and
Listening to Bette's screams
As we poured glasses of ourselves
Down our throats?
We cupped palms;
I lay on your chest
We nearly kissed, fucked
Almost poured wine
Down our throats.
Remember?

To Anal Sex (Koch Imitation)

Best: (Manguso approved!)

When I moved to New York,
I only saw you
late nights
On the computer screen,
alone.
I wanted you;
Got you again when I went home,
Lost you again when I came back.
You avoid the city.


Original:
We met on the futon,
Parents through the wall,
He passed a bottle,
Said, “Take it easy, slow.”
You were a pressure
On my heads,
Latex would fill
Premature and I would
Leave him filled yet unsatisfied.
I maintained a rhythm though
Awkward as it was
We enjoyed the changing positions
Before I changed positions.
When I moved to New York,
I did not see you
Except late nights
On the computer screen when
I was alone.
I wanted you;
Got you again when I went home,
Lost you again when I came back.
You avoid the city.



Version 2:
We met on the futon
When I was eighteen.
I heard his parents
Through the wall.
He passed a bottle,
Said, “take it easy, slow.”
Your sounds were quieter than
His parents’ voices.
Your smell, more poignant.
His parents’ voices
Conjure strawberries
And feces.
You overwhelmed
My heads every time,
Filled me with doubt that
Latex would fill
Premature; I would
Leave him filled yet unsatisfied.
I was done before I started.
I held it off despite you,
Maintained rhythmic thrusts though
Awkward as they were
We enjoyed the changing positions
Before I changed positions.
When I moved to New York,
I did not see you
Except late nights
On the computer screen when
I was alone.
I wanted you;
Got you again when I went home,
Lost you again when I came back.
You avoid the city.

To My Stomach

You shrink.
Last year, I only saw my
Penis when sitting down.
Now, I see my pubes.
You shrink.

To The Finger Buried in My Anus

Roommate's out,
You're in.

Real

Abstract non-fictional characters surround you;
you want to hold onto them but your fear stops
every last ounce of strength to reach out
to grab, for one instant, tangibility in ghosts
skimming the soft recesses of your body.

You kiss to feel more alive but never live
more than the few seconds before everything
melts back into the floor and leaves you
curled inside yourself in the living room,
watching the others' stories unfold before you
just so you can feel like you do have a life.

Millisecond pauses are too long for me to
shut down a life built on avoidance,
perfectly sustainable before you came,
changed the way I felt the world;
I stare out the window at the snow falling,
millisecond shutter clicks capturing
single flakes I am too afraid to search for
before they melt back into the floor.

You need to harden, cool to solidify,
I need to freeze, cool to solidify;
Everything is real when we're together.

I Lay Frozen in a Snowless Winter

Nothing was confusing
when life was a 3-week coma
away from the rush where everyone
goes to get lost from the world in a
sea of neon lights and chrome,
but I am stuck here,
frozen to the bed
in a snowless winter.

A month is all it took
for you to take my everything
in your greedy little hands.
I will never be the same.
I don't seem to mind, though.

If I get laid on Sunday,
the only person I'll see is you
and it scares me that we never
moved past the platonic
cuddling of Yellow Tails,
homemade pizzas,
flashbacks to the 70s
when neither of us lived
nor care to live again.

I can or cannot detach,
will not allow myself to fall
out of these arms
that never held me,
never loved me
because they were afraid
to break apart again.

You're so unstable,
eye of the hurricane
that does not know
if the turmoil waiting
is worth the effort to move
back into again.

So I lay here waiting
For the snow to fall,
the season to fulfill
fantasies as another
man enters my bed
leaving your cologne
covering the trail of
loveless fucking
just to remind me
I am still human.

I have never wanted
the snow to fall more
than when I met you.

All My Friends

There were things we said,
did, wanted to say, do
but it was -- was not
-----
nothing will be the same
everything is the same
I love you on days like these
When turmoil is the only sane thought
-----
Will you run from the sunset with me?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Baby, we have the world here
Leaving is impossible
Loving inevitable
----I want to bury lives
between the sheets
in purely platonic love nests
built on two extra-long twins
pushed together under permanent starlight
-----
Smoke to the sunrise tonight?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We. do. not. get. embarrassed.
Unabashedly, love me.
Unabashedly, live with me.
Unabashedly -------
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck
My heart bursts
when you understand

~~~~~~~~~~

We censor our words
as we laugh at the porch lights
like they are fire,
we the matches who lit the flame
----
believe me, I love you
I cannot change, though,
do not want to
I want to stay here
----
Are you coming or not?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Life is not yours to take,
to steal, to suck the soul out of,
Life is borrowed
------You don't get it
-- I love you, still
------------
You are a drug
No one can break from,
no one can live after
You suck the soul from them
From me, from life
--I love you, still
------------
I cannot explain you;
I do not want to anymore.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fifty cent dates are the best
When the sunset crystalizes
our moments together
in 5-second stills
------we climb bridges
--together
--------------
We have children
born in our imaginations
running wild over waterfalls
where the drought refuses to strike,
heat paled by the passion between us
--------------
We have forever in crystal sunsets.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Honey, you melt me altogether
Everything is perfect, light, whole
Even in the bitchiest hours
of your lingering presence
when even the Turkish skies
Cannot keep us apart
-------
You solidify reality
in sweet sugary cups
dark curls, pale skin
------
You drip like Honey
into my veins

Let Me Go Home, Baby, It's Better There

Inhale the lies,

try to find some hope

where the solitude clings

to lips like the last drag

on a lonely cigarette

in a quiet field of stars.

The air permeates with stillness,

quietude of summers when

nothing was to be missed,

so unlike now when 

everything is in turmoil,

everything missed. Always.

I hear the wind blow

like knives in our backs

as we turn out the world

in our embrace where

every other word is censored. 

You're worried. I'm jaded,

and nothing is the same

as those summers

and everything is the way

it was back then

when you are in my arms

and we laugh at the 

porch lights like they're on fire,

us the match that lit them,

stirring this household

in the middles of a field

full of summer stars in

a snowless winter.

Let me go home, baby, it's better there.

The Both of Us.

Sunset summers ago

I would never have left,

you never would have known

there is something out there

greater than the both of us.

Fuck Me in the Full Moon.

Wake up, fuck me in the full moon

where shadows will lie

as we lay in the grass carpet,

my imperfections paled in the glow

so you will forgive me these words

I refuse to censor, screaming

like it will mean more

if i can just tell you

how it feels to hear

these tiny phrases

whispered through

moonlit breezes

carrying exhalations

over your body,

mine, our loveless,

senseless, passionless

fucking in the grass carpet

where the moonlight

hides my lies.

100 Miles an Hour

I can drive 100 miles an hour

just to feel the rush

I left behind

of the push and pull nonsense

down the neon-lit tracks

as I spin in circles

on my way back to you

who left me lying

here amongst the ashes

of a thousand-ton sunsets

with more color than

lamplight guiding me

down tracks going more than

100 miles an hour.

And all I think of here

is no longer being

here, without you.

My Parent's House

One semester gone,

five months tattered

among the papers

strewn on the dorm room floor.

I want to say I'm going home

-- the home is where the heart is

-- my heart is buried in the paper

somewhere in the center of Brooklyn skies.

I feel the warmth there

in the frozen city of lights

while I slumber in the snowless

winter of these lukewarm Texas nights.

I am a quote out of context

in my parent's house...

get me back to Brooklyn,

Back to Brooklyn,

Brooklyn,

back home,

out of this house.

Agreed?

White.

-------Gray.

Orange.

-------Red.

Reddish-Orange.

-------Orangish-Red.

I agree, you know,

with almost everything

because I want you.

I want you to like it,

like me, like us.

I'll look out my window tomorrow

1000 miles from home,

wonder if you agree:

I can't wait to see you again.

Colonel Mustard, With the Candlestick, in the Kitchen

Take my hand, please,

just let me know you want to care.

Under the table,

from your desk chair,

on your makeshift bed,

let me know you are there.

We could make a mad dash,

throw about the dining hall,

auto-asphyxiation with the noose

before I cut you down with the k-nife.

But Colonel Mustard

has us corned in the kitchen

with the candlestick

and I don't have a Clue

as to what's going on now.

Your Sense of Humor Keeps Me Grounded in New York State

I want to say hello to you

face to face every day I'm away

cleansing myself in the river,

fetching buckets from the well.

I dive under the Mississippi,

swim to the gulf of Mexico,

cleansing myself of the Hudson,

missing the grit of the city

where we met yesterday,

saw a movie and I fell

downstream into your

captivity forever.

Even when I am swimming

 toward the sunlit surface,

 I can reach out to touch your hand

 -- we are still together in the current.

Your red sunrise comes

an hour before my own;

I can feel the warmth

even here, away from home.

Reach out and touch me through the waves,

your smile is my New York State.

Subway Rides are 2 Dollars

You have an apartment in Queens,

Miles from me, but just a two-dollar trip.

Two dollars to see how you really are,

if you mate premeditated words

flickering on a computer screen.

I count the stops from where you are.

8. You have blue eyes, red hair.

7. A puppy -- a love for animals.

6. You gave me your number first

5. Invited me out, straightforward.

4. Will you like me?

3. Am I cute enough?

2. Why am I doing this?

1. Shit. Damn. Fuck.

71st Avenue. Oh, hello, I'm Chase.

Burn

I hate it when I smoke

until the butt burns my lips.

I'm not smart enough

to let it go before then.

Like I'm not wise enough

to say no to all of them,

those men, those beautiful men,

who burn my lips

before I learn to let go.

I"m not the rock star

sitting on my bedside table

in his underwear,

waiting for me to let him down.

I'm like the frosted flakes

in a bowl beside him,

weeping puddle of drenched crispness

stale and frozen to the bottom

like some discarded memorabilia

from four days ago,

the ticket to a show

we were supposed to go

to together but he never showed

so I went there and from there

alone.

I need to learn to put it out

before it burns my lips again.

Let's Go Back to Renaissance, We're Not Sinners There

Come back old philosophies,

We'll enter the realm of material things,

forsake the guilt instilled

by papist sinners in white robes

wound too tight for comfort,

too close for sinful flesh.

Let's go back to Reformation,

out with the pubic leader,

trim the hedges and a plant a bomb, a

new wave of change.

The lumberjack can take a whack

at the terrorist if she'd like

but the old man's got a foot in grave,

the other has ears of nations.

We'll set a bomb a-light, and

rock these Christian foundations.

Let's climb the mountain for the hell of it,

Mount base camps 1 through 3 and make the final score,

hit a Homer, take out the Virgil,

drive Petrarch to the Annals of time.

Fuck this life, clim the mountain,

admire it more than life itself.

I want to go back to Renaissance,

at least there, we're not sinners.

The Air Makes My Balls Fall Off, My Dick Won't See Spring

Three Goddam Fucking Months,

Dry and empty, empty and dry,

look around and wonder why,

Why, God-dammit, WHY

can't I have someone inside?

I look like a fucking creampuff,

groin swelled and clothes to bluff.

The air is thick with fake snow,

empty rain, it's goddamn fucking COLD

like the sheets on my empty bed,

perfectly smooth but oh so chill,

I lie there in my defeated will.

Will someone please fucking fuck me already?

It's so cold my balls are falling off,

I'm afraid my dick won't see Spring.

Please, dear God, Allah, Buddah, Obama,

just give me someone with a thing!

It's so goddam fucking cold

my nuts are buried by squirrels,

I'm afraid my dick won't last the winter

unless it finds somewhere to hide

and escape this goddam thing!

Mr. Wall Street, the Subway Comedian

"Here's a dollar,

I'm gonna pester you

for the ride."

You live on laughter of others

Generated by brashness,

uncanny New York style.

They ask if you work on Wall Street

With your full black ensemble:

thrift store hoodie,

chain-store jeans,

chain dangling from Hardy's belt,

I've got that same jacket at home

It's blue. They cost Fifty-five Ninety-five.

You're not Wall Street,

you're me, 20 years later.

Thanks for the ride.

Beyond Your Eyes is a Galaxy Where the Lies Melt in the Milky Way

It's the same old bullshit.

Day in. Day out.

You've got magic inside your eloquence,

the way words spill over

like 1000 poems on the pavement,

scattered lies covered in daisies.

I have nothing but a quill,

keen eye for the blind,

silver ink dying the crimson papyrus,

Egyptian queens slathering make-up

over eyes that remind me of yours.

Blue meets black and I see,

I finally see, the real thing:

weakness beyond tears,

fiction dissolving in the morse code

of your pink over black, black under pink,

sharp dilation through misty gray.

You have a sea of reconciliation

past that forest of dark lashes;

I cannot help but gaze longingly,

staring into a stream full of stars

you never cared to share.

Every day you fill me with falsetudes,

personal insecurities paling

against the sunspots on my soul.

But beyond your eyes is a galaxy,

I want to linger in the stars,

ride the Milky Way to your soul

to the castle beyond the labyrinth

just so I can decipher

what it is you mean

when you say

"I don't love you anymore"

We Crave Sexually Frustrated Empathy Forged in Monogamous Promiscuity

Bodies bump, grind,

Long days worked, unwind.

Take me in your arms and 

Hear me roar like a sex ferret!

We're not that close,

membranes melt together,

two become one -- BULLSHIT.

We're not that close.

I'm just buried inside of you,

membrane all aglow

Like the lights would be

if I wanted to remember your face.

You're my little cigarette

Inhalation of sweet release

I blow as I exhale.

That's all I needed you for.

Want romance? Too late.

It died with chivalry, an

idiotic fallacy livid in youth. 

I used to believe in chivalry:

Gallant hero stealing the scene.

Then I realized Juliet had Romeo,

Cleopatra her Antony, Adam his Eve.

Mommie Dearest made the latter

painstakingly clear with reforged

visions of the perfect world according 

to the visions of one man among many

who said two men could not lie together

lest they become beasts and fall from their steeds

in the passions and intimacies of foul deeds.

I am chivalry run astray:

I'll open doors, buy roses,

sing you to sleep,

but don't expect my love.

Not anymore.

I crave the innocence of children's eyes.

I yearn for that peaceful ignorance

found buried in Legos in the back of my closet

where I emerged, blinking into a field

of rainbows and unicorns,

the words "totally straight"

scattered on my bedroom floor.

I never had want of the sky,

but I drown in a sea of starlight,

I never wanted the hot, sweaty club scene,

but I got hooked like a cigarette fiend.

All I wanted was pure, unadulterated,

hot, steamy, monogamous cuddling

in the throws of my one true love.

Then, chivalry died.

Then, I lost it: the card. 

The card.

It wasn't sweet kisses,

it was penises everywhere.

Slide, bump, easy, now slow.

Faster, faster, faster!

Love me like THAT!

Through your membrane all aglow,

lights off, sheets down with your head.

Oh God! JUST LIKE THAT: Sonic -- boom.

We crave sexually frustrated empathy

forged in your -- slate grey eyes

your alabaster skin all aglow.

All we got was one night

and the promise of never. 

Where is my knight in dull monogamy?

Lost in the sunset of Amber skies.

The Community of God Expects Their Kingdom Come Today, St. Augustine

They stand with arms to heaven

Naked but for tea-leaf loincloths

Waiting for Kingdom's coming

For Christ to be reborn

Just to see him crucified

Hear his cry: "It is finished."

Their Kingdom comes today.

We are officially in that time:

everyday apocalypse

sinking stock markets and politics

to the recesses of human thought.

In their minty nudity,

they give up the world

craving eternal happiness.

Not me!

I am skeptic, follow probability

Nietzsche, become superhuman

stoic, jump the downstream flow

epicurios, minimize pain, double pleasure

not a quitter, won't surrender 

earth. No! Not for the vague promise

of something better. Ha!

Anything is better than the surface:

9 circles of Hell, Purgatory, Paradisio,

Listen to me, Dante, you describe LIFE!

I'm not that kind of Christian,

maybe God won't notice?

I swallow transcending wisdom in leather-bound dosages

Texts long-dated in confessional lies to God,

Buddah, Satan, Mother Mary, my own fantasies: fallacies.

I confess to thee and thine my will:

I know God and chill with the Devil

in my bed on sinful sheets,

soul's solitary climax

bathed in crumbs and juice,

midnight Mass leading

Emotional Masturbation

knocking on heaven's doors,

begging St. Peter to let me in.

Let me in!

Crimson droplets linger balancing,

falling, melting in throws of passion.

Jesus falls from my lips

to meet the downcast angel.

Internal war disturbing slumber

until I spit them both into the bin

tucked safely under my bed

where the soulless can wrestle

against satin sheets of discomfort

and I pray, to God, I pray

Please, please, just let Him win!

St. Augustine, they crave resurrection!

Can't you just admit the truth in your confessions?

No more stealing pears, no more GUIL,

no more Hymns and voices through others.

Give me the Gospel of Hippos

because the Apocalypse isn't coming because He came.

It is too far beyond us -- beyond you!

They stand there with arms outstretched,

waiting to crucify and resurrect

their soulless longings again,

waiting for Kingdom come.

It is finished, St. Augustine, it is done.

I Wish I Knew How Big You Were Before I Started All This

You have the most

--sincere form of flattery

hidden beneath your clothes

You have the least

--pleasure I have ever known

knestled against my waist

We have no meaning

--beyond the intimacies outside the bedroom

beyond cuddling & kissing & all that bullshit

Get cho freak on

--get cho freak on

--get cho

too bad your shortcomings override.