Soon

I'll be close
close enough to blow a whisper into your sleep,
bottle laugher and deliver it fresh at your doorstep.
Without a word we'll share the same slice of sky,
mouths tired
from too many smiles smiled together
memories live in the corners of the mouth
the sweet soreness of pointed yesterdays
promises a closer tomorrow.

I found this poem in the crack between my bed and the wall

Suddenly I've got eyes
who refuse to translate the heated metaphors
clever black feathers
his face turned away to the place morning can't touch
its dew hands pushed away by dreams
the brightness barely contained by thick curtainy green
the bed is still comfortable
after 6 drunken hours
the sunlight doesn't matter,
limbs rearrange
in sleepy affection
no matter how sharp it tried,
clarity could not become that smile.

been making zines so poetry energy has sort of gone into that

the adventure buzzed ahead of us,
the traffic jam tearing its splendors from our reach
we followed for so many hours
caught it with expense and urgency,
this is the right time for talking,
and telling stories about spaces we filled:
voices in every modulation and medium
left their marks in the air
and even though the both of us have gone
that place will remember our names.


threaded along
this homeless game
is sharpening its teeth
as the stakes raise
I can just about cough out a bluff.

grumble

the hours winnow out
and patience cracks
loyalty leaks through the cracks.

got too hot on the ride home

the brain is too slow for a sizzle
grilled cheese of the mind is limp and less than crisp
still cold
stiff in the middle.

up too late (no edting)

tender angles
I hope that feline motor sings you dreams so sweet,
So sweet the birds won't be able to touch your morning.
behind the eyelash curtains
possibilities play out their caramelized rehearsals
with every run-through it gains in gossamer and tension
it's the small movements that matter the most
In that magic geometry all the angles mattered,
even those measured by touch alone.



When you smashed insects out of their twilight lives
some of their wings flew back into the night



Scratching for the rent money,
I let the eyes fractal over;
dry-red,
the desperation stratifies my dreamspace.

such a sad climax

heart not just broken,
but shredded up the spine of the story
cracked throat
wound to a dry silence
not every story lifts the voice
this endgame is a miser of sounds
swift movements auction off the possibility of tears.

3 day yard sale

We hung them in the yard
as a series of dusty anecdotes
price-marked talismans
drink sweet breathy sunshine
and hope for new journeys.


Too many sharks on the airwaves,
shakes down radical intentions
leaves the trees lonely and thin.


Found your mouth,
sunshine-strong
letting the language grow
so small.
In the shade of our near silence
we dodged metaphors all afternoon.

Well that was unproductive...

Sometimes the tension festers beneath the fingernails,
pins you down all day long
fastens the mind to every too-big intention
and spins the fingers into a web of missed possibilities.

Unproductive visit to campus

While the afternoon pursed its lips
the leaves were making so much noise!

up way too late.

grumbled insomnia
absurd
but cozy.

a poem, very slowly wound

A light cracks under the door
and a burnt shoulder freckles to life,
movement smooths over the hallway sounds
and both mouths transition—
become a doubled pocket watch
meticulously twisting into balance

I lost gravity in the angled space,
between that curving spiral arm
and time made slow, sweet strides across our numbered faces.

I LOVE THE GINGERS (Collaboration with Jessie)

I want your biscuits
and snow on the ground
there is synesthesia in the weather
and you are raining down
in huckleberry drops

I am diner coffee in your veins
while the foyer boys headbang
to the beat of your heart

the music floats
with the grace of a bumble-bee
stops- and collects
in an atonal mist
around the neck

tonguing the shape of "S"'s and "L"'s
up the nape into your ears

There is a small thud
as music crashes into taste buds
crisscrossed feelings radiate out
and the absurd
takes our laughter
for a bangin' ride

partypost

Sweet beets,
we ALL lost some clothing
and the mosquitoes punctured themselves into
sweet red joy
this show requires at least 3 costume changes
and the correct alchemy of pressure.

Smidgen

In the middle of the sunshine
waiting for the time to ripen
leisurely decisions yielded delightful disorder.

Marrow

a jagged cornerless page:
the lines missing didn't make a difference.
I plan to replace that pen.
The concave thought is enough.
convinced to tolerate the earwigs
I dizzied until the sprinklers came out.
In the distant creek beds
your voice rattles off the rocks
so soft,
the mosquitoes don't even matter.

small collaboration:

At 10:37
The streetlights are throbbing like ten million moons,
I'm out in the yard
screaming like a lawnmower
and threading a song in the spokes of your bicycle.
When the music reaches you
our minds climb through the roof
and I am circling your sleep.
If you let me in,
we would make good metaphors.

What am doing with my life?

the heaviness came from somewhere
adding density to splayed brain-fractals
ideas losing electricity to a smiling gravity
the game gets serious.

few

My proximity to a computer has been really spotty lately. sorry about that.

8/10
There is something
from the distance
rushing in
and beginning to cusp.

8/9
Our closeness devoured the hours
found us dry (and drinkless) 4 in the afternoon.
We out-geeked each other
and edged past the middle of night.

8/10
The termites flew into my windshield
& died like a tangerine sun
suspiciously colorful.

Poem Bomb

8/7
Romantic
and wearing only shoes
our skin became a topography of light.
In thousands of salty pinpricks,
the flickers folded around the body.
It was too cold.
We laughed uncontrollably until it wasn't
and ignited magic in the shallows of the sound.

8/4
reconstituted atmosphere breathes paltry music
the swelter is only 40% suffocation
the coffee deposits the leftover numbers.

8/3
our shadows tremble-
the rectangular edges wiggling
as they sweep over the dry terrain.
I can smell the onionfields
breathing into the colorless air.


Through the fog
a yawning rad ladder and its arced pinstripes
climb up to sky.
Softly swaying exhilaration is punctuated
by winking dolphin backs
they cut sharp little ruptures
in the infinitely flinching surface,
green and wizened
the water dances like a time-worn tarp in the wind.

8/2
As the dreams leave you
school children become less like birds.
the fog settles asymmetrically
and we have to climb towards the sunshine
as the steel arteries race beneath out feel.

7/30
smaller tones of morning burble out from gypsy mouths
traveling tongues scale the brambled hillside,
the colors collecting around the ankles and knees
like bees
harvesting the sweet intensity of yellow.

7/29
Bearded hero
dusting the roadside with literature and anarchy
scaffolding humanity with words frantic & desperate.
Using distanced language
& backward anthropomorphic metaphors
the legal tropes are tendered
toward him from stubborn uniforms.
Each objection falls hollow and tinny
against 6 rocky syllables
"We are all citizens."

7/28
We picked up two hitchhikers
and bonded in bookstore
as they scribbled away in the back
I could feel my body being written into their stories.

7/27
The force behind those eyes is soul splitting.
That hard-edged gaze plays Hiroshima on my heart,
each feeling fractures and explodes.

I drempt last night
of walking through the streets of your poetry.
Buildings composed of pure music,
punctuated by thin cobblestone alleyways.

We at garlic bulbs like they were apples,
stripped off and discarded any trace of nonchalance,
we walked until our legs were sore,
and both out souls were a little bit cracked.

7/26
Even beneath the overcast morning
the roadside is shades brighter
than those deep ominous trees back home.
Maybe the salty sea-fog
contains invisible level of yellow.

7/25
with sound
Led Zeppelin lubricates our relationship with the road
we gaze hungrily forward
as our wheels hunch toward the coast.

7/24
a drop of spotted shine
floats nearly full in the late July skyline.
Down by the froggy fingers of lake,
the trees look thinner in the moonlight.


Post-Mortem Break-up Poem
I loved you so much
I let the sunsets slip through my fingers.
Touch losing the colors
I was slowly forgetting how to use.

Instead of that proverbial knife,
you cut my like a rusty hacksaw from WWII
slowly
embedding nostalgic particulates with each toothy twitch.
I'm still picking pieces of you out of what left of me.
No way to distinguish what might make me stronger
just a body
not letting go.
A hole.
New world where I can't close my eyes
from how it all looks different now,
like beautiful only meant something we could share.
Give back my beauty!
I'd like at least half of every moment we shared.
My beauty is too big for those small hands,
to rich and deep to lose its color
& baby I'm climbing back out and up that horizon
Gonna recapture my sunset.

7/23
Soft chatter blankets the brain
my body finding more weight in the simple
while waiting,
the mood softly settles
A family breathes beneath the words
"We all love you"

7/22
List of things done today:
bunker music
gambled with distance in an afternoon race (all the way past Sequim)
Typewriter altitude overlooking La Push
Switch-backed roads tunneled over with forest
Lemon drops & a whiskey sour
Pulled a lever and drinks were on the house
10+ the last dollar in my pocket.

7/21
1
When the ocean exhales a small patch of death
sea birds swarm on that far-off spot
like fleas
fighting over the smallest scrap of skin.

2
Small adventures stretch their legs
we made a 15-minute friend.
He was very obviously Canadian.

3
A tangerine that glows pink
(or maybe it's a clementine sun)
the waves shivered into its colorful disciples
& yawned purple into the sky.