Ambien Dreams

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Ambien Dreams

Breathe so heavy that the blanket breathes with me

watching the smoke detector so closely it'll never get the chance

to bolt out the window like I know it's thinking

because I'm so goddamn real that I can see its thoughts when I close my

eyes of precious stones and bodies of straight gravel they 

pound for pound are the strongest spirit animals I've spoken with

raccoons and foxes traded soft for hard and jagged and

even the owls don't seem to mind they're too heavy to fly again

so they oversee production on a road must be somewhere important

laying down the furs and pelts they've traded for 

and I can feel eyes like there are four or five of us

but the bodies mirage when I try too hard to focus

if I'm in a cave it has a mouth

if I'm not there's a whale nearby

and they're both trying to swallow me whole

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There you have it, post number twenty-seven. I love that number.(approach with trepidation)

Thanks

I don't usually get into the holiday spirit much. Don't get me wrong, I like to give and I like to receive, I like to dress up and be with family and be thankful. I especially like to get drunk and dance in the snow to chime in a new year. Maybe it's the whole "good will towards men" thing that I'm not in tune with. Either way, as Thanksgiving passed, I did take a moment to reflect on what I'm thankful for, so I wrote about it. I very recently received my 2000th hit, and that's a big deal to me. So I would like to extend my thanks to you, dear reader. My words might as well be so much ash without someone to read them. So cheers, and tell your friends.

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Thanks

I'm thankful for insomnia
or mostly just the cause
like people who can sleep at night
don't have any thoughts worth keeping them up

Also leather, cats, the ocean, bones
trees, stars, feathers and words
and the way I can wield them

Magic and Tigers and Girls and Ghosts
but mostly the way I don't need to say that
because some things I'll always
be thankful for

And for my state of mind
and that I have the courage to say it
without worrying
about it dissolving
from beneath me
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There you have it, post number twenty-six. (approach with trepidation)

Fears and Hospitals

I've been developing a fascination with words used to describe harm or violence, often used out of that context. This poem is about a kind of loss, which I am simultaneously clueless about and quite familiar with. I can't really explain it, and judging from what I've written here, I hope I don't have to experience any time soon, because I'm clearly ill prepared for it. Also, please forgive my chaotic punctuation, I've never really gotten the hang of properly punctuating poetry. I'll work on that.

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Fears and Hospitals

All these afflictions

from a list, laundry-like

expressed clinically

and dispassionate

Dry

like my eyes

in stark contrast to yours

But my sleep's been stretched

thin, full of holes

or artificial and stupor-like

the product of sleep aids and alcohol

in stark contrast to yours

comatose

until moments ago

Now I know what fountain

this feeling springs from

that twists tendrils

round my ankles and shoots

chills charging past my shins

fills my throat with water

I can breathe but I can't swallow

like your swollen and tender

will not allow

your chest and it's broken

ragged breaths

and how you shake from the

searing and shooting

to draw them

I'll never see again

thesameform thesamegrace thesameshape

never curl myself around those

shattered clavicles

serpentine 

ohgod

what if I wake

all twisted in dreams

and can't bear to leave my bed

and you're not there to temper me?

ohgodohgod

Our eyes are 

temporarily the same

when they talk about 

just how so very long

they expect before you'll walk again

and I have to leave the room

ohgodohgodohgod

And all I can think of is

how I need a drink 'cause

I can't deal with this

and where are my meds

and I'm not all here

and if bones are your problem

you can have mine I don't need them

cut bits of my ribs or my shins or my spine

my fingers take my fingers

I'll hold the scissors

ohgodohgodohgodohgod

I'm just bits

and parts and pieces

connected by tissues

and tendons

and creases

and without you that's all I can be

I don't need the sum of my parts

I need you, goddamnit

But all this wild-eyed fear

I plant beneath the surface

because the last thing you need

is my typical breathless

wandering chaotic

thought trains and panics

I'll summon strength for you

if I can manage

and squeeze your sweet fingers

undamaged

and say

"Baby, can I get you a sandwich?"

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There you have it, post number twenty-five. (approach with trepidation)

Blues

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Blues

Girl's got bruises on her heart
you can see from across the room
When we got to talking
I could tell that they were new

freshly black and green
purple and blue
but despite all the damage
She's so goddamn cute

and my skin's grown thick enough at last
that when she bites it doesn't sting
and the rattle of prescription bottles from her pocket
is no longer frightening

so I took her to a seedy bar
where they turn the lights down low
I poured out her beer
and she poured out her woes

I went to the jukebox
and put on the blues
because I knew that's what she had
but not sure that she knew

I put one hand on her waist, 
the other around her hand
her eyes went wide, she stammered and blushed
opened her mouth to protest, but found herself hushed

I started swaying to and fro
and told her to shut the fuck up
with no ill will in mind
she managed to shake off the shakeup

and she smiled
real quick
and real quiet
in secret

and we danced.
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There you have it, post number twenty-four. (approach with trepidation, such trepidation)

Conflict!

(oh goodness, dear readers, it appears our host has been at the hooch. Take this as you will, we're only trying to help, really)

Gandhi famously said "Be the change you want to see in the world." Well, I have a T-shirt that says "Be the trouble you want to see in the world." I agree with that more than Gandhi. I want to trouble the world. I want the world to look at me and say "Here is a problem, one that requires our attention." Only then will change be affected.

The world only changes when they are scared of something. We (the USA, where I live) only went to the moon because we were afraid the communists would get there first. We only discovered the ability to generate power because we first decided to fuck up someone's day by splitting the atom. Lasers have recently taken a huge stride forward because they can be used to defend ourselves from intercontinental ballistic missiles. Now, for $300, I can buy a laser with the power to permanently blind someone and set things on fire. (imagine the possibilities!)

Comedian Louis CK (whom I adore) said in a stand up gig that "Boys fuck things up; Girls are fucked up." Well, maybe the world needs men (or boys who've grown into men) to fuck things up because conflict drives change. Just a few days ago, I was preaching love as a means to further the space program, and today I'm advocating conflict because it drives things forwards. To paraphrase agent Kay from Men In Black: "Imagine what [I'll be preaching] tomorrow."

This is why I'm not a world leader, and why people consider me disturbed at best, and stark-raving mad at worst. Like the Verve (in "Bittersweet Symphony", of course) said: "I'm a million different people from one day to the next." And for my last horrendous quote, Truman Burbank (from "The Truman Show"): "Good morning, [readers.] And, in case I don't see you, Good afternoon, Good evening, and Goodnight."

(I stopped him from quoting Fight Club, the poor dear. You should thank me)

There you have it, post number twenty-three. (approach with trepidation)

Dead Astronauts Part 3

Neil Armstrong is dead. That brings the already small number of our species who have walked on another world down even lower. There have been 12, now there are 8 left. One day in the not-too-distant future our children might look at the moon like some kind of fairy tale, a pipe dream from an antiquated and unrealistic past. Like the opulent cars of the 1930's, when certain economic events rendered them laughable, bizarre artifacts of a world that no longer exists. Children will look up at the moon and say "There were men up there once." (I already do this)

It's because we're too busy dealing with the dirt-centric problems in our world to look up anymore. Not even the important issues like how we can generate the energy (nuclear, damn you) required by our numbers and technology and yearning for discovery. Not how we can make ourselves last longer (transhumanism, damn you) so that we aren't lost to our mortality at the pinnacle of our knowledge. No, petty things. We worry about if someone will point a gun at us and take what we have, so maybe we'd better make sure we have a bigger gun first. We worry about which member of our respective nations (damn you) will get to wear the shiny hat and tell us all what to do for the next period of time. We bury ourselves in little made-up worlds that are small enough to keep us from feeling insignificant. (I'm guilty too, I know, stop looking at me like that)

I read a quote from Charles Bukowski the other day. He's most well known for being an accomplished poet and a jerk (See Bukowski by Modest Mouse). He said "We're all going to die. All of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn't. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing." He's right, you know. 

Very recently a man named Felix Baumgartner rode a helium balloon to the top of our world. He opened the door, looked around, and jumped back down to the ground. It took him three hours to get up and four minutes to fall back down. He broke the sound barrier on his way. He travelled up to 833 miles per hour. He travelled 24 miles, one way. That man is a hero to me, not because of his world records, but because for the first time in a while, he gave us a reason to look up again. (His small step actually was a giant leap)

An energy drink company put a man in space during a time when the most powerful nations on earth believe that pursuit to no longer be worth paying for, and they did it just so he could jump back down. Maybe they figured we've been wandering around and staring at and fighting over the same rock for as long as we've existed, maybe it's time we started walking around the block. Or maybe they wanted to be rich and famous, I don't know. The truth is if we could just love each other a little bit, then we could all be astronauts, and save them from extinction.

We're all so broken down here, give me a way to rise. Please.

There you have it, post number twenty-two. (approach with trepidation)

I'm gonna go see Deftones play now. Have a good night.

While Everyone

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While Everyone

I wanna meet her

while everyone is dancing

and dance with her

while everyone is leaving

and whisper with her

while everyone is sleeping

and walk with her

while everyone is driving

and sing to her

while everyone is eating

and listen to her

while everyone is talking

and kiss her

while everyone is fighting

and fight her 

while everyone is fucking

and love her

while everyone is watching

and bury her

while everyone is crying

and remember her

while everyone is moving

and forget her

while everyone is meeting

and then

everyone is dancing again

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There you have it, post number twenty-one. (approach with trepidation)

Alone

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Alone

when I'm alone

I drink

and dance

like you wouldn't believe

even if I told you

I sway and sweat

slain in the spirit

when the music touches me

I go where it wants

to take me

when there's no one around

to shake their head

then I shake and cry

and laugh and spasm

all at once

because what's the difference?

you don't have enough skin

to tattoo what I'm feeling

under

it's a horrible means

as I throw myself

around in most dramatic fashion

to a wonderful end

I destroy a little of myself

with a smile

so I can create.

Because they say you die twice

you know

it's a wonderful end

I can't help but wonder

if this comfort doesn't lessen

my chances at trying it another way

if I had all my wasted hours back

would I rather waste them with you?

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That was...difficult, but maybe more true than anything I've written in a long time. I may be on to something here. No promises, but stay tuned. 

There you have it, post number twenty. (approach with trepidation, I mean it)

Let someone else talk

I now ask that with trepidation you approach not works of my own, but works of men far older, more talented, and deader than I. The following are not my poems, but poems I love and have cherished for a long time through my own experience with writing. Please enjoy, and I will resume normal, non-stolen postings hereafter.

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ANARCHY.
JOHN HENRY MACKAY.

Ever reviled, accursed, ne'er understood,
Thou art the grisly terror of our age.
"Wreck of all order," cry the multitude,
"Art thou, and war and murder's endless rage."
O, let them cry. To them that ne'er have striven
The truth that lies behind a word to find,
To them the word's right meaning was not given.
They shall continue blind among the blind.
But thou, O word, so clear, so strong, so pure,
Thou sayest all which I for goal have taken.
I give thee to the future! Thine secure
When each at least unto himself shall waken.
Comes it in sunshine? In the tempest's thrill?
I cannot tell--but it the earth shall see!
I am an Anarchist! Wherefore I will
Not rule, and also ruled I will not be!

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INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP.
ROBERT BROWNING

 I.

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon:
  A mile or so away,
On a little mound, Napoleon
  Stood on our storming-day;
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,
  Legs wide, arms locked behind,
As if to balance the prone brow
  Oppressive with its mind.

 II.

Just as perhaps he mused "My plans
  "That soar, to earth may fall,
"Let once my army-leader Lannes
  "Waver at yonder wall,''---
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew
  A rider, bound on bound
Full-galloping; nor bridle drew
  Until he reached the mound.

 III.

Then off there flung in smiling joy,
  And held himself erect
By just his horse's mane, a boy:
  You hardly could suspect---
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,
  Scarce any blood came through)
You looked twice ere you saw his breast
  Was all but shot in two.

 IV.

"Well,'' cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace
  "We've got you Ratisbon!
"The Marshal's in the market-place,
  "And you'll be there anon
"To see your flag-bird flap his vans
  "Where I, to heart's desire,
"Perched him!'' The chief's eye flashed; his plans
  Soared up again like fire.

 V.

The chief's eye flashed; but presently
  Softened itself, as sheathes
A film the mother-eagle's eye
  When her bruised eaglet breathes;
"You're wounded!'' "Nay,'' the soldier's pride
  Touched to the quick, he said:
"I'm killed, Sire!'' And his chief beside
  Smiling the boy fell dead.

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The Hollow Men

T. S. ELIOT

Mistah Kurtz—he dead.

      A penny for the Old Guy

      I

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us—if at all—not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

      II

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death’s dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind’s singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death’s dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat’s coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer—

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom

      III

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death’s other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

      IV

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death’s twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.

      V

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o’clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
                                For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
                                Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
                                For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

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There you have it, post number nineteen. (approach with trepidation)

Shivers

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Shivers

your skin, susurrus, susurrus, 

curls smokey around my outline

between ill-at-ease and shivers

I've been looking like hell for quite some time

the condition of my spine

is not your business business

but demurity could ply my tongue

cap ti vay ted by your fitness

I'd be lying if I said I didn't

rant and rave about you when I'm 

knee-deep inside my bottle

climbing rooftops to catch 

a breath of air to converse with

because our world has been on fire

when I shake murmurous murmurous

like I've caught the holy ghost

who's gonna exercise me?

slapping my hand against the post

I wish I could put you in a vial

for when I crave that comeliness comeliness

oh your sugar on my tongue

and not our derelict lilting dalliance

and I'm building an updated

version of me, out of

a sturdier material, I hope

kicking in doors bruised

shins and shadows stapled

to the floor for their mischief

The worst part of it all

Is I can see you sitting

calmly smiling 

hoping that I'm rising 

to the occasion

While I might as well be

sitting paralyzed

with fear 

playing operation

on the living room

floor

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There you have it, post number eighteen. (approach with trepidation)

Mentiroso

I speak a little Spanish. I studied it for a while in high school, and I have an appreciation for the aesthetic quality of the language. It can sound quite beautiful when not a harsh high-speed trill, but more carefully enunciated, like is spoken in Spain. I admit, my Spanish is not good enough to write this outright, so I used a translator to help me out a bit. As you read it, even if you don't speak the language, try and say the words out loud to yourself. Get a feel for them. It's not just about the meaning, the words themselves are important too.

This was inspired by a disjointed, adventurous dream I had. Only being able to remember bits and pieces can be helpful, sometimes.

For simplicity's sake: http://translate.google.com/

Go ahead, it's not cheating, I promise.

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Mentiroso

covered in a thin layer of sweat
como la escarcha de la desvelo
down the tunnel, tight and dim
huye el mentiroso
bag laden with ill-gotten goods
con todo tesoro mio
hesistates, hearing me plead
"No me tires a las arañas"
kneeling, placed them on the ground
para reunir como diosecillos
The holy book tucked in my robes
las palabras sagradas
is in a language I cannot speak
una lengua ajena extraña
but I can still read it
con mis costillas
I traced his steps to the cliffside
pero se desapareció
cliffside is such a beautiful word
sin embargo, un final amargo
madman, I journeyed home
discutiendo con mi reflejo
there's a girl in the house
olvidada/reclusa/esclava
forbidden from leaving
herir apretado
so happy to see me
ella cae de su ropa
but it's all nonsense
las mentiras de la mente
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There you have it, post number seventeen. (approach with trepidation)

Dead Astronauts Part 2

Let's admit it: space is scary. We live in a tiny bubble in a very hostile reality. If you were instantly transported out of our bubble and anywhere else in the entire universe, you would die in seconds. Every time. It's too hot or too cold, there's radiation and solid objects moving very quickly. Things are blowing up and coalescing. Maybe, just maybe, there's something...someone out there too, watching or perhaps plotting.

That being said, I want to explore all of these frightening and dangerous things. I want to stand on the solar-wind swept surface of a lifeless rock, looking into the blue-hot face of a star that takes up my entire field of view. I want to feel heat and cold unlike anything experienced on my home planet. I want to shake hands (or membranes, or tentacles or pseudopods) with the natives of these strange new places. I want to stand on the surface of a titanic planet, and gaze on a mountain the size of the continent I was born on.

Obviously, I can't. I'll die. Even if I wouldn't, these places are impossibly far away. Our closest neighbor star (proxima centauri, the nearest centaur) is 4.24 light years away. If I was born today on a state-of-the-art spacecraft travelling towards it at maximum velocity, I would die of old age before we arrived. So the best I can do is chew up scientific journals like travel brochures of the most far off and exotic places that will ever be. They might as well be fiction, they're so impossible to reach. And if they're fiction, I might as well create a few of my own.

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Dead Astronauts

silent
sleepless
star sailors
visors down
so your face becomes theirs
too close to death
to reach the next port
even when they were born
stepping aboard
celestial schooners
sacrificing their minds
and bodies
for a scant chance 
at being a corpse
washed up on strange shores
exposed to blackness
beyond the backdrop
of the stars that scar our ceilings
while the rest of us slowly circle
staring at our hunters and swans
crabs and bulls
lighthouses
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There you have it, post number sixteen. (approach with trepidation)

Priest

(Nothing much to say.)
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I dreamed I was a Mayan priest, sequestered away in the royal chamber atop the second-grandest of our pyramids, second only to our Great God-Emperor. Draped in the finest silk and gold fashions and adorned with sparkling jewels of all kinds, glinting in the golden glow of the torch sconces in the night. Tailor's and artisan's own empires rose and fell depending on my choice of their product or their competitors. My dozen concubine harem splayed across my bed pouting and moaning, catering to my every base desire. Servants cooked my food, drew my baths, entertained me with song and with poetry. If I was wrathful, they were scorned, if I was magnanimous, they were praised.

My only duty was to the people. I was to take the wisdom granted me by the Gods and bestow it on our subjects. I was very fortunate to have such a connection. None of us, save our Great God-Emperor, could claim to have the ear of a God, or to hear the voice of one. Our Great God-Emperor had once told me the holiest path was from the Gods' lips to my ears. Therefore the holiest of duties was mine to perform.

Such was the occasion that night. It was a festival, and we had been hard at work. My servants had heard the woes of hundreds of our villagers, and selected a dozen of the most difficult problems for me. They ascended the great pyramid, hearts and souls heavy with great trouble. One by one the knelt before me and poured out their troubles. They came with problems difficult and varied, complex and trying. Paradoxes and cosmic questions and horrid moral dilemmas by the handful. 

I had no answers for them. 

I opened my mouth to apologize for lacking the wisdom my station suggested. From deep within me came an incredible sound. Holy music, a divine reverberation. The rumble of thunder, the blast of cannon fire, the roar of colossal engines and ancient beasts. The keen of whale song, air-raid sirens, funeral mourners and shearing metals. Children laughing, stars burning, hearts beating and chains clinking. All these things and more spilled from my mouth in that moment; simultaneous, blurring, layered. 

I closed my mouth suddenly, in surprise. The troubled peasants making prostrations at my feet had tears welling in their eyes. Looks of profound gratitude stained their faces, as if this sound could carry away all their woes.
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There you have it, post number fifteen. (approach with trepidation)

Nebula quickwrite

This is just a few words I wrote from the point of view of a deep-space explorer seeing a star system out the window of his ship. I've been playing around with sections of prose awash in decadent detail. I'm not sure I succeeded, but it's a start.


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Even a dead star can light up your sky. This one did so with vision; little white dwarf. The tendrils of purple gas clouds curled tenderly around their mother. From one angle they wrapped her remains in the folds of a burial shroud, thankful. From another angle, horrid tentacles gripped to drag her to an unmarked grave. And she hummed her nebulous children to sleep. What a song! The low rumble like an earthquake under lilting cries and warbles. It reminded me of whale song. Had I heard whale song? Perhaps in my childhood, but those creatures paled, anemic, in the face of this violet sepulcher in front of me. There were times in my journey when I was faced with such majesty that I thought of finally stopping. My eyes would flick to the airlock. It wouldn’t take much to just open the windows on my little ship. I could float out without regret and make this system my home. Space is funny like that. Nothing ever really dies. This system was both dying and just being born. From different angles, you could say. My own heart is just an engine made from the remnants of a dying star. I’d just be going home. Home...


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There you have it, post number fourteen. (approach with trepidation)

Tenebrous

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Tenebrous


The bloated, dying sun
oozing red rays
through the tenebrous sky
tripping over particulates floating
that lose their way in sick
jaundiced haze
before falling
exhausted and diffuse
on my skin


So, finding no pleasure in the heavens
I turned to the earth
The off-white cobbles 
over which I walked
(and I dare not call them cobblestones
for here and there I swear I spy
an orbit or a clinging tooth)
lead a rambling path through plains
of iron shards
rusted
desiccated
thirsty
in twisted mockery of grass
if you draw your hand down
near their tips
they strain towards you
like magnetism
or hunger


Scattered across those
Tetanus Fields
were old stone tables
like pagan altars of ages gone
adorned with ram-horned women
who strike carnal poses
beckon and thrust and moan
sweating for the taste
and press
of flesh


and far behind me
the air, it shook
with the sound of
creaky-hinged doors
of prisons and dungeons
as the great swinging arms
and razor wire
and wastebins
of the harvester
trailing its ashes behind
searching
always searching
for what, I do not know


so I followed that
yellowing path
to the crumbling city
since the outskirts seemed so...
insidious


There amid the 
crumbling brownstones
and ruddy clay bricks
all smeared with ash and tar
and saints-know-what-else filth
I came upon
a cheery gentleman


He wore a crooked stovepipe hat
and a rakish grin
a longtailed coat with a row
of bright brass buttons
and a familiar wink
a sharp sort of man
to say the least


He tipped his hat and greeted
"Good evening, Madam."
though I am a sir
and as I squinted in questioning
I came to realize my error


I had seen him before
beside my bed
when I woke
had I woke?


Then I could see the truth of him
every tooth pointed
eight fingers on his hands
Brass irises; eyes of the damned
smokey wisps peeking and fleeing
between his hat and raven curls
and his outline like a migraine
the walls are wrong
the walls are wrong


So I shrank, I'm not ashamed
from the devil before me
and turned to make my escape
down a candlelit alleyway


Lying black and savage
in my path
with the size and stature of a stag
a dreadful thing
like what chases wolves in their dreams
and it chews on a cast-iron chain
like a dog on a bone
dripping red-tinged ichor
and wears a stately collar
like a mans, not a dogs


It looked at me
and I knew it knew
everything I'd ever hidden
and though mine did,
its gaze never left me


Its gaze never left me.


and I ran, I'm not ashamed.


In my panicked state
I caught a glimpse and a mouthed word
from a raven-haired girl
with a white bonnet cap
tattooed with birds
flying from her clavicles
demure and pouting
lips not quite hiding little fangs
and those damned brass eyes
sparkling with lively intelligence
looking back over her shoulder 
down the street that I ran:
Delicious


Thus I awoke
in my bed
with no cheery gentleman beside
But I'm afraid I won't be joining you tonight
dear friends
for it seems in my state
I wrote on my walls:


THEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGTHEYARECOMINGT
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There you have it, post number thirteen. (approach with trepidation)

Matador

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Matador


It's a bull
slumbering atop 
blossoms beneath
blue and pink
and green between them
whose nectar I would greedily drink
dribbling down my chin
as such is my weakness


Chestnut and blonde
the taut flanks rise
serenely sleeps the beast
notched and splintered
crimson cloves
the taut flanks fall


Stirring my tongue
to talking
and other things
readying fingers
for action
and other things


I can't be sure
without the truth of the eyes
stripped of protections
just how many bones are buried beneath
the scars are well-hidden too
because the bull will not speak


And yet I have a feeling
if I take up my cape and sabre
I'll end up beneath
left broken and bloody
with those cloven marks
pressed
on my damned matador's heart


because it sleeps
and I do not.
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There you have it, post number twelve. (approach with trepidation)

While the ink is wet

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While the Ink is Wet


pulling back indigo drapes
two moons
full and bright
fight for rulership
of your night
shining such as sun-spared skin
of Oriental women
and these moons heave with breath


keeping them within arm's reach
to catch a glimpse
(just a glimpse)
of those holy tattoos
those winking inks
and the exotic lands they promise
before blindness
off the light reflected
from her belt buckle


It might be a man's world
but we built
it all for
you
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There you have it, post number eleven. (approach with trepidation)

TBP#1: Broadripple is Burning

This first selection from The Basilisk project was composed to the song "Broadripple is Burning" By Margot and the Nuclear So and So's. I encourage you to listen to the song as well as enjoy the story I've written below. There are a few different versions of the song, the one I listened to was from the Daytripper sessions. You can find the song on youtube, and their own website is here.
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When Tyler arrived at the farm house, Markus was occupying a few stairs in the yard. Dust caked his face, save for two symmetrical trails from the corners of his eyes to his chin. He was camouflaged against the dirt-colored, unharvested grain waving in the field behind him. The stairs he occupied had been put up two summers back, and his father had planned a shed to attach to them, but caught a bullet before he could start on it.

A dozen yards from Markus was an idling armored car. Men with guns and masks marched purposefully from the house to the car and back again. Each man carried an armful of goods to be stowed in the back of the intimidating vehicle. One of them raised a rifle when he noticed Tyler’s approach.

“Don’t fuckin’ move.” He more suggested than ordered in a gravelly, sleep-deprived voice.

Tyler’s hands went up. “No trouble, just talkin’ to my friend here.” He explained, motioning to Markus.

The gunman kept the rifle trained but took a few steps back, leaning back on the grill of the armored car.

“We heard they hit your family, so I came over quick as I could. What happened?” Tyler said, planting himself on the stairs next to Markus.

“Everything I thought I had has gone to shit.” Markus slurred. He reached down next to his leg and grabbed a paper bag wrapped bottle, took a swig without a wince, and continued.

“They’re the gang that shot m’dad, too. They jus’ drove up this mornin’ and told me to give ‘em the keys and stay out of the way, or they’d shoot me down and take everything anyway.”

“What’s that?” Tyler motioned at the bottle.

“It’s not important.” Markus took another swig and passed the bottle over. Judging by his tone, Tyler wasn’t even sure he’d heard the question.

“Where’s your Mom?” Tyler questioned

“Prob’ly sick off huffin’ glue somewhere in town. Since dad died she ain’t been of any use, you know that.”

“Sister?”

“Katie lit outta town last week, hitchhiking. Got picked up by some truck headed north. Might be dead now for all I know. With any luck she’s somewhere better’n here.”

Tyler took a tug on the bottle and choked on the rancid liquor inside. He passed the bottle back and asked:

“So what’re you gonna do?”

Markus stood and smiled.

“Doesn’t matter. Anything I get, they’ll just take from me. Think I’ll just wander a while, see the sights.”

He shuffled unsteadily to the dilapidated fence, swung one leg over and looked back across his shoulder at his friend.

“Hell, I’m a free man now.”

With that he finished crossing into that dirty wheat field and disappeared into their swaying stalks, singing a wandering song.

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There you have it, post number ten. (approach with trepidation)