courage

i often wonder about
c o u r a g e .
it is often mistaken
for stupidity.
is courage an act
or is it an action
?
i'm never quite sure about this ...
any of this.
what is so
worthwhile
to put yourself in
harm's way?
L O V E ?
mostly.
but often not.
Love is often mistaken
for lust,
for comfort,
for revenge,
and for retribution.
the stakes are high.
it is a crime of passion.
it is a crime of want.
Love as an act of defiance
is as good as it gets.
defy the traditions,
the expectations,
the wanting need,
and love as freely 
as possible
for the sake of love,
in the hope of loving
more
again, longer, farther
than we ever considered
loving before.
just give it for the hell of it,
because it is the only thing
worth giving.
it is a true gift
without guilt.
now that's 
c o u r a g e .

cellophane daydream

the days drip
away
in silence.

they don't care
enough
to hate me the
way
they used to.

i used to be a fucker.
i used to be a fiend.
now i'm afraid of getting shot
on my way home from
the grocery store,
so i remain silent
in the same way
the days
drip away.

i used to be able
to go an hour straight
without pause.
now, i go an hour
without any hope
of climax.

the joints
feel as if they're
trying to wrench out
from under the skin.

pouring salt in the wounds
doesn't help anymore,
and i have a bad tooth
that needed to be pulled
six months ago.

the other night
i was so dizzy
that i threw up.
and it got me to thinking
of how it will be
when i throw up
for the very last time.
i can't pour salt
on that
wound.
even if i did,
i'm afraid i wouldn't feel
anything.

but that's they way
with numbness;
it gets in the way
of any feeling
at all.

so as a profound
asshole,
i decided to write
it out
in a poem.

one word followed by another

the words
meet in little lines
that merge
hard on the eyes.

small words of mere 
nothingness,
gliding along the page
for sight to molest
in ways profane,
gleaning meaning
from what is ordinarily
mundane.

so smooth,
the pen traces out images
set behind the eyes
to gather where 
sparks of energy
conceive new patterns
of thought
where none seemed to be
before.

like walking through 
an open door
that always seems to be
closed 
when you look back
over your shoulder.

sometimes a curtain is
just a curtain.

symbolically,
the tiny words
come together
to form sentences
that merge into paragraphs
that mean as much as the
words, individually.

we always hope they mean more 
than they do,
somehow always fixated on you
and your life
and the way you perceive
the happenings
that construct analytically
in a horizontal fashion.

constructed of passion
and tension
and hopeful
realization
that were singular
just a moment before.

a simple word
fills a need
inside a soul
that sometimes bleeds
across the page
for crying eyes to perceive
like darkness
wandering toward
light
that just might 
be the very thing
that saves your life.

our nature is futility making love while the war rages on

life is futility
so we do the best we can
with the time we have.

we spend our moments
making comments
on what we are
and where we've been.

you never hear
someone on their
deathbed
say that they wished
they had spent more time
working.

we waste our health
on our jobs
while getting robbed
by taxes
and hidden fees,
hoping to get to
a better place that doesn't
actually exist.

we run into walls
and become misplaced
by all the information we're fed.
we're exterminated by
our desire for more
when we have nothing
to gain
in the first place.

all we can hope
is that we elect the right people
to make the right decisions
at the right time
to make a better future
for those who come
after we're gone.

and that's what we're told:
a better future for future
generations
that will come and go
in the same way we have
only to endure the same
hardships and the same
neglect
we were tortured with
throughout our short
                                  short
                                           lives.

at any minute,
maybe we'll all wake up
and wonder what the fuck has happened
to our happiness,
to our future for future generations,
to our possibilities, and
to our needs.

where have all the good times gone?
maybe they were shrouded in parties
and ignorance cleverly disguised as
innocence.
maybe they never happened at all and
it was nothing but a dream shrouded in
drugs and alcohol and slumber party madness
hoping to get girls who were hoping to get guys
hoping to fuck hoping for a moment to cry
hoping for luck enough to bypass the lies,
hoping to never begin.
hoping to never try.

and the beautiful always seem
to slide through while the rest of us are
ugly.

hope is a cleverly placed flower
in the hand of a secret love,
always waiting for this moment
to arrive.

                 love is a symptom of need,
     hoping to encounter the very moment
           when a connection is made
               and skin mingles with skin
         as the white hot rush of lust
gathers at the point where
           tongues meet for the very
                                                    first
                                                           time.

you'll never hear someone
on their deathbed say
they
wished they had loved less
and hated more.

the stakes are high
in this thing called life,
and no one has ever gotten out alive,
but we try,
no matter the expense,
to win,
to feel the sweet expanse
of the heart
under our shirts
for one last time
before the hammer drops
us
six feet below
the place we started.

consuming consumption

they cough the tribulation
from lightning strike
smokestacks
into the air
like desperation
for the masses
through gases
poisoned
with
rancid intention.

with products to buy
we get high
on the trouble
they peddle
from factories
in third world countries
just like our own.

the sound machine
produces low rumbles
to say:
you need to pay
for the right to stay
docile
in your consumption.

: we build it to break
so you'll buy
whatever we make
a second time.

: we give you
what you want
tenfold
and hold out
on the next production cycle
to ensure
you're
docile in your consumption.

: and if it gets
too hot
in the kitchen,
we'll sure be switching
to a new production cycle
so you're none the wiser
to the geyser of shit
you're soon to inherit
from lightning strike
smokestacks
bellowing poison
into the air
like desperation
for the masses
through gases
tainted
with
rancid intention
and the love
of something new
just for you and
the other hundred million
customers
who can afford
to gorge
on the docile nature
of the consumption
we're selling.

such an ordinary life

golden conversations
just might
give light
to an ordinary life.

imagine
plentiful resolutions
dropping diamonds
from purple skies
if only you will try.

listless abandon
caressing milk blue
galaxies
just beneath your eyes.

and suddenly
you're set free
from such an ordinary life.

with moonlight in your eyes.

never quite assuming
any other
way
other than today
which lasts forever
unlike any other
and suddenly you will shudder
from this place set in never
glancing like the slither
from a snake
through sands of glitter
on its way
to yesterday.

dewdrops of glass
on plastic blades of grass
merging from chocolate earthen fields
where happy giggle laughter reveals
a better solution
to the age old question
of what is real
and what is dream
and suddenly it seems
that crystal streams
are golden,
drowning out sapphire screams
beholden
by the hands that cry
across the milk blue sky
of reasoning with abandon.

holding hands across an ocean
under raging tropic sun
it's no wonder you don't know where you've been
because you've only just begun
to see

with moonlight in your eyes

so suddenly set free
from such an ordinary life
just as ordinary as me.

damn the feeling

your heart is broken.
it is shattered, torn, ripped to pieces.
along the mark,
past the scar on your chest,
is the place where the memories
survive.
it is in this spot where you
make a stand,
grow beyond the partial
view of who you are,
right above the scar
where they stabbed through
the tenderness of you
and left a mark that you'll carry
through your life,
remembering the knife,
the blade formed of words
that brought the hurt,
and dropped you to your knees,
brought the silent pleas,
begging them not to take away
the innocence that remained.
but now it's gone
and you've lived too long
to form retribution
for the acts committed.
you have grown beyond the pain,
past the triumphs with an insane,
gleeful smile
that will take you miles
beyond the limits of what
you thought
you could endure.
and it is in this place
that you'll find the friends,
the lovers,
the saints
to help you carry on
and make you who you are.
just because one person can't be trusted
doesn't mean everyone can't be trusted.
you're a little smarter,
a little wiser,
a little tougher,
and you have the scars to prove it.
the next time someone comes
blazing through your door,
you'll know for sure
whether they intend to do harm,
or whether they will make your heart warm
in the cold world you left so suddenly behind.