'Sorrow found me when I was young / Sorrow waited, Sorrow won'

'm not sure why I'm posting here. I doubt it'll get read.
I guess I'm just in a mood.

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I sometimes feel /
Like, like, like /
I'm not good /
For you /
Like, like /
Not right /
For you /
Sometimes, I /
Feel like /
Like, like /
I'm getting to /
A point /
Where I'm no fun /
Anymore /
Sometimes, I /
Feel like /
Like, like /
My dreams are /
Too broken /
For you /
Like, like /
Only forty /
Hours and getting /
'Free' are my /
Dreams anymore /
And you /
You're my only /
Real /
Dream any /
More, you /
And this stupid /
Black, stringed /
Beast /
A month's rent /
Forgotten for /
A dream /
I used to dream /
I could write /
Now /
Now, all my /
Line /
Breaks /
Seem ran /
Dumb /
And it all seems so /
What? /
So what? /
So cliche. /
So. /
So, I'm still /
Writing /
Still /
Fighting /
Still dreaming of /
You /
And if my dreams /
Are broken /
Well /
Your dreams /
Are broken /
Too /
And I can /
Not /
Fix them without /
You /
And you /
Cannot /
Fix them without /
Me /
So me /
And you /
I guess we're stuck /
Together /
As long as /
You /
Want me /
I want you /
Too

Shitty Poetry

The birth of a new day
New pen on a new page
New work with no new wage
A new stage
For the same old actors
The same factors
Plowing us over like over-grown tractors
Like
Poverty, lack-of-plenty
Selling for ten when
It's worth twenty
Because you need the ten
And you'd take a penny
When there's so many
Like you
Broken down
Beat down
To the ground
Bark like dogs
In a third-rate pound
Your in the lost
And found
'cause your money was
Lost
And never found
So turn around
Turn things around
Do your best
Don't make a mess
Before you hit the ground

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Corner to
dirty
Corner, we
mark
each spot
our
own, like
loving
chess pieces -
King,
Queen, King,
Queen -
Check, Checkmate
on
my heart

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New England highways fly by
-your hand in mine
Your firework eyes
-strike the iron in my mind
-and set off sparks in my heart

I Wanted To Write Something Here

I wanted to write something here
But realized, sorrowful, that I had
Nothing to write, nothing to say

And no one to read it.

I feel so strange tonight.

Frightened

It's absolutely absurd how frightened I get when I remember you. It scares me how I look for me in the reflections of your writing; I always find shards of what could be myself. I then find the obvious disconnect; the place where the could-have-been-me isn't me. It's horrifying how my heart races when I hear from you, or I see some silly little thing that reminds me of you. It's maddening how angry I get when I pass down Thayer street and remember it's one of your favorite places and wish I could've walked down it with you; hand-in-hand, natch. It's terrifying how I continue to pine for you in spite of obvious flaws; namely, that there's a damn red line of how much I'll ever mean to you. It's chilling how I know I'll never forget kissing you; my first, and the only one that's meant a damn thing to me so far (that shitty little bitch couldn't be as good as you on your worst day).

It makes my hairs stand on end when I remember you saying no one writes about you; because I did. And I do.

I'm not over you yet, and that scares me. But, in time, I will be.
And even when I'm over you, I'll still love you.

Azaleas, miss, and best wishes.

Cookies

It's bizarre how cookies have fault-lines; chocolate-chip California and macadamias hidden beneath dough like undersea rifts. You bite into them, but where you bite isn't where they break; and it falls apart, leaving a trail of crumbles like the wake of some great destruction.

And that, friends, is how the cookie crumbles.

This Digital Life

My life is defined by staccato black-or-white keyboard noises
Character after character punctuated by punctuation or white-space
Poems and stories and games and thoughts all wrapped up in tiny black pixels
Or speaking some obscure language like: if open paren string first dot trim open-close paren dot length greater than 0... oh. Yeah.
Hobbyjoblife wrapped up in electronic one-oh-one-oh-one-one-one-oh words is my life.

"Look, the east is burning red!"

I'm tired of "No hope" and I'm tired of "No harm"
I'm tired of drawn out, worn out, half-cocked alarms
I'm burning like a roman candle, bright and blue in the eastern sky
I'm tired of walking this weary road - I'd much rather fly

You want to sink, so I'm going to let you...

I need to stop falling for strangers
I need to stop falling like leaves
I need to stop falling in autumn
I need to stop falling in love
I need to stop writing poems that don't rhyme
I need to stop thinking these dreams
I need to stop dancing alone
I need to stop dreaming these thoughts
I need to stop feeling this burning
I need to stop falling for hope
I need to stop I need to stop
To stop
To stop
To stop

Another Finn-ian rant/poem...

Yeah, I know I'm not hot, I'm more like lukewarm
And when I say I'm Luke-warm, I mean I'm a little dark side, a little light side
I'm a little on the fried side, not too much on the bright side
A little on the little teapot side, yeah, here is my handle
And you can find my spout - spout off some nonsense
Make no sense, bad sense of time, bad timing
Dead living and bad rhyming

Hundreth

One-hundred written words
One-hundred fucking fears
One-hundred pointless posts
One-hundred terrible tears

One-hundred quivering quartets
One-hundred blameless blasts
One-hundred silly songs
One-hundred painful pasts

One-hundred darkened days
One-hundred little lights
One-hundred pitiful poems
One-hundred forgotten fights

One-hundred daring dreams
One-hundred misty mates
One-hundred waking wonders
One-hundred brilliant baits

One-hundred little loves
One-hundred angry acts
One-hundred cunning crows
One-hundred fiotional facts

One-hundred killing kooks
One-hundred grand girls
One-hundred funny friends
One-hundred prose pearls

Here's to another hundred!

'59 Reasons To Go To Space (Or Hell)

Young girls
Young girls
Ain't supposed to die on a friday morn
Aren't supposed to live and love
They really shouldn't even be born
Accidentally through society's shocks
They bring out nails and teeth or flee
And bring red blood upon me and you and me
I chase, I dream
I dream, I chase
But no one chases me
Or speaks to me with fire or force
Or passion or looks at me with might
If I make chase, I am the foe
And it is only wise to flee me
But hold back and they drift away
Leaving scars and wounds and pain all the same
And the music
The music
The music keeps me alive
While it reminds me of pain
And cuts me fresh
And wakes me up
I've got 59 reasons to
Fly away to another world
A brilliant alien realm in verdant
Greens and reds
Or a pale grey moon
Or a darkside
Of a moon
And I've got
59 reasons
To go to hell
For all the devils
Are here on earth

Dirge

Teardrop rain
Flood the basement of my heart like an
Abstract hurricane
Empty days empty nights and an
Empty pain
Heres a dirge for the fallen and a dance for the
Loveless Slain

Three short poems for three troubled loves

J

When Wind, as Wind is wont to do,
Picks up his icy and knife and cuts you through,
Stand fast, my friend, stand fast and true.

E

Blood cries to blood and wine tastes of wine;
Dance into the garden and drink of the vine;
And in the summer heat would you ever be mine?

A

I feel in words most honest longing,
Happiness, content, forgiveness of wronging,
As you walk in the glow of mockingbird's songing.

We were set apart

"And when we were made we were set apart, and life is a test and I get bad marks." - Brand New

Ours is the exile.
Ours is passion, madness, beauty, sorrow.
Ours is to be unusual, outside, strange, different.
Ours is to be so uniquely amazing and terribly alive that the world shies away from us - we, in turn, feel the world's pain.

We are actors, artists, lovers, writers, poets.
We are, almost entirely, alone.
I hope we can be unalone, together.

They've taken love from me. They've taken happiness and safety and peace, too.

They took it all so I might suffer as they did, as they do.

Now, they've taken even sorrow, and that pain.

When I think of you, wonderful and beautiful and potentialful and lifeful, I think I can find that again.

Will you remind me what it is to dream?

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Dedicated to EEM. Quack.

Huddled Masses

Huddled masses and and wretched refuse indeed. So many people, in the heat, often unwashed and / or oversized. The smell at times overwhelming.

The rude youth, a stereotypical "ghetto" man with a sense of style, calls to a friend on the sidewalk - loud, obnoxious.

Then, later... a woman gets on. No seats, the youth stands without hesitation.

Sometimes people are dirty. Sometimes they're clean. Sometimes they're rude, and sometimes kind.

But mostly? People are just people.

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The heat and smell and dirt created a strange contrast with the beautiful, serene blossom shreds falling to the ground.

I was reminded of the dichotomy of blood dripping off an ancestral blade on a background of sakura blooms - in the eastern style.

I contemplated the ways of the samurai - the words of Hagakure - "A samurai should make all his decisions in the space of seven breaths.".

When I got home, bolstered by my new resolve, I got only to six breaths... then I called her.

Walking

(This one's kinda long, but I like it. It's got the allusions and references I love so much. How many can you recognize? Hah... Also, it's helped me clear my mind. Read and enjoy, people of the world.)

I went walking by the river and I called to some friends...
And as I walked through the city they met up with me one by one.

First Johnny M came to see me, and he told me not to fall in love. He told me about the orange leaves hitting the ground and where to watch for snakes and worms. He told me about the evils of censorship, but the five-o put out an APB on him and he went and hid 'round the corner and I never saw him again - I heard his kidneys crapped him when he drank too much wine.

So then I called up Nicky - his name was Leo but we called him Nicky - and he came and met me and told me 'bout the kingdom and rebellion and follies of the heart. He told me about his home, and he told me about war and he told me about peace... Martin and some Indian walked with us and heard Nicky's words... He told me about leaving his family, his money, his home - it hurt him, but he knew he had to. But he slipped on the ice by the river and fell in and by the time we fished him out his lungs were gone.

(Marty and the Indian (I think his name was Moe) went off back home and left me all alone, but I heard they woulda made old Nicky proud.)

Then my buddy Phil from years ago, I saw him on a corner. He told me there was no kingdom, told me 'bout the republic and how we need to work here and now. He told me not to be afraid of love, he told me 'bout marzipan. He said Johnny was wrong, and maybe Nicky too, but I don't think he hated 'em... Just didn't agree. He spoke to the kids and he spoke to the old folks, and he told us to make stories of our lives. 'course, he was a busy man, and he had to go home to finish his book.

Towards the end of the night and the end of the river, as I came upon the Narragansett bay (where I heard there'd be some folks skinny-dipping, strange as it sounds), I realized I wasn't alone. Someone was followin' me, singin' all rough and handsome. I couldn't recognize the voice, but the stories told me it was Finn... He told me what to celebrate, 'bout redemption and resurrection and staying positive.

I walked home past the townies and the hood rats and I knew that I couldn't be afraid of love, but I couldn't let it hurt me either. I'll never stop loving, but I can stop wanting.

Johnny and Nicky told me not to love, and that clever kid - I think he said to love too much. But Phil, I think Phil had it right when he told me about two different parks and the rise of man. He reminded me of the flight of a woodpigeon and talking two walks in two different cities.

He reminded me that love is stronger than want.

Anthropomorphia 1

(This [unlike many of my works] is not about any real person. Instead it's the first of [what I hope will be] an ongoing series about the personification of abstract things - or at least non-human ones.)

I tell him about how I couldn't live without her.
How she fills me up, lifts me out of the waters that drown me.
I tell him about how good it is to pull her to me after too long apart.
I tell him about how I burn when she's away.
How I hurt when she's away.
I tell him about how she gives me energy.
Gives me hope.
Helps me go on in life.
I tell him how some people appreciate her, and some take her for granted...
And I tell him that everyone who knows her needs her.

He asks me who's so special to me. Why do I feel this way?
What is her name?

I tell him: "She is Breath"

W.A.L.K.I.N.G

Walking through
An urban wasteland, the bus awaits
Let me see something beautiful, hopeful
Kiss my eyes and ears, world, with your majesty
I glance about seeing if anyone else
Notices the wonderful details hiding everywhere
"Go!" I want to tell them... Go and live and see life and love everywhere.

Love Point - Mazes - Love Point

The above is a "love point", a bit of punctuation proposed by some french guy in the 1960's but never really used anywhere.

I absolutely love it, though. I mean, it's perfect. Two people's confusion meeting on a single point to create something beautiful.

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Weary worrisome wandering... curious, concerened, confused... I walk through this minoan madman's masterpeice fearing frightening ferocious battering bulls. Lost, lonely, laughless I seek something special, for at the center of the maddening motherfucking maze... You await.

I'd face bulls and kings and impossible mazes for you. I can't always help, but I always want to.

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We're both messes. Both all questions and few answers. We both get confused.
Reminds me of the love point.

The Girl Behind The Counter

There's a girl I'll see tonight; I wish I knew why she captivates me.
She's no model; short and a bit plump, with blemished skin - her shoulders, she says, are horrible.
I don't even know her well; we aren't friends, we just work together.
Her razor wit cuts me, but I feel no pain; I return the favor and she laughs.
She reads while she works; silly stories about people who become animals, and books on clean living.
She's proud of her choice, almost defiant; loyal and strong.

She's my favorite co-worker, and I love her in a way I feel about few others.

The boy with the red ribbons wrapped 'round arms. He inspires me, and I him. He was the first, truly, and I hope he'll be the last.
The girl, so beautiful; there's a part of her that wants me, I think, but she doesn't need me. Sometimes I wish she did.

These are the people that inspire me and give me the hope to carry on. This, I suppose, is why I love them; higher than any other reason, it is the simple joy of knowing them.