& it feels awkward unwieldy it stumbles in places & considered excusing this claiming it is uneven by design but i couldn’t, isn’t. so it’s rough, a draft, oddly i did try to keep it quiet tucked away let it settle & breathe in peace. however that just wasn’t feasible.

oh yeah one more thing: twenty three years ago? driving down McKee Road in San Jose, on my way home from my night job. you?

have you ever mistaken an edge for the answer
jagged begging for more & more arrogant it
offers you perfect & solves you seduces
you follow you become
undone
it begins
in your eyes filled with
desire or fear & defines
itself in your image & only
exists in reflection
silent like questions
unasked leaving reasons why
traced in the mist
on the surface
fading
as last of your will
fails & falls through the mirrored
world without end
unrelenting
& you after all
unknown & still twisting
the truth like a razor blade rubik’s cube
& you play to lose blood & oblivion
begins in your eyes still
unanswered

& ends

ashfallen the feeling bonebleached
beneath dirty blonde sun harsh
heat soft dry light thick
friction fills the eyes raw
silence fills the lungs slow elegant
stillness in the shape of a living
being vanishing under layer after
delicate layer shallow like skin hollow
a shell a girl torn
like a hole in her own
afterimage
after all
ashfall

~me
27oct03
(reporting live from fiery southern california)

baptism by fire extinguished consumed with torrential rage & i swallow my bitter lesson poison & spiritual emetic alike & nature of course takes no chances vomits ash & stench & molten granite & iron into the clarity of the gaseous myth-ridden separation of our latter half-lives & shows you winter just like me nuclear & i stand back hold back hold on hold what i can & until i can no longer stand & laugh like bells rattle bones & confess yes this has been my most realistic simulation so far & funny thing i think i had you for a minute there i did didn’t i?

it’s not really poetry, unless it is, and it’s either completely finished or not even close to it.

i wonder what it says.

finally
·
radiant in the heat
of the moment the
pleasant pressure of her
atmosphere & aware
the lateness of the
hour & every other
measure she weighs
against the center
waits watches as
the imbalance slips
silent by yes &
on beyond doubts
& settles into
impatience
&
she sighs,
finally
yes, oh
yes, not
yet, but
yes.
·
next morning
the mind & hands
prepare the body,
make it clean & dizzy,
obsessed & soft, almost,
not quite;
·
she takes
the intricate &
extreme liberties
minimally necessary
& chooses among them as if
they were gifts, giddy & ready
·
& the last lingering fretful
practical ethical logical
momentum against this
collides violently with
the urgency which
weaves away
unscathed
scattering excuses like
you woudn’t believe

·
·
she tosses a dazzling
glance backwards just as
your eyes lose her
entirely
·
know you
never knew her
·
& nothing further
·

~me (09.23.2003)

written sometime during the past three years (as evidenced by the coffeebean paper it was written on, my only clue) and revised a few nights ago in what turned out to be an entirely different direction.

oddly enough i chose to squirrel it away over at liz�, which was (if this makes any sense at all) an act of selfishness. which makes me really full of myself doesn’t it? it does.

in the interest of full frontal disclosure i wrote this other one too. again, iffy iffy. but hey.
you strip down
lay yourself out
i know you can’t fake it
but are you tired and naked
are you tired and naked?
~michael stipe

yes. yes i am.

junior damn high school. mrs. allen’s creative writing class. it wasn’t my first choice of electives, you know. but it changed my whole, entire life.

what if … naah.

and i’ve never exactly thought of it like this, but you know, mrs. allen was a saint. can you imagine, your whole career devoted to the care and maintenance of bad teenage poetry (including publishing an entire book of it every year). and believe me i only post the stuff that is waaaaay over to the ‘not so bad’ end of the bad teenage poetry scale.

there are copies of echoes ’75 and ’76 that i could seriously be blackmailed with.

hidden by the sun

the future becomes the past
and away you are fading into dust

still and grey, you settle along
the fault lines of my life
then the wind
scatters you over water
and you sink into memory
i dive in, but float on the surface
as you swirl on down
just beyond my straining fingertips
beyond the barren horizon
where the sun always sets

the timeless night finds me
settled in the sand and
passes into the
first dreamless day

the sun’s reflected path
rocks over the sea
shafts of light stab the green darkness

the symptoms of dawn are there
but not the feeling

like the stars, it is hidden by the sun

-(me) 1976

remembrance
old memories of
   faded tears
long ago but still
   inside me
never to be free

unfulfilled longings
   that haunt me
from waiting for
   dreams to come true
waiting for you

-(me) 1975

… is remembered
fondly and also with
incredible regret and
without whatever was
taken
forsaken lost
dismissed
and
or
forgotten
in other
words, most
of whatever it
might have been and
everything it meant even if
that wasn’t anything
really

still, it
was perfect
as far as the
imagination could
manage and beyond
that, understand:

nothing unreal ever
ever
ends

… was dreamt in a
dozen thousand
words first then
set loose in
lives, words without
restraint sent unrepentant
and as consequences go how
these were unforseen is
beyond the scope of
apology, ironically
there are no words to
repair whatever those
words flayed wide
open or any of
many subsequent
losses
one of which
is
trust
and
words fail
me here but words
do not betray
people, people do,
and in the process
the damages go
beyond
and indeed the words
themselves were
damaged,
for what went
unwritten was
something else
entirely, and
that is all i
will say, i
have done
enough
already

… and i would add that
just knowing trusting
isn’t anything by
itself and by
alone i mean only
knowing ones ownself
in relation to some thing
else which will
never be, maybe,
and this means
it is merely
a theory as
far as that
goes, and it does
go on about
the business of
spin and yes
indeed i was
spinning then
only just
spun into time
out of mind
out of time
and why? well
you see what it
isn’t is
real, that’s all,
aside from
that it is
intense it
is perfect it
makes sense well
from some perspective at
least, it must, though
this makes no
difference and so
mostly i just
know and i know that
i know and lately i
can hardly stand this
knowing