It crawled through her bones
like a slow fever, knocking knees
1/21
Kissed her ivory hips
as if I was tickling the black keys
of a piano.
They’re the odd ones
you say
but so are we.
Giggling through the howls
of a Tom Waits song as if
we’re in on it too.
After tinkering with keys
you’ve got nothing left to play.
So douse the piano in gasoline.
Flame licked legs and dripping veneer.
Snapped strings in and out of tune.
Every piano fire burns this way.
Every piano fire ends this way.
The explosion
The confusion of the fog
of the fire extinguisher.
Grit teeth and white heat.
The piano is broken,
but we’ll get another one.
12/13
We danced in perfect time
while we told our crooked lies
and smiled golden promises
between our rusted lips.
Nothing was perfect
and everything violent
in the linen landscapes
of your single cell.
=====================
I’m not sad. I just saw some sad images in my head while listening to some music.
12/8
Cover your bodies
in sweat,
in tattoos.
Cover your bodies
in ink
with ideas,
ideas your tired tongues
would repeat forever
if they could.
Cover your bodies
in flesh,
in each other.
‘Cause you don’t burn
as bright
alone.
3/1/10
Days of old when threads weren’t cheap Drive-in theaters and take-out sex Thunder moans and lightning bites jolting the earth. But it’s not always like that at the lookout
Tom Waits is at the fire extinguisher and ivory keys
Picked lock pick-me-ups
and robbed cabinets.
Take the Liquor. Leave the guns.
My mouth’s a loose trigger to begin with.
The city lookout looses its scenery at night
There’s nothing but blinking lights, blurred vision
and a couple trapped behind fogged station wagon windows.
We’re just ex-kings and ex-queens
Princes and princesses pimped out and pandering
because we’re told to.
“Rain’s coming. Go inside.”
No. I want to stay and drink it up
because it makes me feel useful
instead of used up when she leaves.
“Yeah, you like that? How about here?”
She’s so heavy, man.
And if you get it just right
all through the grain and the rum,
Levees break and cries go up:
“Oh, baby. Hold on!”
where the ground lies fallow
relationships begin and end in the back of a Chevy Nova
That’s “No go” in Spanish, cats.
Oh, sorry. I mean gatos.
But, we’re ex-kings and ex-queens
sipping and dripping drinks
lamenting Yoricks, Ophelias, and Romeos lost
“Get inside. The storm’s coming.”
No, man.
You mean the earth.
Listen to her.
An Ocean
The air was thick with salt. The beads of water jumped ship from the ocean’s crests only to be swept up in the gusts of Autumn’s breath. Diamonds dripped down her face as she stood at the edge of the cliff and control. Her hair was thick with the Pacific and rested on her shoulders. The sun was masked by a silver overcast.
“This is a perfect day,” she said to herself.
Hands clasped ‘round her hips. He looked at the constellations on her neck and kissed them.
“Are we leaving,” he asked.
“Almost.”
She turned to him, touched his face. Took a step back and fell in to the ocean like a fever.
He woke up and turned towards the house’s dwindling fire. She was still asleep exactly where she had fallen. They were safe.
10/3.5
“There it is,” the boy exclaimed.
“Where,” she inquired through her hushed winter’s cough.
“Just at the bend in the road. You see it?”
“No. I just see an old house’s charred frame.”
“That’s it. That’s what I brought you here for.”
“What do you mean? That’s it?”
“We’re here. Those are her bones.”
A twig snapped behind them through the ash laden air, muffled, but loud enough to penetrate the cold. The hair on their necks shot up in that instant. He spun, reaching for the gun. The sound of leaves dissolved in to the sound of the crack of the hammer against the shell. The birds left their nests as the echo lifted the silence.
Whoever or whatever it was that had been following shambled a few steps from the cover of the blackened forest to the edge of the road. It was a man or at least a human. His rifle fell beside his feet as he coughed up blood. He fell to his knees and as if in prayer he pressed his head in to the ash and lie still. The pool forming beneath the body began to run a course along the street. Even without rain, the gutters still serve a purpose.
Fits
Raucous noise
swinging our heads against
hour hands.
Beats and nouns against time.
Sweat drenched smiles
tasting like oceans
between our
teeth.
Rust in hand
rust on strings.
We broke our guitars.
Screaming.
These are fits.
10/3
At low tide
the ships’ skeletal remains
were oft mistaken
for the leviathans
who could bear the depths no more.
Weird Dream 8/26
I had a dream last night where my coworkers and I were starring at a storm outside of our office. A general calm then fell over the surrounding city only to be followed by a tornado staring us straight in our faces, ripping in to the side of the building pulling loose chairs, ceiling tiles, and papers out the windows. It passed and no one was hurt. The office was in ruins and I made my way to the roof. I climbed up the stairwell to find the door to the roof unhinged. Pushing it out of the way, I stepped in to the light creeping from behind silver clouds. It was blinding at first, but when my eyes grew accustomed to the light I saw that I wasn’t on the roof of my office, but on the ramparts of some gothic structure in the middle of what appeared to be a large park in the middle of a New York-like metropolis. The city itself had not been spared the destructive forces of the storm. Limbs had falled in the park below and people began making their way to my now gothic office building. I turned to look back from the stone ramparts to the facade of the building behind me. It was covered in rats wrapped in spiders’ silk. Some as fresh as today, others as new as months old. Men in hazmat suits were clearing the piles away and working to kill any odd creature that may be alive up there on that rooftop. A grizzly bear bounded past me and slid to its owner or friend’s feet. The man exclaimed “There you are! I’m so glad you’re safe!” The bear smiled and lay on its back with crossed arms.
The dream ended
"If you had to ask me, “What’s it like in the day of a boss?” I’d have to fire you."
— Roman Deckard
Cokehead Pilot
The shrapnel was burning past our ears in fits of kinetic climax, amplified by our steel flying cage of a flying fortress. I’m pretty sure Captain Philips had lost consciousness at this point and the gunship was taking a nosedive into the winter German landscape like a cokehead looking for their last hit. Coincidentally, the co-pilot took what we thought to be our last minutes of life as a cue to snort the entirety his pillbox. Our port side gunner, Thompson, slid past me with a smiling scream “At least I’ll go out slippin and a slidin’!” He would later go on to hang out in New Orleans jazz scene with the likes of Eddie Bo writing jazz and R&B.
Can’t Sleep
I could break you
with a song
that used to echo
from your stereo
across from the field
of linen sheets
where your lips trembled
with beggars’ gasps
for charity.
Fallen Stars
Took the sparks in your eyes
right in my mouth
when I kissed
your eyelids.
Planted them back
on your skin
as freckles -
An astronomer’s new map.
