I hate it I All the thinking I hate about the facts the lists no thinking that is about the pattern of the veins on a leaf Fake thinking dead brain no reason to think; it is in scientific fact actually about inserting that five-thousand gauge lance into the throttled vein of a druggie So tired that nonthinking becomes thought becomes effort slogging through moist warm suffocation air leaking pressing into the nares suffocating Forced here there are cotton balls in my ethmoid air cells there are frogs hopping on my tympanic membranes there are leeches sucking blood straight out of my abdominal aorta There are small carefully selected sea urchins and metal wedges inserted in the sulci of my brain Electrified by eels swimming in my cerebrospinal fluid Other ribs of other animals are sharpened and then placed carefully in my own intercostal muscles as punishment Not quite piercing my lung pleura I react to the xenograft but it can never be removed: That Is The Rules. Other animals are crawling up and down the walls why is it always small animals crawling on the walls? I wish I could pull one person for walking side by side with me Holding my hands with both of their hands But my hands have no nails anymore: they are peeled Instead of nails I have bleeding stumps The bleeding stump of the small boy injured by his cousin in the door with the bone sticking out of his shortened finger moaning through the ketamine it was not deep enough I have accumulated all the injuries That is why I am here I collect them all that they may be replayed over and over again on my own body and on the bodies of the people I love, in my nightmares in my daydreams and there is not a single person here who would deny it – that they have this experience – except they all deny it, lies to cover up their carnivorous porous wilted souls, they refuse to realize that they are just here also to soak up the blood with their blood, to graft the skin with their skin Nobody is a healer who is whole For you must give away small pieces of your soul like chips flaked off dry low-quality clay They will mix you in with sand and bake you sleep-deprived until you shred off, a universal donor One day I will look in the mirror After taking a pee in the disgusting bathroom that has toilet paper strewn about in fragments And I will see dead eyes staring back.
Category: Poetry
lizard
Lizard lays on log lapping up the light Never nodding off unless it’s nearing night Licking at the air, licking at the stone Clicking blackened claws Happily alone.
It will be like a guidewire
It will be like a guidewire Clear, straight path to follow Since we are all of the same caliber. But no! Blood clots mistakes sharp turns extra branches atypical anatomy Who said all the bodies were the same? Lies. You will bend until there is cursing And still you will get stuck And break And none of it is your fault For there is a system which must fit everybody And by fitting everyone, nobody fits perfectly. No patients No physicians No students They call us learners but we are all learners We are all broken behind the guidewire Covered in blood.
the dandelion
The dandelion lived in a curious meadow Where tulips and roses grew wild The dandelion talked at the yellow sun And smiled at the passing child The roses and tulips said “You don’t fit in. You’re simple and tiny and sad,” But the dandelion yellowed itself for the birds With all of the yellow it had And mirrored the sun with all of its might And thought that one day it would burst into light Trying so hard; living simply and glad. The roses and tulips grew old and decayed The dandelion woke and its beauty had frayed But the dandelion captured the whitened sun In its prisms of fluff all arrayed And it danced in the breeze and sung with a wheeze, “I’m living; I won’t be dismayed. I’d like to improve the world a bit Make it a brighter place But if I’m to fade, that’s how I was made, So I’ll smile and bow out with grace.” Then the dandelion drifted off to sleep And the wind scattered prisms far and deep And the birds and the grasses drooped down to weep. But then by surprise, before all of their eyes Fed by the sunshine dried from the skies Dandelions covered the meadow in streams And sang to the sun, and flourished and dreamed From the dandelion’s still life, out sprung the young To sing out the joyous still left to be sung And the old dandelion looked down from the sun And smiled as the sky shone brighter by one.
pome
A round pome Slip it under your tongue Like a laser-cut flower candy It may cut you Or you may crush it A weak pome Underchosen words Throw it out A slit pome Slit it behind your ear Slit it between your toes Twist it into a straw Drink. Dispose. A pome of light Reminiscent Luminescent Glistening Kinesis
the ribbon
Fluttering in the wind lives the ribbon Fluttering in the woods out of the corner of my eye Sometimes through the trees I glimpse the ribbon Distilling all the sunbeams, praying to the sky. If it’s on a young tree, perhaps it’s from construction But I suspect an old tree marks the ribbon’s timeless lie Placed in rituals long ago to remove the dark obstruction That sequesters the divine beyond the reach of human eye. Sometimes when I’m looking down with glasses set beside me I see the ribbon acrobatting in the trees nearby The only way it has such freedom is its knotting to the treeside If I set the ribbon free, it would descend to earth and die. The only way it’s animated – writhing, reaching, dancing, Is the wind invisibly surrounding it, to steer it Sometimes I wonder if the ribbon’s measured prancing Is describing the condition of my immortal spirit.
the pigeon
The pigeon sat awkwardly crushing its tail its wings dangling like grey canvas sails It had been hit by a car. I carried it home in my hands Everyone stared. “the rats of the air” I fed it bread and water Put it in a large open cardboard box by the window so it could see the sunlight It sat in its own poop, paralyzed in stink I cleaned it so carefully in the bathroom sink It drank so thirstily And then died, flailing suddenly in fright Three days later despite Everything I tried. What makes it worth it to try to save a life? Did I just prolong its suffering? Or did I give it a more peaceful exit? I cried I cried for the pigeon.
I have sketched your skin
I have sketched your skin Etched you, stretched you in My arms in the air sprinting under the blazing sun, by the white house, the lighthouse A white salted dress, a red ribbon, hair sprinkled with sun-scorch A salty kiss for you; you etched waiting on the porch Hair permanently ruffled, lighthouse permanently quaint Seagull cries permanently muffled in the flight of oily paint But I can still hear them shriek, through all of the years As I paint you in with the salt from my tears.
new grass
the sunlight slips between the branches to hit the dirt makes the new grass shine like golden hairs in patches. if I stepped on those angled blades, would it hurt? would my feet leak from redly burning scratches? or would the sunlit grass melt between my toes and suction me to always wander where it grows?
trees holding leaves
Love is the leaves clinging the trees and the trees cradling the leaves. One harvests minerals, laps up the earth, the other soaks light from the sky; trading and talking, in springtime and fall, coming and going to die. They nourish and parasitize each other, generous thieves who reply: “We the leaves reincarnate the /trees/ reincarnate the leaves thereby”
balladrael 
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