you
surround me
like
a prison
you
cover
tempt
and taunt me
with your
flawlessness
perfection
at every corner
and junction
obscene
in your
purity
and
so
bare
no projection
of the mind
could ever
penetrate
or mold you
my fingers
s t r e t c h
tracing
every
groove
gazing at
the canvas
of your
body
dying
to create
the first
flaw
silently
desiring
your
demise
November 12, 2009
you pick at a worn shoelace
getting up for more water
you watch dancing leaves
lemon-ginger kisses
smooth the worry
from my mind
and your words fall
onto overwhelmed ears
as raw as low-fi LPs
and just as sweet
we fit
like the homesick hand
turning a familiar doorknob
greeted by stacks of books
and mugs of tea
how we found one another
still catches my tongue
you fell from the sky
determined to move me
not with the force of a catapult
but the curiosity of a slingshot
-October 29, 2009
five boxes holding
five years of lost dreams thrown with
two and a half years
of higher education
and a record collection
makeshift bookcases
lean against a faded wall
next to an old bed
my dad wasn’t ready to
welcome me home but he tried
while unpacking he
pulled out an old record and
remembered when he
was my age – slowly cleaning
packing and moving with it
-October 2009
Following the fog
to San Francisco, I knew
I wouldn’t stay long.
Kerouac and Steve
Allen drift from shot speakers.
Talking about Jazz.
There was no message
that I was home, besides faint
Billie Holiday
and her copy of
Naked Lunch, carelessly thrown
on top of my bag.
-September 13, 2009 (edited November 1, 2009)
peeling
rusted
i see your face
in the faint yellow
that once graced the handle
of the sun damaged payphone
i pass by on my way to work
untouched for years
passersby don’t even acknowledge
your presence
solitary
reserved
stoic against the cracked wall
i see your eyes
once wide
and youthful
now far off
not looking past those
standing before you
but through them
though years
since my last thought of you
i see you every day
a rusted vision
on the corner
of a bus stop
and gentleman’s club
just like I left you
back home
all those years ago
– August 2009 (edited November 1, 2009)
It starts with one note; repeated.
Introduced to the universe; its first breath.
That first intention.
Slowly, melodically, the sequence receives a response and creates the essence of communication we’ve followed through these millenia.
We fall when questioning what it is to truly be. To see. To hear. To feel.
To know.
Strangers passing in the street, by chance two separate glances meet. And I am you and what I see is me.
Are you flying around the sun? Creating soft shadows that dance upon the surface we walk upon. Spend centuries abusing and destroying. What do you see from there? Casualties? Chaos?
The simple downfall of man.
We cannot understand exactly how much we impact our surroundings. Feeling we are advanced enough to walk upon two feet and regurgitate from pocket thesaures that shield our hearts from the piercing spear of knowledge.
They keep away from the sphere of knowledge. Watching and mocking us as we enter.
No use in expanding the mind when no one owns their’s anymore. What do you say to the conditioned? Do you bother to hope for a response?
Modernization of civilization is the death of communication.
We wander through persecuted whispers and shrill cries of those who were misunderstood. The intellectuals that were shunned and exiled for theories and philosophies. Poetry and prose.
Those who broke the law to dance and sing when the moment came upon them.
Those who lived to live.
Do we give up the freedom to dream because there seems to be no point, or is that why we continue to do so?
Do we fight to hear that one note?
The pure note of creation. Existence. Passion.
Do we follow it through the ages, accepting what it leads us to? Knowing that the same struggles are ahead, just labeled with a different year. “Different” eras.
We must give in; those moments that hearts race and breath quickens. The impulse of passion is the driving force of movement. Not necessarily forward, nor falling back.
But moving up.
We must run. Follow the beat that has been given to each of us down each path paved by those who knew we would come.
We must embrace what it is we see each time we open our eyes.
So I throw the window wide, and call to you across the sky.
[June 2009. Sent to Ian along with a letter. Written while listening to Pink Floyd’s “Echoes”]
Eventually I’ll have something legitimate up here.
But for now…
More schedules because I love them so damned much.
Fall Semester 2009:
.POSC388 Public Policy
Tu/Th 9:30a – 10:45a
.ENGL406 Creative Writing: Poetry
Tu/Th 11a – 12:15p
.ENGL204 Creative Writing: Creative Non-Fiction
Tu/Th 12:30p – 1:45p
.POSC455 Comparative Revolutionary Change
Tu/Th 3:30p – 4:45p
.ENGL386 Poetry
Tu/Th 6p – 7:15p
We’ll see what happens.
[Listening to: Roger McGuinn & Calexico – One More Cup Of Coffee (I’m Not There. OST)]
I’ve never quite had the capacity to make a great first-composition.
The first in a set always becomes the foundation for those that come to follow, and creating [if not simply comprehending] an underlying current that works its way through each piece has never been my strong suit.
The pressure is already on. Internally I guess. Seeing as this is merely a string of words to anyone who cares or chooses to read this. I can only hope to contribute to the depth and growth of you. A new idea. A new love. A new path in taste.
An opinion.
There is no limit to the potential of this collection of thoughts. Aside from personal limitations I may fall into. I hope not to.
To be so cliche, the possibilities are endless.
[Listening to: Syd Barrett – Milky Way (Opel)]
Often inclined to borrow somebody's dreams till tomorrow... 