I have lost control of my fingers I

wish on a keyboard but no they

do not behave they way they should my

pinky dances up and down without me telling it to

pinky, why can't you stay still

I will slap it with a ruler it doesn't

help where is the nun am I a schoolchild why

won't the shaking go away

little gravestones

I don't want anyone carving

my epitaph until I have picked

enough fights just for the small

happiness of slamming one million

doors-- don't write my eulogy until

I've broken the bindings of enough

books, felt my feet grow cold

with the knowledge of enough

Novembers--and don't lower

me into the hard dirt, not until

I've watched enough people pick out

fruit at the grocery store, eyes fluttering

shut like thin pieces of paper,

stealing grapes away in their wet

mouths when they think

no one is looking

Westcliff

as in that moment
after the thump
before the spray

you have this way of suspending me
in the spaces between your footsteps

internal monologue in the presence of joey richter

"hi,
holy fuck you're a real person
you're even paler and scrawnier and weirder-looking
than youtube suggests
you aren't just a parody
you're real and you're flattered
that i came all the way here to see you
as you run from the tour bus to a
public restroom"

cop out haiku

the smell of coffee

coming in from the brisk air

read alone quietly

square

keep yourself fluid, unfixed
your body bent over

your skull and spine shouldn't align

but solidify
your poor shitty neurons

3 minutes is nothing, it only happens
15-45 times a day

if you have any focus left to lose
then ditch that shit, it's so over

you don't need crutches made of paper

the idea of love

was for me a watch secured

tightly to my wrist

now time has no measure

just a blur next to me

in the hour of the Dixie cup

ash from a cigarette
suspended in night air,
cigarette tip shards falling
back to earth like
adolescent cherry blossoms

the evenings when you stand on
this wooden deck are all the same
somewhere, dogs are barking

look up:
past the watertower
past streetlamps

the moon hangs heavy and white
through the smoke--
winter's exposed skin

in the thrall of a lighter,
your thoughts burn
the way
loose ends
always

do

on a scrap of paper dug out from a box written last winter

Last night:

The rakes of empty branches
power lines hang globes of light
empty for adventure
darkness as a traveling coat
sameness
every shrub the same, regular
just a regular shrub
comforted only by this.

I know these shapes
should I dress them or leave this path
and I am saddened as I go
I let words go, alone as I am made
So how can I be sure the search made me happy
Alone, a heavy word, the words themselves stand
and let them stand

Helmet

Darling darling oh darling please,
(does that word never grow old?
Oh have it your way!)
Darling darling darling oh darling please,
be careful with that head of yours!
It's precious.
More precious than you believe.

Wonder wonder wonder

Ocean Rose Tell Me,
does that horrible man still make you feel ugly,
and does he still never touch you?
Tired and assey, coming home from, from, from whatever, to spend himself
with the clicking lights of his real wife, that bitch in the corner.
Does the dream land of the early hours still make you feel better?

I've been in dream land since the early years, and no matter how many dreams pass,
I believe that I'll never get used to you as a blonde.