boys II trade

 her mind is scrolling

 blue, green, 

                purple-black, on a blacked out screen

all your gold

     dark rainbow tips

skeleton bones like a hive of sticks

smaller fingers, holiday love

                remember the future

for what you dream of

friday is important

      are we going to talk about friday?

                 she has a plastic case of cupcakes 

walking up school stairs

i look up through the window and watch her ascend

she holds the case like a trey

              i n m y p e r i p h e r y 

an old woman feels the walls for sound

"i wana take some lessons, norman

one or two of em"

carry the fish over the bridge 

      while youre under it 

walking tied to a rope, 

he scales, pun intended, the bridge again to meet u on the other side

nothing is little, everything is brilliant

a tiny pearl in a sea of trees -- his face. 

hides, perched above the shoulders of his suit

           a shiny glimmering hope

its all he needs,

button up shirt

carpet cowboy hats roll folded

              matchstik bones

               avocado tissues

                                            fruit punch bloodbath!

                    courageous muscles,

           there he is 

      in the sky lit up neon ice cream

oh, hes eatin it

and the world, 

sky is purple and marsh-mellows make skyscrapers

it foods your beer

its got your stripes--

i get that now

no one else is here

                            just me 

             watching the sun

watching a father

       watching a son watch his son watch himself fail

with shoulder pads on or something

in a plastic zip up bag space like ETs house

ice cream dreams II

won't sleep, last night,
roller-coaster-pit-stomach
ready for me--

the other side of my eyes.

shade on the concrete
fighting for we

yet here i am, awake, alive.

it's not gonna be what you want
it's just not gonna happen

LOOK AT ME

don't be this strange
don't be this scared

don't be so scared
to look at me

you've got the questions
don't you
dig them out of the ground

it's just that habit

the way i hold you

it's not gonna happen
the way you want
at least the holidays
will be enjoyable

worry wart

there's a fine line between having it all together and everything completely falling apart. at least in my life, former life even.  maybe that's what happens when you train your brain to live and die everyday. 

momentum, vulnerability. some parts of our near or long-distance past can carry us through hurt and heartbreak and the overwhelming nature of interacting with a world outside of ourselves. it can also eat further at what is consuming our personal outlook. 

i've been on a true path since september 11th. everything is easier, and i actually, physically feel great. but it only takes one moment, one decision to turn it all around, either way. every passing moment...

when you continue to make destructive decisions over and over, you become numb to the process. some people just think they're fucked and the mess is too big to ever clean up so why start? when truth becomes the constant in your equation, the process slowly becomes second nature. 

i've been feeling so good lately, surrounded by a small community of realistic yet optimistic young people who seem to actually care and put effort into my well-being.  it nearly put me in cruise control. at first i was extraordinarily productive, relatively speaking, which made it almost a habit to do the right thing. progress, not perfection (ha!), but progress nonetheless. until a crucial decision comes out of hiding. it waited until i was vulnerable, yet primed and prepared to do the right thing. whether i did it or not is hardly the point...but a certain charlie kaufman scripterpiece scrolled through my mind:

"Everything is more complicated than you think. You only see a tenth of what is true. There are a million little strings attached to every choice you make. You can destroy your life every time you choose. But maybe you won’t know for twenty years! And you may never ever trace it to its source. And you only get one chance to play it out. Just try and figure out your own divorce…

“And they say there’s no fate, but there is, it’s what you create. And even though the world goes on for eons and eons, you are only here for a fraction of a fraction of a second. Most of your time is spent being dead, or not yet born. But while alive, you wait in vain wasting years for a phone call or a letter or a look from someone or something to make it all right, but it never comes. Or it seems to, but it doesn’t really.

“So you spend your time in vague regret or vaguer hope that something good will come along, something to make you feel connected, something to make you feel cherished, something to make you feel loved. And the truth is is, I feel so angry! And the truth is, I feel so fucking sad! And the truth is, I’ve felt so fucking hurt for so fucking long and for just as long, I’ve been pretending I’m okay, just to get along!

“I don’t know why. Maybe because…no one wants to hear about my misery…because they have their own.

Fuck everybody. Amen.”

i've spent a lot of time waiting. waiting and waiting for someone to wake me up, waiting to see the progress instead of hearing about the potential. waiting for him to come back, waiting for something to happen to me. i've been waiting for the circumstances to change, not realizing the power i have to overcome whatever comes my way. this does not make me unique anymore than it makes me aware. visible, tangible progress may not come for months, years, or ever. yet, every second we have the freedom to decide; no matter if you are in prison or land-locked or buried, you can still do what is right in your world. if i fucked up ten minutes ago, there's always the chance to do the next thing right. and that gives me hope. a simple, truth-based philosophy that things will get better. if in that moment progress doesn't show her face, there's always another train coming 'round the bend.