Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Show poems

Why I Can't Sing to You
we stare forgivingly
cheap neon stars
growing faint
that feeling you slipped about me
my disposition to nervous laughter
worn-out pages of exhausted excuses
free-falling face down 
the obsession of wordless songs 
and the overwhelming traces of our choices
drowning each lobe
parallel figures white flags 
and I wish there were lyrics to sing to



[no title]

your eyes can't help but close
they've left us in this room alone
your bed is stiff
don't struggle to move for me; I'll fit
each breath brings 
this overactive nausea
closer to my mouth
I convince myself I smell
your high school cologne
July heated pavements on our backs
a kiss in Zippo-lit garage corners
this time I wish your mom would walk in on us
your words blocked 
by a deafening rattling in your lungs
my words blocked
choking cowardice
so I run most fingertips
back & forth on your knee
hoping it will pinken
ignoring its resemblance to my bent elbow
wake up, wake up
I'm enveloped in lines of panic
trying to make up for the last 1,384 days
and I breath so deeply
I break through all fabricated familiarities
the smell of 
empty Kleenex boxes
monitored room-temperatures
bleach white pillows
enables instant paralysis
I silently plead
wake up, wake up
so I can continue to not say a word to you



Taking Pictures at the Ocean

with each step we take
two to your one
grinding salt and sand
I wonder if you're thinking
about the space between your toes
I try to fill the empty space 
between my first two toes 
clenching them tight 
forcing closure to this humanly void
the first overlapping 
strangling the second
because the phantoms between
remind me too much 
of the lack of us





Wrong Turn
slick fingers 
retreat through yours 
to race to my mouth
to tear at the anxiously red bits
of my bottom lip
your questioning fingers are rough with mine
strangling them again
if these knuckles were necks
they’d go limp
you’re trying to manufacture
a sense of security
I feel your heartbeat against my pinned wrist
You’re feeling my pulse, not my heartbeat.
my pulse buried itself
in my eardrum
banging on it
begging to it
spelling out arbitrary words
and I’d choke on my own breath
if it wasn’t holding those words back
Are you sure we’re here? 


Appointments
“She”
the name casually assigned
by your shrink
twice a week
this damaging orange bottle
chemical assurance 
why you've been placed
in this morbidly tidy space
for the last 42 minutes
two undiagnosed 
broken right hands
two unhinged
broken bedroom doors
two less-than mutual
mutual separations 
one bottom-heavy list of
things thrown against a wall
defense mechanisms 
against retaliation
her tears, your targets
and any chance of a clinically
healthy approach at intimacy
for either of you
suffocating under the debris
“She” 
chokes down guilt 
a few times a week
but she doesn't have to come here



Shoot-out

I cry just to calm you down

and don't worry about your grip
that chair clearly aimed for
wreckage or my dropping jaw
I begin to shake
the buckles on my boots echoing my movements
I'm wearing weathered cowboy boots
the spurs fall silent
I don't shoot
but you fall to the ground
I pray you never get your hands on a gun again


[no title]

it lines
her teeth
her mouth
her tongue
tipping the 
crest of her
top lip
when she
tells you
her name

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