Not Writing You A Love Song

This is not a comeback. This is just me stopping by. Real life is taking over, not in a bad way. A poem for you.


I don’t know what love is.

I know fear
Dark, consuming
Gut clenching, sweat drenching
I’ve been frozen to stone with it
Struck dumb
Helpless
This is familiar
Yet different

I know joy
Bright, heady
Smile readying, hope steadying
I’ve been filled to burst with it
Full of laughter
Flying
This is familiar
Yet different

I know grief
Heavy, overwhelming
Heart wrenching, soul rending
I’ve been pulled down low with it
Shed tears
Dying
This is familiar
Yet different

I know peace
Calm, restful
Mind soothing, pulse smoothing
I’ve been suffused by it
Learned to soar
Uplifted
This is familiar
Yet different

Is this what love is?

Forget the Cowboys, Just Find Out About the Prose

I don’t need a prairie sun or a happy ending, so I’m not doing the dishes. Also, the cowboys are probably off hooking up with each other. Here’s some poetry.

Ever since you left
I have not missed you

That the small of my back longs
For the curve of your palm
Means nothing at all

Nor does the fact that your pillow
Remains as it is, unwashed
After all
Hardly any traces
Of your scent
Cling to it anymore

It is becoming rare
That a stranger’s random smile
Invokes your memory

My laughter is genuine
My carefree air
Is no pretense
Mostly

My fingers absently
Tracing the shape of your lips
Is of no consequence

Because ever since you left
I have not missed you
At all

Maybe I Didn’t Know Him At All

Nine years ago, when Jeff Buckley met his death in a river in Memphis, I was still a child. Years later I was in Paris and bought Live at L’Olympia, for a friend. When I gave it to her I listened and smiled and nodded my head, but walked away unaffected. In my defense, at the time I was somewhat a fool. Not quite as smart as my friend, it took me a while to develop discerning taste. I did however eventually, one could say inevitably, fall in love with that heart wrenching expressive crazy-ass voice. And just like Bowie’s immortalized Ziggy… ‘boy could he play guitar’. And while Hallelujah is good and well, it’s songs like Lover You Should Have Come Over that really tear me to pieces.

So I post this, in tribute, in memorandum, for love, of the beautiful Jeff. I shed a tear for all of the fucking potential lost in that river. Whether by accident or his own design, the entertainment industry is missing something I believe could have been truly worthwhile. My heart truly aches as I bid him a sincere if not last goodbye.

By the way, I’d like to upload a few mp3s for anyone who’s interested, but I’m not going to go through the hassle and then have it be for naught. If I see any expression of interest I will, otherwise, there isn’t a point.

To match the melancholy, I give you this.

Beloved temptress
Your sweet seductions
Give rise to my bile
You are my breath
And the blade by which I die
My devotion to you
Is equaled only
By my revulsion
Love and loathing live
In a land with no lines

Men of Wealth and Taste

So have you guessed the nature of their game? Nice to meet you Messieurs Major Players, but I have no sympathy for your plight. The power given to you by the people’s apathy and reluctance to speak has absolutely corrupted you. No more. No more will we stand idly by as you steamroll the voices of dissent in your race to milk the moment for all it has. That moment’s overlong life has ended.

Of course right now, the whole thing is less a movement and more of a stirring, but the peoples slumber has been disturbed. Let us hope that this is the herald of an awakening, and not again the dragon turning over before it goes back to sleep. To be sure, we don’t want the bag of tricks that’s been recently entertaining European parlors, more show than substance.

We have no desire for overturnings and new slates. We’re not gunning for a second verse because that usually winds up sounding same as the first. Our needs are very simple, though many will protest difficult to achieve. That’s fine, as we prefer long hauls to quick rides anyway. After all, government is a process and we understand that. But through said process, the Powers That Be should operate with transparency, accountability, and efficiency to name a few. Really, is that too much to ask?

So let these gentlemen obfuscate and drag their feet. They can hem and haw and paint big pictures with grandiose words. They just shouldn’t expect us to grin and bear it any more. I hope.

Note: Three guesses as to the inspiration behind the lead in, and the first two don’t count.

And completely unrelated, I give you this.

You brush your hand against my shoulder
Guiding me as you point my way
Of the touch I sure you’re unaware
Yet it lingers there for days
Ghosts of fingers haunt my mind
Every time I meet your gaze
In your eyes I see bemusement
Over my blush and stumbling words
Weren’t we friends just yesterday?
I want to tell but do not dare
The truth burns a hole in me
As does the skin right there

The Future is Bright

Bright and shiny, plastic and bland, it seems to me the older these books of the future are, the more accurate they seem. Heralds of dead men's fears coming true. As humanity turns away from spirituality into materialism what will become of us? Less people do any real thinking, and more regurgitate the facts they've been spoon-fed. In our lecture halls discussion is giving away to repetition. Mindlessly we look to others for behavioral cues, until we become lemmings. Books gather dust on shelves as imaginations are stunted my bright sounds and loud colors. My friends, we as a people stand as at a crossroad. These are the days that will set our course as a nation. We have three paths ahead of us, one (the less likely of the three I'm afraid) is of a revolutionary type, where a flawed system will be uprooted and one of fairness is implemented, the second is less steep, it is of dialogue and compromise, where we sit at tables with those we disagree with and come to middle grounds and transitional solutions, the third is slippery slope into an abyss of totalitarianism and suppression of the people's will. So let your voice be heard. Believe in something. Care. Be an active member of this society. Know this, you are a citizen, and your rights are also responsibilities. Love this country.

And away from the current situation, make a human connection today; find out something new about your coworker. Look at something from a different point of view; give a chance to the other opinion. Touch someone's life with kindness, allow nature to touch you. Embrace diversity. Step away from the faceless masses, and make some waves; your boat might be better for rocking. I want to do something that scares me, on a personal level. I want to make a new friend. I want to get someone to read a book. I want, I want, I want so many things. I want my being in this world to make a difference, if only to one person. I don't mean that I think I don't matter, I mean I want to help someone grow. Just a thought. Done being preachy. Here's a little something. Somewhat off topic, but still... future.

I look within its murky depths
The scrying glass is broke I think
I will not give credence to the thought
Of a future full of shadow and smoke
I do not plan for a career in the law
I have no interest in politics
I will not give the news reports
No thoughts of being a businessman
I pause and give it a second thought
Maybe the soothsayer does not lie
I know I do all the time

Summer Lovin' Had me a Blast

As a child, I cherished the beginning of summer. Those were the days that saw school going out with a bang of trips to water parks and end of the year parties, playing heads up seven up despite our faces being feverish with sunburn. Looking forward to months of freedom stretched out before us until they appear seemingly endless. Our eyes bright with excitement and our faces already tan from numerous weekends at the beach, nothing was more beautiful. This is a little something for those lost days.

Rosy cheeks and sticky fingers
Squinting under the afternoon sun
Relief bought from the bicycle man
As my rescue arrives, not on time
Burning fingertips on the window glass
Fighting over gold-wrapped vanilla
And flavored water like a traffic light
In this cone lives my childhood

But gone are those days of joyful innocence. Instead I fall to pieces as I watch the house of cards I’ve been carelessly building all semester tremble under the heralding breeze of due dates. With nothing to look forward to but the paltry days before summer term begins, I have no patience for the oppressive weather.

The heat is a clumsy seductress
Unwanted, she clings to my body
Pours herself into every crack
Saturating my pores
Suffocating my breath
Her affections trickle
Down the length of my back
Then pool
At the base of my spine
Vestiges of her cling to me still
As I am embraced by the cool indoors

Knock Knock Knocking on a Different Door

In the core of my being there is a longing, nay, a need, to be a writer. This desire is one of my psyche’s defining qualities. My attempts have been exclusively in prose since we shall never speak of my being sixteen and the emo doggerel through which I chose to share my ‘suffering’ with the world. Now even though these musings, stream of consciousness bits, and pieces of fiction are admittedly mediocre, I do have a lot of affection for them. So when a lost and annoyingly insistent poet's muse attached herself to me I was little thrown. Despite my initial resistance I soon gave in, and since it’s in my nature to overshare I’d though I’d let you sample a little of the result.

every time she opens her mouth
pretty baubles fall from her lips
people around her coo with delight
follow her and hoard the words
this is no indicator of value
some people collect snow globes

And on a slightly less obsessive note…

My eyes have had their fill of you
Sight on whole is unsatisfying fare
I would draw a map of you with my fingers
Paint your portrait, my tongue for a brush
My lips long for the insides of your wrists
The backs of your knees call to me
As does that dip between your shoulder blades
Do not deny me the curve of your jaw
Or the juxtaposition of neck and collarbone