Whiskered Nights

I stalk you.  You stalk me.
We're a cat furred family.
With a knickknack
pattywack
flay flesh from all the bones
and leave a special carcass
at our best friend's home. 

You Are More Than a Map

"...they don't love you like I love you........."

and

vomit.  Violently.  Projectile it into
an upturned hat.

You are old.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

Stop it from happening again.  Do you see.

Vomit violently again.  Spill
is that a tooth sized piece of carrot

over the side.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

Stop it from happening again.  Do you see.

Vengeance.  Vengeance!  You were small.  You grew.
Vomit and do not miss the mitt.

Down the left pectoral.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

Bang.  Head against ceramic.  That cannot possibly
work.  Where is my hat?  Where is my hat!

Slick hands and magic tricks.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

Reverberations.  Time.  Space.  Vomit
like your vertebrae depend on it.

These are not your friends.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

EVACUATE!  EVACUATE!
PLEASE!

You've seen what they're doing to their kids.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

THERE IS NOTHING I CAN DO FOR THEM!
THERE IS NOTHING I CAN DO FOR THEM!

Erase her.  Erasing her will.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job. 

I'll see you soon.  It is happening again.  Nine years
from now.  It will happen again to the person I love.

Kill her.

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

I will be suspect and examined.  There is no way and
THERE IS NOTHING I CAN DO FOR THE KIDS!

I will. 

It is happening again.  You

had

one

job.

Leave her?  Leave me!  There is a way.
Create.  Show the way.

She will die.  As will her friends.

It is happening again.  You

have

one

job.

Focus.

Airlock

"I will find you.
I will find-"

Tear drops cling to eyelashes
like molten glass.

Never.  Again.

Adrift.





How far can you see
with the nearest star fourteen light years out?







What is the battery life of helmet lamps
in a model JXL7858?





Urine. 

Urine.







Screaming urine.







Come with me.
"Where to?"
Outer space.  It'll be fun.

Trash

Love.  That loaded word.  The sound a revolver makes.  A revolving door's  sweeps that push candy wrappers out and keep the conditioned air in.  The sound double dutch makes when the rope scrapes the ground and sneakers bite against cement to rubber sole, beating the time to jump in.  The rattle rattle of empty chamber flow and the carousel clicking toward and away from the tunnel with a primer.  A revolver.  Sitting on sun beaten iron tracks with a flattened penny, warm, in a palm and the bristle breeze breaking the silence the way a freight line might from one mile beyond the bend an eye can see.  The sound a revolver makes.  Orange moon, low and full, near the eastward hills reflected on parking lot windshields yesterday a year ago.  Squawking door hinges unfixed.  Doors scarred further, collecting efforts.  Love that loaded word.  The sound a revolver makes, heavier.  The same windshields.  The same orange moon.  It is not a breeze.  The penny is scorching hot not because of the sun.  It is a carousel.  The chambers are not empty.  The sound of shoes are running feet between ropes tiring.  The air is the same.  Sweeping cigarette butts onto the sidewalk and into the lobby.  It will be jammed by a body.  That loaded word.  Love.

Song To My Mother

If you had the years back
that you whispered about
across the faux granite kitchen table cleaned,
crosswords and papers and notes,
packets of artificial sweeteners,
phone pamphlets and applications,
half eaten toast and tea cups gone cold,
unfinished math problems and pencils,
the loose change unorganized and all
face up, broken earring and tabloids,
and oh so much mail to sort
would you break into the same pieces
the same repurposed tupperware
for your parts
waiting
for someone to reassemble you?

Lover's Spree

Sniffles.
Sniffles.
Addicts, we.
Six years older.
"So that's okay?"
I'm pretty sure it is.
The constructs be as they
Heart torn out and shown to me.
Cadence and glory and don't you dare
tell me what I needs.  "Can I be with you?"
A fresh razor is always fresh.  Tucked penis.
Remember the day I picked up a body
while it cried on a stoop five blocks
away from where it was supposed
to be and I shouted into a phone?
Circle the block and gasoline.
Fury and smoke and petty.
A show for the students
going to school in the
afternoon in Spring.
Wanting is flaw.
I love your's.
Do you
love my
own?

Have We Met

You have a bone collection!  I have one too.
Run a nail underneath each opalescent scale
above your blades and muscle, hard enough
to snatch a chuckle burbled the way
birds do at night before the clocks are set back.


I miss you.


You have a paper collection!  I have one too.
Writhe upward from a squat the way snakes do,
venomous, dorsal tines sparking
the way metal is wont and ripped,
turned toward rock and sand.


I miss you.


You have a tool collection!  I have one too.
Bridge nosed close; backward petaled
eyebrows feathering in hymns,
your charred skin and scorched hair stench
mingled with my own.


I miss you.

Hit

First meetings and I want to know everything
that makes you different.
Worry war
for all four
all fall down.

Stumped and charmed with
your "I know your confusedish"
wry
smile.
Can I compose an excuse to meet with your
guillotine?

Planets and stars and
large spaces of curtains of gases
and claws and was that a wink
from beneath eyebrows
or a glint
of a guillotine?



A wash and do not be upset.
Lives to live.
Be let in.
Walk across. 
The only blade is the one inside of your head.

Obelisk

Learning what it is to really.
Skin eytn scdsa.
You're not supposed to say that.
Expletive enhanced.
Chunker. Do you remeember?

The way your father had conversations with you
with television sound bites?

Slaughter house six.  Cult.
Joys. 

Why can I not have a tooth collection?
I don't want papa to be proud of me.

I would like to gift him one of my teeth.
Be reasonable.

Don't ualrlr lwek  dl  dl;;lk;d dio9090
dopioodopwan,m.d,. d.n,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.m,.d,ddddddddd

p ;sdlka I suppose
we could skin them.  I don't know how to dry pelts. Yet.

Four years from now
to learn.







Reasonable
scope.








Afterward.
One finger to a year.
Make it count.

Tracers 5

Once you hear
you can't unsee.
For the thrill;
willing to peek
around a corner.

The Ancients 2

Cigarette butt circles chrome sink drain
and catches against the manhole cover
chrome plug.

Tinnitus shaped curl
aerator screamed
hush.

Glance backward
to see
the dune peak alive with beads.

Fuffs of sand scrolling backward
as the lake large as an ocean
sings to a freshwater jam band.

The gales
the chorus. Trees misshapen,
rooted as near as
the inland sea would allow.
Eyes to the medicine cab'

mirror for a sun.  Hairs held in place
by grains of sand.
 

           
          Do you not shower?
          Do you not wash?



       I've seen no ocean like that before.

Through A Porthole

The size of bent edged metal lodged and twisting
inside her intestines is unknowable, to watch
me fall to one knee for the fifteenth time, blue
red, gold, and phosphorous white
licks of flame bursting from my suits seams.

Break glass, air driven out.  Still burn.  Chemical
blaze.  Extinguisher plumes filling containment.
Still burn.  Over radios screams and crackling tears.
I'm okay, I'm okay!
I can't help you!
Please, listen to me.  I'm okay.

Days that pass and months without incident.
When we arrive at the colony station
the stories we will tell.  Work continues. Monitors
blink and machines whir our songs.
Card games and reading her to sleep.
Nights up with me when I could not.

Check in, check out.  Cautious smiles.
Loose bodies and minds.  Guests, invitations.
Space walks and communiques.
Drops to planets and moons and back.
Stay aboard, take care of the ship while she's gone.
Let go.  Another job lost.  I don't understand
what happened.
I can do this.  Don't worry.  I can-
You have to try.
I can-

Alarms drown thoughts, seals clip into place.
Over radios urgent commands conflict.
Get inside.
This time is different.  The thump of
foot thick steel beams seat to their cylinders.
The whoosh of air gone.  Through smoke dimmed porthole,
her eyebrows broken and streaming,
a hand across her mouth.  This time is different.

Please, listen to me.  I'm okay.  Don't-
The lights turn off.  Extinguishers plume.
I cannot see through the fire light filled helmet, you.
Days pass.  The lights are gone and
the remains of myself charred and
heat grafted to what's left of the suit.

I can't help you.  I love you.
Crackles through
the radio link.
I know.  I love you.
Before it dies alongside the main lights and
the emergency system's too.

I forgive her the blast door ever fallen locked.

The ship abandoned for too many memories
trapped inside.  Too many smiles and footfalls logged.
Too many meals and doors and machine sounds we knew.
The pain of helplessness that must have tore through her
to see the blaze rise from being
without an answer
arrests me anew each year
removed from finding the outer seal lock
against containment, turning the hard key
and blowing myself into the depths of space.
Never again
to tap "I love you" in Morse on the blackened porthole window.

The empty ship still turns in space somewhere
full of memories and aches, scorches, and empty pods.
A keepsake floating in a drawer with drapes.
Perhaps a shoe and a few keys to nothing.
What system it's found
or salvage impound or
if it's fallen into the belly of a star,
no one knows.

Across the reaches, alone on my station, cobbled together
from other ships and wrecks I've come across,
through deaths and births I cannot say,
I still comb signals now and then and smile,
a bit of ash drifting from my cheek.

Once in a while the noise resolves and
I see a picture of her content and shining face.
Brush away the spark and adjust a sleeve's clasp.
We are loved.
We are home.

Cat Nap

Open one eye to partly cloudy rays
between the slats of the window shade,
stippled through the thin burgundy curtains,
to see if the cat is still stone asleep
in the crook of your arm
while the A/C whirs.
Find that he
has one eye open to see
if you're ready to serve lunch or
tickle a swiveling ear,
or if you'll forget he is there
and give up your warm pillow
because you've gotten up to go pee.
Tut and click teeth
until his lid closes
and he stretches and yawns.
The afternoon is young,
the apartment a sauna,
scratch scratch his nose,
then your own, with a free hand
before slipping, for a few minutes more,
back to sleep.

No Pants Wednesday

If every orgasm
set you blind for minutes
you would likely
and rightly
become quite apprehensive
to touching your own skin
and that is no way to live.
The little tremor
and screw of the lip,
the glint of teeth
in tiny pop of saliva bubble,
jaws spreading to breath
and lashy licks of eyelids
when you finally blink
is certainly enough
for a Wednesday
kiss of a reminder
that it is okay
to take a moment
away from the world's afternoon
and burn every minute
of that torn away page
in love
with just you.

Near The Fire Pit

Feeling myself
wake up to Winter thaw.
I miss you.  A wife, a baby
inside still screaming across the fabric
at mach 2.3.

To inconvenience.  To inconvenience?
I do not know how to reach you.
Love has not faded.
If love were projects there would be
duct tape coating every city
on the face of the earth.  Lowercase.

Picking up my phone
wasn't terrifying
before.

I've changed.  Fuck that,
you've changed.  Fuck that.
I've changed.

All I want is visitation rites
to grant visitation rights.  I kid.  I lost
you.  I was warned.  Minefields crossed
eleven inches at a time, hipdy shifty,
toes grasping terra and fumbling

and fumbling

and fumbling

pick up!

I will rip you a new one.  Jealousy is a silver bullet.
Coursing and coursing and cooling.  A tank fitting
trigger
leashed.  Pinky toe in grass.
I will find you
and adjust.

Blacklisted, haw haw haw.

In time.  I took a photograph
of the embers.
Kicking up and wandering.
What is that song?  Two coins in a fountain
or something like that.

Rip the wheels from the motorway.
Grey diamonds and chorus.  Leaf in the wind
or something like that.

Easy furnace.  The depths of love and
slag.

As much as I miss you,
sitting beside my fire pit and eating fumes,
poking the chameleon circuit flame lights,
poking the char and infrared and near white
and amber and breathed flashfire rose and glow bits,
the brain that you showed me live
on the range.
Thunder through skull underside secret
to crack the lock's door.

I believe the idea and joy of you
doing the same.

The years will fly by.

The years will fly.

Tooth and Nail

On pain of death
the line you cross
with ease.

In all seriousness;  you will die.

I have no misgivings about cutting
the head from a bear.

I have been trained, schooled, and practiced.

It is
nothing
to me.

Keep your yards.

Your camp.

Your one million and one jokes.

Your one million and two.

And your stories of the battles and
reckless bits you performed
when you were my age.

I will have your teeth.

Dreamed reasons.

Thank you for flying
tiger airlines,

mind the plastic,

we will be landing shortly.

January Kiss

Home from Emma's birthday party
we stayed long enough to make the train schedule
in time.  Stopped off at the drug store,
do they still call them that,
to make up costumes and you went as a box:
packing tape on every seam.
I went as bargain bin socks.
"Last minute idea," we agreed,
was too easy.

The debate on table games ran long,
my mind drifts over the ease of frat house logic
and quarters broached and shot down
before the "wart" left my mouth
to make "quarters".
A window glance
to remind we are 29 floors up
and it is a one way ride
to the sidewalk.

A beat to glance at the telescope's
empty space.  "Why don't they have one?"

Undressed and too dressed to fuck.
Oh, they'll break up soon.  She's on a tour.
Not a "last hurrah!" sort of thing,
but he did say some weird shit
while we played Connect Four before she
disappeared for half of an hour.

Breathing in your fresh toothpaste:
"let's touch eyeballs."
The old joke turns and hiccoughs.
Let's touch eyeballs.
Noses mash while lips rest and
breaths from inside your wings
come to rest in my chest.

Eyelash tickle and flinch and wince.
"I'm tired too."  Agree that folks should learn
to dance more often.
Your phone is on the kitchen counter,
not the L line's seat.
Pajamas.  Mine is in the freezer.
How else will I remember
to put ice cubes in my water come morning.

Breathing in, noses eyelashes apart.
I love you.  I envy you your friends.
Let's see them again.  Breath in.  Breath out.
Whisper.  Listen to your lungs
like a neighbor sex offender and warm
my insides by your bellows, feeding a fire.

"Let's go out tonight."
Your quiet heart.  Your memories.
Your Emma.  Your party.
Our confetti, our dance.  Our argument
parting ways to work and
I thought you had fun too.
I'm sorry.

Lighter spark.
Gray tendril licks the sky blanketed in stars.
I'm glad you can sleep.
Old friends and music and table games.
I miss you already, tamping out a cigarette
on a stairwell bolted to the side of building.
Come morning
you will not miss me.

Androids Dream

Wake up.  Please wake up.
Nuzzle the grille.  Lick the left sideview mirror.
Then lick the right.
With gloved fingertips
nick the icicles from fenders.
What's wrong?  Please talk to me.
Fire.  Remember that night beneath a silver dollar moon
when we bombed all the way to Tarentum
humming to 94.5 FM and the disc jockey said
next Saturday would be a great day
to watch the Perseid meteor shower
if we could get to a location
without light pollution?
It snowed on the way back home and
it was dark enough to expect
a night whale to thrust
four lanes of silt headlit flaked blacktop &
send us into a flock of barrels
like a silver trimmed, rust fendered, bowling ball.
Please wake up.
Help is on the way.




                I love you.

Blade Runner

Every time you walk the razor
you renew the lease
on this body.
One more nail to hang a picture.
One more mural committed to walls.
One more reason to see
the sun rise and bathe the evening slag
and die.
Every time you walk the razor
to renew the lease
on this body,
promise me the evening sky
when the chimney swifts are feeding
and the bats are beginning to take wing.
That silk spectrum sky between
diamond black heaving and
sunlight's bleeding.
Every time you walk the razor
and renew the lease
on this body,
show a glitter of teeth
to let the engine seething
breathe underneath.

Breaking Apart The Origin of My Siblings

The first was without purpose and beloved.
The first asked for a second and the second
was different.
The second begged a third to gallivant and play
and the first had an entirely different set of rules,
fuel, and sway.
The first could not take care of the second
though the second could take care of the first,
however,
the second all alone could not be burdened
with that curse and so the third time was the charm
and the spell came true.
Two boys and one girl, two combat, train, and flume.
What would the first do, but to have see after
twin devils.
Fighting with sticks and rocks and guns
to be trained to be twin angels
while the first learned to dance and instrument,
to care for two angry robust hearts,
and so was born one last
angel capable and sound and sweet as a tart.
Two animals with horns that locked and played,
stout shoulders and brought up to make buildings sway
and one angel at the beginning who only wanted company
had two soldiers to journey and be quick with blades
with her other side born apart
and the knowledge that
we are all a part
of her original dream and to the wind intentions.
Adult and grown up
each of us a different invention.
Nothing came to be to their blue print looking down.

A symphony
when our strings hum
a song and  a sound

be it a single note held
or tremelo.
Two for depth and three for the shoals.
Four for cacophony, and the rest for death.
Be aware when we all wish
with one breath.