Return to the Bottom

I want to lay down and sleep
Forever dreaming of the days I woke to your smile
The heady aroma of everything you are
Keeping me on the highest cloud
I want to return to the days
When I lived in your heart
Because I don't know where to go from here
In the world of today where "alone" is just as abstract as "dream"
And I don't think I remember who I was before I was yours
So
I want to lay down and sleep
Because I remember the view from the bottom
Where the floor needed vacuuming
And the old show under the bed was a comforting friend
The thing is
The bottom is up from where I am now
And above that is the dream of the memory of
You
I want to lay down and sleep
Because falling so far after rising so high
Feels like jumping off a bridge and not dying
I need to lay down and sleep
Before I start to fight the instinct to survive
And dreams become the reality of sleeping forever

By Any Other Name

Question the beauty of a rose
For a love that may go by any other name
May be replaced in the dark of night
Where dreams rule over fate and
Roses may make a man bleed

Question the beauty of a rose
For a love whose growth must be pruned
Groomed and taught to be pleasant
Lest its thorns become wild and
A man becomes enslaved to an ideal of "beautiful"

Question the beauty of a rose
For a love that smells so sweet
May find its way into the heart
Where love's battle with sensible rages ever on and
Roses may make a man headsick

Welcome the beauty of the dandelion
For a love that is so pure
It is first seen by children
As a gift presented to their mother and
An innocence that once lost may never be recaptured

Welcome the beauty of the dandelion
For a love so sweet it may become wine
Sharing this honeyed intoxication so
It may be forgiven for growing so wild and
Beautifully, unapologetically free

Sketchbook

It started with a line
A pencil sketch from a steady hand
Vertical and straight, right down the left margin
Until a sudden curve
Quite literally draws it away
Mere seconds before it would have run out of page
     and died a smudge on the desk

The curve became a spiral
A slow and determined movement
Building a path
Traveling around and around itself
As if it were seeking its own center
Seeking some sort literal closure
     in the absence of an emotional one.

It started again with a square
One on top of another
Connected at the corners building a cube
Shaded on the side and
Casting a shadow to block out the spiral 
A box to keep everything in
     and the walls to keep everything out

Because this picture isn't worth 1,000 words
It's only a sketch worth 500
Just a moment in time, a second really
To explore the white space and
Rob it of its purity
Spreading darkness like butter onto bread
     feeding consciousness with beauty only to be thrown away

In the end maybe its enough
It might just happen that this sketch reached its full potential
And died happy in the trash
Balled up in the corner, hugging itself
Finally loving itself and being happy to do it
Or maybe that's the lie
     and every sketch that ever died in the trash is mad as hell

It could have been so much more
The next Mona Lisa or
Something as bright as Starry Night
Cathartic as the Scream
Only how will a sketch ever know
Huddled up around itself in the trash
     the junkie of art

Then it starts again with a line
Only the hand isn't so steady now
It shakes, trembling with urgent desire
An artist's need to create
To get that next fix
An explosion of self-expression in an image
     saying everything that must never be said

This line is darker
Striking in its boldness
Running to the edge of the white
Daring itself to jump from the page
To the sky as a bird in flight
A masterpiece sculpted from the meager beginnings
     of bold lines on a page

Instead the jump is a break
A right angle across and another up
Sketching the path of an elevator
Down to up and down again
Then back up and down more quickly
Cycling faster and faster rushing to the right margin
     where it will die, a smudge on the desk

It started with a line
A brushstroke from a steady hand
Vertical and straight, right down the left side of the canvas
Until a sudden curve
Quite literally paints it away
The beginning of a new picture born from trash
     a masterpiece worth 1,000 words. 

How to Operate With a Broken Heart

I'm trying to find the words
Or a way to explain what's in my heart
All the feels piled on top of me
Pinned under their weight, I couldn't breathe
Until this crack in my chest opened to a chasm
And I stood up feeling numb.
The real fuck of it is
The world looks the same and nothing's changed
Just a slight tint from my eyes that makes everything look just a little blue
So I just put one foot in front of the other with a smile
Walking through an unchanged world that doesn't give a damn
Inside I'll ask "what about me?" and "what about my plans?"
Then I'll choke back that sob and keep walking
Keep smiling
Because nothing's changed.
It's the end of the road
And I still got bills to pay
I still got to eat and sleep and work and dream
With this mask upon my face
Stepping one foot in front of the other with a smile
Passing all the faces that taught me what it is to sonder
Don't you know this hurt?
Can't you feel this pain?
Fuck no they don't care
Why would they give one fuck when
I can't wake up in the morning feeling happy or
How I cry myself to sleep every night because the nightmares just won't stop and
There's fear bleeding out from under the bed and coming out of every closet
And I'm trying to find the words
A way to explain what's in my heart
Just to show you, to show me, to show everything
I got ulcers in my belly all from worry
My back is out and I can't stand up carrying all this weight
It hurts here in my chest
All the way to my soul
Drowning in a river of tears that only flows inside until everything is just a little blue
Because nothing's changed
And the world still don't give a damn
So the mask smiles when I can't
And I'll walk through day after day
Until I stand up and feel numb
Because the real fuck of it is
The right words only matter when there's someone to listen

Time Squared

I took my gaze off of myself
The day you were born

The day we met
My future became our future

I smiled more than ever
Because I knew I’d never be alone

I’ve watched you grow
With fascination, admiration and adulation

All I want
Is to see your future

To honor your wish
In seeing love unfettered, held only for you

I’ve learned
Through your teachings

With time
All things will change

Mirror, Mirror

Mirror, mirror
Tell me a tale
Not of the fairest
Nor of the beast
Weave the tale of what you see
When I gaze into the window of your soul

Mirror, mirror
On the wall
Is it me that hangs on ev'ry word
Perhaps it's you
Speaking the truth
So bold it can't be understood

Mirror, mirror
Shall I look closely
To see the ugliness inside
Cold hard honesty
Reflected in your deadpan smile
Sending shivers down my spine

Mirror, mirror
What do you see
The image of a man
Plus the reflection of what's behind him
Do I look at what you see
Or what's in sight beyond

Mirror, mirror
What do I see
A reflection of pain
Soothed with platitude and rhyme
Rising to the surface and above
A scar that never heals

Mirror, mirror
On the wall
What is true
Comes from those who call
And who is fairest
Are the healers known only as 'friend'

Incision and Drainage

You thought I didn't see but
I've lived off of your sidelong glances
I've made your resentment my armor and
Your sneers my weapon of self-destruction
I've nursed from your infected tit for so long
Negativity courses through my veins like blood
Black, thick and oh so sexy
Because all I've ever been is someone else's trash
And all I was ever going to amount to
Is the sum total of the pain and abuse that fell upon your head
And that shit rolls down hill
A diarrhetic waterfall I've drowned in
For a score plus seventeen

But do you want to know the secret of pain?
The moment you stop feeling it
You can start using it
Attracting the beautifully damaged
Moths to my flame
Batting them away when they knock my dick in the dirt
Only to invite them back
Suckling with vampiric tenacity
Drinking from the fount of insanity
Developed through years of your intricate lies
Feeding from the same as a perversion of Namaskar
It's who we are and it's where we're going
And where we've been

A sign that things are going wrong
This can be your sick love song
A verse to slit your wrists by
A goodbye kiss to the pain
Sent with love from me to you
Another attempt to exsanguinate your disease
You thought I didn't see but
Your sidelong glances and resenment
Your sneers and negativity
Are a mirror for your misplaced self-righteousness
Faced with the horror of your own reflection
I drain this abscess of your infection
Until the blood flows red and clear as my introspection

I won't become the thing I hate
Burning from the inside, still so fucking cold
Strangling my throat into silence
With a caress of my skin, welling up inside
Finally free, running down my arm and from my eyes
Salty on my tongue
This bitter taste of victory
I have finally made you warm
With a heart that's become so old
I won't believe this shame
As I watch you wither, blister, and burn
Peeling back the flesh at last revealing
The monster of my nightmares

After all this time
Running from so much
And hiding just like you taught me
You have no power over me and
I won't even waste originality
"From hell's heart,
I stab at thee.
For hate's sake,
I spit my last breath at thee"
Because my verse is free
And now
Facing a reflection of my own beauty
So am I

I Only Cry When I'm Alone

In the morning
When the sun shines brightly and
I can see the beauty in the world
As the leaves whisper on the wind that
Everything is fine
I swallow a pill to make myself believe, so
I only cry when I'm alone

In my heart
Where love grows in transilience
I'm surrounded by the acceptance and fellowship and
I belong in this world full of devotion and care
Yet I still feel like a migrant,
Oliver Twist holding out his empty bowl, so
I only cry when I'm alone

In the evening
When the sun kisses the moon goodnight
As it sinks into the darkness to rise once more
Painting the sky with pastel luminescence so breathtaking
The Gods themselves stop to take heed and
I shiver in the cold and lonely darkness I've created, so
I only cry when I'm alone

In my mind
Where I remember every good thing I've ever missed and
I try desperately to forget every wrong turn I've ever made
Wars are fought against my heart and
Casualties are made of everything and everyone I love
Yet when the trumpets sound the ceasefire, it's too late, so
I only cry when I'm alone

In the dark of night
When your eyes can still find mine but
I can't see your face
Only the wound I've made on your heart
Bruised and bleeding
Choked in the desperation of my amity until
I wish I could only cry when I'm alone

Dancing At Night

They danced in the moonlight
A seductive waltz in traditional triple time
With bodies speaking in the language of sensual seduction
And the Earth opened beneath their feet
Welcoming them to the cosmos
As they danced and danced
Into the eyes of nebulae
Through event horizons and
Past the absolute magnitude of the stars
They danced through the night
In the blackness of the sky
Over the darkness of the ocean at nighttide
With eyes connected through knowing glances
Soft secrets shared only between lovers
Partners to a dance stepped out in time
Two hearts beating as one
And in the chill of the morning
They held each other close and
Oh so tight
Fearing the love they’d found dancing in the night
Would evaporate in the harsh light of the morning

Redemption

Eyes as blue and clear as the sky
When I look into forever
And realize how small I am
Standing in the vastness of everything that ever was
Reaching for your hand so I can
Hold on to a love that has gone unspoken for far too long
Erasing all the broken love that came before
The result of lies, cowardice and the machinations of the petty
All gone
A hallucination of life disguised as a slow death
Lost down the rabbit hole
Replaced with you, so beautiful
Everything I ever want to be
Looking in those blue eyes now
Begging, just hold my heart, patiently
Because it’s those eyes that draw me back
Making me see I’m better than I was
Whole, happy and ready to live
The life I imagined
The only one I ever need to know
As waiting fades into now
And it’s me and you across the world
Redeemed in the eyes of the only Gods we’ve ever known:
The men behind crystal blue eyes
Looking into forever

I Can't Save You

I can create anything I want and make it as reall as I want. I can tell any story; dramatic, or scary or funny as I choose to weave it. But I can't save you.

All the rage inside you ... the all consuming fire that twists us and turns us around, making us into the monstrous beasts that we ourselves don't understand.

I can understand it. I can understand you. I can see everything I've already seen and everything I want to unsee through your eyes. I can feel the chaos inside and I can hear the cocophany. but I can't silence it.

See, I made you. As completely and perfectly in my image as God made Adam. It's just that I didn't understand that the apple of my eye was original sin to poison your innocence and banish you from paradise.

10 Things I Hate About You

I hate the way you lie to me and
The way you make me cry.
I hate the darkness that you bring and
How you wear it so well.
I hate the way I know no one will ever love me like you and
How hard it is to get away from you.
I hate the way I always come back and
The way the abuse feels so familiar I mistake it for the embrace of a friend.
I hate the way you cut me and
That I know I'm nothing without you.

One Night Stand

The way you kiss me fiercely
As if my lips held the cure for your sadness
The way your hand deftly unzipped my pants
Searching for masculinity to match your own
The way you pushed me to my knees
Gently asserting your will

And I return your kiss
Drinking the poison you've carried for so long
And I filled your hand with everything you desired
Man to man, burning in passionate fire
And I drop to my knees
Paying you the tribute you deserve

We both know you're going to fuck me
As I rise to my feet looking in your eyes
Telling me without words
That I'm wearing too many clothes
Buttons hit the wall, ripped open with my shirt
While we slowly dance to the bed

I'm on my knees
A supplicant to your desire
The familiar pleasure pain reminding me
I am the object of your lust
As you fuck me, fuck me
FUCK ME

Your essence floods me
Filling me with all you are
The very best of you
Deep inside me
Filling me, changing me
Taking the very best of me, returned to you as a gift.

The way you hold me
As if all the joy in the world just passed between our bodies
The way you lightly stroke my ass
Reaffirming the intimacy born of our lust
The way you sent me on my way
Sated, satisfied and solitary

Crossroads

North is the land of memory.
All mistakes and stupidity.
The bright fantasies of inexperienced youth.
That time when your cock leads you around by your balls
and Sex, drugs and rock 'n roll are the law of the land.
Oh what a time we had!

South is the land of responsibility.
Everyone does exactly what they're supposed to
And live revolves around tiny boxes.
Tiny boxes to live in.
Tiny boxes to stare at.
Numb and believing they exist outside their tiny boxes.

To the East is the village of family.
Watch how they hide from each other,
Even while embracing affectionately.
Where the promise of 'happily ever after' hangs in the air
Like a carrot before a mule.
Everything anyone could need; just out of reach.

Westward the sun sets,
Its bright rays stabbing the eyes
A reminder that even in beauty there is pain.
A place where living as one was meant to be
Permeates the air with the discovery of the unknown
Explored by those who understand the limitless potential of the mind

So here I stand at the crossroads
Looking back at every trodden path
I wonder how it's possible that every turn was wrong?
The answer to this question refuses to show itself
It's so busy contemplating it's own self-righteousness
That nothing else matters

Have you ever rebuilt yourself from the ground up?
Splintering the past that shaped you
Into the dagger plunged into your own chest
All the while knowing that this moment is the moment
The one you've been rushing toward your whole life
With no way to stop it?

The right words always come too late
So I learned to cry in six languages
Just to make sure that every time I opened my eyes
I could see raindrops on the window of the world
A beautiful storm.
Perfect soliloquy.

I thought I was looking for death
But it turns out I was looking for love.

Schedule

It's a new week. A Sunday, a new beginning. A day to wake up with the sun, stretch my arms and rip the curtains off the wall with eagerness to face this day! You lay next to me, chest rising and falling in a peaceful sleep. And in that moment its easy to forget that even in paradise, the sun sets.

Monday comes with the shock of the alarms ringing in my head. Responsibility crashes around me and I open my eyes, still tired and trying to do the math of how many hours, minutes and seconds until I can sleep again. Until the world fades again and the hurting stops and I can float away into the ether of a blessedly dreamless void.

Tuesday breaks through; a smack to the face with none of the comfort of an accompanying splash of water. Another day, another dollar; as the saying goes. But I'm already running on fumes and there's nothing you can buy for a dollar these days. Not even a 20 minute phone call, much less the motivation to rise above the muck where I swim with the other "dregs." Oh darling, I wish you were here.

Wednesday and I'm halfway out of the dark. I'm already thinking about you and I have to believe that what I'm thinking is the reason that it's called "Hump" day. I can't focus on anything but the memory of when you'd bend me at the waist, pull me back slowly, fuck me hard and whisper softly into my neck that I'm yours. I want to give you the air I breathe and I'm caught up in the pleasure of the pain,  because even if it's moving too fast, baby, we should take it too far.

Thursday I dreamed that we were together and you wanted me as much as I want you. I held you in my arms and made you safe. You thanked me with a kiss and as the fireworks burst behind my eyes I thought to myself, "why does my tongue feel so damn safe inside of your mouth?" And I fall again.

Friday I sat under the stars thinking about you and wondering if maybe, just maybe you were thinking about me too. Only to see the answer in the light of the moon. You're like perfection, some kind of holiday, you got me thinking that we could run away. Into your vision of the future, through the looking glass you held in front of our faces. The shimmering reflection of what we could be.

Saturday I woke up wanting to kiss you. I crave your touch making me feel like I'm being electrocuted. I crave your lust-filled eyes fixed on me as the only being worth conquering in this universe. I want to taste you again, like a secret or a sin. I think about pressing my lips against yours; fusing our bodies together. Each of us desperately searching for something the other doesn't know is inside them. Thousands of years old, too old to be captured in poems. Too old to be loved by everyone; but loved deeply by a chosen few. 

It's a new week. A Sunday, a new beginning. You lay next to me, chest rising and falling in a peaceful sleep. Looking at you, I realize, you're the perfect example of falling for someone's soul before their skin. Because as beautiful as you are through all the days; I didn't truly love you until I'd memorized the sound of your laugh and swam in the blue of your eyes.

Meditation of the Bull

All I see is red
Gouts of blood on tips of horns
You're beautiful

The sun on my skin
Like being wrapped up in safe love
It feels like heaven

All I see is red
Gouts of blood on tips of horns
You're beautiful

For Those Who Are Still Tirelessly Pursuing Happiness

Happiness is an elusive cunt.

The carrot dangling in front of your face keeping you hauling these bags forward. Always pursuing happiness, have you even thought of what you'd do if you caught it? Have you considered that maybe you can't catch it with your arms so full of luggage?

Have you considered just being happy instead of chasing happy?

What a bitch smack those words are. The people who say things like that, they don't understand. They think it's as simple as just picking up your luggage and taking off. They're even glad to tell you, happiness went off in that direction. Wait, you dropped a bag. It says "depression" on it. It's heavy and clearly high quality, and it looks so good on you.

Do you think they have it in my size?

The luggage is heavy. It didn't start that way did it? The first bag was easy; I mean you weren't carrying anything. So you picked it up and you started walking; a nice walk, with plenty of people all carrying their own bags. After a while when your arm was tired you decided to look inside.

Remember what that felt like? First the feeling of utter relief when you set that bag down; the pins and needles as the circulation started massaging the numbness back to life. Remember how terrifying it was to reach in and pull the second bag out? When you started carrying both of them it still wasn't that bad. Sure, they were heavier but nothing you couldn't handle. Until the two bags turned into four; which turned into eight which turned into ... tell me, how fast did your arms get numb this time?

Maybe you should take up juggling. Everything might not be so heavy and cumbersome if you just keep it all in the air; and you might be able to reach out and grab happiness with your free hand at just the right time. After all, you've only got two hands. Just be careful looking ahead, you might trip over now. Maybe a forklift.

Do you think happiness has a forklift?

This goes on forever. The luggage just gets bigger and heavier while you fall further further behind happiness and you realize you don't have the right to, only the right to pursue happiness. No, this this problem goes much deeper than anything you could have seen or could have controlled. And no one can tell you where happiness really is. But I can tell you what I've heard:

1. I've heard happiness in laughing with a toddler about something nonsensical.
2. I've heard happiness in the raindrops hitting the roof of a covered porch warmed with hot coffee.
3. I've heard happiness in the beat of the drums around a fire of dancers.
4. I've heard happiness in the music of lights that shine from my fingertips.
5. I've heard happiness in a lover's voice wishing me good morning after a wonderful, sleepless night.
6. I've heard happiness in dark at midnight.
7. I've heard happiness in the first light of dawn.
8. I've heard happiness in the company of the friends who erase the concept of "inappropriate."

I've never caught happiness. Not once. I've seen it quite a few times and it's beautiful; and I can tell you that happiness isn't carrying anything. Happiness is always just a step ahead because maybe happiness knows something that I don't; because if happiness is traveling without baggage, what do you suppose happiness is chasing?  The only way to find out is to drop your baggage, speed up and grab it.

Legacy

Here we are at last
The rest of the story
I never wanted to write
The chapters have come and gone
I needed you....
I missed you....
I don't like you....
I don't want to be you....
How many times have I said it
I.
Don't.
Want.
To.
Be.
You.
Somehow I've never escaped your hegemony
And it is true that it's your face I see when I look in the mirror
Here's the pause
Where everything stops
And I try so hard
Just to see things for one second like you
To find peace in the legacy you've left me
For the first time I finally do understand
Though it's nothing about you
But I know what it is like
To return from a war in peacetime
Wakened cold and sweaty
Beaten bruised and bloody
With no enemies left to fight
Nothing to fill the gaping hole left by your patrimony
Only now at the end
Can I fathom the truth
This absence is a kindness
Whether your absence from the thing called 'Father'
Or mine from the thing called 'Son'
And so here we are at last
The rest of the story I never wanted to write
In which our hero
Will erase borders
Engaging in diplomacy
Not out of compassion
Nor from affection
This deed is born from necessity
A need to end a war that's raged for decades
Hard fought and well won
Darkness falls when what you've given
Returns to you
And I am born anew
No more words
No more verse
No more pain and
No more nights wakened cold and sweaty
This absence is a kindness
For one cannot exist while the other lives
And I understand only what God must have felt
As I kill your first born son
To wash away the sins of the father

Musings of the Mad Volume I: Every Stitch Tells a Story

Readers of the mad rejoice! The first collection of Musings from your favorite madman is now available in print! Every Stitch Tells a Story collects poems from the page as well as new, never before published material to round out your collection. Special advance copies for readers of this page are available through direct order from the publisher, just click on the image below.

C

I am the basis for your division

Without me you will never be full

I am the sum of your isolated incidents

I am semiperfect and self-descriptive

I am the explosion of your heated passion

Your blood could never boil in anger if it weren’t for me

I am the will of legislation

You are bought and sold at my hand

I’ve seen more years than nearly anyone alive
I can save your life

The individual within your group

I burn brightly as the Sun

The microcosm of your macrocosm

I escorted Christ to his condemnation

I am the tears that make the river of your Sin

I am ordinal perfection

I am Dante’s Divine Comedy

A vigilant overseer 

I am the eyes of Argus

The Verbe de Dieu

I am to be crowned as King

The creation of order from chaos

I am the achievement of all your dreams

I am the path to inner peace

The determination of your secrets

I am the discovery of the absolute and completely hidden

Supremely perfect

I am the Universal Energy

Bringing new beginnings

I am the end of the road