you're trying too hard
out in the back yard
tallying scars to the length of your arm
and i want to be
smiling
the chandelier is crashing down again
it's the crystal eight ball
with designer trim
you sold your self-defense

i could have been a better actor for you
everyone knows i never skipped my lines
but i've been cut
isn't that cute?
there are some sins we can't define
some sins we can’t take back
not that either of us would
we are married to this
our nomadic religion

driving, driving, driving
seems like we’re always driving
she keeps twisting up her hair
unsettled daydreams
filtered by the tinted windows

i'm not sure why i even care
guess it's just something
to spend my time in
i'm not one to play the course
i'm out of luck

ceremonial clink
primordial unveiling
skin stretches you out
thin as your regrets
but i've got cigarettes
and you’ve got the paper umbrella
from your last drink

i just keep racing back and forth
always driving
my heart twitches
chain-link fence in winter
that familiar sign-post
i can't wait until i'm lost again

it’s a broken windshield master plan
the carving knife stuck in your hand
it’s a cage that’s lost its keep
that falling feel, without the sleep

it’s a playground that’s been drowned in blood
love notes and shoelaces caked with mud
it's an owl that doesnt trust the tree
an empty chair on Christmas Eve

bare feet stuck in your mire
skipping blind into the fire
momentum breaks, i face the beast
choking as i gnaw its leash

hope's a double sided token
sometimes we're just broken

She said no more sad songs.
I strip the piano wire
from the piano, and let it fall to the floor,
next to
letters with
all that I had left to say.
I find every pen in the house
and give them to the mail man when he comes that day.
I take down all the posters.
I make a box full of
metaphors and similes
and what I thought would materialize as hope.
The flames from the box
momentarily take the chill from the air,
little plumes of words race up the chimney
sending smoke signals to no one.

She used to embrace the
sadness.
She used to say it’s how she knew she was alive.
She used to wait for each word
while it dripped off my pen and tongue
as I spread her in tri-fold color
like a bleeding lotus.
But she is the one that left us both as smoke -
she as weightless, as free,
and I as blackened as the soot
holding on to the hearth,
waiting to be swept up
and collected...

Such disposable gems.

just because i didn’t tell you
what i couldn’t tell you
doesn’t mean
i didn’t mean it

defenseless to the difference
you drifted in
senseless tides divided by
uneven stares at odd hours

i knew you
before you knew yourself
I knew you
in the time it takes
a vulture to understand
road-kill

your reflection
in the heat waves
spells you out
sells you out
so that i could buy in to you

like a martyr without a cause
an example for the defenseless
with a scavengers veins
and a tub filled with feathers

i cared about you
before you cared about anything
lost child in an empty market
leaving bread crumbs
for carnivores

blinded by indifference
you drifted by
your feet, guilty or not
still have rhythm

so dance
i know you will
will you ever know
how long it took
to trace those steps off the edge
of this empty page