86 Scripts

Western medicine
has been minding me
for one third of my future life,
according to Western medicine.

But I will probably lose my life
by the time I double my currency,
and I am currently in the process
of transferring my accountability.

My future finger has been pointed,
and I say I'm sorry more so
than I ever thought I would,
and now I'm tipped out.

A Messy Trade

I can't
I won't
I don't

I know
My age
Is flexible

Sixty
I mean
Twenty

I know
Division
I'm thirty

A Real Thought

she couldn't stand
still
she couldn't stand
the way
I wrap my words
in a way
it's a more clinical
man or her
ways can
be gender neutral
or even
gender neural
and that's a thought
and that's real

Amateur Daze

a breath
is not far
from death

a cape
a casket
a break
a basket

no life
is far
from life

Amnesiac Stint

Entrepreneurs in lust
with flaccid peanuts
packed in real tight.

Zip tie my love
with the wind
that blows me.

I am a slim lamp,
trying to do my job
in this dim ageist life.

It all begins when
the abstracted end
enters the rear-view.

Drive away like decades
that meant nothing to you,
and look forward to reeling.

Anchors

Bowling for grape leaves,
I leave my family in pieces.

Balding for stability,
I cough up security.

In some ways,
I am who I thought I'd be
by the time I was fully wilting.

In some ways,
I'm just a dent in the wind,
and I'll surely die a tumbleweed.

A face is a world,
a body is a lifetime,
and feet are certainly a mouthful.

Striped lives always fold over,
and seeded plans choke all life.

Anchors are never anchors,
and dusk is only dust before dawn.

Bedside Monologue

I feel like the crumbs
of a trampled croissant
when I flood your face
with El Niño thought waves.

But really, sometimes I lose
my planet to ego obesity,
and then I am just a sad stethoscope,
unable to properly read heartbeats.

I want to write a general letter,
similar to a strong suicide note,
in which I apologize to everyone
whose air I’ve ever stolen.

I never meant to be a thief;
I think I listened too much
as a young boy, and as a man,
I mouthed off the right route.

Beta Meditation

Deny actuaries;
plead sanity.

Spare spark
at the race track;
you got my legs
caught in a crawl.

Soma sofa
in a poppy field;
you got my arms
tied to a trophy.

Deep awakening;
peasant sanctuary.

Blackout on the Back Route

Hit these pills if you must
Got to get it in the gut

I’m not a problem
I’m not a costume

I’m a Bin Laden mascot whistle
In the MacBook ghetto scene
Pull those strings or pull that metal
Hit that glass or hit the jackpot

I was a neutral sock youth
Thinking freely in Yonkers
Perfecting critical chemistry
With paradoxical pupils

Shaved the armpit of Bushwick
And my French got hard in Philly

Trip up the fame engine
I’m a buzzed rebel on the run

Blue Scripture

Smoking oxygen
Drinking gin
Calling bullshit
Gambling quick

Benjamins
Are dangerous

Angel dusting
Up in restaurants

No luck
No lies

Cut it
Fuck it
Spit it
Get it

No dough
NoDoz

Die slowly
With nicotine

Now in the temple
With Mr. Clean

Survival is a sword
My tongue is my word
Liquor got me bent
Hope my words ain’t spent

Born Again, Based Forever

how can I know your face
if you don't know your name
the lesson can still be prescient
if the agenda is to be lessened

you have proofread my life
so many times by now
you have chosen to type it out
and somehow I'm still alive

in China I am nothing
in Hong Kong I am less
in New York I am a memory
now I am a body out West

Born Again Till Death

Chicago is a cold place
to be institutionalized.

Don’t feel sorry for yourself;
I don’t feel sorry for your self.

Isn’t it funny how some bodies
become a sharp knife to fall on?

If you’re not laughing, you’re falling;
if you’re not falling, you’re laughing.

So the thing about knives
is they become dull with age.

We’re not getting any younger,
and patience is for hospitals.

Jog your Nikes down to their souls
until I-90 becomes a childhood memory.

Cardigan Strip

There are no birds
where I live now;
only stray quadrapods,
trained in the wild.

The digital thermostat
has overheated again.

Sometimes I talk
to myself at night,
perhaps especially
when others are near.

And it's not so embarrassing
to come undone now and then.

Chain Reaction

Ice cold
Shit happens
In this life
In the Bronx

Million dollar puzzle
Peaced out of New York

Living better now
Vegas weather now

No money
No cops
No problems

Chasing Bullshit

Christ is drunk again
Like an off-key model
Dubbing blood in the club

Singing and smoking weed
While Chloe privatizes fashion
I’m going somewhere novel

True writer for the night
Real narrative for the wife
I profess zero fucks for dicks

Stay hot in Los Angeles
Avoid the cold in Dublin
Always hustle with amnesia

Cinema: A Being

stay awake
long enough
to love

stay asleep
long enough
to die

compliance
is defiance
of one's self

what makes you
yourself after all
when your actions
are sequenced
when your words
are infrequent
when most of all
you're climaxed
and credits are due?

Das Boost / Die Oath

Alone again
with
asthmatic
synthesizers
I feel
like a trill troll
in the dungeon
of a drunken dragon
and it's like
can't we all be
masters
of our own
fantasies?

Dip on the Hollow

Car-kicking boys
Getting sober for girls
It’s all good in the hood
I’m so hood when I’m good

Cops and mobsters
Peep what I say
Know what I mean

I’m like Van Damme
In the Grand Canyon

I’m like my momma
Chilling in Morocco

I stand in as a ski mask
I stand out in Montana

Squeeze hammers and homies
Mount heads of phonies
And paint lead on canvas

Bail money trust fund
Court ain’t stopping this fun
Trust the sports bar guru
To slap claps for diplomacy

Dish Verse Can

It’s lonely in the basement
Dealmakers look up to God

It’s even lonelier in the closet
The rest of us try to get high

Up in the attic or is it Atlanta
I’m just a white bitch in my zone
Trying to duck traps
Like a shark in a drought

Look down if you need it
My money don’t need cleaning

I put my schooling in the vault
I scale up before I chalk out

Disobedient Hustle

Drinking beer by the case
Comfortable with cognac
Lounging, e-mailing
Putting down police

Drunk off bleach
Ditching petty shit
Sitting pretty on
Metropolitan goals

Real white man
Frail motherfucker
No money in the plan
Nothing but perspective

Society is tripping out
Talking back to folks
Fuckers slapping down
Ones trying to come around

Pointing fingers
Walking away
It’s automatic
After 1979

Do The Dishabille

Barometric pressure
is impossible to gauge
in inflatable domes.

And bad decisions
cannot be determined
with two-way mirrors.

It’s almost summer
and everyone appears
to want to get naked.

Dosage Decreed

No bite
in the game,
but yet you
are still hungry?

And what to make
of a table with no legs?

Burdensome
feats of fear...

I eat what I want;
I eat when I want...

sometimes my words;
sometimes my world...

Dropped Feels

I live crazy
Like
I’ll live short

You know?

I keep my game tight
But my mom taught me
To stay polite though

Don’t talk to talk
Discuss something

Don’t laugh to laugh
Love something

No knowledge
Left on the L
Just Groupons
And groupies
Alone below
The Range Life

Drought Slurp / Crank Night

Bottles are legends
Down in the South

Let’s be honest tonight
Let’s fuck repercussions

If we can forget model matters
We can spit chatter tomorrow

You know I never chose to run
Nosebleeds ain’t improvements

Momma’s gonna be grumpy
About my shit ugly summer

Your ego is some kind of mood
Mine is another language

Eagles, The Nastiest

Five-O survivors
Swing on the town
Like soldiers count
Men on rooftops
And on this rooftop
88 well-dressed girls
Click-clack and bring back
A Grey Goose perspective

Earth Days

Doing simple drugs
In Delaware is the cost
Of living a window life
And it’s like can you relate?

Grew up with legends
Haunted by the horse
Sold my birthday twice
To get dirt off the mound

Get raw with this money
It’s free like your clothes
It’s free like your God
Not even close to the crown

Missing death theme
Fitting in the throws
Head-butt a car door
Settle into the relapse

Eight O’Clock Coffee (Standard Time)

Who is that under the comforter?
I am uncomfortable (again).
I have come for the table (a gain).
Let us be thankful for us, and not much else.
This next year will be split between bananas and leg warmers.
Come to my window, and sing me a song of restitution.
I feel a cover coming on; I feel some kind of wonderful.
Who is that under the comforter?

Everything Must Go: Prequel to Sequel

Losing pants
Making diagrams
Typos and negatives
I am so positive
About maybe a few things
Flexing in flux mode
Oh so Cavalier
In a Pagan Clown World
I am like a fly in a McDonald's
Every day I shave my head
Poorly like a poor monk
And I'm patient if I know
You're good for it
You know you're good
At popping pillows
And pushing buttresses
Ah shit goddamn
My back is thrown again
Dirty old fuckers
Got me bent alright
But I'll stay as straight
As the frays can tolerate

Exhibitionist

Loose noose in the kitchen
Bruised seat in the Zen Den

This is no place for vulnerability
This is a warehouse of mirrors

Lying naked on the floor
Like a model from below

Everything I do is for when
The blue comes to surface

In this painted bird world
We all try to escape the red

Not all chickens default to yield
Most turkeys are flashy in pants

Ducks are a color field series
And geese puff up to get down

I am a brief neighbor jockey
Consuming sex on the beach

I am a shadow-boxing champion
Brewing herbal tea for mobsters

I let the streets have their ways
I look at the overlooked always

Exile on High Street

Powder
Your noses

There's
No sweat
In the game

Key out
The sockets

There's
No blood
In the Thames

First Sight of Water

Daydreaming
Nightcrawling

No plants in the Valley

Slight a cougar
Spill on frijoles

No chants in the Valley

Retrograde renegades
Bumping dicks on the road

No pants in the Valley

Pouring distilled beverages
In a De Stijl home

No chance in the Valley

Focus

Boss women
Get it
They get me

A soft-spoken girl
Once told me
In a parking lot

Don’t trust anyone
In their twenties
But then again
Nothing is forbidden

My one ear is open
The other ear is free

And I don’t slip
On what I sweat

And I don’t sweat
Anything I say

And I don’t say
Anything I don’t do

Fodder Meds

You, my fat mountain of a man,
are Mussolini in a Chaplin costume,
and I will slaughter your greased pigs
with my own bespoken hands.

And your nutmeg scent of a woman
and her World Series of Poker pupils
can dilate with the news prompts
I will feed her ears, prudently.

Fuck your pork-eaten pines
that wipe U.S. sandpaper asses
and shove your shoveled
density in some other ditch.

It’s plain to me that I have seen
the bowels of humanity
in this fallen season of fate,
and sometimes destiny is putrid.

Foie Gras

Fashionable gossip,
and the unhinged hubris
of professional songbirds:
operatic backhands,
handstands at the opera.

Birdbrains naturally acquaint themselves
with high-perched opinions of peers.

Of course, black tar geese fly south for the winter.

This is the stuff self-revolving global dreams
are lubed up with on graveyard shifted scams.

Freedom Less Violence

punch me in the nose
and wonder where
the feeling goes

feeling is a word
but it's something
you can feel too

too also has two
other spellings
as well and well

language is a religion
and religion is foreign
and I am just a noun

oh my god oh my
don't you believe me
when I tell you I'm free

From The Wood

Full-on geek out the gate
Chain link the brain for good

Green creeps like a slow war
Front hard on the low brow

Still a steel mouth in the racks
Still walking bricks off the gas

Smoke minutes in Belgium
Pocket life like a hood trick

Gravedigger

We are horses bucking
on wet grass hampers

We are runway models
keeping secrets to ourselves

There are gas lights
setting fire to mornings

There are black nights
setting companions free

I am dogging myself
in a pet cemetery

I am planing myself
on a clean white tarp

Grim Ripper

Wardrobe for the week
Weak closure for the peak
Getting high in the den
Feeling spent on the trek

Marked by luscious slips

Dragging lacquered nails
Across loose goose lands
Flying new pigments
With crested armatures

No more pants for days

Halftime

A number
in a notebook
is maybe a lock
or maybe a key
depending on
the dash holes
sweating it

--&&&--

time out
in time
our time
is now!

International Air Waybill

everything
is the same
everywhere

eyes are eyes
sex is sex
death is death

everything
is the same
everywhere

Jazz On Behalf Of Blues

Hard bumps in the Valley

Thrown like a broke bastard
Nothing but concrete shoes

Yawn on Mission
Wash the morning
And dry leaves pale

Free health party
Soap under nails
Cups of Old Style

Hypnotize men and women
And kids punch words like rain

The shit I smoked in Cologne

Kimono Love

Dress me up
in your fortune.

Your patterns
rock bottoms
out from under-
worn wormholes.

On these paisley-
rich walkways,
wisdom crumbs
fall upon soles.

And if my foil
has any holes,
your fingers
fill with flair.

Eastern minds
talking bodies
on Western fronts,
over and back.

No plateaus to see
where we go to be.

Labor

Unions
abound
because
what else
is there
but us
in world
exchange?

We are
as free
as free
ranging
chickens
afraid of
ourselves
on shelves.

Last Call

Pride evaporating
with the shatter
of a shallow mug;

I am the shell casing
of a stationary bet,
double down on the Solo.

Lawyer Fees

I’m flossing skulls out here
I’m Walter White out here

I’ve got an avalanche
Of sweet butter shit
Breaking necks
Like gym bitches
Bonding over quarters

Trapped in the living room
Counting money in the closet

Rubber band men
Keying Benz lives
Eating pills now
Like powder girls
At a wedding

Your god ain’t gonna stop this
Your old lady gonna watch this

Live Like This

Patience got me mental
Doing circles on myself

I admire my own authority
However brief it might be

I got mad clapped procedures
Expectations can’t let me sleep

And codeine can only dip the pain
If you’re conveniently in the Valley

Lock my wired mind in my tired body
Codes keep my head close to my feet

Lost Land, Lost Life

When I was halfway through a man’s life
and a third through a halfway house
maybe closer to a quarter life crisis
I met a prairie girl who duped me
into an encyclopedic subscription
to a great millennial depression.

The oasis I had lapped in and around
for two decades prior to the downed outs
had dried up and I was thirsty and proud
and I was looking for love or a rebound
but of course I found a shared needle
in a crowd full of berries and beans.

And until I felt the stone cold drip
of the North Country’s winter grip
my knuckles were stiff like the tips
read from a newspaper’s bagged body
dropped into my lap and bred for dead
announcements in the springtime.

This was an old-fashioned suicide
crafted in Manhattan like disco
and my karaoke can sure get twisted
in the twilight sung songs of sorrow
and I’m sorry I ever met this temptress
who tempted me into indebted darkness.

Maiden Man

You could have been
the synthetic believer
you once threatened to be
while we were stuck between
the turnpike and the freeway
smoking Turkish cigarettes
and listening to witches
crush brushed broom beats
but you nicked yourself
and rode the long handle
like a pagan gone pacifist.

Menagerie, PST

"Tough dirt,"
says the high heeled plains.

All the marginal Flatlanders
watch Saturday Night Fights,
and Sprint is their cellular provider.

Boxing gave me depression,
but I do like the cheap shots;
although grains aren't vegetables.

&

All the palm tree Vikings
hike on their Star Trek sets,
and pretend Variety is diversity.

These rolling rocks are so typical;
they're so typically playing roles
of making the rules or being wronged.

"Tough shit,"
says the mills and the mines.

Mesa Rounds

Benching
outside
an Exxon,
I saw you
pulling hair
and I thought
this desert
was on fire,
but attendants
are sometimes
so careless
with cigarettes
and gasoline.

A mirage,
a sequel,
sequenced
with well-lit
foreign texts.

Speak to me
in French,
in whispers,
and I'll speak
back in time.

Mime in Mind

I forgot about
the times you
rifled my tomes
like an orphan
assured with
cocky flair.

The panache
soon panned out
like a flooded flame
and out with the old
you said as you left
but you never spoke.

Monastery Dropout

nobody deserves a hood pass
especially not in this urban life

nothing deserves a title without
the privilege of having earned it

forget your name forget your age
you are only what you believe

remember to have faith in death
it will happen with or without you

Money in the Middle

Hollow coast
Suspicious style

Lick dirt
On arrival

Grip trust
For survival

Material peels
Cold clienteles

Stay savage
In the zone

Get gone
In the dust

My Own Private Mexico

Some roads are built with dirt and powder. Some bodies are drawn with sand and paper. Some walks are talked over cornbread in a corner.

My Word Is My Word

Sipping purple
In my prime

Fade back
Into the Gap

Firstborn son
Second grade nerd

No grandfathers
No privilege

I’ll pay the cost
I won’t take the loss

Never Going Back Again / The year is now, and now I am me…

exchanging rumors
at the old record mart

going to college
for the first time

circling back
around
on
elliptical decades

picking fingers
out
of
gutsy depths

& then
& then
again

any
relationship
can
be
clipped
or
filed

like
how
narratives
can
be
news
too

& then
& then
again

getting lost is just something that happens

New Jersey Commas

Weak claims
Mark hearts

Real bad boys
Bust fools' jewels
With steady hands

Clique bitches
Take money
Like they know
How the rules go
Like they know
Them young pieces
Leave you deceased

And

I don’t fuck around
With them pull-up
Peeled-off wax homies

I’m fatal as fuck
Like a Big Mac gas trap

Get spanked for style
Get shanked in the paint

I can feel it
I can reel it

I can real it
I can fill it

I’m a California puffy jacket
Looking to flex like uh
Now I’m just smoking
Now I’m just like uh
Wearing Eddie Bauer

You bout that clout?

Newport News

I could have been
an opera singer
instead of a miner
and yet here I am
crossing rivers
drowning in threes
but I am so grateful
to have your mystery
and your crystal hands
craning downward
getting me high again.

Night Rattler

I am no country western singer,
and this is no cowboy song,
but I am nostalgic for a woman
who will teach me something
about how to be less of a fruit fly.

I almost overdosed on self-consumption,
probably at least two dozen times this year,
and I had nobody to give me a cold bath.

It’s tough out in the molten streets, anywhere, you know,
when you’re a splayed and flayed dog with dirt in your ears
and mud in your face, and it’s like, “Why you pissed, God?”

I never really believed in God though,
and to be honest, I’m not sure if I know
what I can possibly believe in anymore;
I do believe this country is going down and out,
and I’m staying out West, despite the forked stress.

No More New

Is it possible for a city, this city,
to have an objective agenda?

I believe this blunt force aims
to discover the pawned strength
of vessels. Wood, flesh, or PVC:
Do we soak up within ourselves
or funnel something of ourselves,
and float away with buoyancy?

I believe this city measures
strength in numbers, like metrics,
like science, like Europe, like blood;
if you let it, it will let you—will you?
Slit a side of one's sight of one's self...
drowning is a commitment, you know?

Is it possible to sail away for good,
and still remember old horizons?

Non-Profit Relationship

You got arrested for listening
to The Crystal Method
in a deserted national park?

You say you need someone to talk to...

I say go flip a burger for a year,
silence your characters, too;
then we can talk about some times.

At least you have a life insurance policy...

Oh, Hell

The smell of vinegar
Creeping through cracks

The smell of Band-Aids
Covering up the cracks

I did a bad thing to my body
Like a Country Western singer
Up in Minneapolis on vacation

You’ll never guess the tons I’ve dropped
I’ll never amount to the funds you got
I’m washed up like a barrel in Niagara

Past Gone

A day in the now
Now in the know

I am long in the wind
No time in any place

No space to spread
I am short on change

A day in the now
Now in the know

Patient Quotient: A Cat Crying In An Alley Doesn't Need A Hand To Feed It Fear

Rust looks the same
in Paris as it does
in Los Angeles…

as it does in Detroit,
as it does in Brussels,
Milan, Miami, Basel,
New York, and Berlin.

Rust probably looks different
in places like Tokyo and Dubai.

I wouldn’t know—
I prefer public deaths.

But the low
doesn’t have to
get high, in rehashed
reverse rubrics,
as we’ve come to
corner in the recent
organic burials
of selfish coffee tables.

“I take my coffee with cocaine…”

And I just wonder
how these people
do this as I wander
along more canals.

Benders become blunders;
blunders become forever.

I’m not even kidding anymore—
I just want to walk my dog.

“My neck, my back, lick my pussy, and my crack…”

Let’s start over:

Crack the selfish asses
in half; split the fools
up, like a tribal tattoo
on the lower back
of what pages stuck
together with hair gel
or hot semen call culture.

Cull cultures of past,
and greet them
like a masseuse
in the fringes of
any rusted city:

THANK YOU. YOU’RE WELCOME.

And then you’re gone.

And then I’m like, “How many times have I seen this episode?”

And then it’s like, “Oh, wait…have you been looking at Contemporary Art Daily this entire time?”

Pfizer Love

I used to sit on flannel
until I slept down under
cheap fake feathers

I used to get curdled
by a lactose intolerant
in my Brooklyn dreams

I used to let her milk me dry
and slice meat off my bones
like a butch fairy in a freezer

I used to be used to cracks
in my back I couldn't put back
together but we had each other

Pitted Over Moon

Banana Boat
Sliding along
Wet pavement
Like Stockton
Desert dribbles

And now I feel
Deserted plain
But across plains
There is a fantasy
Peeling oranges

Rotten fruit spoils
In wintertime rags
But seeds sprout
In and out of bodies
Experienced as one

Polemic Party

In the garden
I wait
for beetles
to ding bottles
like the bot I am

I recite
the words
of Eastern soldiers

I imbibe
and tell lies
to new comrades

I refuse
to drink
fruitful beverages
by mountains
or by sea

You see

I am a Communist
in common places

I am a Capitalist
in capital cities

I am a glutton
inside and out

Positively A Ballad (Or A Negative Creed)

swallowed enough bleach
to tie-dye my insides

that's slang
like
piss water
or
hooch

mom's mad
and nobody blames mothers
unless they bleach their kids
or something to or of that effect

I haven't thought about a girl
since I got one
and
I haven't been thirsty
since Mexico

Pretty Boy Flow

Bitch-ass man
Hanging heavy
On the street

Got a fat jump
On the lawn though

Smoking bunk pot
Like God in Milan

Like where my clothes at?
Like where my car at?
Like where my money at?

Real World: Earth

Pissing the bed
until I catch a leg.

I will drown you in my life
until you choke on my vibes.

This is real, this is real;
this is the real world.

Rear Window [CC]

Rotten apples—
gnarled like a sofa
bought in Burbank
years prior and pried
apart on a dirt patio.

I ask myself what kind
of diet I will go on now.

My new life tells me
it's going to feed me.

And I say I didn't mean
I'd watch my weight.

It's just like, "Wait,
which valley am I in?"

And then I hear a trumpet.

Regal Funk

Who to find my place
How to get on the grime

A life like this is metallic
Bent reflections cut enough

I'm retiring this week
I have no more guts

I've pissed in too many rivers
I've got islands of sick homes

I swear I'm just a cat now
No more visits to the pound

Regency, Nix, Onus

Blocking cages
just before dusk,
it's October again
in theory, and you
are milky; the moon
whispers in Italian,
and collections
lack agency now.

These fickle pickles,
slipping through
vinegary palms
have forced my will
to crystallize;
and in a season,
I will be seasoned,
and by year's end,
all can be novel.

Writing rote notes
forever and then
some, this can be
more than real;
acting in acts,
turning out turns,
I will plaster bodies
of work, of course,
to play out on streets
for your consideration.

Route Construction

Raw dogs at the rave
Smearing lipstick
Like heavy jail hustlers

Drop the attitude

You know rich kids
Don’t give a shit about shit
Doing blow like Eddie in a wig

Forget the kids

Kidnap my head
Slap my throat right
Smart men aren’t violent

Kill the temper

Nonsense drawer
Safe razor in the crib
Liquid conscience in the hood

Take the money

Rustic

Mist most
of the time
in this city.

Gabriel
in my eyes;
Delilah
in my ears.

Missed most
of my time
in this city.

Self-Help Writ Wrong

Bought a box of adrenaline
from a Chinese pharmacist
near my local massage place,
and thought I had a real plan.

Licked powder in a parking lot,
stretched out in chino pants
at a Moroccan-themed pool party,
and thought I was high on life.

Ended up with a month’s worth of infections
and a game show host’s list of regrets.

I’ve lost a lot of hours in the ink sink.

Self-Made Market

Windows up
On the ordinary

Bricking test earlobes
Grinding ice in Chicago
We’re all empty as banks

Grisly-ass young ones
Get shredded for the psyche

Sporting blurred vision
Twitching out at the Ear Inn
Straight respect for the hell piece

Soft haters at the door
And you know they’re crazy

Tight white bitches
Still mad like Spike Lee
Stacking Prozac all night

Ain’t a dealer
Ain’t a killer
But I’ll stay hard
In my front yard
Until the day
I go to sleep

Singapore Migraine

Mind full of heart
Hammer state of mine
Graveyard journeyman
Sawed off at the funeral

Sip on orange juice
In air conditioning

Take authentic naps
In the midnight mist

New state lights here
Maniacal lava fucking
Haul off with the tears
They wreck your bedtime

Sling

Office hours
are a luxury
to be dismissed.

Some men
are perhaps always
fascinated by mud.

There are catfish
to be noodled
on every level.

So Cosmopolitan

Today,
the Internet is in Braille only.

Tomorrow,
I am taking a break from myself.

Sometimes,
I feel like
I am overbooking
my immediate life,
and I’m not even
staying at a Marriott.

What do I want anyways?

It would be nice to see
Brancusi on poppers.

It would be nice to hear
someone sleep silently.

It would be nice to taste
desires without showering.

It would be nice to touch
someone, metaphorically.

It would be nice to smell
Relational Aesthetics again.

I have total recall
of ulterior motives,
and I prefer watching
things on parked screens.

“Nothing lasts forever”
is a shitty line for a poem,
but an important reminder
to do something in life.

But then again,
from what I’ve read
in women’s magazines,
length isn’t everything.

Sometimes NyQuil

is maybe better
than vodka
and the rock
is only an alias
for alliances
in perpetuation

and we dance
long and skittishly
in a haze of sorts
in the deep south
or north of fear
wherever is near

Sprung

A pleather belt
on a cold clavicle,
busts open the phlegm
seamlessly hemmed
and stiff at both ends.

Like a virgin,
I will eat peanuts
in a cardboard seat,
limber for all
and all can wait.

In good times
and windy times,
palm trees still stand;
sand swerves though me
and ice cream goes soft.

Stationed

even when I have
not peeled out of beds
full of aluminum
and shot petals
I've still been driven
by necessary scents

and now I smell
dinner for two
and I'm hungry
for your rare feed
tonight and tomorrow
and next week still

I am a root vegetable
bound to the ground
stuck to my foundation
and all I want to do
is to grow with you
so don't be chicken

pots and pans
cannot contain
the explanation
required in full
to illustrate heads
gone empty again

Steal Those Cuts

Digging deeply
webbed contradictions
on time
sensitive,
time-stamped
facsimiles,

(cotton clear,
caught on fear)

while tending to
surface level scratches;

(braising bruises,
traipsing truces).

Someone always gets hurt.

I’m sorry for my apologies,

but also, is it just me,
or is it the relative content,
or is it the relative context,

that leads me to ask,

“Why don’t people pay
as much in attention
as they do in dollars?”

Stranger Than Days

Loose cops
Living heavy
Without warning

On children
Just chilling
In the morning

And it’s like
Fuck minutes
Guns punch screws
And bullets mace faces
In situational seconds

Renegade government
Intent on outlawing
All Bad Brains
And them wild wounds
In bedroom ceilings

Felons and snitches
Sticking and stinking
On surface streets

Con job comeback
Obey like a Fairey
Or be terminated

What party?
What warrant?

Where the mattress?
Where the Hamptons?

I’m dead again
Thinking about my lady

Street Bruises

Dirty job
Dirty business

Salty problems
I dissolve them

Bounce again
With the slugs

Float and die
Buzz takes a toll

Sunken Turf Channel

I thought you were you,
but you were a hologram.

You were false hope,
staged like Tupac.

We're all animals,
surrounded
and shrouded
by plants and water.

Life is a game
with no rules.

Death is overtime,
unfamiliar to film.

Syndication Nation

Italian dinner
for an Irish drunk

Not me man
but I can relate

Eating sedatives
on the 110 again

Quarter pound
towards my weight

Collateral doomed
a plain aging punk

Taking The Highway

Snarling past midnight
like a Siberian Husky
trying to go vegan
to impress his owners,
I will sink into the ditch
you dug for my liver.

I can stomach anything
but another day with you.

This road goes nowhere
aside from my direction.

Talking Money, Talking Funny

Plastic planet dive
Measured in liquor

Rubber gossip scene
Bumping like Catholics

Grinding pills outside a Starbucks
With some white girls from Yale

I’d pawn my own mouthpiece
To keep my tweak peak tender

Time Zones

My mom sees me feeling
Leaving the world unlocked
Like a sleeveless model

My dad sees me watching
Shit in gold and copper goggles
Like a player in a top dollar opera

I’m just cooking eggs with a fever
Hot and high like a proper popper
On some full throttle BBC bullshit

Too Real Punk

Smoking in Texas
Born again
It’s a circle

Too real

Scrape the pipe
Can’t see anything
Scrape some cars

Why not?

One hundred thousand
Chrome towers
Dripping for miles

Why not?

Money spent
Money paid
Money spent
Do it again

Too real

Thinking
Painting
Sipping
Painting

We’re all frauds in the game

Tracking

Your head:
a crown
in a crowd.

Your hands:
pawned paws,
fawning at laws.

There are only butts
of cigarettes on streets
in this neighborhood.

There are only footprints,
proving desire on carpet
in this spectacled arena.

Karaoke in a room,
with others or alone,
we undress and address
the fading songs of regret.

You're a fantasy
and I'm a bastard,
but we're each other's
to own on our own.

Two-Thirds Purely Wrung

From January until maybe May,
I will be your Mary Magdalene,
but all through the summer,
I will have to be a beach poet.

From September until maybe forever,
I will let you enter through any opening,
but you will have to undress the work
I put into this private pillory exhibition.

Use My Illusion

I dragged a Harley
into the Harlem River…
and shit, once I got to Brooklyn,
I drank two black coffees…
and later, I huffed some poppers,
for a while, just because…
and while I was throbbing,
I realized life was worth more
than New Yorkers realized…
and, well, it was time to go.

White Men Can't Jump

AT&T got my phone drunk the other night. It group-sexted some punks in the beerlight. I felt the kind of shame that only a person with a camera crew can ever feel. And now I’m bombed out. It sure seems like there is more sun these days.

Shit, man. Some Americans are so American…

Planet of the Apes, Lululemon, Tazo Iced Passion.

Detox redux. Turn back the clocks.

Where are you now? Amsterdam...

What can you do? NOTHING...

I guess I could get drunk with my phone the next time this happens. Or maybe I'll just switch to Verizon. Sometimes things are ironic in an Alanis Morissette sort of way. But nothing is ever funny in a Dave Coulier sort of way.

PS There is a difference between hearing and listening.

White Whale (Wander, Wail)

up in the valley
down for whatever

I shredded aluminum
for a night of you know
it’s like hell on an island
and I’m not sinning any
longer than I have to
these days these days
I’m an oasis I’m an
oh I wonder why I’m

up in the valley
down for whatever

World Truth

“We’re all alone, despite ourselves.”