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this bit of poetry is all wandering molecules and angry atoms. 


touch falters. a soldier in a long series of silent wars.

words hold their breath. as time's floods prevail.

we are only paper and sand. bits and pieces of a puzzle we can never hope to solve.

the end would come easily. if only we would let it.

their names make us weak. their faces pull on our zippers.

we grow smaller as truth colors in those empty spaces.

fingers dance over quivering skin. a dare to look over the edge.

strays gnaw on their leashes.

choice is a tunnel. once we enter, the other side is the only exit.

gretel emerges from the forest.

the seldom tears that fall on plastic cheeks abruptly become authentic.

but it's too late by then. 


Filed under: October 2024 Sad Poems

the numbers fail me. just as they always have. still i keep counting. determined. to prove how far we've strayed. how close we've been.

chalk lines on the pavement. the dead carelessly dismissed.

the orbit has its pull. the greed of the darkness as daylight relents. time weighted with an impotent chaos. frail cocoons that lay empty. threatening to prove. how useless change is.

untransformed i seethe. withering in the famine of my own existence. always searching. hungry for a proper assassin.

i remember every perfect moment. with a crippling clarity. but i can't recall a single kiss. perhaps there were none. or maybe i've forgotten. the one detail that would easily destroy this.

it's natural enough now. to say to myself it was and won't be again. it's tempting enough still to imagine what almost was.

the maps have all been drawn. the turns have all been taken.

yet we haven't moved an inch.

the soft carousel. quenches its parched sentiment. in overt ghosts and empty hauntings. the atoms pretend. small gods manipulating the larger.

touch is medicine, but not a cure.

a vague compendium of doubt. a trembling thigh of certainty. in the shallow scrape of open doors against love's careless wind.

flesh evolves. from want. hungry and loud.weighed down by these bones. betrayed by its patience.

the distance unfolds. tissue paper in the fist of gravity. the journey surrenders to the war within.

her eyes closed as she coasts down that hill. all her allegiance lost to broken ladders and blind demons.

the sharp edge. the tender corner. tangling their puppets.

hard measures. angles and what not. such as the body is. divided. slivers and threads boast their independence. the larger mass mostly gravity and the subtle science of apathy.

sex's crass magicians pull rabbits from our heads. time's adamant priests locate paradise in the most unlikely places.

there is a momentum to the grey. a tide beneath the sober. and all of us are devoured in its hunger. we can never be. nor ever have been. that time was long spent before we noticed it. we flail in our emotional bankruptcy while the taste of wealth stubbornly lingers on our lips.

the pauses have their secrets. a mania of escapes in a quiet house of cards. like the ocean. trapped in its cycle of touch and go. like the edge of the world. A much sharper angle than it would seem.

the color of flesh. always changing. dark to light. and back again. a kaleidoscope of pleasure colliding with the life's tedious conflicts.

the pretentious wars of women and their affections.

a trodden path. a footprint too far. the juncture. like a soft poison. the moment a brilliant suicide.

black ties and empty tuxedos. weigh the skeletons. the questionable accuracy of choice. a flurry of pennies and wishing wells. quieter than i remember.

flesh betrays. hope is a treason. the war comes and goes. the struggle is constant.

the bark on her sigh. thick sober molasses. dark. sweet. and suffocating. can't swallow. can't. breathe through it. the dense soldiers of why. the soft machine guns of if. a quiet conflict. so loud. with ridiculous choices.

the hours spent. angles on the chase. cold blankets as the bed consumes our flesh. this skin a hollow cocoon. these bones not enough. a stalled metamorphosis. the beautiful laments of strangers and sex.

little dolls. their frozen fingers. forever clutching. what doesn't exist. the pace. the footsteps of when. time. knowing. like some awful vaccine. curing me of this most wonderful of diseases.

the paradox of touch. that it always takes more than it gives. that it multiplies our desires. and divides our trust.

the edge has its uses. gravity boasts its allure. falling becomes us.

naive time machines. of tangled threads and empty needles. deep, filthy rivers of lost. foul maps to navigate these crumbling walls.

softly the world ends. at the coax of hollow terminals. and the choke of empty prescriptions. her gentle ambitions never did her justice. whispers amongst the chaos. the skin is the last step. the final threshold. the humble lock on a deeper treasure chest.

the colors have their portions. the science of circumstance. as it focuses its ripples on the stilted silence. worms in the earth. the always moving soil. microscopic quakes carving their veins in the world.

the end is always close. when the edge is where you choose to play.

the wind remembers. the shadows keep count. the longer we drift, the more likely we are to be found.

the flame manifests in angles both acute and obtuse. a prism of choices bathed in the blood of circumstance.

a fraction of when is everything.

jagged edges tell their stories. in sips of wine and doses of skin. the void romances her. the dead are loud. the end is quiet.

want suffers no masters. we are free to covet. the needle bargains with the thread. simple stitches overhwelmed by the hole they try to mend.

ghosts tell their stories. as they are given to do. long bouts in pergatory. and its precarious views to heaven.

wounds fester. sick with the suggestion. that this time machine is ours to murder.

we follow. everything does. in its own sickness. a cancer of questions steadily solve her. the science of if. the madness of when. like so many empty skins still in the shape of us.

a powerful silence. a louder confession. the hours that conspire to define us. lay there. gentle hammers. bargaining with gravity.

the world ended years ago.

crippled ogres walk on the shoulder. as the trucks rumbled passed. corduroy fairy tales fuss with their zippers. as the moon bleeds low in the sky. just corners. nothing else. stark islands in a concrete ocean. the simple drowning. the aggressive science. of wanting.

shallow cuts. deep needles. like any respectable drug.

the world ended, yet life went on. churning in this incredulous void. all the people empty skins. all the moments dissolving paper. stranded in an endless rain.

wrong turns. right ones. all the same. just places. to go. no destination.

creases in the wind. wager their treasons. casual monsters circle the throne. paper dolls steal our skeletons. bone pirates.

the world ends in fits crayon and strangles of disappointment. a suicide of parenthetical phrases. the empty choices that perpetuate life.

we're only real when we want. and i don't want anymore. the condundrum remains. lifetimes after it began. we can't be found unless we're lost.

severed scripts write the future. from high ledges secure in the folds of when we were whole. thin wrinkles in history that threaten to forget. the clowns with smiles drawn too close to the edge.

no numbers. we dare not count. how long. or far.


the atom sighs. adrift in the vast science of faces. that tends to become us. given the freedom to mourn.

rotting fences. and running chalk.  so much rain makes us question the truth of the sun. worn masks. wear our faces. as we pretend to touch.

we thought there were rules. but then they left us. and all we had were choices.

all of them wrong.

ten voices. one eye. the harmony of madness dances barefoot on the metling ice. sapplings and thieves paint the forest red. no days. only lingering nights. with more words than voice.

the history of skin is written in sweat and scars. the story of everything we were. are. might become. these plastic time machines break and bend. as we struggle to find what was always there.

life spills in. a drizzling rain seeping through the cracks. too shallow to drown us. too deep to allow for an escape.

dirty corners. steal their faces from sleeping gods. she chases the words. a feeble hunter threatening with broken arrows. the sickness that once made her strong now all knots and stones. Heavy ropes find the room where all those empty boxes still wait. for gravity to remember. how far.

chalk eyes and blackboard lips. waiting for the world to end. in breadboxes and melted chocolates. the power went out and we scorned the trembling darkness. made it feel small. entertained ourselves watching it weep.

wait for us. we are slow. though the world is swift. telling stories in the interim. as if time is only still a child. thick with peanut butter and piss. an equation solved by simple division.

wait for us. let the words catch up. weak predators on the thigh of the moon. arranging the bones and vomit. the clouds heavy on their backs.

she wakes. again and again. inside the mania of trying to be someone. or failing that. something to to someone else.

heavy ladels. hot with the parity of truth. dissonant drugs. fetching paradise from excrement. choices. like bleating engines and stricken machines. condemned to the moment of ignition.

wizened narrators with broken tongues. the feeble chaos that would pretend loyalty. beautiful stories drenched in blood.

soft fists against the glass. not echoing.

seldom serpents manifest. a thunder of dark. tepid fangs scorn the lips. blood like flower petals. blossoms from open flesh. waiting. travelling through the pause. in stabs of conceit. backwards through time. on soft crutches and hard choices.

the hollow chamber of her grasp. the dense apparatus between her legs. the vulgar portals of all things human. swift concessions sell the song. of wet panties and soiled dresses. counting out loud. piercing each number with a grin. worn. discarded. confident monsters lurking under her bed.

so much over. taut labors curdle the charade. giants stride the marathon and tumble. next to nothing. time undresses. intent on being seduced. but all my roses are rotted. all my ironies in use.

maybe sunday was all she could threaten. as the ghosts began to stir. bone on bone. a pantomime of skin. more color than condition. sweating laboorers lost in a machine without a skeleton.

evolution. piglets and pencils. bluntly stabbing broken balloons. choices. pudding skin and parables. loose paper clips on torn pages. the end in nasty verbs. the beginning in ugly adjectives. worn by the words.

skin like templates. hollow cavities receive the madness. jagged pieces stab into place.

beautiful pictures. time dilates. atoms excited. gaunt pupils rough with contingencies. discarded crayons thin against the paper. the easy lies. temptation floats. the hard truths. sputter and sink. deep oceans. sparse buoys.

weeping ghosts gnaw on the stale bones of life. the wind sings - grief and anguish. powerless. tethered to a rotting world. dogs and toothpicks. folding paper. creasing the pages in finished lives.

paths enumerate. patterns transcend. the machine coughs. catches its breath. and then deposits us at the beginning of the end.

the fiction is just this. that there are any lights at all. that sight exists. by any standard of the imagination or folly of memory that might persist.

the universe doesn't wear clothes. it's always been naked. it was my mistake. thinking it had any shame.

angles resolve. to the threshold of desperation. the maps and the measures betray. the geometry of touch is obtuse. the math deadens. everything is so far away.

hours on the rim. flooded chalkboards. wait. wait for  the world to find. the broken pencils on the floor. it's just tomorrow. it doesn't mean anything at all. forgotten lovers in the ocean's clenching fists. distant blizzards in the footsteps of arrogant hurricanes.

she wore me. like thin underwear and thinner scripts. devils in long nooses. gods in slipknots and shallow skins.

the eager departs her. furtive and raw. to lies. to pretend. to say it's over when it's not.

the huff of humanity. weak and harsh. a stab of vaccine in a frenzy of disease.

if we are nothing. and nothing is what we are. paper daggers honing their edges on the darkness. paper dolls clutching the folds.

nothing close enough to grasp. nothing too far away to forget. the truth is purgatory. life is waiting out the storm.

pennies and teddies bears. copper and chocolate. the world ends at every corner. starts again at every door.

the atoms split. the colors mingle. we are lost. everything changes. nothing does. the cold writes its stories in dead batteries and broken glass.

kittens on the roof waiting to be drowned. islands in the ocean. eager to be found.

bare bones. rubber pencils. scrape the proverbial throat. no forest. slender atoms dance on empty graves. the dead pretend to remember. how it feels to live. the living laugh. as if there is a difference.

how long. stares measured in years. how far. distance counted in faces. alone stumbles in. eager stabs at apathy. spill the paint. spoil the witches. leaving lost children stranded in houses of sour candy.

the rabbit races. slower still missing his legs. the tortoise gives chase. the cruel patience that marks every epiphany. she waits for his answer. threads of skin knotted with choices. she rights her army. simple soldiers in a war too complicated. the future finds her. Free, but searching for a new cage.

The hours rush in. Bald wagers on broken horses. The simple math of wanting. the complex evolution of decision. Turning blades from the steel in her head. The deaf listening. as conversations consume us.

The end of the world in bubble gum wrappers and pocket knives.

waiting for the wormhole. prescient clocks. find the end. the void becomes her. nowhere to go. except deeper into the drug. swimming in paths. drowning in places. Her monsters quiet. As she constructs their cages.

Her flesh loud with a parliament of despots and slaves. the turgid democracy of touch. so sharp with the brevity of when. so tender with the urgency of if.

Paper cuts.

Shallow wounds. Deep below the surface.

the wormhole closes. swallows. her panic becomes her. she welcomes the flood. the simple math of surrender. groping darkness. the whispering grey that surrounds it. unwilling to listen.

strangers in her skin. digging their way out.

the grey. ambivalent tornadoes. notches. patterns in her resolve.

the tunnel. guessing games. knots in the string between choices.

the loop. open sores. flaunt their pus.

the friction. tender scabs. clouds rub hard against the sun. because the light is false. only the darkness can be trusted.

her stage is soft. long tests with no wrong answers. just more questions.

her puppets are loud. the roar of concession. soft footprints braid the grass. Chasing monster they've never found.

If the map is true, then you are here. And I am content drowning in the wolf's mouth.

Frail splints name the confession. Heavy tourniquets reason with the wound. Nothing is this small. Nothing is this big.

The world arrives in fractions. Small holes in her panties. Minor integers usurped by the din of now.

Broken storms turn colors in her fist. It's the end of the world. Again and again. Swimming in fingers. Drowning in lips. A bridge of twelve dimenions. Divisible by only one. Colored paper craves white pencils. Snagged ribbon demands scissors.

the evolution of consent. conditions of when. undressed by time. raped by the moment. portions of universe small enough to envy. thunder. the existing storm. fingerprints on the glass insist we're getting closer.

the pain is colorful. A perpetual surrender. as beautiful as it is lonesome. the pain is ambitious.

trinkets and traitors. like the skin on water. Erupting with breath.

Small choices. skin like spiders.

shallow cuts betray. the very nature of intimacy.

the world must end the same way this does. in a frenzy of impotent decisions.

foul with taste of want.

the scream of the dolls as they wake from their dream. stranded in a world without thieves.


her eyes upside down. like distant smiles. waiting on the enemy.

choosing. temporary abdomens. the feathers. scribble in her eyes. hungry tears. eager authors. spoil her signature. empty tires. the manic machinery of skin. clumsily switching gears.

the distance is quiet. bashful whispers embrace the monsters. swell the dead. in their futile rebellion.

yellow ghosts and orange graves. a eulogy of fists. bruise her many faces. pistons and cadavers. wager the beast. in the breath of mountains. and the patience of liars.

the steps betray her. Inches miss by years. truth blame each other. spoiled soldiers doomed by choices.