Life Leaks Out Of Me

It's been an uneventful summer,

with nothing much to call mine,

no wild marching bands, or one night stands

that last for months at a time.

The sunset was golden on May Day,

but the scene was stoic and dire,

I was handed the pearl, then I lost every girl

in the phoenix's ashes and fire.

My father never taught me wisdom,

but I pretend that he did for a while:

"Son if you play that game and come out the same,

then your love was as fake as your smile."

I don't know if her eyes are still diamonds,

or if her fingers are still cold and small,

but if I see her again, I'll know where she's been,

I doubt she'll have changed at all.

The crew is waltzing through the city,

holding hands in the soft city light,

but they've turned off their phones, and I'm still here alone,

left to kill off my thoughts from the night.

Ten years from now they'll be artists,

they won't have to worry about me,

then one day they'll look at my name on a book

and think "Man, how crazy were we."

Life leaks from my veins in the moonlight,

but I try not to let it bring me down;

Ideas sprout from me like plums from a tree

but they fall and then rot on the ground.

Well I'm sure there's a world past this window,

spinning 'round just like the North Star,

but it's ugly and faded and my soul is quite jaded

so there's no point in looking too far.

Song Bird

Can you believe it, I was just in the shower,

when through the window came a small bird,

who held in her beak a yellow flower,

and sang the sweetest song I ever heard.

I said, "Well, thanks for this visit,

but I'd rather have you come a different time;

I'd cook and I'd write you a sonnet,

even though you can't read a single line."

Then she looked at me past her olive beak,

and subtly opened her wings,

The prettiest damn things that I've seen all week;

I knew not what a feather could bring.

Come on now, songbird, sing here tonight

and echo throughout the whole den.

I'm waiting here with my lips folded tight,

doing all that a songbird can.

It's Quiet This Morning

When the television sounds

are all you hear at morning,

and the cereal tastes the same,

and the showers last until tomorrow,

your aloneness begs.

And the daily routines become

exercises of muscle memory,

which has been flawless since the

very first day, so walking out

seems almost olympian.

No one is as skilled at picking

up the phone as you, which is

almost as incredible at how

easily you consider

finding someplace new.

The day's closing but who

has heart to notice, after

all, tomorrow will just be

another today, except with

greater loss.

When you're all alone

defending your bed

from vigilant sadness,

you're not really alone,

you've still got the broken

spirit

of solitude.

Who Knew About The Bergs?

They missed me while I was gone I hope,

just like they missed the soaring flare

stretching high over icebergs and skyscrapers.

Oh, but all they needed was my telescope,

as I was clearly the only one prepared

for the frigid, drowny waters.

The ocean floor tasted like soap.

I'm back now, but who hardly cared,

they couldn't read it in the papers.

Enough With The NightTime

Let's blow the hours out of proportion, and pilot planes we've never boarded,

but let's never stop being sincere.

Let's hug awkwardly in the daytime, where people would look at us and think,

Is something happening here?

I'd rather let 'em guess, since I figure only the dark hours know,

which lately have been flowering quite queer.

But soon as summer's landed, in the gale of a glowing reunion,

the ground won't taste even a single tear.

Message In An Unseen Bottle

It is whatever goes on between now and the soundless dream that escapes me.

It peels my eyes back; it inflames my skin orange.

It easily surrenders to the purest of thoughts,

but those, too, are frequently washed away

by the black ocean, which swings in,

and swings out, and swings in, and swings

directly into the back of the mind dam,

breaking forth to resound throughout

the realm of those still dreaming,

"I am so sorry, for everything."

What Keeps Me Awake Keeps All The Boys And Girls Awake

Thrown soft into the

tundra of post-midnight,

I sought my desires out

to warm me into sleep.

Yet every time I got close,

your face collapsed in, and my

skeleton was pushed away

by the gravity of morality.

But I kept going back in,

just to get a glimpse

into your too-good eyes,

like wells of sunlight.

Nothing Could Ruin This Night

Well?

What if I told you

that there are souls

in the fire pit?

What if I sold you

my dignity,

would you dance with it?

Because there's nothing

living in your

synergy.

And there's neither

love in the way

you breathe,

nor anything true

in the breath of your deity.

So how perfect is this night,

as the both of you cuddle

in the rubble

of the cemetery.

The Luck of the Lake

Lake clouds spin

to create a halo of

breathtaking gold,

as if it were the

second coming of May,

and the police lights spin

in the distance, where I

watch the window lights

creep on over the city

that we vacation to

every second of our lives,

only we call it home instead,

and they reflect off the

lake clouds to dim the

halo of my night.

There's something sobering

about the sun poised behind

purple clouds.

Prisoner Of Dreams

The dream was never as it should be,

despite me taking candy-coated dream

tablets with your smile on them.

They were dark backwards streets,

with headlights that I could never see,

as if the whole world was in my blind spot:

And then there was the man to my side,

with his pristine suit and elegant tie,

always looking for somewhere to be.

The wheel grew teeth and spit me out,

and I landed in the passenger's seat.

I'm sure he was nothing but relieved,

as he spun off the highway into a

crowded beach, cursing repeatedly:

He told me to take him home.

I walked away into the waves.

Never again will I force you

to become my dream slave.

All That You Never Get

Perhaps the guitar isn't for you,

sorry but you only have two jobs to do,

one is to kiss your home goodbye and leave

and the other is to grieve

once you find out it was never your home

in the first place, you're an oxygen waste

and I'm sorry but you're still alone,

demoralizing the microphone,

so put it down, no one's going to

be impressed with you now,

and besides, the world needs more singers

but everyone's too busy rolling shit with their fingers.

I'm getting tired of this secondhand anger

towards shadows with names and all the traitors

who follow me without their fuckin' Twitter

and would probably follow me all the way to Denver

but it's okay, I can last for another few hundred days,

until I feel the sand in my toes

and taste the ocean spray,

but for today I'm just trying to get some dark sleep,

without images or words or the so-called deep

creations of the collective mind of my friends,

but in my dreams she texts me like we've made amends,

telling me off on my secrets, filling my mouth with regrets,

but she still doesn't get that all my life

I've never had any secrets,

and that what you write

is all that you never get.

But perhaps all this hatred isn't for me:

Tonight I'll be standing in the sea.

Goodnight to the World

I can't say I've felt the pain of men,

but after being where I've been

I don't think I'll be going back again.

I look for someone to hold for tonight,

but my eyes have lost all their flare.

The mountain ears are deaf to my pleas,

so it seems only the mulberry trees

will watch my half-smile freeze.

I've given my soul in forty-plus pieces

but she doesn't seem to even care.

I guess it's the way of friendship,

like wandering on a mobius strip

until someone jumps off the ship.

I say goodnight to the world

and it's like the world is no longer there.

Tome of the Precarious

Sitting numb on my modern desk

rests the future relic of the ages;

it has come into my possession,

and I am not worth its pages.

It glints in the faint cavern

like a painting tossed into the bay;

Its cover is morosely gorgeous,

yet there's nothing for it to say.

The handmade pages still empty;

braced to carry the weight of my heart.

But I fear the relic shall never be born,

for my fearful fingers know not where to start.

The String Thing

Co-Written by James.

We're all strung on life's empty string,

waiting for a simple anything,

from a secret midnight fling

to a public emerald ring,

yet all we do is sing

about the lies and sad bling,

which fails at covering

up the madness we bring;

one winter day, I might fling

off my skin, without thinking,

and only then will I bring

your honest emerald ring

to your doorstep in the spring.

And when my children hang on the string,

they won't hear the song that I sing,

nor will you in the spring cleaning,

or when we're all outside gardening.

And we'll all be smiling

on the emerald string.

It's just a delicate thing,

the matter of the string.

Drive-In Blues

The rabbit in the moon

watches over a field of cars

crunching over telltale gravel,

lit up by blockbusting cinema,

splitting our minds, tearing our hearts,

drying our eyes while the sky

shakes its noble head black,

and the cars rattle with anxiety

and throttle with pleasure and distaste;

plows of smoke fill every makeshift bed,

innumerous with wide-eyed faces

and thick-veined excitement!

The bright lights are in my face.

How I wish that you tonight

could take their place.

Obvious

This used to be the title

but it has become less true:

Everything you have heard

about me is absolutely true.

How could you think otherwise,

when you personally have seen

the stained glass tomb

of my reckless conscience.

(My secret is one of pain-

staking obviousness,

like the moon disguised

as a smooth, curved star.)

(My secret is one of love-

dreams faltering in

spite of boundless faith

in our mint condition.)

Resurgance of the Detested

I won't lie, your words put me to sleep,
left to dream about stuff I never cared for,
like broken stairs and the ocean floor deep,
until my soul melts to the ocean floor,

where it's dark and icy and I so very miss
everything past that just isn't now.
So I escaped my catacomb, I can love sleepless,
even if I fall into the mud, somehow.

There's nothing I can know for myself,

since every secret has a hidden risk.
I opened every case on my faithful shelf,
and flooded my night with an unknown disc.

In that instant I felt as open as my window.
And if there were anyone with me to bet
(I see no reason for them to ever go),
There may be magic in me yet.

Canyon

The great defender

of childhood freedom

stretches wrinkled paws over cliff-sides;

his pink nose gently

waking everything

long forgotten.

The troubled fawn

he once courted

now long deserted, he jumps

into the arms of restless birds;

taking him swiftly

back to his rocky enclave.

The poor lonesome lion;

how difficult it must be

for him to overlook

the snowy peaks

in the arms of a golden swan,

the one I gave him to

because no one likes flying alone.

The Ballad of Forever

I once knew a girl, my would-be wife,

Who did all she could but still changed my life

Till Europe did come, pregnant with strife

And gave birth to the murder of our children

She once moved my hand a little bit South,

And whispered “If you want, you can just take it off,”

Her endangered skin had never been so soft

I wish I’d died in the arms of February

Her absence had pushed me against the wall

Higher and farther so’d I soon fall

I expected the rest, since once you have it all

There’s nothing to do but to lose it

The blanket unraveled as we sat in the sand

Our voices so serious, the night turned so bland

I remember her lips as they touched my hand

Eternally gracious and loyal

The stutters grew loud as my face shattered wide

In the middle of heaven there was no place to hide

Then the clouds disappeared and thus I was denied

The chance to ever meet my one Savior

Not once, twice, but Infinity got hurt

I bled on the bed-sheets, my notebooks, her skirt

So I buried my letters in Oregonian dirt

And felt the future slipping

Then she dressed me up like a memory doll

Till I looked like her lover, glasses and all

But I'm aware of it now, it was only to stall

My elusive transformation into gone-ness

We salvaged whatever we could from the mud

But too many evenings had reeked of our blood

So Fate saw it fit to unleash the Flood

Which froze up all of our visions

It’s over, it’s empty, there’s nothing to see

The only thing left is her chastity

I suppose that now I can finally breathe

The thick summer air of desolation

Now the battles are over: the end has begun

She won them all; I was the younger one

I promise one day to tell my first-born son

About the Great Civil War of Forever

The Sky Ends In Reality

The clouds in the mirror looked fake,

pixellated to the point of near smog,

thick unrelenting blankets of tear gas

that choked the endorphins of the sky,

and lonesome rain did make.

I couldn't help but notice her nighttime tan,

which stuck out like poets on driveways,

dizzying the loose inspired mind until

sticky eyes closed until the next day,

waking up an attached sort of man.

Nothing seems to ever work out.

All my doors have been long shut,

all my poor dreams end in reality,

my keys have all been dulled to null.

The sky is rank with clouds of doubt.

When Doldrums Become Delights

When soon you are away,

take a picture for me

of the mountains paper-mâché,

wherever they may be;

we'll be them, someday.

Mt. Olympus

Today a rare event took hold of me,

and a nameless girl turned my head.

She glided on the pavement, while my

heart slowly filled with crimson lead.

With her Daisy Dukes, pixie nose,

and raspberry lips I'll recall for days,

she set the trap I so often avoid.

And now I want to write her plays!

I wandered around to see her again,

to see if maybe I could light up her skies.

But I had left my glasses in the past,

and I could not see into her soft, colorless eyes.

A Strange Kind of Weakness

The girls on my flooded dream streets
twirl their hair and flaunt their feet,
asking me to touch them in inappropriate places,
when I only want to touch their faces.

Moth Complex

Lost tonight in the tangled identities of wispy souls
encircling neon orange street lamps,
as if they were the great Sun itself-
Somewhere in the drizzly darkness,

they all struggle with their Moth Complex.

And with their minds reeling from my historical fiction fables,
they accuse me of having a Butterfly Complex.

(Oh familiar Wisconsin night,
pregnant with low-pitched sighs...)

Yes it's true, crucify my pale emerald coccoon,
before my enchanting wings shadow the sun.

My wings do not rest lame on my thorax,
they stretch beyond shower petals and

glint merry in dew-drops;

Only I know the one secret that truly

seperates us (as if by nature's fate):

The flowers, those rainbow adobes of joy,

are much much easier to find by light of day-

(In the fog of the rabbit moon, they are lost
to the riverweeds [much like you, dear] )

So yes, I am a butterfly, pluck off my eager prolific
wings, before they eclipse your streetside sun.

(and, on some other day,
disintegrate into weary mothballs)

I-94 East Takes You Somewhere

The acai-blueberry sky flowed
through and above the rigid
scope of the great Deliverer,
I-94, or, the yellow brick road;

I am ceaseless on its belt,
carving an unrelenting path
past casket cars,
and roadside stars,

past the truck drivers
making 36 cents a mile,
past the deer that have
been lying there awhile,

towards endless worlds of water,
flying down the dream highway,
the all-american attempt
to drown my tedious torments of today.

But now I peer into my coffee
blacker than all desire,
with eyes in far-off ecstasy,
conjuring an autumn stage

so busy with songs
that are yet to be written,
so busy with characters
that are yet to be broken.

They Get To Keep Our Names Once We're Through

Can you imagine—
infuriated waves of
closet bankers and
closet stalkers and
closet delicates
grabbed by the wrist
and pushed into the
twenty-first century smoke?

This oughta fix
what never was broke.
You can see ‘em now,
coughing up
their privacy
until they choke.

Don’t have to imagine—
the masked money makers,
they've already spoke.

Second Coming of Sweetness

Quite the evening firelight,

I feel my eyes burning black,

Looking into mellow eyes,

Sweeter than 'mallows tonight.

On the podium of soccer goals

on a steamy locust day,

she sounded the horn to retreat

to where slow dreams roll

down to the thundering present,

where wants become musts,

where faith is in the water,

which births smiles luminescent;

This is the Temple of Tenderness,

the monument I hold where angels snuggle,

and everyone holds their neighbor's breath,

waiting for the Second Coming of Sweetness.

Cycle Of The Only Busy Weekend Ever

Out of bed, out of want,
out of toast, out the door,
can you imagine my distaste
at never being able to shower
to get rid of the smell in my hair,
as if chat logs would ever care.

And then tiny seasonal favors
become scorching chores in an
unknown family friend's backyard,
and mosquitoes rave in the sweat
that I haven't tasted all week;
my beautification seems weak.

Then later, under a film of salty water,
the hootenannies and booms of
the spider-web lights seem dull
and lack fire to blaze the country;
but we stand to take off our goggles
and hard hats, and sing our vows,
not even fire enough to burn the cannabis plant,
and then go home, and by candlelight,
recant.

Once Safe Neighborhood is Safe Once More

You see them peeking through the manhole covers,

staking out in the lilac bushes,

licking their lips from the cradles of oak branches.

You know that they're there, there's no doubt,

the night is never to be trusted,

not even for a minute, which reverses years,

if you allow it to, which you might tonight,

because who cares it's some sort of holiday,

at least isn't it always?

So maybe you leave it in the shadow

of your most trusted fortress, they can't see

it let alone take from you what's yours,

so put trust in the whispering street-signs

and kiss the diamonds in the road goodnight.

Yet once your predictable tire oozes in

like an injection to keep your smile warm,

everything disappears at once somewhere

and outside the shadows have gone ultraviolet,

leaving reddish stains from where love was before.

Hey, it was your fault, was it not,

can you stand the embarrassment, guilt, horrifying pain?

Yes,

at least until life creeps back into life,

because if only they had known

how warm your smile just is,

they would have been content with their flowers,

and nothing would ever go missing, at all.