Take a Swing.

The door swings both ways
You know
(you would)
but I’m going to go ahead
and oil these hinges
because I’m tired of cringing
in the middle of the night
hearing them creak
wondering whats left
for you to break
because you’re always right
on target
when it comes to shooting
through these sheets I’ve wrapped
around me like the egyptians do
and oh they could learn from me
on how to make the dead
look alive
look a lie
and I think sometimes
I’m mummified
You stole my brain
Straight through your soft lips
Sliding out like a sigh
Cut my heart out
Threw it aside
I probably handed you
The obsidian knife
And here I am
Wrapped in layers as I lie here
Lie about falling downstairs
About knowing that you care
So instead I’m going to oil this door
Shine it smooth
Crawl back into bed
And pretend that I’m dead

One day, you wait.
I’ll remember how the door swings
At some point even clipped birds
Learn to take wing

Bar None.

I met him when I was
Leaning back in my chair
I was singing laughing
And then he was there
I decided that I liked him
Because of the way his hair
Got twisted in his fingers
And he scuffed his shoes
Like he wanted to linger
So I pulled up another stool
(you’re a fool a fool)
and told him to sit a while
because hey who doesn’t want a smile?

and who wants simplicity?
(oh pick me pick me)
i'd love life to go in major keys
but i keep hitting these notes in minor
and im just a coal miner coal miner
looking for, hoping for a diamond

He left me at noon
When the sun was blazing bright
And he shrugged and hoped
I’d be alright (be alright)
but he had to go
Don’t you know
That some men aren’t made
For this life of trust and musts
So here’s a fair trade
I’ll leave you the memories
And all I’ll take is me
I let him walk away
Because, hey, why make him stay?

and who wants simplicity?
(oh pick me pick me)
i'd love life to go in major keys
but i keep hitting these notes in minor
and im just a coal miner coal miner
looking for, hoping for a diamond

puppet/puppeteer? They're called Marionettes.

i look at you and i see
what you could be
one of my other lives
one of my many lies
you could be
you could be happy
with me
without me
we could pretend
that you could depend
on me
but you see
its just not reality
because i look at you
and see one of my other lies
one of my many lives
and because i love
the thought of you
uncaught
unstained
untamed
i'm going to keep walking
going to keep talking
to my self
leave you there
in your haphazard health
living in straight lines
cause i'm a straight faced liar
and even if i gave you wings
you're no high flyer
so i'll leave you here
keep walking
closing the door behind me
for someone else to find me
to look and see
the life
the lie i could be

i promise i could make you happy.
i swear on inconsistency.

Flight T261. Now Boarding.

i'm holding this sign
because i hate the sound of goodbye
how it sounds like 'you' and 'i'
but is twisted warped broken
into something thats anything but good
everything in me is screaming
this is not what life should be
but the numbers don't lie
and that clock face is pointing to time
so i guess im going to try
not to choke holding this sign
knowing I can't blur away goodbye
no matter how hard i cry
so i'll crush my fingers around this cardboard
watching you disappear into the airport
a mime caught in this cage
of fate's making
and no one taught me
where to find the key
to unlock these lips
unshackle these feet
run after your coat of dark blue
scream don't leave me
i need you
so I'm standing here
holding my sign that says goodbye

for every front there is a back
on the other side of that bitter truth
i've written words just as true
holding my sign taht says goodbye
and i love you.

Fire and Ice.

i quote frost
letting the sharp syllables fall off my tongue
plink plink
to shatter into the pavement
to melt into small puddles
and you go spashing through
not knowing these words
i think i know enough of hate
to say that for destruction ice
is also great and would suffice
and oh you would suffice
for me
because even this my frozen tongue
touchs my warm fingertip
to then trace your identifying symbols
amidst my own
wrapped round with a bent circle
and everything in this world of mine is broken
and yet i find hope in this
that some say the world will end
some say,
the world will end
and who knows perhaps another will
begin
befriend
me and take me away
because i think i know
i know enough of hate
and oh i have tasted of desire
and hold with those who favor fire
bring my burnt fingertips
to my frozen lips
and tell my heart

the world may perish twice
first in love to begin again
this is the truth in fire my friend
and then in bitter ice
as hate rises to sweep the scene
the world may only perish twice

i quote frost
as you walk by
splashing in puddles
unaware.

Fly Away Home

I'm going to stand at this window
watching the sky like a road
watching the light of a thousand planes
hover in the black like stars
watch with hungry eyes
press my fingertips against the glass
and build clouds with my breath
as i whisper as i pray
-come back alive-
all these lines of light in parallel
shooting through this thin pane
this thick pain that crowds my lungs
sealing off my pores
leaving me a cement statue
keeping her vigil
all these parallel lights
parallel lives
places that i could should be
things i could would see
but tonight theres only me
at this window
watching my heart fly away
and i whisper
and i pray
-come back alive-

I taught my heart to fly
taught my soul
and now I'll wait here
teaching myself to pray.

You forget the value of a heart
until it flies away.

one hundred.

this is one hundred.
the tipping point into something new
some place i have not been before
and oh its a strange new world
that i've reached step by step
a thousand slips of the tongue
to slide safe at home
to stand secure and open the door
only to find a universe beyond it
all these syllables and signs
this symbolism and these sighs
have pulled me a long
side step side swipe
wipe your eyes and keep moving on
this is a hundred
and not the end
you were one i loved
and now a friend
there is a difference in truth
a change in trust
i find however
that where i was standing on your toes
(getting in your way
slowing you down)
waltzing as you carried me
life never quite looked the same
a bit of a blur
as to where my world began
and yours ended
now i live on my toes
the world is a dangerous place i know
but you are the one who was
and i am the one who is
this day is one hundred
this is my day of declaration
my hundred definitions
of who is me
who i am
the tipping point my exit
the place where i dicover
i have finally gotten off
your planet your perceptions
your passive love that caught me like a drug
and now im free
and this is one hundred
ways of saying liberty
of me defining reality
this is one hundred
and i know me.

I have many miles before i am home
many hundreds before i am known
but the journey of a thousand thousand thoughts
begins with a hundred poems.

Why don't you...

shoot the messenger
stick him with the pretty darts
pour tranquility into his veins
be merciful and let him fall

no one wants to know the consequences
of their actions
their muscle twitches air expulsions
that odd force of motion
exiting somewhere between their tearducts
and their ears
all these orifices
with which they-the pitiful-
attempt to challenge fate
warp it -unknowing all- to their desires

so shoot the messenger
before he grasps his doom
Helen is gone
and the war must go on

20-20 window to the future.

pinnochio. pinnochio.
i'll keep you on your toes.
tiptoe. tiptoe.
barefeet
splashing through the wet concrete.
and we'll watch the rain fall
catching on your curls
sliding off my smile
and its you and i
in this chlorinated depth
magic water beings
listening to a thousand kisses
break the liquid skin
hearing the remnants of lightning
they carried with them
in their grey bags of travel
crackle along the edges
and oh you are glowing
and oh so am i
welcome to this
our rainy day
our one day hideaway

and we wonder
why we haven't done this before
where we could have been
if we had discovered we were friends
years ago.

Why Physicists Should Not Be Counselors.

she said
why does it hurt so bad
how does love go away
how am i still here hurting and hurting
when he said it would be here always

and he said
its all a matter of physics
the law of conservation you know
(if he thought his life mattered
he should have conserved his breath)
matter cannot be created
nor destroyed
you said you'd loved him forever
well then it was'nt created
would you say love was matter?

Of course it matters!
(she wasn't listening really
concentrating mainly on translating
her explosive hiccups into oxygen
becase somehow breaking your heart
does something terrible to your lungs)

he decided to ignore the anomaly
in the meaning of matter and proceed
"well if love is matter
it cannot be destroyed
therefore it must still exist-

Doyouthinkhestilllovesme?
This is just a phase.
I mean, everybody fights, he didn't really
mean it when he...

He cut her off
it was easy because she was crying
again and air was losing
against the salt slick of her face

"Well matter can change of course
look at radioactive decay
things are always changing
being lost, remade...
it seems
that when love reaches its half-life

half-life how do you have
a half-life of forever?

it depends of course
but it seems his half of the love
is gone (he kept talking over
the sounds that came like retching
as she ran out of tears and air)
when matter decays that left behind
is different, changed
and it is this concept which explains
the hurt bitterness and despair
because love , which is matter
cannot be created or destroyed.
hmm you could hypothesize that..

At which point she introduced Newtons law
in which his action produced a reaction
and her reaction sent him stumbling
down the stairs and out the door

Round One. Retaliate.

i hate walking through this mist
feeling each droplet land on my face
impacting to a sheen across the skin
drop by drop
it outlines my form
until I am blurred into something else
something foreign- some water creature
defined completely by this element
in which she moves

it reminds me of you
the way you constantly throw thoughts at me
small phrases slight glances
and i feel them bending against my skin
hammering against each other
hemming me in with your hidden
strings of sentiment
hidden till you put them in the half-light
like you do
and i see you have been tying my hands
binding my feet
blaming me for backing away
and still they come
landing thick and heavy
till I am trapped in your eyes
playing the role of cruel Beauty
like I'm speaking a foreign language

i hate walking through this mist
wondering where your next trap.

Nine are mine. 24 to you.

hello dream
do we want to try death again?
i can't decide which is immortal
you or me
whether i'm stuck in this
Grecian subway
always hungry always thirsty
for lucious truth beyond my lips
smooth warmth beyond my fingertips
or whether i am mortal
and you are are the deathless one
because no matter how many times
i put you under the knife
here you come again
coiling rough round my eyelids
prying them open
and diving deep
through the clear center into
the places i never want to go again
but still you drag me along
by the retina
through this horrorland
that is my secret hope
gone wrong wrong wrong
wring me out
leave me limp
upon this pyre we've built
because i'm sick of it
both of us will burn

Thirty-third's the charm.

The Giving tree.

i'd like to plug you in
like a respirator
in in in
out out out
and i'd never get enough
of you
pour love down my lungs
sweet and heavy
and it seeping into my veins
in small strong bubbles
that bounce and bend and stretch
me till i am grown
some glorious thing
rich and wonderful and flying
lifted up
because your love
and these mundane things of earth
like gravity or grief
exist on different planes
different universes
and in this the law of matter states
that you are all that matters
and i'm in a hopeless state
of delightful dependance

because without you
i can't breathe.

sick sick sick
sore joints and swollen
i keep walking
because i dont know what else to do
and you said you would make me strong
that you would carry me
well how about that...
i'm still walking.
nice try superman
but i've got enough words of my own.
believe me
if they were worth anything
i'd be rich.
but i never found that shaking air
did much at all
moved flags
flap flap fall
through the gunpowder clouds
into the mud that is red not brown
congratulations. you've done it now.
changed lifes
oh yeah. sure.
like the fanfare creates the parade.
im a constant stream of background noise
and currently im drowning
sick sick sick
im out of breath.

and you say
baby you look so blue.

Still think she's the Joker?

i have blood on my hands
dried beneath my nails
that old rusty colour
coated over with the bright red
of freshly oxygenated liquid
and if they ran the scans--

which they will
after they wrap me in those
cold silver hooks
and tell me about silence
and my right to it
that is where i will laugh
loud and long and with a tinge of cyanide
until they supress me
repress me
slid the silver slip of sanity
under my skin
and force it (unwilling) in
to spread and combat my slippery blood
and subdue me finally to somnolence--

they will find that
this blood is no stranger
to these hands
that it slides inside these veins
familiar and unquestioned
that silence was the weapon
that stole this life from light.
and that compliance was the accomplice
that the killer and the victim
are laid in the back of this squad car
while the officers discuss the yellow tape
and mark the lines of do not cross
across a life overflowing
with others words and worlds

Side Effects of Strength

cradle me in this chaos
this nest of sharp edges and rough things
that break my skin
i carry a thousand silver casts
stretched to meet the solemn skin
that ripples at the junction
and you say that i glow
i decide to disagree
with my colder harsher face
that these days built for me

and i wonder if spiderman hated that suit
hated the way it bent around him
made him stronger kept him moving
wished that somedays
it would just be him
him and the frail cotton of common
with nothing to hold him up
so that he too could fall
who knows
maybe he loved his synthetic spine
to be propelled along with the force of nature
as though nothing could stop you
nothing could break you

i take delusion like a drug
popping my pills of positive thinking
washing them down with a good draught
of forgetfulness and faerie tales
cause no one loves reality
we'd all rather live inside our heads

in our heads
where i wear the cape
and you wear the mask
peel it back in the rain...
and we all know what comes after

but i'm here
in this cradle of chaos
you and i and this fragile spine
me and mine and all this space
between you and yours
and oh it aches
these silver scars stretching over this broken skin

and you say baby you're glowing
and i say baby i'm going

salt stings me
i am silver all over
i am strong and silver
and oh its over

i wish i were broken. instead.

Relationship Royalty.

i'm the queen of the throwaway comment
that bounces back against the rim
of your ear and falls
like the newspaper balls
you transform into game winning goals
screaming as they tip over
into the empty pail
and these sounds circle the edge
and slide off to the side
lying scattered on the floor
piled on their predecessors

I'm the queen of the throwaway comment
and you
you're no environmentalist
leaving them out and about
to decompose in the dust
and theres a toxic buildup
you'll never notice
sinking in my syllables
because i can't give much more
and soon the sludge will stick to your feet
and you'll fall flat into
all the times i told you so

I'm the queen of the throwaway comment
see them drifting around your feet in piles
I'm the queen of the throwaway comment
and you are the king of denial.

Well?

i'm flying through these photographs
tracing the river
down among the rippling green
watching the wind
through the clouds
and where it throws them haphazard
in the way of me
the secret silver tube
streaking through this sky

beep beep buzz
the radio is calling me
sending its waves bouncing
against my careful cranium
rearranging the atoms
like grains of sand
and one day you'll build a castle
with what you've stolen from me

but now i am still free
still fighting gravity
unaware of this your felony
this my undoing

i'm looking through this landscape
dodging these skyscrapers
wondering what kind of creator
would leave these thousand craters
these thousand traitors
amongst the million dreamers
who've fallen asleep and can't escape
can't explain, can't restrain
these awkward awful expressions
of terror and tension
what happens when the world
gets an extension
and stretches beyond the horizon
and now nothing can surprise them
they're dreamers in delirium

and i'm tumbling too
from this crazy rush of youth
into the craters
patriot or traitor?

no one told me when you stole my heart
the alarms were dead. you got inside my head.
took my walls and windows apart
took my fear of falling and made it fear of flying

no one told me living
felt so much like dying.

Lyrical lies

i'm listening to the lies leak
through the radio
behind the static of your voice
these lyrics are driving me mad

i'm not going to be your umbrella
(ella ella)
i'm tired of being left in the corner
quiet in the shadow
till life gets rough
tired of you shoving me small
in the edges of your mind
then stretching me wide
hiding beneath me while the hail beats down
letting me take the rain
asking me to deal with the pain
not even asking
just pressing your little buttons
expecting me to react as i always do
cause i swore that oath
to be there till the end
but you know what?
i swore that to my friend
i'm not sure who you are anymore

I'd like to help you fly away
but for now i'll just tell you
i promised i was here to stay
and i won't turn my back on you.

Dream 'Ware.

no no
i can take this. could do this.
not that. not this.
not it crawling off my fingertips
not it in motion
oily on my skin
slick and sticky and sick
and its roiling in the ridges
of my cold fingertips
stretching it self thin
small tentacles that grab
these plastic keys coiling round them
like a snake before the crush
then sinuous as can be
disappear
and i never knew
never understood where it went
that sticky evil that's coated my mind
it grows at night and laughs loud
and then moves
and now i know
now i know what this is
this last step
turn of the screw
twist the knife one more time
its been crawling through these plastic keys
into the door i'd give anything to lock
been letting itslef in

did you notice the first time
your fingers turned grey in the light?

because i know now
that you wake gasping in the night
with the faces before you
and your hands empty and aching

i thought i could do this.
not that. that you too bear this.
i'd take it back if i could
i would i would
take it down with me
into the dark it loves so well
and leave us there
both it and i
the culprit in this
your nightmare and mine.

did you notice
the first times your fingers went grey?

Reflections on Reflection.

Which to be? A diamond in the rough
Or a pearl among the shine
Which is the treasure of today
To gather upon self
the many layered realm
of opinion, perception
glimpses of the sky
until you yourself are a
great heavy mass
translucent trapping light
and throwing it back with the oily tinge
of all that you are made of
all the other thoughts you’ve wrapped around yourself
Or to compact your own thoughts
upon yourself
under the weight of the crushing crowd
holding only to your convictions
to congeal upon your conscience
till hard beyond believe
taking light and breaking it
into its own segmented teeth
its own rainbow truth
with your sharp sparkling edges
Which to be? The capsule of your age
Or the internal reflection of yourself?

Disaster Zone

i am the cleaner woman
with the pink pink tongue
and the chapped hands
because that is what i do.

mess mess
in aisle three
guess my breaks over
it broke up
we've got another heartbreak
in aisle three

grab your mop and get to work
catch those cracks
careful warning
sharp edges here
its slippery
on the edge of heartbreak
on the edge of hell

and hold your breath
this bleach is bitter
clear away the evidence
raze and burn
chemical cleaning
thats the way to go
cause these scars are here to stay
might as well clean
the filth away

heartbreak on aisle three
i've got to go
because i am the cleaner woman
and that's what i do

Lover.Dreamer.

layer up. lay her up. there out of reach. a porcelain thought. untouchable. lest she break. shatter. into the thousand movie images you gleaned her from. into a million beams of coloured light. light not fire. because she won't keep you warm. i'm here to warn you. but to you i'm the spectre. spectator. don't make a spectacle of yourself. in jealousy.its not your place. in the face of her grace. in the grace of her face. and you'll keep her safe. this dream of yours. dream girl. that you go dream whirling with. and i'm the unwelcome alarm. pulling you back to earth. so layer up. its cold outside. and it's time to go.

so say goodbye.

Autopsy Report.

never knew it would feel like this
like my fingers are broken
long flower stems
snapped
left hanging
on green shreds of skin
limp and loose
lumps that are useless
hard throbs of pain

never knew that it would feel like this
like my feet are gone
lost from the ankles
tree roots dug away
abandoned
rotted clear out and empty
shell-like nubs of hollow mold
meaningless
holding nothing up

i never knew that it would feel like this
like a shattered spine
paralyzed
lightning struck
can bud no more
left a gigantic scar
across the horizon
a flagrant warning to what comes
of stretching high

i never knew that it would feel like this
to be helpless
and to love
which of these crimes is worst
one begets the other
to love
is to give hostages to fate
to be helpless is to learn to love
and this is me
no hands no feet no tongue
split and silenced
by the horror that is helplessness
to a heart who loves

Call it a crime
and call me convicted
but still i swear
i never knew that it would feel this way
to be helpless. and in love.

Miss Manners.

never smile at a crocodile
never lick your lips
when first meeting a fish
for tis not good taste
to picture him in chili paste
while you sit to talk a while
manner manners
learn to cross your T's
and dot your I's
never cross your eyes
nor show your knees
and never carry banners
stand with grace
don't speak out of place
and most of all
don't risk your face
by smiling at a crocodile

if.

if i didn't see you tomorrow
if tomorrow i was gone
i'm not sure what i should tell you
i know that i should say
that its alright its okay
that it was my time
and how time flies
when youre having fun
but i'm not sure if these fingers could do that
if i could turn my back and say
its laright its okay
part of me knows
that i am a child of this earth
my toes grip this dirt
and i cannot let go
i'm a fighter.
they'll tell you that
those men in white coats
with the dragged down skin
around their eyes and mouths
the skin stretched by hours of reaching
to catch these flailing hands
they'll say she is a ..
no they'll say was.
she fought hard.
and thats how you'll know
that dangerous little twist of the tongue
that drives yesterday from today
that leaves space empty
space i used to take
but if it comes to taht
i don't know what i'd want to say
i'd say i love you
that you made me
who i was
but that the parts of me
taht were only me are gone now
not to worry what you gave me
nothing can take that away
so they'll return
with the scent of me to keep you warm
those thoughts and sayings
the time we spent together
i gave you them
you gave them to me
and thats going to last forever

so if now is my last today
this is what i'd want to say.

i love you. i need you. it will be okay.
the past is for the future.
its my gift for you this way.
be strong. be happy. and don't forget to say
i love you.

it will be okay.