he was a rusted buoy sitting on the dock staring out at the sea in which he happily bobbed for years the salt has pitted his skin with blemishes no circular grinder could hope to recover the noble death the one he would have chosen if given a voice would be to sink beneath the […]

it’s crazy i am crazy in my head you can decipher all of the clues the things that mean other things that sound like one thing but are most definitely not you know home home is her you know i am an orphan half by choice no one can see me. i am unvisible to […]

when i am at the brink the edge of manic swells or negative spaces of depression i say to the universe beep beep, richie when i was too young i read it under the blankets with a flashlight through the night i wanted to be bill sure he stuttered but he was the leader and […]

the plastic bag hung suspended like a jellyfish in the invisible water at an aquarium i watched you as much as you watched the fish together we watched the crowd holding hands exchanging looks where no word need spoken as the jellyfish hung suspended like a plastic bag in the humid air of a parking […]

sometimes i have the overwhelming urge to shout but the words get tangled on my tongue my brain misfires i blush then turn away some days i choke on the words i wish i could say typing erasing messages never to be seen again it’s quiet in the places that used to ring with peals […]

i am sorry you don’t want to hear it i don’t want to have to say it but i am sorry even if it is not worth the pixels it illuminates you’ll never hate me half as much as i hate me without you. let’s just pretend i was never here.

i wrote i love you in cursive down her spine tasted her sweat and desire as it dripped from my beard but in the quiet moments when teeth and tongue were still it was the memory that kept me going as cobwebs draped her once loving heart now it is the aftertaste of being pushed […]

where is your fire your passion your sense of wonder stuck to the bottom of her bare foot in ashen footsteps that lead anywhere but here do you think i control this that i control anything that i can assert my will to enforce change on this world of miserable half-truths i am not a […]

i can tell i am not the same as i was before new skin same scars the smile doesn’t fake itself quite like it used to all the dull aches have taken to screaming my eyes are more sensitive to the light have i grown more disillusioned or more in touch with myself as the […]

everything seems bogged down in rain and drowning and dream and that moment she walked away the casual swipes she cast as she did now the storms have come to dallas i cannot tell if i am awake or dreaming did i write about this or did it sing in my head as the slide […]

measure twice cut once the sound of the tape measure retracting extracting retracting again before the soft whorls of wood fall to metal teeth as the saw savages the grain he measures the coffee in four even scoops a shake of cinnamon a dash of salt as the water fills the glass carafe in the […]

she found the broken toy on the sidewalk as she headed home it wasn’t much to look at parts were missing paint had been scraped off but something in the sad painted eyes spoke to her somewhere sometime someone had loved this toy discarded it when the magic had fled it’s plastic body but she […]

desire is a scarab skittering along my brain leaving only empty places where rationality once sent paralytic blasts to ease the burden.

it has been a fiction less month as the friction of reality burned the skin from my knees as i knelt begging for what would never be there is a reason my tales never have happy endings there is no such thing just brief excursions into fantasy where the hero slays the evil finds true […]

it could be any of these empty parking lots across the goddamned city where no one cares under the gray sky of her dismissal that they find the dried up corpse of insipid verse once work realizes i haven’t been in for days

i am well aware that i am a great a lay but emotionally i am a glove compartment of unpaid parking tickets if they loved me half as hard as they came they wouldn’t only call when they knew that city hall had burnt to cinders across town

i cannot figure out why these beautiful women pay me more than a passing glance my words don’t have the reach my soul has no glimmer my heart is a scarred mass of wilted lily petals tied with coarse string into a bundle in my chest my face is a child’s drawing of the boogeyman […]

i feel my heartbeat in my throat choking me my heart has escaped torn free of the membrane that suffocated it cracked ribs bruised lung wrestling its way up my esophagus my larynx strumming my vocal chords in a song of drowning

she is a nymph of the storms her smooth skin a tapestry of coal dust clouds with tongues of purple infused golden arcs her stare a blizzard in brown deception far deeper than any storm primordial her voice the rumble of future pain shaking the leaves from the trees i lay nude beneath her majesty […]

obsidian flaked insecurities interwoven through the soulheather like thistle thorns on the stem of tomorrow and the chimes sing in the breeze heavy heart laden with prudent heresies gold flecked irises unblinking an owl in flight soft silence on the wing of night tremulous tumor inconsistently consistent in depth of unholy need the fangs of […]

it is just the average soul crushing hellfisting on repeat a kind of struck match to the tinder of despondent fuckall

as i peel back the onion skin exposing the onion skin beneath expecting the new layer to be an epiphany of sorts in a languid absence of answers, there is an epidural effect as the spine stops responding to signal i just wish the needlework stitching of the vivacious nurse with almond eyes who blushes […]

i call your name in the silence between notes in the lull between lines it is in those spaces i fall apart.

i am a glass bird pecking at the keys in the futility of feeling anything but lost much like the bird i cannot reckon my own fictional existence in diction in fiction in prose i expose that when the man was removed from the cave in plato’s allegory he spent the rest of his life […]

she broke the spell of her lullaby of frustration now the universe is restless her limbs deadened from so long immobile she sang softly beautifully of what was lost beneath the weight of loss the levees crumble

a year of rejections from the life destroying to the more mundane decisions my art was not good enough i can only assume there is a lesson in this as well but the depression has swallowed any sense of learning my heart is not enough my soul is too tattered my words ring hollow my […]

i have accepted the fact that there is no beauty comparable to you that i will always be chasing after your ghost that i will never give every piece of myself to another after having it delivered return to sender to my stoop the simplest of realizations are the most painful

i saw you briefly in the corner of my mind’s eye standing silently at the edge of the crowd for a second our eyes met yours widened mine squinted as i tried to believe what i saw was truly there you vanished lost in the faceless face of the crowd while i stood on teetering […]

i woke up with a mushroom growing out of chest i noticed because of the bioluminescent glow beneath the blanket it took me by surprise the ethereal blue glow like electricity flickering in a pattern i recognized as the pulse in my ears now my body effuses that tell-tale throb of electrical glow as the […]

each headstone another marker covered in misrepresentation summing up a life of dreams desires hopes and failures into a placard reducing the spirit interred into rigid numbers polite reminders homogenizing an existence into cold information while erasing all trace of the individual weather battered trail markers worn down to smooth stone with decaying blossoms eventually […]

the dishwasher glugs along to fill the room with the secret sound of the ocean just beneath the surface as it swirls among the coral dragging the waterlogged corpse of creativity nibbled by eels little fish in every hue darting to tear at the gray skin; as i sulk in self-manufactured well manicured misery.

he crept along exuding a pestilent stench pus oozing from his open wounds of self-inflicted pennance wretched is he who truly sees himself for that man shall never know a moment of peace in the flurry of whispered truths.

i am going to use the straight razor today in the pit of despair i didn’t trust myself to hold the keen blade against my scarred skin for fear of going too deep but the electric never really removes the entirety that dwells just at the surface naked to the human eye but still scratches […]

you are confused, possibly bewildered hurt, i am sure if you are reading this then you have pulled the trigger ended whatever charade of a relationship we had found ourselves languishing in i am sure i am devastated but good for you i likely will be in the midst of spitting tear soaked ballads into […]

the sun rose the engine roared the cat yowled i woke the bird sang the neighbor showered the silence settled i lay the plane circled the squirrel scampered the wind blew i listened the couple fought the police came the lights flashed i wrote across the page it appeared the world was the same even […]

entwine the stems of roses three a sprig of thyme to tether thee around the hill the clock winds back a golden light beckons once pitch black a boon is granted in the emerald light as voices whisper from shadowed night as your legs quiver like a newborn foal the fae they call for your […]

i don’t know if i lost part of myself or if the parts of myself i tried to give away eventually returned there are so many things i don’t understand that i stare into the abyss screaming for answers that are only swallowed by the darkness from within my photo-negative facade the human x-ray unable […]

it’s one hundred degrees and the power is out the stale air carries the tinge of brimstone satan’s breath carries over the land to hang heavily like the body of the first poet from an old oak tree

is there ever a time when a man can shed his skin awaken to be someone else a new pattern emerging from the flaked off scars a new epidermal epiphany or do we all fall back into the routines that lead us off the cliff on repeat until the final curtain draws to the applause […]

one sock a tab of bubblegum stuck from the hot sidewalk beneath staggered steps the sweat dripping magnifies the cruel glare of the infernal eye in the sky one bloody footprint leading from the scene of the crime the setting where once upon a time died a gurgling death choking on the tears of disenchantment

through misery through joy the sun truly does rise again to that i say with all due respect and admiration fuck off sun inconsiderate ball of burning plasma with no respect for boundaries no matter how i blackout this room your tendrils reach you cast your judgemental unblinkingly gaze through the hole in the ozone […]

o’er the dreams i dreamt when sleep i slept the tenebrae of loss doth permeate for none call in the night the whooping crane pierced by fangs with venomous drip beseeched by the betterment of mossy regret to perch high upon yon beleaguered soul

the world appeared coated in hoarfrost or so it seemed through tear soaked eyes a glimmering nest of vipers frozen in lapsed adoration

she entered my heart like wind chimes carried on the evening breeze a masterfully subtle coup d’etat that soon my every cell was imprinted with her touch now there is a crater where a pristine chapel with an ornate bell tower once stood the sound of wind chimes still makes my soul ache with loss

calculating the infinity in her gaze using a protractor to measure the acute angle of the angel’s tilted halo as my broken wings sweep through the dust in hopes of finding the missing components to this suicide vest of unsent valentines with cartoon hearts etched in blood

if i was dead before you only springing forth to life when you showered your fleeting affections upon me what type of revenant have i become in our love’s passing i would have a funeral but the urge to crawl into the freshly dug pit would be likely more than this simpleton can take even […]

there is a ball of frustration that keeps growing like a new solar system in my guts as each new piece falls off to rot upon the floor i am left seething with this inability to accomplish the most basic of things correctly work is a dead end the words scream for attention that i […]

the bitter sting of her rejection, her silence, her anger the things she promised she wouldn’t do at the beginning but slipped into like comfortable shoes has gone i wasn’t enough, she made that clear, it was the words i now see as honey flavored falsehoods, the promises that stopped meaning anything when the road […]

i imagine it is difficult to tell an angel from a vulture when you are dying a slow death in the desert alone. it is hard enough to tell the helping hands from the lashing strikes when one has been consistent the other seldom seen.

i sat in the car in a parking garage as they took the bull statue off the flat bed a group of workers in orange safety vests watched as the forklift driver slowly set it on the ground the sky was dark above the wind beginning its howls the air conditioner was blowing higher than […]

i want to feel her draped across my chest her scent strong in my head as we lay just basking in each other instead i will stare at the ceiling see how long i can go without breaking down tomato potato

i find that the swirl cone of anxiety mixed with despondency has me feeling like every single thing i do is pointless or destined to fail you don’t know how important the anchor is until you find yourself floating listlessly on the waves with no land in sight

pale purple flowers growing in a field covered in blown about trash there is a lesson there but i can’t find it through the tears

can you hear me? am i doing this right? be silence once for yes twice for no it’s just that i have been dealing with a ton of shit lately some of it wasn’t even my fault who the fuck am i kidding? it is all my fault the straw broke the camel or choked […]

the rains are salt water and i walk around without skin in the downpour i don’t have enough middle fingers to express the agony of this world of lies that sound like joy

when i was a boy filled with grand plans of great adventures before the understanding of how the lessons taught were tinted by the victors how the conquerors were not heroes i wanted to discover new lands with that childlike misunderstanding that already inhabited lands weren’t new just unknown nations across the serpent infested seas […]

woke up to see the sun glaring down at a world frozen in place the birds hung in the sky in static formation like a swarm of gnats a plastic bag gently hovered my first thought a jellyfish in a tank i didn’t dress just stepped out into the scorching day filled with curiosity this […]

she sat on the edge of the couch with tears and snot streaming, inconsolable in her grief damn it if she didn’t find a way to make sorrow look sexy i told you not to fall in love with a poet she collapsed in a heap on the floor, shapely legs and smooth skin he […]

i saw her reflection in the waves and filled my pockets with stones to find her i heard her voice in my mind and cracked my skull open to set her free i kissed her lips in that moment i chose her as my salvation i gave myself freely to her and she rejected me […]

i let myself be swept along the currents of this invisible sea never afraid of drowning as the coral of loves gone ashen slice the softer pieces into a slurry that calls the sharks to feast. dragged face down through the desert in her eyes parched from lack of reciprocation longing for my lungs to […]

never so beautiful as the eagle that swoops down to consume my liver each dawn never so poignant as the chains that bind me to this stone made from unreturned affection a modern day prometheus, mute fool with too much emotion not enough sense to cease being if only the eagle would feast upon my […]

i get glimpses of poetry little images that flicker across the inside of my eyelids but by the time i stop to write them down her face has replaced every fractal of thought while i know she doesn’t stop to think of me there is a brief moment that stinks of hope reeks of need […]

every trip to midlothian seems the same but degraded slightly the quarries announce your imminent arrival new buildings litter the highway but once you get to the heart of the little city that is when the cardiac disease seems to be slowly eating the town by inches the faces look lined as if the knowledge […]

i thought to stand in the hot water of the shower listening to the song it played off the bathtub in a symphony of disharmonic malaise the smell of the soap reawoke those memories that i have tried to smash deep down into the lockbox at the foot of my brain i was at the […]

we were once two tent stakes driven individually yet united in purpose now the canvas flaps limply in the breeze ensnared in the branches of the old oak and i am alone buried to my neck with a frayed loop of rope to remind me of what was

I. his fingers bleed from clenching the quill tightly in his hamfists; gelatinous eyes peering over the piles of crumpled pages; a cloud of stench hangs over his hungover countenance; a pool of inks catches the reflected candlelight he dies this evening II. the clock on the wall judges all that dare step foot in […]

it is with a solemn and profound sadness i have to admit i derive no pleasure from this existence not that it matters i will still continue the same rigormorale write the same drivel and press forward

she said my eyes were sad peaking over the mask like two whirlpools that pulled at her heartstrings she asked if i needed a hug i did but my aversion to people to the world to everything feeling like saltwater poured on my naked frame covered by a thousand papercuts of dismissed need i am […]

i feel dehydrated drained emptied of all but the need to frantically spill verse across the opiate colored skies. nothing left but to die ugly and leave a trail of tear soaked odes to promises that were only meant to be broken.

some days the melancholia is rusted iron chains threaded through every corridor of my mind’s cathedral the picturesque glass detailing the arabesque landscape an afterimage of hell overlaid across the idyllic images of smiling faces holding hands a bitter hint at hope in decline as the world crumbles around them i lay on my back […]

at this point short of a time machine or full frontal lobotomy this is the new state of normal i have been soldering components but leaving out resistors because i have given up completely the room smells of disinfectant with an underlying scent of sadness the ice pick sits in isopropyl as i steel my […]

I the moon hangs pregnant like a pause in conversation in which the wrong thing is said at too loud a.volume he was the king of doing that it didn’t help he was usually the loudest any way i watched him the world taking on an eerie slowed down pitch we were outside telling lies […]

i think had she known the task the burden the tireless need that comes with loving one as broken as i she would have been deterred it isn’t as if i didn’t warn her my poetry alone should have been dissuasive enough yet she cracked down on the hollow tooth let the cyanide flood into […]