Vapors

Simple and clean
And unmessed and not perfect
But something to behold.
Keep seeing vapors of you in front of me
Grey, curling, twisting, elusive
Even when you’re far away
Somehow it’s all still there.
So now that you’re here
And I’m weary
Sing me a lullaby, love
And send me off to sleep
So I may see your face there
Exactly as I remember it.

Things

I have always been a genuinely happy person
If I have the room.
Do you know what I mean?

My room to be happy has no walls
except when I need them on bad days
quixotic and fleeting, to fence me in.

The span of my room is just enough
to breathe for myself yet think of you,
brilliant and whole.

It’s the place where I set my keys, rest my head
in that room, it’s all there
I need little else.

Everything else is just things
just somethings and nothings
these things no one needs to be whole.

I had a dream the other day, you were in it too. We were in an elaborate mansion that was crumbling in the corners. The rooms were filled with birds, and each time we tried to catch one it would multiply. There were thousands of birds: in the kitchen sinks, swimming in the pool, on top of shelves. I had a net and I was jumping through the air, trying to catch them as they flew but that didn't work too well.
"What are you doing here?" I said.
"I just want to pet one of the sparrows," you cried.
"Just brooowsing," said the owl, an incredulous stare in his eyes.
"Free as my own species!" said the sparrow.
"I like walking*finding treasure," said the two heads of the crane.
"Missed me, ha!" said the mockingbird.
"I love to sing," said the canary.
Nevermind, I thought. Too many creatures in this conversation. Then we left all the birds in the rooms and went somewhere else. We figured the birds needed some alone time. I wish I could have seen them all in color. My dream was fuzzy so I don't know where we ended up going. I won't soon forget my bird mansion dream though.

Why I work for the weekend

Petting chickens
Heckling Avril
Coincident silence
Sunburns
Google Earth exposure
Cuban sandwiches
Ironing board
Scrabble scores
Movie lullabies
"Thank you"
Gargoyles on carports
Shared stories
Boo Monday.

So much I curse this present, the words flow out from tonsils and tongues within but I can't seem to stop it, anger's my sole defense for such vulnerability. Missed the train, missed the memo, things you say but I don't receive or believe and I'm maddening angering amidst the nice letters strung together that you said to me so long ago and repeat verbatim to me now. I'm screaming, yelling where no one can hear, my ears are the sole audience, the guy in the back of the room saying fuck you, can't you do better? I can't, is all. Can't make you believe it's dead and buried in the ground, falling upon deaf ears these words are. But these words are all I got. I can't make much more than what comes out, can't trust much more than what I have, can't be much more than what I've tried. I just want something more than this, want something wholer than nonsense words and sentiments, words that cut and regret their own existence. You're drunk, more tears fall, I'm drunk, more tears fall, both lone stags in crowded places, different times and faces, and all I do is yell louder, such miles away from you and that's all I know, how far apart we are, how this distance and loneliness is your making. Seek unforeseen solace in strangers, I don't see anyone wanting to be a tangible, talkable friend. Suppose I'm supposed to be living and laughing but I'm at full capacity yesterday or last week or whenever it was I smiled for real. All I can do is think of the words I wish you had told me then and wonder what those are, will I remember, want to forget, wonder how the hell I fall so hard for you then and how hardened I've become. Who the fuck cares, I give up so easily now on new people, wanting to run away from possibility of being hurt so bad, something that already came to my doorstep. I forgot to sign out, forgot to give my name to the man that counts things and makes things count, and just can't comprehend these systems. Systems of games, systems of words based on time, systems of affection based on sympathy, just don't get it. Love hurts and leaves me, I see washed out copies of it everywhere, a skinny promise but it's just a lie, just lost hope. Return my hope.

OUT.

Thinking away everything about you, want to scrub it off my conscious but you've sunk in too deep, my memory steeped in your presence. Want to go to the beach and waste away, have the water rub down to my bones in ideal preservation, be endless in the ocean yet so fleeting to you. Need you to forget me before I get burned again; I don't always want what I need though. I'm bleeding you out like molasses but you're still stuck on every day from now until who knows when. Need my heart broken for my resume; gain the experience, feel the pain of it, to remember how it feels when you're loved and when it's gone. Don't want permanence, don't know alternatives; just want to hold, to love; is that so bad? He held me once, told me I'm spoiled now by something I can't have or just can't handle. How willing I am to offer that love to you, raffle it random on a return gesture; for now I just wish blindly that the vapor of utopia might someday thicken so I can just hold on.

Please Try Again Later

A talk so beautiful, broken up in static, pieces come through the speaker, lightning-electrical-cyclical-musical how do you breathe with words like this? Must have forgotten respiration but can't forget your stories, your skin, your smile. Just want to hold you till both our worries float away but I've failed to remember how the pieces go, just break them and edit for best fit, you and me, your pain, my pain, everything will be all right soon. Chest still heaves randomly, tears in eyes while opening mail, buying shampoo, walking up stairs. So long were my words wrung from my throat, words that might have made my wishes known; now I can't find ways to say them. Wasn't looking for trouble, just borrowed it and it's overdue, letter in the mail but can't picture where I left it, right it please. Pretty please, pontificate what my ears hear and my thoughts mind, teach me ways of life along my lostness voyage. I'm losing that way slowly so I run, no socks, pray to dissolve in the cold and want to fuse to the sidewalk beneath me, ice and concrete nothingness. Run in the street, pray to absorb the impact of reality telling me it's a-ok to be alive but no more after this. How do I empty my head of this, turn sideways and shake? Convulsions, I'm wretching love out, out stomach, keep this thought from hitting bottom, keep me from falling apart. Who wants to watch over me, hide me from my poor intentions, hear me in all my troubles, protect me from fears and sticks, love me from toes up? Barren candidate pool, I'm unruly, unbelievable, unrelenting revisitations of nightmares -- they leave only through mouths. Hunting, people love the chase, the challenge but not the catch, want mystery and no truth, want to hunt in the sanctuary, shoot this bird down, take what they want to the taxidermist and throw the rest away. They want for better, not for worse; I only know for worse, just put a smile on my face and you've changed my world. That isn't too hard, is it? Can't help how I'm messed up, want love but can't make it whole yet. Gotta wait till I shed my skin again, gotta wait till the cage door opens, gotta wait till the sun comes up once more, gotta wait until my head heals.