Just to hear your voice.

In the morning
I fell into the sobs of your voice
I fell into the cries of loneliness
and never

never have I missed you more

I heard you
on the call of repeat
in a mess of self-torture
because the pain

the pain brings you back to me

You are the one
who should be in my skin
who should hold to my head
when the breaking comes

comes in the morning with your diamonds

I
will never fear what comes
when I have you
with my skin on your skin
my heartbeat against yours

and yours
is the one I cry for

My 'him' no longer.

And I just realized
that none of my memories here
will be of you
ever again

you have abandoned life
to forever be
and always

and always
just a shadow
of what we could have become

You: Homesickness.

Baby,
in all of your glory
I am bestowed upon thee

Baby,
in everything you are
I can’t forget thee

Because you
you are everything
you are everything

You are the broken hinge in the door
You are the cold coffee
on a Sunday morning

You are strangers met on the sidewalk
and photos
never seen again

You
You are a coin of gold
shining the glint of pavement

you are pages unwritten
forgotten to finish

And now,
you are a morning pick-up
a case of
How do I get home?
Can I come home with you?

053009 8:46AM

And while he walked
he heard
a peculiar noise
it fell on his nose

a noise like
someone
brushing teeth

it echoed off the walls
it echoed from his mouth
he began to look around

around
shika-shika
shika-shika
the brushing

a dull but brilliant
a familiar tone of
nothing in particular

he looked up
and there she was
a girl
in the window

still awake
from the night before
out her window
she leaned

and down it came
shika-shika
shika-shika
the brushing

and all the while
an old man
from the door of his shop
watering the street

shika-shika
shika-shika
he wondered
her blonde hair
blonde eyes

who was she?
That girl
was me.
I brushed
in the morning

I brushed a
shika-shika
shika-shika
breaking morning
breaking stones

I brushed a
web of lovers
court of
amalgamated
associated
hands in hands
and constant mated

lovers of lovers
lovers of sons
lovers of broken
and lovers begun

I didn’t know
quite what to say
except:
shika-shika
shika-shika
shik-

he looked and I
looked away
in the morning sun
in the sun because

I was never
the girl on the beach
I was blue eyes
and broken teeth

shika-shika
skika-shika
shik-

I was never
the feminine
but now
now I am
the optimum

shika-shika
shika-shika
shik-

What is one to do
with a morning
full of morning
with a morning
like this?

An Ode for Poison Oak

I listened
I finally
finally listened

I listened to you
to your voice
to your song

and when I realized
I laid my head
down to the blanket
I laid my ear flush
up to the speakers

and sideways
I broke
fat tears
slid
over my nose
into my ear
and down my face

and as the line came
“
let the poets
cry themselves
to sleep
”
I knew
you were for me

and as you sang
I knew
I was for you

And I cried
without reason
except for
a broken heart

And then
when you ended
I turned over
and I played your voice again
and once again
I cried again.

Some things I will miss about Madrid:

1. Crazies on the metro

2. School-girl uniforms

3. The way your hair blows back
- like a supermodel-
when you leave the station at Chueca

4. How the city is designed around socialization,
around people

A Reminder

I will keep
but one scar
from you

allowing the others
to heal
completely

I will keep
one mark
in a place
I can hide

and only I,
or perhaps
a future lover,
will know
it's existence

This scar will fade
with age
almost disappear
completely
in the long dark
of winter

But
when the sun returns
I will bear my soul
for all

this one scar
will creep
along the curve
cautiously

and remind me
of what
I have loved

Urchin

You are in the sand
and written for decadence;
but you crave permanence.
You want to be carved in stone
and much stronger than gold.
You want to become petrified.

And I have the solution.

I have always had
exactly what you needed
but you are broken
in a way that makes you unfit

You crave something new on every turn
but your impressions are dug in sand
and though each stone you've crept upon
will stand the tides of time
you will wash away

You will drag clinging
biting with desperation
praying for an anchor
but those stones will wash clean
kissing you goodbye to the sea

and all that will remain
will be tiny tracks of blood
from the scratching
you left behind.

Oh boy.

Last night I was on fire,
but the morning
brings a sickness
in the smoldering.

Damn this smoke.
it always leaves me
reeking desolate.
Yes, desolate.

I need sunlight
and water.
I need purity.
Sanctuary.

I need a head so clear
I could sort you out
see you the way you are
and then box you up

for storage
and then
put you
away.

I’m so tired of you
laying around my floor.
I’m so tired of you
catching my feet dragging.

I’m so tired of this
pull on my heart
that upsets my eyes
when I feel you yank.

I don’t want you
to be miserable
but I don’t want
to be either.

I can’t keep stepping over you
I want you out of my room
off of my floor, out of my eyes
and free from my mind.

I want
to stop
needing
you.

You have been cruel
treated me poorly
but somehow
somehow

You’ve crept under my skin
slipped into my veins
and withdrawals are always
the hardest part.

When I wake alone
crashing the morning
I think of you
My bones begin to ache

It’s a yearning for
the trip-
not at the end where
the addiction was a sickness

Where I forced you
into my blood by
pulling small veins
severing nerves

from my wrists
from my neck
and this one
connects my heart

No, I am missing
in yearning desire
the summit-
the peak of the high

The time when
you touched me
and my skin
erupted

When just your eyes
could ground me
root me to the earth
and lift me higher than

I long for the world
the one we created
between our bodies
that made me question

everything.
Searching for a truth
in the world outside
our reality.

Polished Silver

Last night I danced
with the nine foot goddess
and her sister
who’d abandoned her shoes.

We danced on the lights
that freckled the floor
with one hundred eyes
locked on our grace.

Last night I danced
with giant angels
with big full lips
and nervous hands

They fiddled the locks
of their cascading wigs
with flashing eyes
wanting and dreading

Those eyes were darting
battered thick
with black midnight
and false lashes.

Last night I danced
I danced and I danced
and when the angels retired
I asked them to dance again.

El Madrileño

Then came the problem,
and you
became an asshole.

You
trying to play
all the games
all my lovers
have played before-

only,
they played them
better.

You are not good
in what you do
you lost your hand
in a fit
jealousy.

You called me a slut-
you had no right to.

You lost it
and managed
to offend me-
in a language
other than my own.

You have some
real
talent.

And I
am not
easily
offended.

I am not easily offended.

I / Will / Pay

There was sunlight
there was heat
in the cabin of
the corner of
the sunset
on the street

in the passing of
the straining of
their poise contained
their stride maintained
stilettos on cobbles
stilettos on stage

and brows without moisture
and necks without mist
in the cabin of
the corner of
the breaking of
the heat

while trails tapped
a pacing knack
for trampled on
for tramping-
a beautied wink
you stop to think

then nothing
then nothing
the corner comes
a heat in lungs
then nothing
then nothing

She smiles quick
a spreading lip
gloss to glint
her lash in squint
with sun on graffiti
with sun on her skin

And then
and then
you're dizzy with
you're dizzy with
and then
and then

A pocket coin tink
A pocket-eye link
and brinking on
a breaking on
desire for something
desire for heat

with sun on graffiti
with sun on her skin
in the cabin of
the corner of
the woman of
the street

We are connected by the trails of our veins.

The lines
on the inside
of your face

line the grooves
running the bark
of a tree

Those lines
trace your laughters
and long nights

Those lines
trace your blood

Those lines
lead your lineage
back through

mothers and sons
fathers and mothers
daughters and brothers

and then
the mothers
of those

With satin
in billows
to curtain

your face
and light
freckled tissue

With pale windows
which open and close
revealing the lines

and
the secrets
of the lines

Those lines
on the inside
of your face

have always been
my favorite place
for hiding

I asked him:

If you could run away to anywhere in the world, tonight, where would you go?

He told me:

I just came back from running away out of this planet. I can't run anymore.

So I asked him:

Where did you run to?

And he said:

I ran into an artificial illusion within myself of pure and beautiful feelings denying reality.
Then I woke up to face reality with respect and faith on me.

051409

This morning brings about
an odd fascination.
A morbid curiosity
that could kill me,
if I let it.

There is electricity.
What would it taste like?
On the end of a knife?
To draw the shape
of blood
on my tongue?

Would there be blood at all?
Or perhaps,
an instant cauterization
of wires;
severing nerves and
burning them apart,
all in one spark.

And what about pavement?
How would it feel
caressing my flesh
like a lover;
raging from the height
of a rooftop?

I want to fly.
Drop backwards
off the eaves of imagery
while imagining only
the color green.
I want to capture it
in my mind;
tamed by a certain
solitude.
Think only of green
and become it
in a million
falling
drops of paint.

Would I ricochet?

Or
would I exterminate my colors
in a staining of stones and
for all eternity
they would know
where green expired?

Would it leach from
the fresh leaves of roses
and morning glories?
Would it leave the earth's fauna
in a ghostly, dusty hue?
Would the color drip
down from every point of life
and travel the planet
slowly
to arrive where I left green
as an executioner
to shine obsessively vibrant
in reminiscence
for all eternity?

And when I walked
from my tinted massacre
would the only memory
of green
remain as just a hint?
A tiny glint of color
in the wink of my eyes?

Or what,
what if I needed refuge
from these nights
of wild dreams,
of oppression,
and I took to the street
to sleep with the whores,
and learned Spanish
as I told them my sins?

The confessions of an immortal
desperate to die;
of a heart that danced wild
in the heat with a flame;
the cries of a mother
unwanted, unwed.
The breaking of silence
on water.

This musing is dreams
dipped in mischief;
is skin
dripped in hard candy
cherry flavored;
is secrets
reveled by eyes pacing
beneath the sweet shell.

This dream is escape
is escape
is escape
is escape
and throwing your memories
through glass
to the ground.

This is a forgotten sensuality
the caress of a dull blade
running the curves of my skin.
After all,
this blade is nothing
but a piece of life
in my hands.

051209

I am sure you will miss me for a very long time.

But me? I will fly free from you as a mosquito;
Slipping saliva into the pores of the humans I love
and taking only blood as a souvenir when I go.

The Peninsula.

And now

I am wonderment

amazement

and decision.

Right now

I am finalized.

I am longing for

anywhere

but the city

I miss

what I've always known

as home

the beaches

made of stone

water

too frigid for swimming

and swimming

without reason

just the same.

I want

the peninsula 

the chill

of evergreens

with a slow drawl

and sun-baked

pine needles

in dust

feeding apples

to the misty morning

deer grazing the bluff

above the cliffs

above the sound

above the fire and

under the stars.

I want to be kissed

by a boy

who is simple and sweet

who dreams of music

and the road.

With sand-colored hair

and soft skin.

I want the dust

of the country

the U.S. west

where voices

mimic birds

and skies go on

forever.

I want my family

the arms of my mother

when I cross reckless

past borders and states

o'er rivers and peaks

through the frame of her door

and back

into her home.

050809

The sun sneaks up 

over the mountain

I wake 

to think only of you

with heavy eyes

laden with 

fleeting dreams

I bring them half-open

fill them with pink-and-green petals

with sunlit slats permitting 

just enough

from the places I've been

in the beat of my

rapid eyes and

sweet dream sweat

wet on neck

down the shoulders

unusual.

I am here with

the waking morning

almost silent but

here:

a quiet tick-tick

and there:

the city's first living:

a barking

a birding

a rooster saluting

broken only

by the pass of a distant

solitary engine

and then

another.

The countryside

marked by

the early hour

by simple living

by shepherds leading

low bells to echo

mountain to mountain

valley to valley

sky to the sea

and back

to the necks 

of the sheep.

what comes next.

"we bury them all in glass coffins at the bottoms of rivers and put foxfire in the tombs, so they glow at night and we can appreciate what comes next." -Richard Brautigan

Poppies

There are poppies that line the freeway leaving Madrid. They remind me of you. Of your lips and the way that you smile. 

I want to walk among them. Stick my feet with the hot dry earth. Feel my hair whip into tangles with the wind of passing cars. Kneel down and feel the kiss of wild petals on the crest of my cheekbones. I want to lay down among them and feel the mass of a sprawling sky. I want to feel them purify me, pulling toxins from my blood as they do from the soil.

And there, by the breath of wild poppies, by the rush of the passing motors, by hills growing calm and cradling, and under the pale blanket of the enormous sky, I will give my life up to destiny and my body to the earth. 

I will forget my name and my sins and become only red wildflowers that line the freeway leaving Madrid. The ones that remind me of you, and the way that you smile.

A night walk with insanity.

You are fireworks on Grand Via
and the squeal of a drunken pickpocket
while my tune rings the pavement
in an octave just above your reach.

You are bags of emptiness
caught in the wind
dancing circles around my feet.

I am am hair in a vertex
and jazz rising up from the subway.
You are caught in my eyes
with the flick of the breeze.

My legs find comfort
in the sound of an always-loved
nostalgia. Out of control.

043009

Hielo, beware when the road is just
pointing, to a broken and lazing
example, when nothing you've chosen
will fit you, and the tantrum
on the hard bathroom floor.

'Cause you're hiding
where the sun-trees remind me of
childhood, with the three months
we lived without rain
and a browning, of skin turning something quite
golden, white eyebrows and pigtails
alike.

But it's gone now
with the sinking of skin on my
forehead, to the pillow and forever
sleeping, and days sliding past without
grace. But a reason
to stare at the stones in your
eyelids, and wonder what plays in your ears.

'Cause it's boring
this pointing and tired
commuting, while the bus shakes a violent
unreason, can't tell you how much I miss
raining, while my life here won't let me
complete.

Tell me a different story.

You are long in your longing
I have nothing but worry
I send you

shattered dreams
to rattle and shake
shove torn through the cracks
your door of depression.

You had a fire
and now it's gone
where?

Where did you loose it?
"Just hibernating."
in a sigh.
Where did you loose it?

Can I find a switch?
Can I mend wires?
Bending metal to metal
Bringing current to current
Binding with black tape
electricity.

"No." with ashy eyes.

You want to be anywhere
but where you are
and I am exactly so.

I want to give you:
crystals of ice
drops of dew
banana leaves
and dreams.

(Remember dreams?)

I want to dream with you
burn my fingers on your heat
burn the planet with our tongues.

And I'm reaching,
I'm reaching,
for a flame that's gone cold.
Embers.
I hear it in your voice
and I know
you're loosing.

You're loosing.

You need a change,
you dream of unknown,
Images of snow and
thick humidity.

I'm coming for you.

You won't be there
when I arrive.