grow lil' tree. grow. grow. grow! plx

its very night,
and i.

don't know what's in me.
this push. this puuuuuuuuuuuush.
toward a bed and out the door,
together. we. are.

i'm learning a remote control.
i'm learning pancakes.
i'm learning bills, and debt, and my first gray hair.

bells. scooping up my books, my bag,
flying fish and invitations
full of decor like lightening,
and fuck, maybe,

unicorns.
dragons.
a dying tire, sighing brakes, the long shadows of ex's and a worm
out history of families, broke parts make
believe.

fixes, and a plead
for soft landings. sex

plus us.
plus everything.
see?

part one

1. your nose
2. your distracting jawline
3. your stubborn positivity
4. the humility of your upbringing
5. the complexity of your upbringing
6. your love of shopping
7. your willingness to give
8. the honesty of your pain
9. the art buried into your instincts
10. your passion for celebration
11. the sincerity of your tears
12. the sincerity of your touch
13. watching you eat a chilli dog
14. that you dislike scary movies
15. that you like mushrooms
16. your eyes
17. ok, your body entirely
18. that we are mosaics that have settled for along time for finger-paintings. they are abundant, easy and very fun but were never ready to see all our complex parts. their idea of us as a whole was incomplete, and when, inevitably they were faced with the details of what life next to such a muddled work of art looked like up close they mishandled us or we simply could no longer endure the simplicity. now between one another, each piece makes sense, is beautiful on it's own accord and in terms of the whole. we are surely uncommon. we are surely wasted when entirely devoted to the common. we are no longer adrift in finger-paintings.
19. your martini order
20. that you aren't afraid to work
21. when you get snarky
22. that you will drive anywhere
23. your honest love of sushi
24. your honest love of people beyond race or disposition
25. the way you take photographs
26. the instantaneous stress of a missing key or misplaced object
27. your affection of harry potter
28. that your heart beats so hard i can feel it through your ribs
29. the gravity you assign to celeste green, errr turquoise
30. when we grab furniture that someone else has thrown out
31. the way you eye baking items when we shop for kitchen things
32. your love of a grocery store
33. your commitment and indifference to your cat

what has been, what will be, come to this one end, this present. lessons from bed.

lit bulb

when you redefine the function of a bed.
feathers
the entwined cotton
the hum
of an air conditioner.
the red glow of digital clocks,
and the creaking of an old wooden house we are too involved to hear.

together.

they take the agency of all the globe ive ever known.
they are the busy streets i stumbled into.
the bars i shoved across.
the taxis i pushed into.
the reverberating walls i leaned on for support.
the ground i crawled on to find my wallet's contents.
the girls that yelled, swung, brooded and went cold.
the end tables, coffee tables, bar stools, and periodic tables
i fell into, i crashed right through, or blew.
the sum of a history comes,
    reeling
to a lone focus,
in a simple room. we are
      heavy
   matter.

all the time i've ever poured
out, like an apathetic exhale

is now heavy on you. wrapped around,
mussed up, and across whatever part
of your structure i am nearest.

and then our arms and feet,
wind 'round like vines.
dangle off the edge among
clothes
clothes
pillows.

fingertips,
tracing lips or slip
down along

your cathedral ribs,
magnetic hips.

middle america: i thought i could never love you, so entirely sorry.

light rays bend along the surface
heat, oh Ohio roads.

yellow lines chop at you
asleep. these arteries of interstate
we circulate, to go
home. oh, Ohio moans...

for more sense,
more dinners in small kitchens,
more friends.

and we,
Ohio's own.
a cake lover and a heavy handed drink.
we bend light,

across our surface heat.
and we,

remind our dear thing,
our adopted city,
to beat,

life out, across,
through it's streets.

oh Ohio, oh sanctuary, oh my Melanie.
time always goes on,
shaping the simple grace, that,
before we bore scars,
before history and broke hearts,
we couldn't see.

dear march, o you.

you're soooooooooooooooooooooo dead.
silly little fucker.
gawd, you were nice.
fluffer you.
thanks...............

rough-lil-month
i can see your spine
i can see your breasts
i can see the indentions in your lower spine
i can see the muscles in your abdomen bend , curl , heave
i can see you

rain on me
rain all over the
plants: the tall grass, the early azaleas
all over the dogwood blossoms
all over the lent, the foreheads swiped in ash, the plans for vacations in destin

i am trembling
i am drinking
i still smoke
i keep "losing weight"
i'm sure im falling apart
    like a storm tearing up some rookie leaves.

these are my,
my white knuckles.
im holding on
i am taking you with me. silly tree
stubborn roots
obstinant foliage
you glorious fucking flora

welcome to a new world
wilkommen auf der april
here's muh teef
my abdomen in tune with lapping waves
my steady breathing, like an old train
my piles of american dream
my lost self
my book burning wit
my scarred forearms and my X

hale.

i love, love, love concrete. strong, cold and complete.

   When i was in 8th grade i had a teacher named Mr. Teed. He was the varsity soccer coach and my 8th grade "Bible" teacher. I remember one day i started arguing with him about some very insignificant bit of theology because i had been raised presbyterian and he was a very devout southern baptist. he interrupted one of my objections to something he had said. The reason he stated for doing so was because he had apparently looked up my "file" because i was that big of an asshole already and he had noticed i had an very unusually high i.q. he felt that i should basically "shut up" because someone "as smart as myself" would know they were just being an asshole to fight all the time about things that were by direct inference only there to fight over. why he wanted to teach things that were implicitly meaningless wasn't really as much of an issue to me as the "idea" of my own innate potential.
   Potential. what the everlasting fuck my "potential" means is still almost entirely meaningless to me. i just got home. i was out till almost 5:30 drinking with whomever was willing to be awake and drink with me. i was awake because i get off work at 3 am. i was at work till 3 am because i work in a bar. i work in a bar because i needed some form of a job to pay my bills. i needed a shitty job because i am still in school and my schedule was limited. i am still in school because i can't seem to get a grip and do bullshit undergrad general education requirements. i cant do those because i am as emotionally mature as a 16 year old. im that way because thats when my dad left. i have been doing whatever i could manage to do to keep from dealing with the monotony of life because 16 year olds are that stunted and act in their own self interests and for the sake of direct stimulus, shamelessly. i went to school in europe, montana and even in russia to not just be "myself" and therefore live up to my "potential" but to just as much not deal with how "shitty" and "ordinary" life can be so much of the time. did i mention i went to school in europe?
   yeh, i did that. i went everywhere. i saw better concerts than anyone I've ever met. i stayed in nicer places than any full grown adult i'll ever meet(most likely). i drank more than any such also. I've flown in an airplane over 300 times. i saw a person die. i saw carnival in venice. i saw st patricks day in Dublin. i went to and got bored in the Louvre. i took off half my clothes for a picture in front of the Colosseum. o and i have scars. i have more scars than i have stamps in my passport. i have a million stamps in my passport. I've been to brunch in country clubs former presidents were members of. I've met a fucking former president. i was drunk. i own alot of suits and they all fit fucking beautifully. i know what it is like to win 1-36 at a roulette table in a mafia casino in moscow. I've been part of 8 people fitting into a chicago cab. I've been bitten in a concert. I've been bitten in bed. I've been bitten by a dalmatian not seconds after proclaiming i was a "beast master". I've watched marriages fall apart. I've watched long term relationships fall apart. I've watched classroom discussions turn into fights. I've watched fight's turn into tragedies. I've watched tears well up in girls eyes. I've watched a house catch on fire. I've watched myself like a movie hide a sledge hammer behind my back everytime i was watching everything else, and im sure i was the only one noticing. my guilt.
   yes, mr. teed, i have incredible potential. i do believe you. i do believe the test scores. i do believe all the tests after that. i believe the sincere eyes. i believe the letters.i believe the kisses. i believe the scars. I believe the tears and my entire lack of them, except when i see some commercial or reality tv show or very obvious movie... and all i can think is "why are there tears in my eyes!" i fucking wish i cried. i'd love the catharsis. but honestly why then, why with all this "potential" would i fucking tear up now?! i was the only one there when my grandfather died(the good one), and he said some meaningful things to me. i had nothing.
    I'd believe my "potential" meant i just came full circle to being affected by dumb shit i would normally associate to dumb people that, bless their hearts, wouldn't know better, but thats not true. tonite i stood in the middle of central avenue and took a picture of it with my i-phone. i was standing on the yellow line. there was nothing human and alive around. no cars, no dogs being walked, no joggers. i was alone on central at 5 am, punch drunk and, at 28, living up to my full potential. there is more. i know it. more than a resume of how low a capable person can go, and i am going towards that more. one foot in front of another, slowly down the yellow line, falsely proving my sobriety. for that knowledge and for the promise of my thirties... my potential and i are grateful, with teeth showing, crouched and ready for the pounce. whatever the noise is for a simultaneousness "rawr" and "sigh"... dear reader i assure you, i just made it.

haha fuck, who knows... im going to the bar.

a clean dark, just as nessisary

you you you
unscrew
every single star
burn and bomb
the forests to shards

this is flat ground

this smoke is clearing up

i have this spade, this rake

and a plan.

what a big moon that was!