And sometimes it feels like breaking, like I’m scrambling
for pieces and they are all the wrong one, I don’t know
how to make them fit, I don’t know how to make myself
fit into you anymore and I want to, I so want
to, I’ve lost so much, I’ve already lost the pieces
that should matter, does it even still
matter that i lost you
Category Archives: words
city sibling rivalry
The city during the day is just barely orchestrated chaos. Millions of people hustling into a million directions. I’ve always had a fondness for the west side, particularly around mid-town: it always seems a little unsure of itself, constantly under construction, always trying to catch up with its sibling, the more polished and well established east side.
Sibling rivalry amongst canyons of buildings.
italians and midwesterners in nyc
What truly knocks my socks off is the people. From everywhere. Italians and midwesterners dressed to the nines, dressed like tourists, dressed for the summer, all out here, being engulfed, caressed, being buoyed about, with their cameras, bustling up against the natives, awash in the traffic and buildings and proof of life that the city reveals over and over again.
Without the people the city’s just one lump of historical landmarks ridden with asbestos
it doens’t matter what
it doesn’t matter what or how you put it down, only that you
put
it
down
put it to rest, keep it restless, keep the fingers moving, in and out of here, in and out of the page, the screen
whatever this is
it doesn’t matter, the act matters, the fact of the act
the who you be when you’re no longer me
some cracked mosaic
all these little fragments of a life real and imagined, of writing and the joy of it, of loose talk and even looser words, of half thoughts, half scenes, of couples on the rocks, of lovers on the mend, of gangsters and killers and clowns as children, of angst ridden poets, all of you, some shattered whole, some cracked mosaic, and i am happy in that, to have found you again my dear, dear old friend. you never did abandon me, and i had thought i could go on without you.
with nails, with teeth
when he handles her it’s all tufts of hair and tongues. it’s all push and pull and scorching heat. everything burns around her. it comes close to violence if love were not involved, if anyone can love anyone any more these days. it becomes like clawing, like trying to get at something that’s beneath the surface, just this side of the vein. and he’s been trying to get at it, with his nails, with his teeth, because he wants to show it to her, he wants to say, this is what i see when i am in you, this is what i imagine you to be, this is you. isn’t it beautiful? how long has it been since you were beautiful?
ever go away
and there are times when the skin is so thin and so real that i rake it over and over to get at what’s inside, to peel it off and see what’s inside, to separate the meat from the bone to feel what’s inside and all i find in myself are maggots and shit and despair like some new tomorrow will never come, like all the world’s roses are perched thorns out from under my chin, like the pressure in my head will never abate, will never grow tired, will never grow old, will never ever go.
bump in the night
a bump in the night makes everything all right.
i wish i could join you
i see you there playing with our daughter, a game involving tea cups and paint.
i’m standing right here but i cannot be there.
i see you there singing at the station, your voice like natalie merchant.
i wished i stayed there for one more song but the train took me away.
i see you in between train cars, going off to the side, telling me to go in, to look out.
i tried to stop you, but it was useless. instead i walked in and then you screamed.
i see you there, smashed and angry, every word one word too many, every drink one drink too many.
i remember feeling free and violent, wicked and wild, but i barely survived it.
i wish i could join you, any of you, but i’m just not him anymore.
fish (revised)
i don’t mean any harm by it, but there are times i just really want to do him harm. sometimes, sometimes, i really just want to gut him like a fish, y’know? and i mean, he’s gotta be awake for most of it. no, scratch that. for all of it. and i’d want to use a kitchen knife, something like, something with a serated edge that’s just a little blunt y’know? just to give it that little oomph as you go along. that belly will give me a bit of a hard time, there’s no bone there, so i can imagine the knife going this way and that. but i figure once you’re in there, once you got a good spike right through his prostrate and start pulling the tear open as you go up, it’s gotta be a little fun, yeah? and i’d imagine i’d need a mallet for the sternum. i wouldn’t want to saw through that, too much noise, i wouldn’t be able to hear him over it, but a mallet would do. just take one good over the head swing and smash that right in. maybe i’d burst his heart. that would be awesome, wouldn’t it? of course the best would be when i’d get the knife under his chin and open his jaw right where it’s soft. this way i could get my fingers in there like a handle and drag him around like luggage. wouldn’t that be something?