tags: poetry
1992
May
- 1992 May 6
- The Passing of Beauty
Queen Beauty's reign, it is so brief
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upon this dark, benighted land
where life is but a candle flame
that dies within a single breath
And life therein is only grief
without the touch of Beauty's hand
for all untouched succumbs to death
Her kingdom spans the starry sky
beyond the mortal world, unseen
where seraphim, they freely fly
and sing of their enduring love
for their fair, radiant maiden Queen
June
- 1992 Jun 23
- Prodigy
A lonely man descends the hill
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onto the dreary, desert floor
of gloomy, grey, and desolate sand
as dismal as his barren soul
July
- 1992 Jul 3
- Soliloquy
The twilight creeps upon my heart.
· Read more…
A veil is draped upon my brow.
As all my hopes and dreams depart.
All happiness is lost from here.
And what remains? A single tear.
September
- 1992 Sep 30
- Lacrimae
What lone salvation might I find
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among these ruined, shattered hopes?
All happiness, I've left behind
upon the lonely mountain's slopes.
Despair, despair, and misery
is all that lives within my mind.
Without her love, I cannot flee
from sorrow's grasp, depression's bind,
and I must sink into the earth
and taste the bitter nothingness
No merriment, happiness, joy, or mirth;
instead is only emptiness.
My wish has failed, my dream has died.
I cannot count the tears I've cried.
October
- 1992 Oct 20
- Summer Memory
Oh, see the sunlight's play upon
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the sapphire glaze of Western Sea
as fires dance across the sky
and daylight fades to memory
1997
April
- 1997 Apr 20
- Chasm
She sits five feet away from me, yet it might as well be a light-year
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I have no hope of bridging the gap
no hope of filling the chasm
yet still I long…
Perhaps it is only wishing to finish what I started
come to a clean end and get on with my life
But the stillness in my heart keeps me frozen in place
Slowly dying with every breath.
Perhaps it is only wishing to share my heart freely
to worry not of receiving pain and sorrow
but only giving joy and laughter
without counting the cost.
Yet my heart is as heavy as stone, hard as rock
and I grow cold and numb with each passing second
If only I were brave, and the stillness in my heart were broken
then I could do what I needed to do
and face the consequences no matter how dire
I could live.
But I'm not brave.
October
- 1997 Oct 1
- Non Possum Sperare
You cannot hope, foolish boy with mad dreams
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seeking to break the Wheel of Time
and steal the scythe of Death - 1997 Oct 8
- The Tentacles of God
The rain trickles down; drizzle patters against the asphalt and the concrete
· Read more… - 1997 Oct 9
- Drown My Sorrow
Half a bottle now empty, the rain is trickling, I can hear it
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pattering on the windowpane. I swear the wind wants to shatter it
open, crack it into a million pieces like my tormented heart. I don't
even know where to begin, find a soft, still quiet place to rest, to
hide from this wracking wretchedness. Oh how I wish I had never been
born, though it is useless to rail against Fate, the best I can do is
take another swig and hope for the best. Oh, but to win, once, to
wear the laurel crown, stand the tallest on the pedestal, to have that
one sweet moment in time.
1998
July
- 1998 Jul 11
- Forsaken
I've seen a trillion stars
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Burning upon the midnight sky
Still hoping for impossibilities
Still wishing for what cannot be
Even as my heart crumbles
Like a dessicated carcass long in the desert sun
Ash, ash, and no hope
Tell me the missteps I've taken
I wish to know what to regret
Much better the particular, specific grief
Rather than this dull, general drear
I trod upon the wayward path
Leading to the endless abyss
The land of the damned
Where the very idea of happiness
Is a ludicrous absurdity
that sets its denizens erupting with mirthless laughter
Oh, how laughter is cruelty
I know it not without its sharp barbs
Laughter which comes from my throat
Knows nothing of joy
and everything of bitterness
Still I dare ask why
I must be
Continue on
As this empty shell of a man
No dreams for tomorrow
I do not wish to stir even today
For the fire in my heart is extinguished
And not even an ember glows
I want nothing
For all I have desired has led to disappointment
And hope has just become another word for despair
I want nothing
But the silent grave of oblivion is slow to creep
Time crawls, inch by inch
I have a hundred thousand days to waste
wanting nothing
And still I will not get what I want
No do not tell me to wait for better times
I know everything about waiting
Waiting leads but to one thing
And that is only more waiting
and waiting to wait
life is only endless waiting
No do not tell me things will get better
For I have hoped with all my strength
wished with all my might
And still I have nothing to show for it
Though I crawl through the mud from sunrise to sunset
And bend my back in hard labor
I am dead
though I must still keep living
I know this is true because I no longer feel anything
October
- 1998 Oct 8
- Endless Wonder
I am to wonder, I am to wonder
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Dreaming of finishing this book
flipping pages until it's over
but it's never over
remembering flames, the buildings all lit up
amidst the burned-out wreckage - 1998 Oct 13
- A Place
All I want is a place
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I'm tired of being crammed into narrow spaces with sharp corners and jagged edges trying to fit where I know I don't belong
1999
August
- 1999 Aug 28
- I Know My Desire
I know my desire
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and yet I do not know
how I can make it Be - 1999 Aug 28
- Hope - First Draft
Hope
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is sweet honey
but is also like
bee stings in my mouth - 1999 Aug 28
- Hope - Final
Hope
· Read more…
is sweet honey
but is also bee stings in my mouth - 1999 Aug 28
- Dawn
Dawn
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October
- 1999 Oct 23
- Winter and Fall in NYC
Winter and Fall in NYC
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Faint kiss of love, frozen, land softly on my cheek
melting, lingers the cold
Amidst the darkness and the great heaving throng
the bustle of the crowd and the bluster of the wind
Stinging, icy teardrops, scoring my cheek
I am forgoteen amidst Winter's blast
in a city of twelve million souls
where I am alone.
2000
July
- 2000 Jul 10
- I Am Too Happy to Know What Time It Is
See the problem here is that Sisyphus is cheating. It diminishes the true (futile) achievement. Fuck it all.
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August
- 2000 Aug 9
- Deliramentum
style of persecution
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inveigh against [disintegration]
isolation
deliver me from temptation
unto the final destination
what patience, consecration, incantation,
complication, with honesty and humility and humiliation
this is my sentence
2001
April
-
-
-
-
- 2001 Apr 29
- The Flipside of Despair
Hope is nothing but the flipside of despair
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running on empty, still, something
burning like acid, chilling like frost
veins all tapped out, and yet you still bleed
you lie there all tingling
upon bloodstained sheets
no game left to play, the dice always come up snake-eyes
and still your eyes flutter open
with the kiss of the sunlight - 2001 Apr 30
- Words Come Unbidden
I did not want to write the words
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come unbidden
did not want to give form, give life
to the shapeless nightmare haunting my dreams
and yet the words still come flowing
like waves, like the ebb and flow
of blood welling from a slit throat
oozing with every rattling breath
May
- 2001 May 6
- Suck and Burn
OMG I am such a GEEK. No wonder I can’t get a date.
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2002
January
- 2002 Jan 1
- Glow
The last morning, the first morning
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light touches the sky
glow
I dreamt the City burned like a star
shattered towers, ashen, fallen,
against the bright yellow sky
flying
the sentinel planes like vultures
midnight steel against the sodium light glow
(like all the lamplights in the world
had been melted and smeared
across the sky like a crayon)
The sky ran like—mercury
tinged gold
the inside of an eye with light shining in it
without the stain of flowing blood
The sky flowed like a swollen river
gold fire
And that was that
another year spent dreaming
maybe you die every time you close your eyes
are born every time you wake
and the world ended in a dream
I am left with only the flickering stars
March
- 2002 Mar 12
- Can't Sleep… Clowns Will Eat Me
Oh God, what have I done? Or more exactly, what did I fail to do?
· Read more… - 2002 Mar 19
- Still Why
What are dreams anyway?
· Read more… - 2002 Mar 27
- And There You Are
That which fails to kill you only delays the inevitable.
· Read more…
April
- 2002 Apr 8
- Rise and Fall
I cannot take the sharp dives, the abrupt ascents
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send me reeling, my heart in my throat
thumping and rumbling, like there's something trapped in there
trying to break free
As gravity's iron grip yanks my body out of thin air again
I'm just hoping to black out
to float in the deep abyss of silent ignorance
knowing nothing and not caring
Slapped awake by the whipping wind
impending doom grows in my stomach - 2002 Apr 21
- Facing It
Don’t patronize me. Let me face the end with some vestige of honor.
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November
- 2002 Nov 28
- Summit
Inspiration strikes at odd hours. I have said this once before. I hope I do not live to regret it. And I mean that last sentence in all the ways it can be interpreted.
· Read more…
2003
January
- 2003 Jan 18
- The Drunken Blog
I am so very tired of this shit, and yet, for some reason, I can’t stay away. I am so doomed.
· Read more…
February
- 2003 Feb 9
- Vast Uncharted Expanse
Down the road that I dared not go.
· Read more… - 2003 Feb 18
- Vague Description
I am trying to understand the Way.
· Read more… - 2003 Feb 18
- Insomnia
I can’t get to sleep/I think about the implications/of diving in too deep/and possibly the complications//Especially at night/I worry over situations/I know I’ll be all right/Perhaps it’s just imagination.
· Read more… - 2003 Feb 19
- The Edge
More than anything else, this is what I’ll never feel again.
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April
- 2003 Apr 27
- Excess Baggage
I really am a godforsaken packrat.
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May
- 2003 May 13
- False Promise
May has always been fraught with false promise
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dreams of love
fire, hope
endings
Conceived in the cradle of springs
Grown gravid then stillborn come cold winter
And STILL I wish. - 2003 May 18
- Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
See the luck I’ve had would make a good man turn bad.
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July
- 2003 Jul 8
- Rivalling Vogon Poetry
Keep the violins going, damn it.
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August
- 2003 Aug 22
- splattered
Blood, sterile technique, and mortality.
· Read more…
2004
January
- 2004 Jan 7
- words
eventually, it's all a game
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shuffling numbers through gates
and pulses of lightning
through arborized tangles -
- 2004 Jan 11
- grease the wheels
"gotta grease the wheels of the economy to keep it running"
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my communist sister declaimed sarcastically as she bought
that new outfit with money that she didn't have
earned from the job that she hadn't been offerred
the paycheck that she wasn't given for the 4 hours of work she did each day
putting it on in full view of the banner of che guevarra
hanging on her bedroom wall - 2004 Jan 20
- words like fallen leaves
now is the depth of winter
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when the heart mourns for warmer days
when the sun hides behind the swirling clouds
and light plays games with the fog and the shadows
teasing with the bone-chilling brightness
and the darkness comes before you expect it
gaping like the black abyss
and the neverending fall - 2004 Jan 22
- spirit
ever burning flame
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searing rays of light
eastern sky afire
I turn and turn and turn
only the sun tells me where I stand
casting my shadow hither and thither - 2004 Jan 27
- fire and ice
flat lands, icy waste
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curling smoke, steam rising
the city breathes in, breathes out
like a sleeping dragon
February
- 2004 Feb 2
- lily white
spill your secret to me
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creeping shadows, and the evil that lurks in the night
that makes the dogs bark in fear
with their tails between their legs
the hooded man without a face
stealing innocence - 2004 Feb 9
- lost (en las calles de los angeles)
what follows is an unmanageable, undecipherable piece of mind-blather that fails to encapsulate the inexplicable sense of alienation I experienced today, wandering aimlessly through the streets of the city of my birth
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March
December
- 2004 Dec 1
- song
the light the rain, the spilt shifting sand and lightning fog
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like ripe blossoms dessicated
by the desert's furnace winds withering breath
2005
December
- 2005 Dec 18
- dying days
burnt out, trampled, bruised and scratched up
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tattered and shredded into bits
was it dark purpose, cruel design
as the daylight waned
and darkness usurped the land
that I was made against my will
to face the dying and the dead
made to be Charon rowing the rickety boat
across that lifeless river
2006
May
- 2006 May 13
- the journey not taken
let this not end, I thought to myself
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as the children yawned
and the conversation died
and I thought of the moon
shining only because of reflected sunlight
otherwise it is a dark, lifeless place - 2006 May 25
- twisting paths
a vision as I stare into the western sky
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clouds looming up like a great wall
impenetrable marking the boundary between
the land—what must be
and
the sea—what is possible - 2006 May 27
- mine, and mine alone
In this tired hour
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of spent beer cans
and cigarette butts
the chewed ragged ends of
hoping for some sort of change
waiting for the winds
to turn aside the drifting course of the clouds
for the sun to shine forth
July
- 2006 Jul 27
- falling from grace
spun like fine threads
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of fraying axons clasping like hands upon
curled, crackly dendrites
like a mad forest of electrical wiring
exploding in a kind of chemical glee - 2006 Jul 28
- spin
dreaming
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wheel of fire
blue green white
the twisting paths of sunlight
beams of starlight glinting across the warp and weave
of cosmic strings and singularities
mathematical catastrophes
eternal darkness - 2006 Jul 29
- final sky
I am singular
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in this effervescing madness of destiny
swirling, quantum foam roiling
madness seeking
I am dreaming again
facing the finality of these decisions
made smeared across time, indistinct
and indefinable
August
- 2006 Aug 3
- perdido
the lost one
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wandering down the shadowed path
2 days since I’d seen the sun
panic, and then
peace
September
- 2006 Sep 28
- starlight (continually redshifted)
gonna buy me a spaceship
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powered by dark energy
take me to the outermost reaches
forever chasing infinity
December
- 2006 Dec 5
- shadows, echoes, and reverberations
becomes a shadow
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dancing on the line
thread upon thread
twirled into the mist
beneath the shattered steel
the dull gray concrete
I walk warily
banner unfurled
sword unsheathéd
dawn creeps nigh
2007
March
- 2007 Mar 8
- stillness on the move
shifting, sliding,
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caught in indecision
trapped in a winding labyrinth
running round circles
fleeing from fate
this moment laden with uncertainty
a drop of rain falling into an infinite sea
roiling and raging
a faint ripple
erased by the unending restless waves
April
- 2007 Apr 13
- no beats. no rhymes. just words.
There is a song in here somewhere
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caught in the convolutions of my heart
the tortuous paths, the cliffdrops, the lonely summits
the bitter abysses, this vast desert of ruin
This wasteland of decay - 2007 Apr 14
- slide
It comes to nothing
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in the first few trickling seconds of this new day
(cuz don’t you know that time is a river, you go with the flow) - 2007 Apr 19
- thoughts unbidden
Too late, I cry, remembering time past, running through shadows
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echoes of ten thousand lives criss-crossing, folding, twisting, bending
In their wake, I am forsaken
Amidst the jetsam and flotsam of plans gone awry
(and still somehow I made it to land,
even now I make plans and grand schemes
to sail forth from this benighted isle - 2007 Apr 30
- “sometime” is “never”
I saw it for a second
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caught glancingly in the corner of my eye
The four walls that enclose time
The four walls closing in
Behind the wheel
I pondered singularities
accepted my singularity
how you can be certain about certain things
though all of time is yet uncertain
This is my life
ending by hours, minutes, and seconds
this damnable ever-ticking clock
counting down through these years of loneliness
my fate, my doom
a curse upon my soul
unbroken, unbreakable
May
- 2007 May 13
- years upon end
Reminiscing about distant journeys
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lost in the murky mist of my fading memories
down that Mother Road, and the paths of generations past
to the south side and the lake shore
and back again
to the mountain pass and to the Sea
the years wash upon the sands, wave after wave - 2007 May 22
- spin the wheel
spiral despair
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rif(f)ling through the trash
rummaging through the detritus
perimeters, delimiters,
we rage through time and distance
the memories well up untold
unbidden - 2007 May 24
- shapes
In my dreams, evil is always man-shaped
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the cockroaches and the worms
fill me with loathing
but they do not fill me with despair
hatred
disgust - 2007 May 25
- the promise of salvation
Could I have saved her—?
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And thereby have saved myself?
Knowing what I know
doing what I do
and all I’m good for
is letting people slip through my fingers - 2007 May 25
- not-so-graceful degradation
cry for stillness
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listen, that rhythm, that beat
crashing and burning
spinning and turning
we’re dancing, we’re diving
we’re dreaming, we’re scheming - 2007 May 28
- continued imbalance
isang pagkakataon lang… one chance only
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minsan sa buhay… once in a lifetime
July
- 2007 Jul 7
- all we need is time
in the fog of indecision
· Read more…
the clarity of the dawn
in the anxious disappointment of missed chances
the cold, hard certainty of inescapable destiny
in the silence of defeat
the distant roar of victory -
- 2007 Jul 13
- Jagged Edge
Jagged Edge
· Read more…
undiscernable
molecular thickness
shimmering with quantum uncertainty - 2007 Jul 13
- Quiet
faded memories half a lifetime away
· Read more…
did I dare, did I dream?
Can I pay that price?
Turn the inside of my soul to the fire
let this aching pain tear at my heart
like some rabid dog gone amok
like piranhas shredding through living flesh - 2007 Jul 25
- Burdens
The though was "betrayal"
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or maybe it was "onus"
The unpayable debt, the blood price
(And if I paid it, would I be free?)
My memories are of Atlas lifting the world on
his shoulders
Sisyphus rolling up the Stone.
The karyatid crushed beneath the load… - 2007 Jul 25
- Like the Sound of the Waves on the Sea
My soul→seethes, burns
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roils,
This vanity this self-deceit
stripped of all meaning
The noise of the teeming crowd
as wounding as the dead silence
September
- 2007 Sep 4
- faith (and the lack thereof)
When was the last time anyone believed in you?
· Read more…
Outside of the trappings of your profession
without the aegis of your Oath? - 2007 Sep 4
- convoluted
every thought is second-guessed
· Read more…
every impulse examined
every sliver of hope is processed
every emotion filtered - 2007 Sep 4
- dreaming
“will you come with me?”
· Read more…
and she would say “yes”
just that
and I would know - 2007 Sep 4
- even starlight fades
the fragrance of her hair haunts me
· Read more…
the way her eyes sparkle when she smiles
the sound of her laughter
the curve of her face
the quiet grace of her every move - 2007 Sep 4
- tortured soul
tortured?
· Read more…
you’re damned right my soul is tortured
twisted and wracked beyond even my darkest imaginings
fraught with pain and blood and death (though it is the vomit, the piss, and the shit that gets to me the most
and worse yet, the stench of bacteria feeding on still-live flesh
I have nightmares about resistant Staph aureus and Pseudomonas more than any of my other fears combined) - 2007 Sep 5
- no desire
why this dream now,
· Read more…
disinterring the past
I thought I had buried it deep
buried it well - 2007 Sep 6
- 87,600 hours
The last 10 years of unbearable loneliness have finally gotten to me, I think.
· Read more… - 2007 Sep 23
- letting go
trust not to hope
· Read more…
hope will have you believing in things
that have no hope of coming true
and despair is not the absence of hope
no, despair is hope so thin and frail and fragile
hope so deadly, so fell, so fraught with peril
a thread of hope so sharp, so razor-thin
cutting deeply, jaggedly, viciously - 2007 Sep 30
- pain cycle start
is it sharp?
· Read more…
is it burning?
is it constant?
is it intermittent?
October
- 2007 Oct 3
- el camino escondido del dios
in that space unrecognizable,
· Read more…
scotomata perforating your visual fields
the mind fills in the gaps
elides the ragged, raging ends of
punctured, gaping reality
all is well with the world
as far your aching mind is concerned
ignore something long enough and
trust me
it will eventually go away
and all bleeding stops eventually - 2007 Oct 3
- el camino real (un poco y poco)
Autumn on this desert shore
· Read more…
sputters and drifts, stutters and stammers
skipping/scratching/scuffing/grooving
and it’s DJ G O D in da house, muthafucka - 2007 Oct 6
- between
writhing with frustration
· Read more…
aching with desire
wrestling with indecision
still as a mountain top looming over the City - 2007 Oct 6
- forcing
Even a nuclear bomb up my ass
· Read more…
might fail to move my sad sack, bloated body off of this chair
stuck stupid and slack-jawed, gaping at this screen
(to filter through reality
like stripped shorn pantyhouse in front of a sewage drain
leaving the cigarette butts and used condoms to wallow
in that sepulcher of corrugated metal and chemical despair
letting the fecophilic micro-organisms,
the rich culture medium of turd
float out in the cold of the unforgiving sea) - 2007 Oct 8
- unsung heroics
· Read more…
November
- 2007 Nov 13
- incomplete, unfulfilled
trip me up with the frailty of life
· Read more…
the inevitability of mortality
even at this height, I can see the deep darkness
of that impending horizon where no stars shine
and night is eternal - 2007 Nov 25
- grains of sand in an hourglass
Come December, and the end of the year is nigh
· Read more…
and though the air is dry and warm
the sky glimmers, shimmers with cloudy gray
and the waning sunlight casts long shadows
upon the cold blue sea
December
- 2007 Dec 3
- facing the unknown
will it be just like falling asleep
· Read more…
without waking
an eternal night
without sun’s dawning
no stars, no moon
just the silence
and the void? - 2007 Dec 5
- exile
unfinished
· Read more…
unending - 2007 Dec 13
- subsistence
when degrees of freedom
· Read more…
fail
just one
a single loss
enough to imprison
caged
still - 2007 Dec 22
- axial tilt
The words come bubbling up all of the sudden
· Read more…
2008
January
- 2008 Jan 31
- night
The roar of traffic, the murmur and thrum of the crowd
· Read more…
and the mournful winter wind, scouring the desert sand
and the inside of my soul is silent and still
like a raging river flash-frozen in mid-torrent
and eons have passed, the axis of the earth precesses, and still there is no thaw.
February
- 2008 Feb 6
- branches, lines
this trigger
· Read more…
sending millions of
particles of light
laser beams
gamma rays
sunshine
starlight - 2008 Feb 14
- fire and rain
should my soul catch fire again
· Read more…
(the embers smolder, glow bright in the darkest hour)
not a wildfire streaking through the fields
up the mountainsides
leaving smoking disaster and ruinous ash - 2008 Feb 20
- not finding
were I not to find
· Read more…
that which I most desperately seek
what would this life be worth?
not nil, I pray
even in this half-existence
can I not steal a few drops of
reflected sunlight
from ghosts and phantoms
of things that could never be?
like a half-starved cur
begging at his master's feet.
March
- 2008 Mar 9
- folly
cracked, but still I've got to keep it together
· Read more…
time out of joint, the sunlight seeps through the window pane
am I coming or am I going
hope is like a little gnat, biting and buzzing
that I can never swat away. - 2008 Mar 14
- wound care
not every wound heals
· Read more…
some fester and drip
leaking poison into your blood stream
infiltrating your very being
even sometimes invading the chambers of your wounded heart
hiding in the scars of your memory
or in the pockets of darkness within your soul - 2008 Mar 14
- through the gate
Out of the desert
· Read more…
I am come to thine gates
I bring the emptiness of the wilderness
and the silence of the bitter wind
unlooked for, I crossed that threshold
no one cared whither I went or no
among the teeming masses
I am but one man
alone
voice drowned out by the bazaar
the moneychangers
the tax collectors
the merchants
the con artists
I tread the worn-down road
a million footprints
turning the soil into concrete
April
- 2008 Apr 13
- here
my heart misgives me
· Read more…
and yet this vigil I must keep
through the long dark night alone I gaze upon the stars - 2008 Apr 18
- the way is not straight
To find the way, you must search for it
· Read more…
but you cannot search for it without losing it first
and how can you lose the way if you have never found it? - 2008 Apr 18
- all water, all light
The water that falls upon the arid plain
· Read more…
was once the water that flowed in waves upon the deep dark sea
the water from the well that you drink with great thirst
the water that flows through the river, rushing down rapids swirling in eddies
the water that is your perspiration, that are your tears
and blood is made up mostly of water, and so is urine and bile - 2008 Apr 19
- man's best friend
Grasp him tightly, try to carry him
· Read more…
and he will squirm and struggle
snap and bite and cry out
trying to get free - 2008 Apr 19
- type-a personality
that which you seek to perfect
· Read more…
fussing and worrying over
will come to ruin
too much force
and the thing will break
too much care
and you will wear it thin
and all you're left with are the little pieces
useless debris, detritus - 2008 Apr 30
- dimensionless
wanting starlight
· Read more…
sunlight
sunrise
gold glimmer
warmth
you make me think of home
and a deep longing buried within the frozen chambers of my heart
thaws
like darkness arising
monstrous awakening
madness stirring
May
- 2008 May 2
- all there is
lightning strikes
· Read more…
end points and infinities
waves and foam
the clouds coruscating against the setting sunlight
a gull takes to wing
fluttering, fading beyond the horizon - 2008 May 13
- time/chance
15 years: 5,480 sunsets
· Read more…
the days spin by, the hours whirl
blurring into infinity
and I can't remember where I've been
nor all the answers that I figured out
falling out of my hands
scattered wildly like spilled grain
as I was, so I will be
upon this path to nowhere
to anywhere - 2008 May 26
- twined
chewing on the frayed ends of old, worn threads
· Read more…
of choice, of chance, of fate, of hope, of dreams
wondering where my free-will ends, this cup
passing, where destiny begins, takes shape
takes form, did it not matter, or do these
things still shift, still split, still slip, twist, and bend
this far out, this late in the game, now in
overtime, with seconds to go, and still… - 2008 May 27
- this way lies madness
Cassandra whispers to me of disaster and catastrophe:
· Read more…
"Harden your heart, o wanderer
the road is long, the horizon far
no surcease of sorrow shall come to succor thee,
no hope of rescue, of salvation, of love
through the grey desert thou shalt tread
alone, forsaken, unlooked for, unwanted, unmissed." - 2008 May 29
- jacta alea est
the die is cast, the cards laid down on the table
· Read more…
the flop, the turn, the river, but it's the pocket that matters
and you don't know what she's got
you're crossing your fingers and holding your breath
trying your damnedest not to give away a tell
June
- 2008 Jun 23
- confundor, exfundendus
Non certior ubi omnes illi inceperunt. Fuisset ubi ea et meus laboramus pariter, ante omnes res quid ea subire. Pro nonscitarum rationalibus, ea meum accrediderat.
· Read more…
July
- 2008 Jul 2
- mathematical catastrophe, revisited
the slow, legato silence, by intervals, by measures
· Read more…
frame by frame, ignition, combustion, explosion, boom boom
that's my soul up there, in particles and all aerosolized
like an ashen rain falling upon my haunted visage
I taste the firestorms of the fall, and the endless winter
that followed, on its heels came spring and that harrowing
catastrophic thaw, now the floodwaters crest, come summer
sun burning and my soul withers, my soul crumbles to dust
and still there are no endings, just fraught nerves, the pain reminds
you are still alive, against all reason, beyond all odds
* * * in this echoing silence, I am forced to ask myself,
was this thawing worth the inevitable disaster?
my words unspoken, my song stilled and silent,
already I can see it coming like a wave rushing
washing upon the shore, foaming and spraying, gurgling, roar
on the verge of breaking right upon you, crashing down like
a shattered, suddenly shorn mountaintop, cut down mid-rise.
Are the days awaiting, the nights laying awake, alone
in the cursed glow of the full moon, or the mocking glare of
the shimmering stars or with all the lights in your room lit,
striving in futility because the dark is too much
its unbearable weight crushing you with your self-doubt, your hidden shame
wondering if mistakes were made, or if you failed because you suck
or if you were driven by fate, unable to avert the speeding arrow of time
August
- 2008 Aug 15
- mushrooming beyond my comprehension
not just loneliness weighing gravid, doleful,
· Read more…
becoming this furtiveness rooted, still
seeming in the light to be seen, yet unseen
amidst the hundred thousand voices seething, roiling, teeming
the faces, the gestures, all worn-down by rehearsal
words spoken by rote, by habit, stripped of meaning - 2008 Aug 16
- route
in this voiceless silence interrupted
· Read more…
by the whirring internal combustion
engines, rubber running across worn-down
concrete, these assemblies of metal growl
past, slashing through the air like two-ton knives
at 70 miles per hour, almost
like the tumult of a rushing river
or waves crashing down on the silver shore
my mind lost in the eddies and whirpools
of wind and debris, as the sunlight streams
in, vainly trying to evaporate
the dark mood crouching upon my soul like
a gremlin ready to ambush and havoc - 2008 Aug 20
- not in this timeline
a phantom lifestyle imagined by my fevered mind where there would be someone at home who would wish me luck and send me out with a hug and a kiss, and there would be someone to look forward to seeing once
· Read more…
it's all over - 2008 Aug 24
- faze/phase
Bewilderment spins mercilessly around my heart
· Read more…
weaves/binds/patterns/stitches, embedded like magical runes
threads of fate, minutest of imperfections becomes a message
that I cannot decipher, much less interpret
September
- 2008 Sep 7
- subito
there was never anything more than fine gossamer threads of hope
· Read more…
fraying and tenuous, breaking, snapping, tearing with the slightest breeze
the merest whisper
more like a dream than anything else
so that awakening came like a disaster
and the dawn brought nothing but dread - 2008 Sep 7
- lacuna
The mornings are the worst,
· Read more…
when all of the sudden,
you are reminded of all that
failed to come true, of all that is not there
all that has never been, and all that will never be
November
- 2008 Nov 11
- infinite regress
Hope is not always warm and fuzzy. Sometimes it is cold as ice, and harder than steel.
· Read more…
The mood of my entire day has been driven by a nonsensical dream about an impossible situation. Even after all this time.
The mind understands that time cannot be undone. Somethings are out of your control. It wasn't chance. It was destiny.
Some of my darkest dreams relive the essence of this moment. I lie helpless as fate turns aside from me. It will never be.
It was not, is not, will never be, world without end. And yet the heart still yearns.
December
- 2008 Dec 5
- illusive elusion
the days fall like dry, dead leaves
· Read more…
even in this land of no seasons
time winds its way
the signs of the zodiac
do their slow, courtly dance
through the heavens
2009
February
- 2009 Feb 28
- retrospect
In these silent moments, I wander my thoughts
· Read more…
the wrack and ruin of the years gone by
the tumult and the despair
the small victories, the trifling triumphs
in all this havoc, I marvel at
how Time consumes possibility
like a ravening beast, it rends apart Chance
rasping the meat off its bones,
reveling in blood and spent breath
and inevitability is what it excretes
Fate is the spoor of Time
March
- 2009 Mar 3
- examining the ruins
I marvel
· Read more…
at the dying glimmering light of the day
streaming through the stain-glass windows
I reminisce on
the panoply of idle Sunday afternoons
the vows are made
the oaths are sworn
in this act of finality
there is a calm solace
a quiet certainty - 2009 Mar 19
- fragment lacking antecedents
that which I thought the greatest thing
· Read more…
this I had never lost
for I had never possessed it
it was never mine to begin with
July
- 2009 Jul 28
- off the rails
Destiny as simple as booking a one-way trip
· Read more…
on a train winding through the canyons and passes of decision
along the lonely gray strand of time
where the waves crash and break into quantum foam
chances realized then dematerialized
and not even a scrap of hope remains
2010
April
- 2010 Apr 9
- picking through the debris
in the shadow of the white mountain gleaming
· Read more…
still ice-crowned though the cherry trees blossom
the sky pale blue as the warmth of daylight fades
I'm lost in a memory of a dream forsaken
2011
January
- 2011 Jan 31
- query
is it possible to see at that depth with such clarity?
· Read more…
to plumb the hidden recesses of the universe with just
the force of thought?
I no longer believe it, yet still I am drawn
to the lofty and the sublime
though still wary of deceit, of confusion
is there wisdom behind the knowledge?
not just comprehension but understanding?
March
- 2011 Mar 6
- if you don't have much soul left and you know it, you still got soul
A few weeks of headaches and listlessness, of palpitations and sleeplessness, of such unshakeable weariness
· Read more…
the painkillers and the antibiotics, the receptor blockers and the immune modulators
make you a little less achy, and little less sore, and the nights aren't as fraught
with tossing and turning, and the fluttery, nervous twirling in the pit of your gut
and that basic fear of worrying whether you even know what you're doing anymore
if the next morning will bring some horrific disaster that everyone is counting on you to fix
and you'll just end up standing there uselessly, hands trembling and nerveless
and the roar of triumphant chaos finally sweeps you away from the sandy shores
drowning you in the dark depths of that trackless sea of despair
2012
May
- 2012 May 20
- some people claim that there's a woman to blame, but I know it's my own damn fault
I've spent too much time thinking of might-have-beens, of the garden of forking paths, of the paths forever barred to me
· Read more…
is it a sign that I'm getting old, always looking backward instead of forward, or a sign that I'm still too immature for my age, unwilling to plan for the future, and wallowing in my broken dreams?
July
- 2012 Jul 17
- searching for flow
The words used to come easy
· Read more…
Like wind upon my brow
like deep frozen memories suddenly thawing in the heat of the sun's blazing
like the ebb and flow of blood through my veins
and into my heart
so full, and then oh so empty
a microcosm of crashing tides and shifting winds
and deep endless night - 2012 Jul 20
- control
The sad confluence of events, starkly rendered
· Read more…
in terse words over the static of the airwaves
confronting you with your own mortality
you've got no control
there was nothing that could've stopped this
you don't know the reasons
how could you possibly know the solutions?
how could you possibly know who to blame?
2013
October
- 2013 Oct 5
- the last days of sunlight
One day shall come a dawn where I do not see the sunset
· Read more…
a summer after which I need not endure the autumn
my last memories will be of the hot breath of the Santa Ana winds
and the acrid reek of smoke from the raging wildfires
and bright sunlight without end.
Until we meet again, my friend.
2014
June
- 2014 Jun 15
- everything happens for a reason but sometimes that reason is i'm stupid and make poor decisions
Who am I kidding? I know what I did wrong
· Read more…
but my errors are mostly sins of omission rather than commission
chief of which was not answering the call of need, or the call of love, even, perhaps
and snuffing out the embers before they might catch
for unfounded fears of catastrophic firestorms and searing tragedy - 2014 Jun 17
- broken then bound
My bedroom window looks out west, towards the last glow of the day and to the north lays a valley where chrome streams of cars crisscross the gleaming white concrete slashing through the wind, roaring like the sea lulling me to sleep like the tide crashing upon the sands
· Read more… - 2014 Jun 30
- prophecy
In the silent hours ere the waxing light
· Read more…
I know I will meet her some day soon
and she will be with me
and I will not remember
what life was like before I met her
But that was just a dream
dissipating in the drear of the morning fog
and the light of day dawns
and I dare not hope
July
- 2014 Jul 29
- summer waning
The end of days
· Read more…
of summer waning
(the wheel turns and turns)
hoping for all manner of impossible things
hanging suspended at 30,000 feet in the sky
and chasing the fleeting sunlight
August
- 2014 Aug 5
- Hope is the Only Thing That Will Get Me Through This
This is no way to live: always fearing the future
· Read more…
Hope is the only thing that will get me through this
unfounded faith better than drifting unmoored
on the uneasy sea where nightmares dwell in the depths
and still I drift
September
- 2014 Sep 23
- waves
September is when I set sail
· Read more…
under duress
amidst the crashing waves of disappointment
driving me far from shore - 2014 Sep 24
- recursion
My heart is heavy in a certain way.
· Read more… - 2014 Sep 24
- panning for gold
Every day that I survive is a small victory.
· Read more…
October
- 2014 Oct 2
- fate
Lately, though, I can't help but think
· Read more…
that this is the way things are meant to be
once [the probability wave function collapses][1]
December
- 2014 Dec 11
- tincture of time
still thinking back to those lonely nights
· Read more…
lying in bed by myself, staring at the shadows
listening to the still silence - 2014 Dec 11
- no rhymes, no rhythm
Trawling through my comment spam and finding some old poems
· Read more… - 2014 Dec 12
- simple
do you miss those days when I strove to win your heart
· Read more…
with awkward attempts at making bold gestures?
screwing up all my courage to ask you out
to walk around these city streets
teeming with crowds
but I only had eyes for you
the whole world could've been empty for all I cared
2015
February
- 2015 Feb 25
- the road
when all is said and done, you cannot belong to me because souls cannot own one another
· Read more…
but with our free will, we can choose to walk down this road together
hand in hand and heart to heart
to build the rest of our lives together in whatever time we’re given
2016
January
- 2016 Jan 15
- Ta-Nehisi Coates' favorite poem
I can't remember where the original link is from, but Ta-Nehisi Coates was asked what his favorite poem is, and he answered that it was "Middle Passage" by Robert Hayden.
· Read more… - 2016 Jan 29
- Fear of Starting
Worried that if I start, then I won't finish
· Read more…
all these loose wayward threads
I am still shuffling, still scavenging
untying knots and burning frayed ends
March
- 2016 Mar 18
- We're All Dying, Really
I know the rustling sound that Death makes as she wends her way to the bedside
· Read more…
the way the breath catches, the heart rate slows
measured by beeps, punctuated by alarms
it was all inevitable in the end
too weary for tears
that dull gnawing ache thrumming through your nerves
though close you lay with Death, so close you could touch
you know you're still alive, so very much alive