I tried to write a poem about a clock
And it's ticking
Ticking
Ticking rhythm

I wanted to tell you how much it hurt
Not to see you
You
You again

Because you were always what filled my mind
That and ticking
Ticking
Ticking going on

Now nearly two years since I wrote that... train wreck
Two years without you
You
You are so far away

Time doesn't wait on my cries for mercy, nor rewind for the bargain I offer
It just keeps ticking
Ticking
Ticking away

And me, I just keep thinking
Thinking
Thinking of you

But the most tragic part of the whole affair is that I dealt the crippling blow out of compassion, not fear or pain as I suggested. That I lied to protect her. I told her I couldn't be with her that the memory of what she had done was too great. That she should move on. And that's what she did. Already far away she some how became even further. Her number changed, Facebook deleted and address lost in the sporatic chaos that is my memory. Our relationship crippled to never again occur.
So now I am left only with her memory, the love notes she wrote me, a duct tape ring, and love notes I was too afraid to give her. And pain. Lots of pain.
All I want is for her to be here for her to laying next to me teaching me once again what it is to love. I want her blue green eyes that strike like a vikings hidden waterfall and that little gap between her two front teeth and her hips so perfectly formed to the way I would drape my arm around her. I miss her laugh and geeky smile, the way she could talk of the flow of poets and art for hours. God damn I miss her. Felicia,  I am so sorry. I was wrong.

In progress

The wind blew with a steep chill that cut straight through the kevlar and utilities. Jason looked down at the cigarette clenched in between is sunburnt fingers. From here he could see the whole city, if It could be called it that. In American terms it was only the size of a farming town in Kansas and with only two street lamps, the city was essentially non existent, floating somewhere in the fluid void of blackness before him.
In most FOBs smoking a cigarette atop a roof during black out hours is a big no no. Here, however, there hadn't been a mortar attack in months. Long before Jason stepped booted foot on this god forsaken dirt patch. He took one long last drag and put the cig out looking out on the now shimmering horizon.
Knowing the moment was soon he focused his mind and reached out for Alex, the soft presence floating in a universe of hardness, and he felt her focusing too. So far away so strained.
The connection came over him like an orgasm suddenly awash in two worlds, one of a sun rising above the Himilayan Mountains in a spectacle of fire and glory and one of the sun dropping below ungodly mostrosities of the New York skyline. He smelled cigarette smoke on her end as well and smiled inwardly at the fact he was not alone in his resurgence of bad habits.
Then he heard her. Felt her. Her every thought and vision and working spiral of mind. she was so much smarter than he, he forgot just how dumb he was when he did not have her mind to probe with every problem and puzzle. The warmth of the rising sun and her ecstasy at finding him again wash over his landscape.

You
in an ever changing world, you were supposed to be the same
in a swirling mass of planets and stars, you were supposed to be still
Amid rotating faces, among the constant shifting of who is my "friend," you were supposed to remain.
You said you would remain.
But what is far worse than all of that,
I believed you

Take me back in time, just a few weeks is fine, back to when you smiled and danced in time with the drum. When our laughter and hearts were open, our guts spilled across the floor. I miss your smiling face and penetrating voice, the warmth your jokes send through me. I miss my friend.

the only safe place is behind a mask,

carefully constructed, 

crafted to conceal the ungodly horror,

you sweat, you cry, you bleed beneath this mask,

in a world that would destroy if it noticed you.

a world marching ever forward,

a banner raised with a cross,

emblazoned bright red and burning,

the word love beneath it.

now the wounds are sore and infected,

but you don't dare remove the mask,

to do so would mean a new banner would be raised,

painted with your blood the words jesus saves

Tomorrow is the day,
Tomorrow has toil and pain,
Tomorrow the sun will rise and set,
Tomorrow I march,
Tomorrow I sweat,
Tomorrow I bleed,
I know one day this will all crash around me,
One day the sun will swallow he earth,
One day the electricity behind my music will stop,
One day I will die and my words will disappear into ash,
But that day is not today,
For today I live,
For today my headphones blare,
My cigarette burns,
And my eyes are dry.

I wasted days like you waste money. They came and went in dazzling blurs that will never be remembered. In trying to feel alive I came within inches of death and looked it in the eyes.
Then I met you. Beautiful, smart, broken you. And I destroyed you. I never meant to but it’s like giving a child a crystal sculpture. He might understand it’s beauty and craftsmanship but he will never be safe with it. He will store it with the baseball glove and football pads.
when I held the broken pieces my mind raced wirred trying desperately to find away to make t not so. The sharp edges of the broken glass that was her sliced my hands and feet. I couldn’t escape lets I inflict further pain. As I grew I realized that the only way out is to put a strip of leather between my sole and the ground and use a similar application with my soul and the world around me.

Today I wrote your name on a cigarette, and I set it adrift.
I hope you will find it, and understand I still want to see you.

I sit on the edge of inspiration, the mood is on me as I smoke another cigarette, the taste of the last pack still on my lips.
I am on the edge of inspiration patiently sitting waiting for my words to take shape. I picture you to help it along. If I could only taste you on my lips again my heart would leap with poetic words and love tales.
But I sit. And wait. On the edge of inspiration

I see you only at night.
It’s been a year since I first kissed your smiling lips and I tasted what you were hiding behind it.
A year and two weeks since we first met. You wrote a note in my journal. I now associate the leaves colorful change to your beautiful eyes.
I only see you in my dreams now.
11 months since i last saw you and I am starting to forget how your nose felt pressed against mine.
I am starting to forget the shape of your short hair.
I only see you at night but soon I won’t be able to see you at all.

I love fall. For many reasons.
The colors change.
Pumpkins.
Holloween.
Sweaters.
Leaves to play in.
Beautiful colors.

And I met her.
Her smile. The small gap between her two front teeth that one could only find by exploring her mouth with ones tongue.
Her short dyed black hair with a hint of purple.
Her hips. These perfect hips that swished this way and that in the sexiest blend of grace and clumsiness.
Her hands. Her soft hands and scarred wrists that I explored with my finger tips.
Her eyes. The green center and blue outline with a tinge of yellow in one eye. They glowed bright for everyone to see. Especially against her hair.

I hate fall. For many reasons.
Things die.
It gets cold.
I lost her.

I remember it wasn’t until a while later I saw her again. I sat with my friends laughing pretending she wasn’t a hole in my soul. And there she was standing over me. My eyes met hers, a nervous smile on her face that I only saw after we were finished fucking. The smile that says she was afraid I would my leave her. But I wasn’t the one who left a suicide note in the for of two words in my phones inbox. I didn’t say I was sorry and try to leave her forever. That was her. And now she is gone. Gone away to a distant land with me hoping that she will find the strength to text me.

I hate the fall. Because everything dies in the fall

I want to live forever,
my name mocked by teens.
i want to live forever,
scholars gathering in teems.
i want to live forever,
in the pages of books people never bring to class,
i want to live forever,
in lovers poems that are supposedly original.
i want my name passed on from man to man,
generation to generation,
because maybe there is a life after this,
but really i just don't know that.
i want to live forever and this is the only way i know how

Have you ever seen the stars from atop a mountain,
Clear and chilled like the ice from heaven rests next to you?
Have you shaken a nomads hand,
Felt his loneliness and content, been slightly jealous?
Have you felt the desolation of the dunes of Coral Sands,
So close to your fellows yet so far?
There is so much you have yet to see,
so much i could show you.

Yet i see in your eyes things i never dreamed,
sunsets on sky scraper littered horizons,
the joy of a crowd celebrating a new year,
of meeting new people every day.
There is so much i have yet to see,
so much you could show me.

I remember that dark summer night as i sat on the ground and averted my eyes. I remember the 9 mm Ruger ringing out and echoing across the rows and rows of houses, houses filled with people who don't know the tragedy that just struck.
I remember hugging what remained of my childhood friend, his blood soaked fur dripping into my mouth and coating my hands.
I remember washing my hands for hours night, trying not to wash away the blood but the memories.
I remember years later working at a fast joint, the way the beef patties poured blood and the feeling of it drying on every surface.
I remember every night when i got home washing my hands until the blood of the bovine was replaced with the blood of a boy trapped in a mans body. I wasn't trying to wash away the blood, but the memories.
and it seemed no matter how hard i scrub no matter how long i remain determined, that some grime will never leave me.
I remember telling my friends and they would ring out "no no there is nothing wrong with wanting to be clean."
I nod as i think to myself "there is nothing wrong with washing my hands until i lose count in the sixties and have to start over. there is nothing wrong with brushing my teeth after every meal and at least once a hour. There is nothing wrong with everytime something dries on my hands, crying in a public restroom where no one can see."
i remember a dark autumn night, where i carry out the smaller of my childhood friends. I remember singing to him, the only creature to have heard me sing.
I remember averting my eyes as a .22 rifle rings out, drenching his fur in blood. I remember digging with dry eyes and steady hand.
I remember washing my hands until i lost count at sixty then starting over again.
I remember losing count three times that night.
I remember replacing the feline's blood with my own.
I remember... and i wish i didn't.

Will you run away with me?
see places we've never dreamed?
will you leave tomorrow?
to a world all its own?
will you hold my hand?
atop a bullet train?
will you run away with me?
to a world we've never dreamed?

Tattoo

Who knows if tomorrow comes?
for the worlds we build,
and the ones we burn,
captains of our fate we called ourselves.
who could be as foolish as we?

The blushing and pain,
a tear dripping from my face,
as it mingles with sweat,
all of it is worth it,
if you but show the best jewel given this world,
smile and it will all be worth it.

your blue eyes shining into mine,
rocking in your chair,
the smile on your face,
dwarfing the sun in comparison.
you tell me how beautiful the cicadas sound,
how we should do this more,
i barely have breathe to agree,
because you took it from me.

It is said old men send young men to war,

but that is no longer true,

Politicians and civilians vote and argue,

while my brothers and my sisters,

and cousins, and uncles and aunts,

go to battle,

fighting and dying.

when they come back they are broken,

unable to tell friend from foe.

the same ones who sent them there,

spit on them, call them baby killers,

or fakers.

She is a smile in the sun,
speeding down the road with a laugh,
her blows in the wind,
hair rushing across her face.
but the most amazing thing about her,
is how she makes you feel.
excited and alive,
you smile and scream.
stealing glances at her perfect lips,
wishing you could have a taste.

i just know that when i walk to somewhere new that i see things that make me stop and write. and there is no better feeling than being overwhelmed to point of stopping whatever i am doing to scroll a story. it is comparable to an orgasm honestly. and i know travelling gives that to me. i know looking at my most recent stories and poems they would NEVER have been possible without what i have seen and i think how many more stories am i missing out on.

Oh how i miss it; A life without worry of pain or boredom. How the waves crashed against the bow as i surge forward. Gib and main taut and wrinkless, the wind and the spray cloaking my face. Forced to feel, forced to be aggressive, through the tacks and waves. The keel leagues from the bottom. I am invincible at sea. While the warm air and cold water are so far away yet those times live on in my heart. One day i will sail again.

never has there been a more beautiful day than the day my name escaped your lips

i say its wonderful, i say i am happy for you but the words leave clenched teeth and teared cheeks. you have just broken my heart into five million pieces just by being happy. i do not think i could be anymore selfish right now as you burn my world around me