Idumea

the words to my favorite Sacred Harp song:

And am I born to die?
To lay this body down!
And must my trembling spirit fly
Into a world unknown
A land of deepest shade
Unpierced by human thought
The dreary regions of the dead
Where all things are forgot
Soon as from earth I go
What will become of me?
Eternal happiness or woe
Must then my portion be!
Waked by the trumpet of sound
I from my grave shall rise
And see the Judge with glory crowned
And see the flaming skies

lonely notes

to bristle with the multiple possibilities of morning
empty that mourning cavern from its hole
and treasure the veins in any surface crease
covered in creases I wake with a sigh

sung at starbucks

I'm at the backdoor at the backdoor at the backdoor
I'm going nowhere going nowhere going nowhere
I can't hold on too can't hold on too can't hold on too
I'm really teething really teething feel me breathing

bell rang sink drain dumb brain sweet kane

forceps and sight have left me dry
hold me high high or nigh
knit me tighter than I cry

suffer short shrift

swallow clutters tired bellyache sore lacquer wallow mellow mud
floral language
will sunlight speechless throat hungry drips burning sin sensation
repression image faraway blues precision simplicity hard conquer
remote battles
trembling tremors
still weight
circular holiness
band of strangers following up a vein quivering
all their might by sadness fell and done with empty satchels
glass has split fractured by triangles and the lens of the eye now aimless and turbulent
swimming in chapped skins distant and in other words alone
twelve men around a beating mind shift their gloves from hand to hand
irritated by foul wit
and smoldered fingers
ravens or crows are all that live in black fits
pits where diamonds crack and long to be melted into fine pastes
baggage whither mine or yours ore yours split seams and definition
now all true flew from a leaf deathly pale and brittle
most things are spindly as elastic and unfocused as day
fearing ultimatums that can truly bring surrender
only wheels have anything to fear at all

dicking around in the eyelids of others
just to jones with the bones of a boy that I know
bed bed sleepy head
wonder what you bought when you thought I was dead

smoke (gets) in your eyes

you tidy the room
stuffing a glass container with rubbers
and suddenly I too am stuck

all the love we have made
fits in a jar
I can hold in my hands

to sleep

ay me, the words blocked by ferocity
sinews twist the sanity away
the lungs hack with ferocity
and I can see no way
to maintain any thread of creation
dwindling ferocity in these cold nights
has found its way into the dregs
of creation
feeble twists of the wrist
eke panic out of eye sockets
restful in all forms of frenzy
heavy cheeks fall onto the ground
and cavernous with dead weight slip out of touch
without much of anything magnetic
poles do not track fear of falling
this sore stomach is made not of polar ice
rather, it is bleeding with iron
anemic for beautiful breath

Sitting at Alewise 8/5/11

grass and hot glue guns
I sense it--all the colors of an old home
sun rays remain restful
howls remain joyful and quick
long necks of geese flood my line of sight
as their beaks open, my ear canals widen with insanity, hungry for false memories
creations of the mind fraught with wormholes

here at Russel Field I live again
and fold the laughter into my flesh
my tangled pit of a stomach is cooled by familiar sprinkles
water meets pavement and in its death finds a new beginning
I miss my old coat of chlorine
security blankets never grow tiresome
orange juice hats and baseball mitts
fitful blissful
clutching for roses

The Power of Art

"This is what drives the greatest art: contempt for ingratiation."

Simon Schama

Rembrandt von Rijn, "The Conspiracy of the Batavians under Claudius Civilis," c.1666 (Oil on canvas)

Cage Scape

the feeling is round and familiar, resurfacing knots--contorting my muscles and producing water from my empty holes. the tiredness of ache cascades like aquatic notes, what is left of such old news? what hurt can be squeezed from a plum dry as stone? the pit in my stomach tells me you are as real as the slenderness of my fingernails and that you live buried deep in the breaches of my heart. dull pounds and what for? why even document these lonely nights when your ancient and wooden voice lulls me down into quicksand? I sit while you beckon and call to me "lovely" and you make me cry for hours and you never come.

mystery, intrigue, infatuation, have moderate half lives--I have seen them all they are knuckles without girth and I have outgrown them