A Woodland Excursion

The stone wall surrounded the strange rock formation, for what purpose, we couldn't tell.

An Exercise in Necessary Evil

Don't get cute with me, sweetheart
I'll lean on you till I get what's needed
Information don't cost a dime
So cut the act and cough up

I'm following faint tracks in the snow
Across desolate fields and railroad sleepers
Finding faded photographs hidden in the walls
Of lonely half-burnt houses

I've consulted carnival fortune-teller witches
And telephone clairvoyants
For $2.99 per minute
So much for priceless knowledge
I'm right back where I started

Singularity

Alone in a parking lot

A childhood record plays on the car stereo

The rain comes down fairly consistently 

And despite my slightly shaky hands

I feel relatively okay

Left so much behind

But at times it's best

To go it alone

Desolation

No further use.

Amy & Astronomy

Peering at constellations and through uncurtained windows 
Down the barrel of my telescope
I pray that she (or God) don’t see me
But I think I deserve a little time for myself
School really sucked today

Video Surveillance

Somebody shut down the mainframe!
The Devil’s nesting in the wires
I trust books not robots
They make our midnight rituals out to be harmless
Maybe a life of science-fiction is what we deserve
Our demise will be broadcasted via satellite

Dirt & Digressions

Sometimes a man's love, can force him to kill.

The Casting Couch

Take a bow, and vow to never say goodnight
Behind the curtain, I'll be waiting
To grab and push you into the dressing room to undress that gorgeous actress
Kiss the places the flashbulbs wished they illuminated
And be strangled to near-death by the B-roll
Slightly bleeding on the cutting room floor
Silhouetted she stands, knife in hand
Ready to carve this heart into the shape of love

Modus Operandi

Ritualistic
Half dead 
Fragmented 
Deliberately delusional
***** ***** Age: 18
(Ponder on this)
(How much longer do I need to take?)
(To take this troubled life)

FAILURE

I miss the days when I

Would drink myself into oblivion

Wake with the weight of indecisions

Heavy on my head

Or find I was sharing a mattress with my old friend Regret

It's been a while since I messed up that bad

The day can only get better from that moment on

And I'm sick of starting out so fervent

I burn out by midday

I was forever tired when I drank

And now I'm sober haven't seemed to wake up any

Then at least I had the epiphanies found in endless star-studded nights

 I just want to feel something again

Anything...

HOPE & FATE Tattooed on the Porcelain Fingers of a Murderous Saint

Somewhere, something must have actually gone right.

A Poem for Someone I am Yet to Meet

Her ribcage opened like a rosebud

Her heart exploded like a Black Cat

I bathed in her blood for the rest of my life

Translucent Canine

WW

The Moon is Moving

Night eyes
Streaked with silver
Heaven’s thighs
Silk slip sliding
Gaping maw
Lined with razor sharps
Perfect whore
Clumsy with words
Marble skin
Carved with care
Embrace sin
The moon is moving

The Lost Art of Letter-Writing

Operator, I’m begging you
(!the lines are down!)
(the switchboard’s spitting sparks like loose teeth)
This conversation’s not fit for the party line
(!!!spin the dial like Russian roulette!!!)
It’s not telepathy
And even less reliable
(The ink bled out)
(Before it had a chance to dry)
How can I begin to explain?
My heart’s been lost in the mail

The Lost Art of Letter-Writing first published in Aphelion.

Utah Beach

Thankful

That I escaped with my life

Abandon Me

The scuttling insects whisper half-truths.

We Grew Old Before Our Time

Childhood thwarted by realization and experience
A darling boy with streaks of grey
The falling stars burnt holes through upturned palms
Before setting the tree house alight

The scars still sit upon the neck
In the shapes of little kisses
Our bones now creak
When we try to take a lover’s hand

Can it be regained?
It floats just slightly out of reach
With sparkling eyes we watch
As it all just fades away

There's Always Mexico

Trying to keep the aces in my hand
But these fingers won’t cease to shake
I’ve developed a penchant
For trying my luck at Russian roulette
No matter how hard I try and pretend
I know it’s just a matter of time
Each and every day
I make myself sick to the stomach
And do my best to hide in fiction
But this is more surreal
Than any pill-induced dream
And she’s just a fey as I am
So I’m putting down all I have
If all else fails
There’s always Mexico

Telephones to the Dead

Transistor radio
Scanning the airwaves
Searching for her frequency

Late last night
I stumbled across fragments
Of past conversation

Static flares
The wires spark and smoke
And I hear her voice

Have Mercy

I pulled myself through the weeds and dead grass, in a feeble attempt  to escape.

Lassitude and Longing

There’s blood on these hands
And death in the air
I’ve been gone for so long
That I can’t recall
Where it was I came from
O, but I have a destination
Someplace to travel
With my head held low
Solemnity can be the greatest of weapons
In the war against time and self

Summer Legs

The susurration of corn fields

Omnipresent and lulling

Skin is blood-warm beneath the floral-patterned fabric of her sundress

The roof tiles are sagging

Windows thick with timeless dust

The sunlight pools on the creaking floorboards

Strawberry-blonde hair billows in a silken cloud

So exquisitely lost

Longing to never find our way back home

We Are Wells

Lost inside ourselves
Desolate and dimming
If you dropped a stone
Down this gaping throat
You wouldn’t hear it
Hit the bottom

Descend

Sinking silent as a black cat traversing a midnight trail.

Beyond Repair

Call me misanthropic, but
I grew sick of making people feel special
Of the concept of folie a deux
Inkhorn hearts and friendships formed
In a mutual forlorn feeling

Call me misogynistic, but
I am oh so sick of women wallowing in conceit
Of falling for the idea of a love so true
Plaintive soliloquies and bonds never broken
As long as two hearts beat in sincerity

But I am the grandest of fools
For part of this delirious brain
Still holds tight to a blood-soaked slither of hope
And regularly gets lost
In dime-store romanticism
And fervent dreams
Of brown-eyed girls
In idyllic small towns
That could never exist

An Unwelcome Welcome

This town... It seemed so damn familiar.

The City Blue-Prints of Washington, D.C.

A past life, resurrected
The clues were there all along
In inexplicable knowledge
And dark-room developed prints
Of dollar bills and pentagrams
And the accent I only speak with 
When I talk in my sleep

house/home/hospital

Some claimed they had seen him outside.

Artless

Alone in a hospital room
Reaching a trembling hand to the frosted window pane
The woods are calling
But I have no way to leave

The snow tumbles down
Swirls and flakes that aren't mine to taste
I think I can make out the tracks of a fox or fisher cat
Or maybe it's Church come back from the dead yet again

I'm afraid
I cannot survive on artificial light alone

Voyeurism

Make quiet breath. Can smell her near.

The Mothership

Rooftop tiles cold against my back
Staring at the stars glassy-eyed
Stoned and alone

Handwriting Sample

A reminder...

Bloodletting

I’m growing ever so tired

Of half-dead mornings

Shying away from direct sunlight

Like a vampire caught in a tricky situation

Or a werewolf stumbling homeward

I’m growing ever so sick

Of the dirty floors and thoughts

And surprisingly unchipped coffee mugs 

That double as ashtrays

That I feel like I wake up in

And I’m reaching the end of my tether 

With these overconfident girls 

And my stuttering shameful self 

You can never learn

When it comes to instincts

I’ll never learn