Cross-legged and bare foot,
Spice on the tongue,
Iced beer through a straw;
Makeshift ****
On the white-wash balcony
Over dusted streets.

Revolving procession of strangers,
Exhausted stories born new;
Doctored through years of rehearsal.

I am every man.
White skin mistaken for affluence,
Exchanged for free gifts
And easy ***.
I never need to remember
Their names. They are always gone

By the afterglow morning,
Nights of mad love with no consequence;
Climbing heaven with feet on the ground.

Bruise of her mouth,
Stifled ******;
Surface wound on my shoulder
The only evidence
She was here.
Impermeable, remorse stale

As last night’s cigarette.
My open door births a crack of light,
Too slight for anyone to pass through.

We were together
Staring out at the black sea;
A void in some backwater alley
Of central Bangkok.

You were laughing at its beauty
And like the stars I stared blankly,
Looking for everything I could not see.

Alternating undercurrent
Of raw sewage and street-food spice,
Alive in the shadow
Of a searing neon skyline,
The moon made of bone;
We blacken our lungs
Six thousand miles from home.

Set in greed for *** and company,
The familiar lilt of Latin tongues.
In a dream I still need to breathe,
Still need to feel the heat of love
Or at least the touch of anyone.

I lean, habit-ridden
Over the railings of misspelled lovers
That carved their names half-drunk
With hotel keys
Into the dandelion paint,
That with gradual loss,
Succumbs to the traffic
And falls in the breeze.

You wept at the sentiment.
I baulked in their loss.
I drew you in closer
To keep hold of this dream,
Before the night fades,
Before time has forgot,

Before life pulls us apart,
Before love loosens its knot.

Winter let you down again.
Hidden in layers, still your thin skin
Breathes in every particle, every wave.

In the heat of every symbol of love
You grow cold and depraved.
Beleaguer every drum,
Every instrument of calm
Until you are left with your breath
And what happens when it is gone.

Smoke a cigarette
When your mind will not rest,
Unwind in the secondhand sheets,
The daily reminder
Of your ineffable lack of sleep.
The pills that you take;
The ache of routine.

The panic button,
The false alarm,
A new lease of life
That swiftly lost its charm.

The talisman of a heaven-sent sign;
Extinguish the stars
For the city light lullaby.
Hear the ocean in waves of traffic,
Hear the truth in interludes
Interceded with static.

Hold fast to the tracks
You have trod before,
The pyrrhic loss,
Each opened door

That seemed to close
Each time you reached out,
Each time you fumbled for change
In your pockets of doubt.

Winter let you down again,
A dalliance with autumn,
Your terminal friend.

In the heat of love,
You grew cold for shelter.
Away from your moods
That shift with the weather.
Away from the rain that follows the storm,
Another surrender;
Another false dawn.

Stood, ill-assured,
On the other side of the classroom.
Shirt pressed, 5.a.m shadow,
Shoes black as sleepless hollows.
The waning attention of wandering minds,
Hearts strung to a breaking point
They believe will relent with age.
One decade, the fence.
I want to reach over and teach them
“I am not okay.”

Homesickness blues,
Blue skies; confused.
Paradise has slipped from view,
Occluded by opened windows
In emptied rooms.
Let the light fall in
But it falls on nothing.
Dust kicks up in the wind;
Brief interlude of a confident June
Before falling down again.
No single tongue that speaks my own,
Home was when I talked to you.
Now that you are gone
I wait by the phone
And hope you are waiting too.

There is blood on the brain,
Your hair on my floor,
Your glass still on my table
To evidence the night before.

You were a kindness,
My fantasy, my misery;
Blowing smoke out of the open door.
Brief surrender under the shelter of
Our shared and selfish storm.

You brushed your teeth in the mirror,
Heard you sing as you tied your shoes.
It was all you as you stared at your phone,
As I disappeared from your easy view.

You were vague and authentic,
Quick to the bone; the truth.
A desert scene of transparency-
I held you high and soft
Beneath the neutral moon.

There is warmth after rain
From where your light came through.
Sat here again, a drink in hand,
Toasting the shadow of you.

Drunk again, on my own again,
without a friend in sight.
I learned to read just to pass the time,
St. Teresa she tells me:
"Be gentle to all and stem with yourself,"
and you will find the light.
But some of us see only in dark,
and we come alive at night.

Been trying to breathe, been trying to see
what William James told me:
"You can alter your life, if you alter your mind,"
my kaleidoscopic eyes-
and act as if you can make a difference
and "be not afraid of life."
But I've been running scared, darling all of the time,
life chews me up and it spits me out.

I'm tired of words, to see me through,
oh, I need someone tonight,
someone tonight.

Like Carl Rogers says, you gotta hang tough,
"I'm not perfect but I'm enough."
"What is personal, it is universal,"
if you just open up.
But if I should die, it would take a while
until someone beats the drum.
I flew so many miles and still,
and still, my sadness has won.