Some nights I shade
my eyes
from dark dreams
like a broken hawk's wing
stuck in the hot tar
of a back country road
when sleep seems
like a long ways to go
in a bad war
and desire and desire
and desire like a fire
in my bones
won't leave me alone.

We write it and we destroy it
Do with it what we see fit
Tear it up
Burn it, hide it below dead js in a cup
Like our souls
Like the cigarette burn holes
In our shirts and our arms
Our sleeping bags
Awoken to forever-under-our-eyes bags

They would have given a lot
those paste-skinned kids
with straw for hair
and knobby knees
Not that frail— it seems

Beneath grayish strings
through black rims
one cracked lens screams—
Gets nothing!
Changes nothing!
Ritual words fall—
a rusted refrigerator
shoved over a railing from the second floor

Barking dogs tied to the radiator of misery
fed on rough-house excuses for kindness

Why do people keep children?

Larger than average eyes
huge foreheads of genetic wrong
******* childhood downstairs
while mother is sleeping
I can get used to the smell of cats
Human ***** is not so—
different?
and if I didn’t change my clothes for a week

What do children know?

Jenny cuddles a starving kitten
then releases it to where
they disappear...
one generation after another
Famished eyes
devour anything offered
words...food...***...God

Screams from the mats of string and gray
Scald the frantic instant badly
I watch her bolt beyond explanation
Night gives no reason to let her live....

My faith went the way the kittens go
Hope and a small girl
blend beyond blackness

There is no cure, no fix, no magic spell.
I am an aberration, as you know.
I never promised you a villanelle.

You cannot trap the ocean in a shell.
You feed the roses blood to make them grow.
There is no cure, no fix, no magic spell.

It does get bumpy on this carousel.
The ride is all extremes of high and low.
I never promised you a villanelle.

I was the aberration, you could tell.
I ******* my neuroses in a bow.
There is no cure, no fix, no magic spell.

I think it's safe to say you know me well
in all my many masks, but even so
I never promised you a villanelle.

Let me pin my ragged heart to your lapel.
If it's truly what you need, I'll let you go.
There is no cure, no fix, no magic spell.
I never promised you a villanelle.

People don't pass away
they certainly die
Nor do they rest in peace
In dirt they lie

And I like to think
they can't rest in peace
Until in everyone
their memory has ceased

It's nature's way
of calling us home
We kiss stars tonight
then our spirits roam

Unblemished notions were
                          reflected inwards,
but inside they're contorted
beyond my perception of right.

I blemish this portrait of perfection
till only smudges gaze within my sight.

I've smoked the strangest dope
I've sniffed the finest blow

Nothing compared to the feeling

I've climbed the tallest mountains
I've swam in the deepest sea

Nothing screamed quite as loud

I've eaten the richest foods
I've felt the walls in my soul caving in

Nothing bled as deep

I've felt ultimate happiness
I've had cold steel against my head

Nothing hurt like falling in the frozen river