I've always analyzed things too much
but I'm rarely right
and I used to fill in the gaps of
things I didn't understand with things
I thought
were maybe
archetypes
and always true,
but, no

nothing is constant and I sometimes
forget that the voices coming from
the speakers are
just voices

who know nothing more than I do
about life and the things we're supposed
to feel,
but must be mad enough to
scream their story at me.

but these don't help
and won't help
because as much of a fool as I may be,
I know the difference between
reality and idealism.

I once thought love
meant a trite Romantic metaphor --
"A bird that soared above some far-off shore" --
calling gently among the metronomic whispers of the waves,
casting a fleeting shadow on sun-kissed sand
where sea spray mingles with the scent of seaweed.

But after four weeks' absence
and the silence of those thirty days,
I saw, while in traffic,
a flock of seagulls
drifting lazily as flies
over the Oakland sewage plant.

I was in the backseat of a 1988 Prelude
listening to Conor's sonnets and etudes,
moving my tongue in uncomfortable loneliness
because your passenger seat was occupied and
I couldn't decide if you were quiet or shy.
I hadn't met you yet.

Hennepin was good to us at 2AM and
gave us space to sip uncommon grounds
in the typically uncommon Uptown.
I saw bright eyes in your words
and unrecognized yellow birds.

I remember things and I don't know why.
I remember the paper mache lady on Nicollet and
I remember that you sang about how it's neat that we all own guns and
I remember wishing that I was born on Independence Day and
I remember walking past empty bookshelves at the end of the day and
I remember remembering when they were stocked and
I remember loving the way we talked
about Huxley.

and it's a year or so later and I'm your passenger
and the streets are still full of images and hidden messages
and faces with whiskers.
"I saved a cat from a tree once,"
and my cackle secured the shackles on my ankles that
I picked out myself off the mannequin.

and it's always just us because Vic is always
with Lucy, Molly, and Mary Jane and
they're having dreams and hearing secret frequencies
(like the ones you pointed out to me)
and doing drugs and discovering Christianity
and decorating themselves with ashes and ashes with Ashley.

and the people I used to know from St. Paul
are working and growing small and
trippin' and slippin' and sippin' gravy,
but we're still sippin' uncommon grounds
and we're all still living in these twin towns.
But none of them are wearing the matching heavy crowns
that you and I picked out ourselves off the mannequins.
They're the same shade of gold as the birds in your words and
they're the same shade of gold as the shackles on our shins
that mold our golden grins
that we had our faces when you said,
"This is the world where dreams come true, right?"

and we're confirmed by a blinding white light that shows through
the windows of the theater in Bryant-Lake Bowl that compliments us
like you compliment me, like I compliment your skinny tie
(the one that makes me want to die.)
But we can't die because this city doesn't have any double-decker buses
or any other us-es.

and I watch you program lazers into my heart
and I think;
What a beautiful old man
What a beautiful growing boy
What a beautiful perfect cylops
with an eye of my color green to shower me in scenic joy.

and as we dance to the records we bought from Minneapolis antique shops,
I look into the eye of my cyclops from a centimeter above the ground
and realize that this is the dream where the world comes true.

Your mouth,
I bet it is a garden
where buried secrets
make flowers grow
and nobody  will ever know.

I want to know.

Do you remember when we
danced beneath street lights
that bowed
in the presence
of our youth,
to that hum
from power lines
that can only be heard
early in the morning
or late at night?

Lately,
much like the power lines,
I hum
but only
when no one
is listening.

I keep these feelings
like water in cupped hands;
desperate to convey them
but they slip,
drop by drop,
through my fingers
and never completely
make it to you.

She isn't smart
she isn't very pretty
but you wanted her body.
The cut of her shirt
the length of her shorts
made you over look me.
If that's what you're looking for
then I'm glad you passed by
I'm not that kind of girl.

I thought you were smart
and, oh, so handsome
but you acted immature.
How your eyes undressed her
the comments that you made
proved you, to me, undesirable.
I thought we could have something
thought you wanted more than physical
apparently you're not that kind of guy.

He said he liked my shoes
sitting across from me
after he said we haven't talked in a while.

I want to tell him everything
as I laugh at his ridiculous beard
then I tell him it's the middle of summer.

When we make plans for tomorrow
my heart and my lips smile
then he looks sad, he forgot he has to work tomorrow.

Some other time I say
happy I got to share this moment with him
because we haven't talked in a while.

I don't realize how longs he stays
until he says he better be going
I smile and tell him I'll talk to him tomorrow.

He tells me he'll call
after he reminds me he has to go home soon
I know I may never see him again.

I hope we still talk
maybe we'll even visit one another
for now I'll just look at my shoes.

Every time I eat peanut M&M;'s
I think of you.
That one time we shared a bag
and you ate all the yellow ones.
I didn't know why,
I didn't ask.

Every time I eat peanut M&M;'s
I think of you.
Now you're engaged
and I haven't seen you in years.
I don't know why,
I don't ask.

Every time I eat peanut M&M;'s
I think of you.
Those high school days together
and how we never got any any closer
then a bag of peanut M&M;'s.
I wonder why?