I opened my eyes
And looked up at the rain,
And it dripped in my head
And flowed into my brain,
And all that I hear as I lie in my bed
Is the slishity-slosh of the rain in my head.

I step very softly,
I walk very slow,
I can't do a handstand--
I might overflow,
So pardon the wild crazy thing I just said--
I'm just not the same since there's rain in my head.

We drink. We love. We drink to pretend we have love. We fake love to feel loved. We know very well what we are doing. We have no idea what we are doing. We gather in groups. We push outsiders out. We know very well what we are doing. We can’t get a hold of what we are doing. We hate each other. We hate ourselves. We hate outsiders. We love our lives. We very well might hate our lives. Stockholm. We drink. We love. We **** ourselves.

We slosh through days. We get sloshed through days. We could be certain that we love the way we slosh through sloshy days and pretend that we have it under control. We have it under control. Do we have it under control? In thirty years there will be a phenomenon. We will all drop dead. We will all drop dead and we will think back to this time when we hated how much we loved our lives because we loved the very lives that allowed us to hate each other and wish we were the outsiders. We push away the outsiders. We are killing ourselves.

Then there are those who are unaware. There are those who might be naïve enough to think this is how the rest of our lives will play out. There are those who believe that the rest of their lives will consist of sloshing through sloshy days and pretending they aren’t killing themselves. And then there are those who very well might have the lives that allow them to slosh through, living and dying because we are killing ourselves. Peter Pans. They will not make it to thirty years before dropping dead. It won’t be a phenomenon at all. They will **** themselves. The outsiders will live on.

We do not know what love is because love is sloshy. Love is sloshy because our minds are sloshed. We pretend that what we feel is love. We pretend that these people are our friends and our lovers and they watch us **** ourselves and they **** themselves and we are all dying together. We are dying for love. We are dying to live. So we slosh through our sloshy days seriously not giving a **** that we are dying. Seriously giving too many ***** about what others think. Seriously ******* around. ******* around is serious business. ******* each other. ******* up. *******. *******. *******. We are killing our plans. We are killing ourselves.

We know very well what we are doing. Except the few that have no idea what they are doing. We live in the moment and pretend not to notice that in thirty years we will all drop dead and the outsiders will live on and love because we kept them out. We kept them out and saved their lives. They resented us because we ***** up and ***** around and ***** each other but we never ***** them and it saved their lives. We resent them because they live. We pretend we do not resent them because we think they don’t live. They don’t live like we do.

We pretend to love our lives. We love our lives. We think we love our lives. We do not know what love is because we are *******. We do not know what love is because all we do is *****. We do not know what love is because we are dying and we know very well that we aren’t well, so we hurt each other and pretend that it is the outsiders we hate. Pretend that we don’t envy them because they aren’t dying.

Some will get by. Some have plans and money and parents to put their screws back where they belong, so that their bookshelf can hold up the book of their life that was written for them. They will live on and slosh through their lives and make money and make babies and make fake substance. They will get married and get jobs and get divorced and get depressed. But they will be rich. Their lives will not be rich. They will be rich but they will lack richness. These people will have everything. These people will have nothing. I will have nothing. But I will have everything. If I do not **** myself the way that we are killing ourselves.

Why does time ***** us over? Everything is changing. Everything is staying the same. People are sloshing by with their sloshy minds. It will remain this way. The way it has remained this way for as long as we can remember it remaining this way. We have terrible memories. We have wonderful memories. We have these memories and then we have some memories that we cannot remember. We will get by. We will get out. We do not want to get out. We do not have a choice. Do we have a choice? I need to get out.

We do not want to leave the lives we hate but love because we are sloshing through and pretending we are rich. We are not rich. We are salty. We are salty and messy but we are happy. Are we happy? I am happy. Sometimes I am happy. Sometimes I slosh through my sloshy life and wish it were over. I never want it to end. I am the some that are naïve enough to have hoped this would last forever. We are the Peter Pans. If we never grow old we can never drop dead and blame it on the time when we hated that we loved this sloshy exclusive mayhem that we call life. I survived my youth, I will get out. I do not want to get out. I hate the love I pretend to love because I hate that I love it so much. Stockholm.

the ebb and tide of diamond waves slosh in the most serene celerity.
it is then that i know i am safe.

i lie in the ocean's arms,
and become a grain of sand,
until your song is sent my way
and i crystallize.

oh i am a pearl, born from pain.

your timbre plays melodies on my heartstrings, siren.
your beauty shadowboxes with my soul, siren.
i am not yours to keep, siren.
i am the tidecaller and i have a place.

but oh siren, why must you sing when i want to sleep?
why must you sing when i want to weep?
oh, siren, take my soul to keep.

no longer my sea.
sea of sirens, sea of song.
your song always lets me know that i mustn't tag along.

I imagine myself
A few gentle decades older.
Finally grasping the cusp
Of success.
Living in my own apartment
In New York City, nonetheless.
Wearing an Armani coat
(Whatever those look like.)
Walking idly yet prestigiously
Through winter in the city.
Taking care not to laugh too loud,
Talk to myself, smile too much.
A small, attractive female
Has to be serious to get ahead.
Customers will buy from a happy girl
Only if she is early 20's, at most.
That is Marketing 101.
I am a small fish in a large sea;
The principles of Darwinism
Still apply to me.
I've learned long ago to succeed,
I must stifle the welcoming smile.
So along the familiar concrete
I stride,
Carefully manicured hands
In pockets.
The Filipinos know better
Than to rush on the hands
Of a businesswoman caressing
A successful career.
She tips well and lives well.
I walk along with cool calm
And feminine grace.
I have regained the safety
To be feminine once again.
The criminals know better
Than to infiltrate
The Business district
And cause trouble
To working professionals
In Armani coats.
I imagine myself a few decades older.
Kissing snowflakes unenthusiastically.
Yes, I marvel in poetry, in Nature,
But I have matured
Much like the snowflakes themselves.
At the end of a cycle,
No matter how beautiful.
My actions flow gracefully and delicately.
I melt into New York City
Like a cell in a body.
Pumping fuel into the *****
To sustain the mass.
A tumor.
I smile subtly as I slosh along.
I recall, once upon a time,
On my lower-class youth.
***** jokes, crude dancing,
And cluttered apartments.
I approach the high-rise building
I call home and greet the doorman
With the obligatory disregard
For his innermost being.
Poetry truly is in the strangest of places.
Even in an enigma like me.
I enter the marble floors,
Wiping my feet,
My rent as sky-high as
The building itself.
Elevator. Comforting motion sickness.
This is success.
The pit of my stomach sinks.
I tell myself it's the motion sickness.
I return to my apartment,
With its symmetrical details.
My thoughts return to you.
You've never stepped foot in my home,
But you've always been here with me.
I get dinner started.
I set out the extra glass, like always.
Rituals like these serve
As my Sunday mass.
I drink your glass with my evening medication.
Dare I say like always?

Yes Spring has come to the land,
Mother Nature has shed her coat,
time to get off the couch and do what matters most. Live and have fun!
So I am out catching up on the chores and second duty, granddaughter watch,
prune here, rake there, now where has that little tike gone?
Perhapes if I give these little hands something to occupy,
why the best thing is a little water, yes that will bring a smile.
So here is the battle ground as  the scene unfolds.
She has a little pail, I have the garden hose.
Her duty, quite simple,place some water on the plants,
end result however, water on PawPaw's pants!
So only to even the score, mind you no harm intended,
was to give the little tike a squirt and the battle would have ended.
Oh no, not today! This little tink has got some guts!
Why with every squirt I give that girl, I get a pail of slosh!
So of course, being the elder here and quite mature I say,
I give that girl her monies worth and let out a real good spray!
Soon the chores are all forgotten and the plants need water no more,
end of the day I can say she may have even tied the score!
Wow how much water do these pampers hold?!

I sing the song of the sinking ships that drown in the vast, dark ocean of depression I call home. They slosh against my ribcage with such force, I fear I may break entirely.

The photographic chamber of the eye
records bare painted walls, while an electric light
lays the chromium nerves of plumbing raw;
such poverty assaults the ego; caught
naked in the merely actual room,
the stranger in the lavatory mirror
puts on a public grin, repeats our name
but scrupulously reflects the usual terror.

Just how guilty are we when the ceiling
reveals no cracks that can be decoded? when washbowl
maintains it has no more holy calling
than physical ablution, and the towel
dryly disclaims that fierce troll faces lurk
in its explicit folds? or when the window,
blind with steam, will not admit the dark
which shrouds our prospects in ambiguous shadow?

Twenty years ago, the familiar tub
bred an ample batch of omens; but now
water faucets spawn no danger; each crab
and octopus -- scrabbling just beyond the view,
waiting for some accidental break
in ritual, to strike -- is definitely gone;
the authentic sea denies them and will pluck
fantastic flesh down to the honest bone.

We take the plunge; under water our limbs
waver, faintly green, shuddering away
from the genuine color of skin; can our dreams
ever blur the intransigent lines which draw
the shape that shuts us in? absolute fact
intrudes even when the revolted eye
is closed; the tub exists behind our back;
its glittering surfaces are blank and true.

Yet always the ridiculous **** flanks urge
the fabrication of some cloth to cover
such starkness; accuracy must not stalk at large:
each day demands we create our whole world over,
disguising the constant horror in a coat
of many-colored fictions; we mask our past
in the green of Eden, pretend future's shining fruit
can sprout from the navel of this present waste.
In this particular tub, two knees jut up
like icebergs, while minute brown hairs rise
on arms and legs in a fringe of kelp; green soap
navigates the tidal slosh of seas
breaking on legendary beaches; in faith
we shall board our imagined ship and wildly sail
among sacred islands of the mad till death
shatters the fabulous stars and makes us real.

Do you hear water wherever you go?
The hum,
the slosh,
the drum,
the stroke.
Always moving, potentially drowning us slow.
Like how happy people hear music
you hear the tide,
and the moon tugging gently;
you have nowhere to hide.

For my muse, I choose the euphoric source
Of my most transcendent -

   Lovely
- Muddy
Memories.

Perceptual flashes ― slosh slushing
Approaching an untamed blue-green pond
Just your average amphibian gone blonde.
In sunshine or windward shower.

Loitering around the grassy brim,
On that one slick rock, I stood up
Catch a fish ― oooooh you swift ⁓
Let it back in?

Or you could...
Run screaming like the flaming river rumbling down the mountain.
To the lunulate lagoon?? in the front yard

Hop & stand
Fish in hand You. Have. To. Make. It.  

But     the        gargantuan          estate.  .     . it's too late.

That tiny t-rex gait ― might just seal
That golden guppies fait.

Cause you sprung like spring
And set that little sucker free.

When the moon retires running her length
the river lies a fishbone on the white plate
feebly breathing like the slosh from oars,
the shadow digs a hole in the bush.

The faintest chill rattles don't escape
and the chatters dull as broken notes,
the shadow picks up from the mist
with the intent of an absorbed dreamer.

The gold diggers in that forbidden land
filter their preys keen to fill some more
from the mines lining the grey riverbank
with each reap a little closer to attainment.

The precise compass weighs the measure
tightening the muscles into a symphony
for that climb onto the ****** in one spring
before stealing the stilled, deep into silence.

Mushy, mush! Mush!!
Emotions twirl and slosh,
Pack it in for the day,
And go frolic in hay.

Barry’s dead.

I saw you dying weeks ago;
An oyster shell turned empty can,
Scrumpled up and finished
By the past’s magnet attraction
In your shakey hands.
It’s just a habit now and you can hardly kick yourself.

Buckets of Grolsch:
My swash-buckling hero
Turned slosh-slurping zero once again
And shiny surfaces
Never suited you.

Scrub away at that black demon matter
With the sole white spirit
Your genius affords. A shattered socialist
Posy primrose ******;
That’s the story of your life –
All
      most
               man.

Now beneath the cowslips
And the heifer’s hooves,
Your saintly-thorny words without a roof:
But who will speak for you?
And trawl the depths
As you once did in youth?
Prizing open oysters…

I hope that where you are
Your silence brings relief.
I hope that where you are
You smell the borage breeze.
I hope that where you are
There’s ox-cheek for tea
And your carbonated past
Is carbonating in mute peace.

Tonight the argent stars
Are dulled in disbelief
Tonight the slate that you’ve carved
Is the hardest you will teach.
Tonight the tumblestones
Are falling down in grief:

For Barry’s gone to rediscover Pearl
And the beauty of her peace.

drunk woodland children, we
ask so many questions, we
firefly skin. the picnic table beneath
our lamps, our ouija board, our girlfriends
next to us warm and laughing.
stories:
we tell stories to scare eachother
before descending into our tents
on the outer darks.
sweet night nothings.
& everythings.

i’m consumed by dreams of you;
somehow running;
somehow ******* my way out of my own inevitable
death.

a lady bug wing half-yanked and humming.
wind scorpion.
mosquito
in the early morning buzz, and i roll over
to see your puffy little sleeping face ::: sunlight there.
limp beyond the tent and zipper.

we eat mayo sharp cheddar salami wheat sammies
& take acid.
everyone one else goes on a group nature-hike,
but i stay behind
hallucinating of my dead mother in those sequined clothes she used to wear.
::: we play scrabble and talk,
until she leaves.
like love.
like guitar strummed chords and many hydrations later –
my tribe returns,
with fish.

the girl i love.
you/she roll joints in your lap,
in my lap,
in a chair and i mirage
the faces of everyone through glass &
slosh; through campfire
& lemonade.

Whatever the cost I pay up at the minnow pools.
I don't know anything of the misery of these trapped fish,
or the failure of the marsh I'm so hidden.

Up above is the island with its few houses facing
the ocean God walks with anyone there. I often
slosh through the low tide to a sister
unattached to causeways.

It's where deer mate then lead their young
by my house to fields, again up above me.

Pray for me. Like myself be lost.
An amulet under your chest, a green sign of the first
rose you ever saw, the first shore.

Then I wash my horse, dogs, me behind the barn.
Only the narrow way leads home.

Are we conducting a robot?
To write off our life slosh,
As we detach to explore...

Are you scared of the person behind you in dream décor?
The sweetness of them, supple, sincere and secure, I won’t turn from them anymore...

I want a space that suits my body, and a body that shapes my suit.
Drooping with these screens, we could be using our screen eyes and bodies...
But we’re biting on borrowed time. Focus on my face and timeline...

When we fully take over, they won’t stop these ache-numb, religious-atheist, vicious silverfish, who don’t think but spin beauty... Spill blood and **** feeling, chase silent moments...

If we lose our memory-doubt-history cycle, get lost and find ourselves in the deeper summer night cycle...

We are with the second sight phoenix heads, playing gold scores piercingly, growing as swimmer-dancers in wonder of the pieces of wild peace, new-vital...

i think about the distance.
how many miles my tires would tread,
turning and turning like the thoughts in my head.
how many drops of gas it'd take to make the journey
how they'd slosh around in my tank just like the
butterflies in my stomach.
due to the prospect of meeting someone i'd never met
but loved wider than the wingspan of an ancient creature
almost as unfathomable as the relationship we've conjured.
maybe it's the celestial coincidence of being born on the same day
of dreary november, almost december.
or the closeness of our relatives who it seems sometimes
wonder why they even planted the seeds of this flourishing friendship in the first place.
mostly i think it is the fact that we are the same
in so many more ways than we are different.
your fingers conduct an orchestra of sound, while mine scrawl out epiphanies on paper
but we're both making miracles, aren't we?
we're both falling in love with the world at the same time, under the same moon, under the same strain of heart
longing to be together
but mostly to be away
from the places we are at right now.
you want my sunshine, and i want your rain.
but i think we secretly just want to be in the same room as each other,
even if it was only regurgitated air conditioning filling our lungs.
because our eyes, for once in our ******* lives would be witnessing visualized faith.
i'm speaking for myself,
but i think we both have found the truth in one another.
and when everyone else leaves you don't arrive,
you stay.
and when i am in pieces,
you remind me you are too,
instead of forcing mine together in a pattern
neither of us would ever be able to decipher anyways.
you make me laugh.
i mean, really laugh.
the kind where i can barely inhale oxygen, enjoying the momentary euphoric absence of necessity, and simply relishing in the smile stretching through my soul.
you tell me i am beautiful in one of the first ways i've ever believed it
and remind me everyday that shouldn't be the case.
we have strange ways of speaking, and sometimes things don't come out quite right,
but it is a different thing to be understood by you.
i know more strength in our separation than in the proximity of some blood
and i swear i can almost hear your heartbeat if i'm quiet enough.
sometimes at night when neither of us can sleep,
much to our chagrin, i read your words on the neon screen
within my palms, in the tone of your voice
and i could swear you were there,
with me,
reminding me we are vastly unaware of what we are to become,
but helping me celebrate what we already know of the labyrinth we inhabit.
when i have to validate the present conditions we are in,
i choose to validate the other conditions i know to be true as well.
we have walked the ravaged earth together in ways, each day growing older in synchronicity.
we spend them in the same zone of time,
the sun setting on each of our days at the same hour.
each of our mornings it greets us with beauty and a knowing
that one day it can glow on our toes, then up our legs,  our stomachs, and finally up to our hearts,
warming us at the same time, from the same place, in the same room,
and all of the sameness may be overwhelming,
even to the glowing radiant life from which this has all had the chance to bloom, but maybe it will be alright
to not be prepared for something wonderful
for once.
i promise to listen to you play, and sing along horribly.
i promise to come to all of your shows, even the ones on the couch.
and i promise that every day i will see your dreams
with the same vivid clarity you do, because you are something i know how to believe in.
and so when you remember to believe,
i hope it is the closeness,
that you see.

still water is my blood
I slosh the earth and
no one cares for my name

sun never was a friend, he
always looked upon me with distaste
so I wear a scarf in summer
while I slosh the earth

the kind ones try and help me
but sympathy's above me
and it's oh-so night lake clear that
one day I'll die free of
whatever they have that I don't

forward motion like a clockwork
rust won't slow me down
maybe someday I will get there
till then I slosh the earth

a man has eaten a nail.  he must bed before it’s too late a woman with a breadboard back.  the man’s brother is married to such a woman, but does not know it.  the brother’s tongue is raw and wouldn’t know good eating were it a thumbtack in a lover’s heel.  the man decides to lounge hungrily in the slim wardrobe of his brother’s shadow.  the man will drink it like milk and let it slosh in his gut for three weekends.  the wife will shine more and more light on her husband; she will bend reading lamps around corners and forget she has things to do.  she will have well lit dreams of a man she can sense is behind her.  her husband will run from the light and she will jump on his back.  the man will come to this empty house and he will be angry and because of his stomach he will need to call someone.  until then, imagine we are in a box held by a thief.

slosh of oars
ripples the night
of tremulous moons

the nightjar soars
on silver light
a sad tune croons!

tides up swell
lap the wood
in ceaseless kiss

moon grows pale
in deep brood
of broken wish

the misty haze
spells the core
spins a dream

mind in daze
forgets shore
drifts upstream!