Your heart is like weak coffee--

Baseless and unsatisfying.

Goodbye and

 Back
    to
     the
       grind.

Monday was terrible.
Horrific.
I spent the day sulking on my lonesome and went home ready to erupt.
I could feel the slight tingle of tears threatening their way through my eyelids
Ready to pour over the second they perched open
But due to my lack of sleep last night
I doubt I could even build up the strength to open my glossy eyes
Even if I wanted to

In a weird sense
I enjoyed the mere thought of Monday being able to make me cry
I almost laughed
Or screamed
Or both

A year ago today
Everyday was a Monday to me
Everyday went horribly
Everyday made me come home crying and lock myself in my room
I was so used to that constant repetitive torture
That Monday appeared to be no different than any other day
Monday was just... It.
Tuesday was "it"
Wednesday was "it"
Thursday was "it"
Friday was "it"
Even Saturday and Sunday were "it"

But now, today
Monday is distinct
In a horrifyingly gruesome way
And this tear-jerking unsatisfying Monday gave me hope

Monday made me cry
Tuesday did not
Wednesday did not
Thursday did not
Friday did not
Not even Saturday or Sunday made me cry
Only Monday made me cry
Only Monday

Just as Monday made 7 billion other humans cry
On this torturous inescapable earth
It also made me cry

And that gave me hope that maybe I really am normal
Or I can be
Or I will be

Because Monday is unbearable for everyone
And Monday is unbearable for me
And the rest of the week is alright for most people
And it was alright for me
And Saturday and Sunday are fun for most people
And Saturday and Sunday were fun for me

Somewhere
Deep inside my clouded, muddy mind
I caught a glimpse of hope
That maybe
There is hope for me
Maybe I am cured
Maybe I can be
Maybe I will be

I can't compute and become mute
When you walk by
My circuitry is fried
Because your program is an encryption
And your pulse is electromagnetic
My car dies, so does my phone, so does my home
I'm immobilized
And demoralized
By immoral ties
To temporary generators
They're validating veneraters
Ultimately unsatisfying
When you're still not buying
I'm attracted to your charge
Until there's a battery
Yet you're the cure to your lure
The EMT for your EMP

Your negative charge casts a cloud around my nucleus
But if you could be positive for a change
We could meet in the middle
And feel energy in our synergy
But as soon as I feel electricity between us
You shut me down
With your EMP
I can't get free

I want to run, run away from this thing called life,
and make my way toward a new me;
a renaissance to believe in and hope for.
I’ve grown impatient with the meaningless days and sleepless nights;
dreams that disturb and work unsatisfying.

Frightened of change, for there is comfort and familiarity
in the desperate misery I’ve become accustomed to.
The uncertainty of tomorrow is beyond my vision,
Yesterday has undone me and tortures me stil.
You were my hope and my future.

Now I must go alone through life’s dark alleys
without your light to guide my way.

1.**

A horizontal fall
from the high-up slide
made for big kids was not
what I expected as I screamed
“Push me down, Haley!”

Unexpected, too, was the destruction of your wounded butterfly days later–
revenge is sweet, yet unsatisfying.
And then you left for six years,
turning up again as hormones
were in full swing
in our freshman year of high school.

2.

you said



"i'll teach you to love,

just draw nearer to me.

draw nearer to me

and i'll make you mine."



as you



laced up your best heels

put on your best face

and applied another coat

of liquid vanity.



as i


made an effort to


concoct a new way to say

"no"


and


ignore the 
rotting

carcasses of

hearts

that strewed the floor.


i'd seen your kind before


"but losing you would be a chore

my darling detritivore"



i said

3.

focus of a new kind sheds a big difference BIG DIFFERENCE upon your face bright yet shadows consume both it and your body like a prophecy. since when did that happen? so what if it never did? so you came to your senses; perhaps that was it. perhaps the realization of “you sure do know how to pick ‘em” broke you and now you’re left with a twelve-and-one-half-inch phallus in your big box of board games. we hardly speak anymore. i am now your temptress, detritivore and you’ll never escape never escape the howls of agony and desire releasing themselves from your joints your muscles your heart aches for fresh meat and you get it, **** you. you get it daily for viewing pleasure. dear heavens speak of shabby apartments and televisions that don’t work. they never knew how to comfort me; so why should they now? falling down the stairs into the pitch black night irreversible womb child conceived on camera and carried to term on God’s watch. do you remember pushing me down that slide in the second grade? it’s your turn.

4.

Unexpected, too, was the destruction of my wounded memory
of an innocent girl from second grade
now in chains and leather,
used and watched and seen and lusted over and masturbated over,
but for a hefty sum.

And I still see second grade Haley
and we still talk
and we share the occasional cigarette
and we tell of our conquests.
But I am no savior–

5.

Feeling vibrations in my palm is finding decaying matter on the forest floor to eat–
the words they carry are a substitute for nutrition.
The nearest bounty of corn is a thousand miles away,
for God places us here and our placement is the source of life’s cruelty.
And second-grade Victor would happily take a beating
for gas money; desperate detritivore–
feast on decaying matter, get your fill
and one day substance of corn will fill your stomach
and you will hibernate indefinitely.

To start --
being an adolescent with autumn eyes,
seeking a prophecy for long-standing bravery
to further the spinning spokes for minutes, five more,

I burned the drapes to reveal a humanity only I could see.

The expectations were elaborately existing, unsatisfying. Sons
and fathers, years refrained from matters
that reverse reverse reverse curses and maturity
without purpose.

Those idle accepted neglect, and the existence of an
unsalted bridge was quickly detained. Alone, the foolish described
to search for the future in geometric formation and coffee ring
stains fading the desk.

But the sense proposed in my decided equality drank dignity
straight from the bottle. The road that lead me between two cliffs,
Propriety and Statistics, with the rocks already pelting down,
could not diminish my enthusiasm for necessary absurdities.

There's no flesh in declared mediocrities.

I became a luminary for pleasures of eminence, hope with resolve,
opportunities in destiny. Blind gambles obliged the fear of exacting
sensibility. Passionate follies created no-regret-consequences,
satisfied stability. Only the **** are granted victories in eternal gaiety.

Mortality is irrelevant if you let mystery be your urgency.

We've reached an age where we talk at people. There's no 'to' or 'with'. We carelessly throw words around to each other hoping not to catch any unsatisfying sentences in return. Most of these substitutions for conversations are shoveled bit by bit through radio waves to small circuits in our pockets. Verbal language has become distant and alien to us. We're too content removing ourselves from the intimacy of communication that we've created societal norms that only further entrench this behavior while encouraging a facade of emotionless abandonment.

An answer other than 'good' to the masquerade of an endearing question - "how are you?" - will raise eyebrows and prompt suspicion. How far removed are we as humans from one another that a question on another's well-being is genuinely regarded as a greeting and meant to be mostly ignored and never answered honestly?

Put down your device and pick up your tongue.

Light the cigarette, inhale exhale repeat
Hurry before your mother finds out
Pulling you back inside by the ear
Slaps your hand followed with shouts
Pots and pans clank together
Furious tension and disappointed parents
A sore hand and ear march up the stairs
Slam! The door and put your headphones in
reflect about this teenage anger and the
half finished smoke burning out on the sidewalk
Listen to the music, calm down
Vibrations from cheap store brand headphones
more then likely stolen

If I could tally up all the cigarettes that I used to ease my mind from thoughts of you,
check the mail often,
causes there's a few empty packs heading your way.
Along with a hospital bill for some new lungs because mine are ****** up
A pair of thumbs that don't ache from the texts I send
trying to make you feel the same about me.
And lastly a heart that only knows how to pump blood
that doesn't remember the good and bad times
one that doesn't build up the pressure from the past
then fires a pain through my torso wrapping around my ribs
causing me agony in the late nights

Worry not old friends I am better
No more are my Friday nights spent reflecting
on the past and possible futures

It's funny you know
I put my emotions into these words
and in turn produce new ones
A forever reoccurring chemical reaction of
lines potent with the stench of the dark side of my thoughts
and vibrant memories
If I continue to write what will become of me?
In how many words will it take to feel like a normal person
and not a black sheep of society
How many lines of reactions are needed for my personalty to become something anew?
Maybe I will be able to be in a room full of strangers, and walk away with friends
Instead of isolating myself to avoid having those horrible, terrifying things
known as social interactions
What's the big deal if friends of friends dislike you?
It's simple go up and say hello
but what if she dislikes my voice
my hair
my weight
the smallest insignificant thing, then my attempt shall be wasted.
My self worth a never ending cold, empty well

Go and do man's greatest creation; language
but alas conversation is a dying art form
Those who express their emotions through words sure are strange aren't they?
Maybe it's my culture that is the cause of my anxiety.

I stay up every night to enjoy being alone
with hopes of capturing thoughts such as these
then regret the lack of hours I slept that night
only to repeat the process again

This piece has no flow no direction,
Good
Observe how my mind works
See what I think about day after day
Look at the beginning of a memory, watch it decay
and erode from over analysis
broken down down to pointless open ended conclusions
and unsatisfying endings.

Don’t ask me why I was standing in the middle of my backyard that Friday evening in March unscrewing a bolt, but do know that I was standing in the middle of my backyard that Friday evening in the middle of March, and I was attempting to unscrew a bolt. The bolt belonged to the remains of a gazebo we had built last summer, a fairly nice, painted-aluminum thing with copper colorings and khaki drapes. It had been blown over in a wind-storm sometime over the winter and I had been dreading the day I would have to come outside and take it apart, piece by piece, and finally get rid of the wreckage of what had once been a beautiful center piece to our back yard.

            The reason I had finally gotten around to taking it apart was that I was angry. This is also probably why I didn’t care that it was raining, or that the sun was setting in less than an hour, or that I would much rather be in my room sitting around and doing nothing. I enjoy physical labor more when I’m angry. If I can avoid any complications, I work briskly and feel better overall when I am done. Unfortunately, this was not one of the times I avoided complications.

            The particular bolt I was working on seemed to know that I didn’t need something frustrating to deal with. It waited until it was the last one that needed unscrewing to suddenly become difficult. After ten minutes, I had gone at it with Phillip’s head ***** drivers, flat heads, two different types of wrenches, and my own bare hands, but still it refused to budge. In between mad attempts to turn the stubborn piece of metal, I would make quick little circles away from it. Up the brick path I was working next to then back down it, alternately glaring at and shunning my nemesis as I went. Each circle was my way of letting out the excess frustration building with each failed attack on the bolt. But as my attacks become more frequent and my efforts seemingly more futile, I was beginning to lose control of emotions.

            The whole situation felt menacing. The corpse of the gazebo wore a condescending smile, my tools giggled each time they failed, and the bolt said nothing, sitting smugly in its socket. I will defeat you, I thought, I will unscrew you and it will feel good to throw you into the woods and forget about you. But I knew that winning this battle would not mean I won the war. My mood was shot. While I set out to make myself feel better, I only ended up feeling worse in the long run. Regardless, this realization did not reduce my anger. I was determined to unscrew this ****** and that was all I could think about.

            Taking hold of a wrench in one hand and a ***** driver in the other, I twisted and jammed the two things for as long as I could. When the bolt didn’t come unbound, I grabbed one half of the structure I was trying to deconstruct and began to rip and tear it with all of my might. When it still wouldn’t budge, I loudly screamed “fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck”, and with one last burst of strength, lifted it above my head and used my other hand to smash the bolt until it was loose in the socket. This was when I finally was able to unscrew the bolt and its uneventful fall to the ground was somehow unsatisfying at the time.

            Taking my newly freed hand, I grunted loudly and hurled the hunk of precision cut aluminum piping over to where another piece of the former gazebo lay. I sat breathing heavily, even if the moment lasted only a few seconds and required only a fraction of my strength. I realize now that I breathed so hard because this was an emotionally straining task. Man against machine. Unstoppable against the unmovable. And I had won, but not before I lost control. Lost myself deep into a fit of rage where I could hardly recognize myself. Anger, I realized long ago, is not my natural state. I get sick with it after even a short time. Those retched moments when rage takes over the entirety my mind are some of the worst in my life.

            I’m still not sure why we humans have never found a better way to deal with anger. We have two options: To bottle it up or to let it out. And the former always eventually leads to the latter. In my life, I’ve managed to avoid anger all together. I stray from conflict, do not work with people I dislike, avoid restricting my ability to get out of any contract or dedication. But I can’t always hide from it, and I suppose that’s why I was standing in the middle of my backyard that Friday evening in March trying to unscrew a bolt that I was convinced was my very worst enemy. I was trying to untighten something much deeper, much darker, something I don’t think I, or most people, ever have the depth to deal with. It seemed the only way out was to fall back on the imperfect methods of my ancestors, and for the time being, I decided that was alright.

Even I, with scales on my eyes and large, heavy headphones pressed tightly against my ears, can see that this three week conversation has died out, although I have made every attempt to keep it burning.
Even I, with my nose bleeding, and my heart bleeding, and my soul dripping some strange, red liquid, know that this has run its course, which, coincidentally, was directly into an iceberg which I never saw. An iceburg that only exists in your eyes, yet this ship sailed, serene, into it, with no word of warning from your lips.
Even I, with guts spilled out, in the street, in front of your house, spelling your name, must aknowledge the fleeting nature of the situation. I guess.
Even I, with next to no knowledge of myself, know that I am lying.
But they are lies that I must eat with the eagerness of starving foxes - for that is what I am now. I am made of lies and paw-prints in the vacant lot, near the abandoned sugar factory, that place I still believe is haunted, to this day. Maybe it houses my ghosts.
But after my dinner of hollow lies, I am left famished still, even though I choked down one too many, coughing, and gasping for air, as if I were drowning in my own falsities. After my unsatisfying meal, I only want one dessert: A cigarette and an answer. But only one is possible, and I have already made my choice. The pull of Nicotine is much stronger than that of closure. So I don't really need it.
I am a blind man, who has wandered onto the train tracks, far outside of town, where the iron horses can really run. In the city (or something that may only resembe a city,) they prance. On display. "Look at my tall, graffitti-stained walls. See my beautiful face of cow-catcher grin and headlamp, cyclops eye."
I made my picnic on the tracks, thinking they were a bench. I guess that was a bad idea. And my reanimated corpse agrees, as it trusts that another train is still far away and stumbles about, picking up lost pieces.
I should build a house here. I really don't mind rebuilding, and the trainwrecks ain't so bad...
All in retrospect, friend.

Your memories creep back into my mind
Their persistence is unyielding
Not a single day has passed that I don't think about you
I'm drowning in the lack of your presence
This longing for you wont go away
This unsatisfying, empty feeling
But I'm only trapping myself
Its time that I crawl out of this darkness
Open my eyes to the light
Stop hiding behind superficial happiness
Because I lack the real thing
I don't feel anything
I'm completely isolated
I stray away from everyone
Including myself
I don't even know who I am anymore
If I even am someone
If I ever was someone

Self Righteous indignation, separation, and a flare for othering

the man who strove to bridge the gap between himself and the world

made himself an island to be safe from the chaotic trade winds

Here, he felt, hell, he felt stronger than he was accustomed to

but this only tempered his approach

kept his destructive tendencies at bay

and filled his time

His ennui and his thirst for consequence

His self deprecation, his lust for power, his empathy unbidden

He knew of his own privilege, he knew other's pain was greater than his

He knew other's success, and had tasted glory in doses unsatisfying

He was meant to be satisfied with stagnation

and was tailored to disapprove of the play by play

but was forced to place bets on the rat race

and to have his mind occupied by symbolism

while he realized the cross was only two lines placed adjacently

He was forced to explain to his lover, what love means, and how to believe

What it meant, how it was, and why it was held in such high regard

He comforted an ailing cherub, watered her roots with his own excretions

For in appeasing her, he cut into himself

All he wanted was to be big enough, to cut himself down enough

that when he gave of himself, he could give what would have been his all

while still holding on to what could be all he was.

self-inflicted incompetence
brought on by a life
of misunderstanding, misuse
sabotaged by my own mind
with this unsettling gut feeling
will i ever be good enough
or will i be discarded
as a broken unsatisfying machine
tell me the truth
that will cut to the core
for deceptive sentiments
cause self doubt to boil
beneath my skin
am i not a man
or fated to be relegated
to boyhood status
unable to quench the most
basic natural demands
a failure at heart
a selfish lover
eating away at my conscious soul

i know you love me
im just paranoid as all hell
we're only human

Suffocation; the torture of life without breath
Debt; the torture of being trapped without way of getting out

We signed away our souls and our very livelihoods
So that we might find treasures deep into the earth
In vain we gave ourselves to this cause
We became bankrupted and we became slaves to our toil
We inhaled our work and it poisoned our bodies
We owed our souls to the company for which we worked

We dig deep into the earth
In search of ancient treasures formed long long ago
Seeking to find riches beyond belief and beyond compare
Beginning a noble crusade for good things
But then continuing on to become a misadventure where there is little redemption
Oh what an ignorant odyssey we had begun!

In a manmade cavern, we dig for riches
Our faces becoming covered with black soot
As we invest into the dreams of the treasures for which we dig
And yet then further and further falling into debt
Until we are not only suffocated merely by the soot of coal but also by our debts
And as if the danger of this mine were not enough before the the mines began to fall onto our very heads

We toil for years upon years in this dark mine of coal
Losing all we knew and all we were for the sake of unsatisfying treasure
Our friends die day after day suffocated by the matter of our toil
We inhale our work and our lungs become so filled and poisoned with the soot of the coal
Many could no longer breathe or bear the pain of the poison in their lungs
And then they die in the depths of the dark caves searching for treasure in vain

Not knowing we had signed a death wish
To toil deep into the depths of the mantle of the earth searching for forsaken treasure
Believing that we were searching for good things
That we truly were in the midst of a noble crusade
Not even knowing of the reality in which we stood
That there truly was a terrible hell in which we were living

To this point we knew not of the soot slowly suffocating our lungs
And we knew not of the blood pouring out of our wounds
We knew not of the utter blackness that covered our faces
Or that no oxygen flowed to our ever so needy lungs
We knew only of the importance of our mission
And the necessity to find the treasures for which we were sent out

But the reality of this deep and dark quarry was a hell never before known
And the unknown need of fresh air was as heavy as a newborns need for his mother's milk
Yet we knew not of the need for fresh air
For our eyes were set on the prize
To mine the treasure for which we had so long toiled
And we forgot of our need to live and seek good things

Not knowing the depths of our manmade cavern and our lostness
Our faces so covered with dried soot and blood
Longing for new air to freshen our dying lungs
And longing for Holy Water to wash clean our coal-filled and coal-covered bodies
Yet we knew not any of this
And we knew not of the depths of our pain and our suffering

Yet then one day we break through the surface of the earth
We see the light of the sun, and we see good things
The light of day shines onto us
And a cool breeze blows onto our faces
Then we take a collective breath of the new air
A breath of fresh air more satisfying than a thousand breaths in the depths of the horrid coal mine

We see something we had not seen in years, freedom
And as our eyes set upon the world which we had nearly forgotten
We see the beauty that we had indeed forgotten
We realize the hell that we had clearly been enduring
And in a moment it all becomes clearer than ever before
The treasure of the coal mine had so deceived our hearts and our judgement and our very sanity

For we knew not of the depth and gravity of the terror of the hell we were in
We thought we were simply searching for gold, but we had truly sold our souls
Digging deep into the depths of the planet toward the core
And we lost ourselves in the darkness and depravity of the shaft
Suffering in blindness and lostness, unable to find any good things
Until finally we found the Light from above

Our debts had been cleared and our bodies had been made new
How sweet the wind was upon our sweaty, soot-covered, bloodied faces as we emerged from the cave
And then we were washed clean of all of our pain and suffering
The blood was washed from our faces, and our wounds were healed
The soot from the thick coal was scrubbed from our flesh, and our poisoned lungs were healed
And we were freed from the terror of our suffering

For out of the depths of the earth with squinted eyes and limp limbs
We emerged into great Light never before seen
And as our eyes adjusted, so did our understanding
The understanding of just how lost we had been
And just how close to death we came with each and every day
But the breath of fresh air, and the sight of new light resurrected us

From the great horror of our past we were healed
And from our ever-growing debts we had been released
We were freed from our self-imprisonment and given new life
And not on our own accord in the slightest
But by the great love of Christ Jesus
For Jesus is our great deliverer

I start with a backhoe, displacing
brain-sized clumps of earth.
A few fickle particles escape
between the imposing metal teeth.

The mechanized bucket clinks
against a rigid texture.
I grab a shovel, bending my spine
to the task at hand.

Pretty soon the shovel only scoops up
unsatisfying fistfuls of dust.
It is cast aside for the broom,
revealing the smooth shape underneath.

A dingy film is spread around
by the coarse fibers of the broom.
I grab my toothbrush, furiously scrubbing
the chrome-plated formation.

Now all passersby
can bite my shiny metal
victory.