ake up
empty fist
clenching
cold wet sheets
sweat drenched in sleep
your frantic mind
broke with dawn
like they
break
your back
the slave driving
the endless
gaze
the eyes tiring
hands swollen
from grinding
fat fingers
fumbling
with the pen
you use to
draft your
letter of resignation
writing instrument
keeps slipping
for
there is
no blood coursing
carpel tunnel
leaves numbness
in your extremities
your scars are
forever
the middle class worker
dooomed to
flourish in
mediocracy
houses
cars
kids
family
you are
the top 10 percent
of the bottom 20 something
its the american dream
and you’re its victim

i talk out loud
into empty rooms
that echo
my misguided intentions
return to sender
your response is
non existent
so i write cause no one listens…

i’ve got a flaw
yeah
no one is perfect
so you say
so i hear
so i’ve been told
we’ve all got problems
not that i strive for it
that’s apparent
but it would be nice
to be perfect

now your thinking
whats with
all this whining
i’ve got hangups too
we all do
in that sense
you’re nothing special
flawed and hung up
on nothing
you can mention

whats a lover
whats a friend
these
faded definitions
of what I am
no relation to
any of them

i’m the heaving collapse
you’re the time elapsed
i’m the cold wet earth
you’re the universe
i’m the buoy on the tide
you’re the oceans wake at night
i’m the sand bar that erodes away
just enough for you to stay
you’re the suns warmth
in arms outstreched
with palms drenched
even standing still
you make me sweat
maybe if I pass out
i’ll forget this time
i’m the heaving collapse
you’re the fighting gasp
i’m the cold wet earth
and you’re my universe

you sat in your space
i spun in the chair
will I go fast enough
establishing equilibrium
so it won’t be my head
doing the spinning
maybe I’m thinking
maybe we’re not
this theory’s not proven
and looks like…
science is winning
so maybe i’ll stop.

yeah i’m thinking
while you’re resting
shadows collecting
the silhouettes projection
catching your breath and
covered in sweat
with arms out-stretching
i put my hand in yours
and you shy away
not just from my side
but up the coastline

now you’re thinking
maybe he’ll stop thinking
gasping for breath and
find another something

box me in
contact
my next of kin
toe tagged
body bagged
on the outside now
looking in
funny how things
at least somethings
work like that
you’ll never grow
accustomed to it
trust me
cause I haven’t
living the failure
hesitant.

little flecks
dots and specks
intricately assembled
paternally resembled
dark or pale
our organic chain mail
keeps us together
shields the weather
mother natures armor
flesh to the charmer
its how we recognize such
things as a cool breeze or a warm touch
of lips and fingers
teeth and stingers
pain or comfort
which ever it is…
that comes first

trapped in the throws
of prose
the curse
of verse
from nose
to toes
from sky
to earth
over bridged gaps
and tapped synapses
wired shut
cleared and cut
mouthing sentences
with vague references
mourning words
more than life
burying thoughts
like resentments
lost love entitlements
harbored away
where they’ll never be missed
on the internet
the vast emptiness
of images and text
i say its
better to waste kilobits
than sheets of paper
with this shit

times elapses with turing hands
or grains of sand
watch faces
clock races
blank spaces
the thought that erases
its time to
transfer my energy
to somewhere its more needed

i don’t pick up on signals,
in fact i’m quite terrible.
at reading people in general.
this serves me no benefit,
i guess thats it.
its whats make this mess.

second guessing,
facial expressions,
parsing information,
for your submission,
in the present syntax,
its hard finding a match,

if i can’t read your eyes,
i might as well be blind.
since i don’t pick up on signals,
in fact i’m quite terrible.
at reading you.

stumble once
and you’ll recover
make it a pattern
and you’ll discover
trust
is like an envelope
never the same
once the seals been broke
thoughts can slip
when they’re meant to halt
even those
taken with a grain of salt
they can’t say
what we want to hear
we’re uncertain
cause the words aren’t clear
it doesn’t matter
when it doesn’t make sense
past, present
or in the future tense