Insight on to human nature, after a scenic drive in Michigan

It's a simple act,
some trees do it with prompting
by weather and many seasons,
other trees don't need any reason,
they'd rather just not be rooted down.

Roots begin to dry,
soil becomes loose,
and gravity takes control,
a care free,
gentle smile sort of free fall
and luckily no one is there to watch
or to judge.

Sometimes trees fall
when they had nothing there to hold them up
Other times trees will fall
simply because they're tired of standing.

Death Overture I

After a fresh, deep, skin toughening sunburn
I spend the night shivering and vomiting,
Imagining that this is the onset of the illness;
the composition of death.

How would I look with no hair?
Should I shave my head now to test the fashion?
My personality is too morbid sometimes.
Always waiting for the end.

I’m so beautiful and young,
They say to me,
Apparently I’m desperately alive

Never seen such a classic beauty
Drown so fast,
Dry cement around her own feet,
Jumping off the boat.

Too pretty to die early,
Doesn’t exist.
Some of us run toward it.

Looking for Leftovers

Parents have become more organized,
nothing left behind,
entrails of an afternoon well spent
with small children who absent mindedly
drop shovels, buckets, toys and float

an absence of toys feels unnatural
knowing that a child was here digging this hole;

have you ever been in a home with children
that had no toys, no color, no semblence
that a kid existed?

it feels hollow.
like that they're waiting for the child to die
or hoping.

Brother

I used to love you
when you would make me laugh
at saturday morning cartoons;
I could look at you at the dawn
summer morning and think
"You're my hero
you'll never change
will you?"

Now I love you
simply because you are my brother;
that if I didn't love you
I'm afriad no one would
and you deserve more than that.

So hard to look at you
imagining how I used to look up to you
see the clear summer sky;
now who are you, drunk driver?
wife hater.
daughter neglector.

I just didn't recognize you
because you weren't looking at me
and you resemble someone who's lost
unwilling, hesitant, embarrassed
by the prospect of being alive.

My love for you is barely there,
but what little I have left
is in a vile, a small label
with your first and last name
social security number
and blood type.

Keep Your Promises

With this light shining on my face,
I feel embarrassed that you might see my grin.
And I don't ever want you to think there might be
any semblance of you in my happiness,

because there's plenty.

I read my poetry to you, allow you to see the words
because I love you, but I promised myself
I wouldn't fall in to that pit again--
so I let you read my poetry because

you mean nothing to me.

I'm okay with all of these contradictions
but we'll need to make a hefty deal
with a contract littered with legal terms
that I promise not to run away again

& you promise never to let on.

Without Them

People say not to write about clouds,
but these were thing and scrawled across the night sky
while I drove down the interstate
racing against every other car to get back
to you.
These clouds were scripted in Arabic
quite beautiful and isolated in the sky
I read them right to left finding
they knew my truth, too.

Writers frown when mentioning love
but I sat in the chair and stared at tree tops
and you built that fire for me;
starting off small and by the time I refocused
it was huge, hellacious.
The people who said you didn't love me
were liars
and thieves.
Never listen to marauders.

We don't have to talk,
just be near me.
You don't have to entertain
in fact, I want to be alone--
but I mean,
the others have to go--
you should stay
I want to undress with you.

This side of the fire is phenomenal
as I work the teeth out of a deer jaw bone
and you stare skeptically waiting for me
to be mischevious.
So it's true that you don't trust me?
I trust you.
What do the clouds tell you?
You can read them if you try,
and I think you know the truth anyway.

(Compost Heap, 2010. RD)

The Subtleties of Coexistence

I choose to take the trash out in the abandoned dark
of night,
I flip the horizontal switch above the sink in the bathroom
to wash my face,
dishes need to be done, but the sponge is dry and breaking apart
in the scummy sink,
crumbs and twist-ties litter the coffee table
in the living room,
the bedroom fans are caked with gray dust.

I think I can love him,
this time.

On my knees,
scrubbing the shower floor, it's 3AM
this is what I do.
I haven't been able to sleep since he started
the graveyard shift,
so I feel trapped in the graveyard.
So much commiseration and arguments,

honey, don't worry
it's okay, I promise.

Yellowing, the refrigerator door sucks shut
my bare feet stick to the hardwood floors
I want a tuna sandwich
and I can hear the young couple sleeping behind the
kitchen wall,
feet apart,
full bed,
it's hit them already,
their nights crawl on,
what a shame.

Our bed is large and I can't get close enough,
scooting and scooting him to the edge of the bed
until he wakes up and mumbles,
"Look at all the bed behind you."

Getting accustomed to this life?
Sure, I guess.
This time, it's different
I'm willing to hold on to it with both hands
until my knuckles are not only white
but bursting from the thin film of skin around the

it's only skin,
seems worth it to me.

our existence is complimentary,
even the empty Star Wars action figure boxes
until the edge of my bed,
my jewelry on his side table,
his mail on my desk,
my poetry laying on top of his record player.

it all makes sense, suddenly
on the front porch along the highway
on the hottest night of the summer, yet.

we are only skin and bones now
and if we hold on tight enough
we can burst through all of this
and it's all worth it to me
how gently i can say this to you
with compassion and admiration in my voice.

True, it's only a voice
one that you've heard before
but there's beauty in recycling
the voice of a lover.

(The Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Daily Chores

A list of things to do,
idly waiting on the scuffed coffee table.
It's not the chores that make it hard to breathe,
the prospect of another day devoted to maintenance.

Sure, I discredit other people for their happiness
as simple as the fact
written in plain script at the top of a white page
that I have very little of my own.

[I have spent too long searching for improvement
routine oil changes in my life
to find that, come winter
I am this dull, this laden with guilt
this disguised by the grin on my face
as I greet customers as work,
"How may I help you?" is code for
"Who the hell let you in."
Savages.

Perhaps this cynicism has been brewing
filing suits against me my entire life
and this is the first time I've had enough courage
to unleash the beast.]

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Clutch

After a war,
despite the sun rising through gun smoke
everyone wears dark colors.

I have begun to pull my hair out
one kinky, gnarled strand at a time
because I am forcing my brain to comprehend
what it was not created to do.

Forcing neurons to fire
and receive orders
that are so foreign
I can feel the sparks flying jaggedly
through gray matter.

It hurts in a novel way,
dull, pressure, motion sickness;
but others will label it
PTSD;
preferred to sustain dignity
passing through scenic destruction
pretty thoughts shot dead,

and it was so beautiful,
is what I had to tell myself
otherwise
I'd still be crying,
I refuse to be human anymore.

(Compost Heap, 2010.)

Almost Perfect Before Death

It had just started, the motion
of his head turning to mine,
his eye lid, the one I could see,
covering my favorite eye.

Before he even spoke,
I lost him.

Heart stopped suddenly
and every day I mourn the loss
of a perfect phrase.

Twenty-seven years, I just wanted to hear it
had he opened his lips a moment sooner,
was always my rationalization.
I'm sure he would've said it to me then.

Hospital Room With the Bay Window

So odd, you died with such dignity
though saliva dribbled out of your lips.
I thought your dry heaving, stale breaths
and thick, stewy vomit would make you less appealing,

I wanted to have sex with you then.

Laying there alone, you needed someone
to lay with you, kiss the corner of your mouth
stroke your jawline, show you how alive you still are
until the last moment.

More over, there's something erotic in death
if not the simple fact that it's startling to watch
an entire life come to a halt.
What else could I offer?

I told you about a dream from the night before
about the road on the edge of town
that smells like stale inner-factory walls
but sounds like freedom in June.

Your slow gazing eyes, contently cruising my face
it's not that you're ready to go
but that you're not in control anymore
and three years of this has turned you into a husk.

No one is holding you, they've all gone home.
I'll hold you because I am also a husk by life.
Hiding my tears behind your gently shut lips--
I guess I could sing in a time like this,
there's a window to look out of, as well.

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Erotica

To consol myself,
I pass homes of unknown people
and convince myself that they were allowed to live
so why wouldn't I survive?

Headlights of racing vehicles infront of me
match the glowing, evil eyes of the sunset looming over mountains
and blend in, all smudged.
I begin to fret endlessly--
Will I too blend in to the aftermath?
Just become another piece of metal and rubbish and muscle
and teeth and gravel and skull?

The cliffs aren't sleeping,
the steep drop off isn't amazing,
these are predators that we're admiring.

Climbing the mountain
I grind against the edges of the road
taunting death with sexy whispers,
"How do you want to fuck me?
Hit it from behind?"

There's only one way to cope,
and that's to drive death crazy with sex.

Each home erected as a monument
to the life lived there;
I'm naive and in awe,
"They were allowed to live..."

If the car flips and my lover's neck snaps
I'll die in desperate shock
my tank top sticky and dense with blood
I'll lay over him and tell him it's okay
although clearly one of us is dead.

A catastrophe on the mountain
is a picture of two possessed cars racing head on
a grizzling explosion as they intertwine.

Brilliant,
I heard you calling, death;
Full speed ahead.

(Compost Heap, 2010.)

Paper Lungs

Centuries now, that this story has passed
dribbled of the cracked, bleeding lips
bile stinging the open sores of
my people.
God has never set foot in this part of the country
never looked into financing a home
never enrolled his chidlren in our ruins of a school system.

He took one look at our skeletons
at our cracked teeth
and vowed never to put his family through this again,
then he got the hell out of this cesspool of gargling delirium.

It was only hours ago that I truly felt his absence,
in the stale air that I find so refreshing;
I took a staggering breath and regretted it immediately
ten thousand morbid realizations
but one floated dead to the surface of my swampy brain:
I have been alotted so many breaths,
and I've been wasting them.

Doctors explained that my lungs are the worst they've ever seen,
"Two brown withered scraps of tissue paper,
hanging from rusty farm hooks, Ms. Smith
what have you done to your body?"
Self medication of sixty cigarettes daily
and they shake their head.
I ask them if they can prescribe another reason
to get out of bed in the morning
except nagging, digging addiction.

They hand me the prescription as I hop off their table,
and tell me to have a good day,
Yeah... right.

The pharmacist smiles and accepts the note,
quits smiling, exits and reenters with a bible,
eyes my existence.

Yeah... right.

And did you know that churches won't buy bibles
from people who have track marks
or hollow guts
crooked rib cages
itching balls
curly hair
desperation
vulnerability
dark thoughts
curses from their enemies?

So I gave it to them for free
and I saw them toss it into a pile of ratty others,
tall and crawling with maggots
like the piles of filth in our landfills.

No, god never settled here.
I'm only twenty
I shouldn't have this demon on my hip.
The sulphuric bitterness is seeping from my capillaries
and through my pores.
I smell like death,
I carry hints of the cologne from the man
who abandoned the worst of me
and he's only a man.

This ward wreaks of the illness.

Lansing, Michigan

Some person with their doctorate,
packaged in a camel colored turtleneck
might explain how silence is not a noise;

however, in my desperation, this silence screams
something bloody and wretched, fleshy and choking
more alarming that the sirens of war demanding evacuation.
In this desperation, I sit in a dark hotel room
the deafening lack of noise
floods my brain with a blackening paranoia.

In another's quaint home with soft yellow flower walls,
the late afternoon sunlight streams through bleached white curtains--
this dream keeps me awake. I turn the TV on and press Mute.
I don't need noise. The Silence is speaking.

The woman with a one room house in the inner city,
she's seen everything
quit fighting for justice immediately.
She's skeptical of me,
I'm too naive for her life.

This idea that America's purchased from high-rise, chrome corporates--
How man more can we sell before the morning comes, before the race ends,
before the noise erupts and silence doesn't not control the masses,
keeping us wandering aimlessly and in awe of your wonder, Oh Lord?

Our mouths are dry, we're begging for water at the door of some person
and for those of us who've heard the gospel
we're hoping this man is Jesus.
There's rumors that he is a gentle man.
The rumors are unspoken.

Unimpressed, but he's convinced himself;
his bored glances, he's tired of philanthropy,
shows us to the water hose,
he doesn't speak,
but we're so grateful it's humiliating.

Not a whimper.

I thought I heard the phone ring,
the way hotel phones startle you into answering,
I'm dying from exhaustion and it was a hallucination.
Hoping one person might call, but who would do that?
We're all in this show of pain, different motives
different tickets, different venues
we're vending trying to be seen.

Shooting prayers up like rockets for a noise
as concrete as screaming mothers as their sons
shot in cross fire, screams like wombs dropping,
a wailing that would impress you, sir
in your turtle neck.

You may not agree with my rationalizations,
but that does not exist here.
simple sensations, and suddenly you're captured.

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Snatch

you can rinse the blood away with a stream of piss,
she explained to herself.
she didn't expect to feel it slide out;
thick and tough,
she thought briefly about how it might burst
if pinched between her thumb and forefinger.
she didn't expect to spread her doughy thighs
to watch it glide down the white porceline bowl
and sink helplessly to the bottom of the toilet water.
it hadn't time to learn how to swim.

It didn't seem right to her,
all of the other women in the bathroom had no idea,
they swarmed around her stall,
heels forcing corporate, dignified sounds on the tile,
making their meetings on time,
wiping themselves from front to back,
inserting tampons,
washing their hands and straightening their skirts...

How did they earn it?
They were allowed to be so
DAMN
PRETTY.
She's never been that pretty.

Staring past her tuft of untamed pubic hair,
legs spread tensely, feet pointed; more a workhorse
than a dancer
she feels apelike in her false birth;
her bloody clot drowning in a toilet, what would've been an eye
shaping up it's mother,
a few faint blood vessels...
a clot is all.

maneuvering her labia, she instinctually squirts a stream of hot yellow piss
erasing the streak of light pink blood, entrails & evidence
from the shimmering white.

automatic flush when she stands up
by the time she turns around she realizes it's been snatched away from her

From now on, she vows, from now on
I will be numb to this shit,
I will be terse.

(Compost Heap, 2010)

Womb Harvest

It began when women plucked their wombs
from their abdomens
like choosing the fattest, juciest chicken
for slaughter
leaving us hollow and dry.

Oh tomorrow is endless,
and the children are so distraught and furious,
adults are staying indoors with canned food,
supplies of primitive survival,
awaiting the rapes and monstracities
after nightfall.

An ironic scene,
the sun is so pleasantly bright
the smell of spring and pine in the air
while I lay silently
giving in as the children rape me.

The girl scouts had knocked on the door,
I didn't see the one behind the corner,
with the recorder,
until the freckled one in front
began to lick her lips,
then they pounced.

I'm a hollow one, you see... empty,
I echo for some sort of control,
and I couldn't help but notice
how beautiful the day was
while little hips brandished sloppy strap ons
and fucking me into my brain.

I have to cry,
we quit peddling innocence the same way
we forfeited our womanhood,
folding it up in our dejected,
limp, withered wombs
and tossed them into the alley
like old, nasty rags after surgery.

The stench brough perverts
and of course, flies.

The children know everything now,
and they're looking for a better fuck,
tighter cunts
fatter asses
bigger tits
and you're royalty.
anything else,
and you're rotting meat,
useless in the eyes of babes.

(Compost Heap, 2010)

Rough You Up

How'd it feel to have someone help
chew your food;
by that I mean, when I slammed your jaw shut
and you have your words between your teeth,
how did it feel to be taught a lesson?

Your words crumbled like tin cans in the grips
of a trash compactor stained by shit
over the years, and no one had enough balls
to clean it.

I told you specifically,
"One more fucking time,
I swear to god, I'll show you."

You ask how I can hurt you so bad
but I made that promise
and followed through in the form of an upper cut
designed perfectly for your face
and when it's time to bleed, hold your head back
and look at me,

and when it's time to hold your swollen,
toothless mouth,
do it in remembrance of me.

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Ambulatory

Hey crazy, where ya been?
It used to be a numbers game
trying to see how many
before you realized you weren't numb anymore.

How many did it take?
Before you realized you were still dead
and no one could resurrect you
make you holy, make you erect,
make you come,
how many did it take before you gave in

& killed it?

The numbers are higher now
the stakes more shocking

thirty-seven strong,
haven't come in years,
still clean,
no diseases forcing you to stop

Good morning, crazy--
frustrated yet?

you've spent years constructing injuries
that keep you from getting hard
while vaginas wither
weep, lilt, just begging you to
FUCKING STOP

because it's been hours now,
and you sit still in your dark room
smoking, doting, fidgeting

thinking, maybe the next one
"I just need to try one more."

the lamp next to you isn't bright enough
and you barely passed your college courses
the apartment kind of smells like piss
and you are so thin you leave bruises against thighs
from leaning into them

couldn't life be bright and shining?
the carpet is shag,
and maybe next time you'll come.

(Compost Heap, 2010)

Word Night

The hug you pulled me into several weeks ago,
while I stood, you sat in your chair
you lifted my shirt, pressed your cheek to my stomach
and just held me there
I realized
that you missed me
a revelation that you never wanted me to walk away
as you sat memorizing the reality of your face
against my skin
...and there we were again
silently, more in love than ever before.
Shit, baby.... I don't know how I feel about this except,
you are my earth. You don't keep me grounded
but you spin underneath of my feet
it's so grand and unfathomable that I don't realize
the power
it moves me to silence

our path is unmarked
still finding our way

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Born of the Left

The girl isn't that bold
born of the left ovary
the right had exploded several years prior
when a much more exalted sibling erupted
through an ectopic pregnancy.

there are nights when the girls silently remembers
her mother sitting on the couch
comically crooning,
"And I don't even remember when I was your age."

but the girl remembers feeling wasted
by time and exhaustion and the sheer effort of living
and a time when she became skin and bones of emotion
because there were so many questions to be answered.

"Will you? Do you?"
No, but the girl dreams of crawling back through a gaping
cervix, up the side of the meaty uterus,
nailing through a delicate fallopian
and cuddling softly with the rest of the eggs

lost,
in an ocean of compassionate ovum.

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)

Cloud Cover

You are my foggy night,

driving down the old state route toward the middle of town,
the street lamps are weeping their dirty light,
ugly tears falling on the hood of my car.

The fog is gentle enough to drive on through,
dead moths and pollution mimic cloud coverage.

Street lamps bend forward self consciously
with their yolky light, kissing like filth
but whisper, "If I shine like this,
and you float across my light like that--
maybe they'll actually see us this time."

My blindness was healed,
for once I don't want to go home,
I swear the weather feels like your arms around me,
and it feels like foolishness.

Others are calling this environmental degradation...

I'm still blind,
you're still lost,
no miracles have appeared--

the fog is a napalm mist,
I'm traumatized when I breathe your air,
maybe you'll actually see me tonight,
falling filthy for you.

(Compost Heap, 2010. rd)