psalm for the damned

damned from four onward when i was kicked

out of sunday school for venturing in my

raspy little ragamuffin voice that

animals had souls

spent that whole morning in the courtyard garden 

of camellias star jasmine and gardenias

inhaling a floral scented sermon that spared me the

fire and brimstone that i guess only

holy water could quench

when i got a little older i

lit candle after candle with as many quarters as i could

nick from the change jar above the fridge

just to see the dim glow 

of cheap candles and hope refracted through

the bottoms up ruby glasses

prayer was cylindrical, answers were angles

hell was conjecture and sin was a seesaw

i lost first comfort then faith but

still feel a stitch of pleasure at the cinnamon swirl of church robes

still feel winded when the choir holds a note

still feel vertigo when i hear a pipe organ

still feel soothed by the mossy scritch of the pews

still feel starry when stained glass saturates the sidewalk

still fear devils and honor angels

Masking

Never could fathom change

i like to look back to find how things 

were the same all along

upside-down detective

walking on the ceiling

like only the strange

do along time 

into u, bald head 

is constant

loss too 

if u look at it a certain way 

cutting both ends and digging out 

for tape

scouring the sidewalk for a lost 
lego sleepy dart injector smaller than a pinkie nail

with disaster looming large on the horizon 
your wheels are spinning 
trying to secure a deal that would make any bad feeling disappear 
like the coin in the magic trick your uncle taught you
if we can’t find the sleepy dart can we go to target and get me a new toy right now?
kneeling on the concrete trying to see 
what this bogeyman of disappointment might look like
and if we can look him in the eye
maybe he’d gallop away,
or, like I’ve long feared,
only grow larger
more pestilent

with the rays of my attention shining on him

the knot of you wanting any shred of sadness cleared out

and in your eyes I'm the one for the job

my breath searching down for tree roots

to be the living thing that says

it's so disappointing that we can't find the sleepy dart

like the books and blogs and podcasts say to

when i say it like a flag pole - 

stagnant, heartless

you get enraged

when i tell you of the special toys i lost

(needing to make them up, since they're lost to memory)

your muscles soften

the bogeyman takes a seat on the bench with us

and in the dusk light

i spot the bright yellow sleepy dart on the mat on the porch

Copernicus. A role model for getting it so right, 

but for absolutely missing the point – 

I tripped and scraped my face on omnipresence,

and lay there in a pool of letting-everything-catch-up-to-me. 

 

  

Bournemouth 2

Some local Christians funded the eternal flame,

it never went out, just stood adjacent to the square,

unmathematical in its positioning,

someone new at the party, unsure whether to leave their

wine, amongst all wine, or to tell the host

for fear of seeming empty handed.

The flame itself proved uneternal, but while it

burned, I rallied by it, palpating my jaw,

punched almost over briefly before, I heard

my glasses skitter away, someone new

collected them, the empty glove slid down

through my brain folds engaging whichever bits

as a throbbing expanded my existence,

listen, I hear myself say, just stay awake, go home,

no-one shall know how queasy this makes you feel,

you are subdued, it shows, you are quieted,

go home, stay awake, go home.

Perspective

I am trying to learn something 

about the distance between 

us. On my shoulder 

you placed your hand and 

I mindlessly kissed it. Skin,

yours, strange and somewhat cool,

felt like my skin. Later, 

I crept by the purple house. 

Fourteen blocks could not have been further 

from the truth. Like, driving I see 

Mount Rainier on the southern horizon, 

and she looms larger than 

anything in my life. But 

I’ve climbed her. I have been 

so close to her peak,

I’ve seen her snow sweat 

under late summer heat. 

How impossible. That was 

the same mountain I see now

speeding home, speeding

towards nothing important.