bottled up energy I have forgotten how to burn
staring long at this screen trying to relearn
that nights are for the drifters
and if I am set to be one
as the omens hint at
then it is time to gear up, escape
quicken my feet up to run
and chase the sun

i stare and stare
same old nonsense
that has caused my family’s absence
from my life for seven strange years
organs aching
story never changes

dehydrated, thirsty for writing any page
of that deeper emotion i feel inside
the kind that would like to acknowledge
i am scared of what i know about the truth i am hidden from

stare into my eyes
grab hold of me
to push me to the edge takes far longer to travel
i am not where you can comprehend
i just need you for the battle

this energy never runs out
and too dangerous to stay inside
hardens, thickens, slows my route
hoping something will come along
to make me trust in what I am sure is gone
and to run run run run
until
i tire out
or find a home…

if ever

af

Is it because I look crazy?

Because I put on the first shirt I saw?
Or didn’t tend to my hair
before I left the apartment?

What about the fact that I come here
alone?
That I write, stay quiet and always look around?
Observe?
And always alone?

Perhaps I look like one type of stereotype
but really am a much different one?

What of me exposing my thoughts
quite obviously
quite carefree and naive
to anyone who cares to connect eyes?

Is it because you presume too much of man
and since I am different
I must be worse?
Could you not imagine
I might be better?

Does whatever I am doing and whoever I am
really make me that invisible or unimportant
to you?

All I want is just another cup of coffee.

af

(written with pen on paper, waiting for a refill)

(sit down, order taken)
(staring in silence)
(man approaches, stands at my left)
(begins conversing with bartender)
(minutes away from my medium-rare extra cheese)

Been really well
Shopping, man…this stuff’s expensive
(silence)
Yea, yea…trying something new,
some new stuff.
Life’s been amazing, though
(food arrives…grease gluttony bliss)
(take first bite)

So, yea, I know you might not care
but
this stuff is awesome, so I
HAVE
to tell you about it.
I’ve never tried it, personally,
that’s why I just spent a paycheck on it
but, it’s supposed to get that really
REALLY
deep cleansing, middle intestines shit
and I literally mean shit
(chewing on second bite)

Yea, so, it’s like
this new stuff
I don’t know WHAT the hell it is
but it gets that DEEP gunk out
the sludge stuff
the black shit.
MAN, you feel amazing and awful
when that stuff starts coming out
(staring at third bite…reluctant)

Mind you, like I said,
never tried it
heard from a friend of a friend
that their friend tried it
but
it’s like colored shit that you’re not used to
green, black, milky gray layer –
But it feels AWESOME
clean, empty.
That’s what they say…
when it’s finally over at least
takes a while, though
but HIGH
supposed to feel high as a kite

I am going to start this right after a few beers.
If I’m going to be on the bowl all night
shitting black water
I might as well be drunk, right?
Enjoy it a bit?

(Box and check, please)

af

(written with pen on paper without too much exaggeration)

Heresay, the blue unicorn, turned the corner, spit three times, counted to three then gave her ominous head nod…three times, always ending with that glistening horn presented clean, regardless of the last victim.

Across the way from Heresay, clear through the brush, eyes squinted shut by the sun, Farsighted, the meanest shot gopher of the old, new and yet-to-come wild wests, achieved perfect focus of the mad madam, threatening with her twitches and half-blood horse breathe, ticky-tock tapping on his piece like teeth to wood.

The moment lasted, though, for only that…a moment, because as Farsighted drew on his pristine target, far in the distance through these woods, Heresay also chose that unfortunate moment to exult her hidden secret to apparate, reappearing at the prices location of the tip of Heresay’s barrel in the precise moment the bullet left hurtled from it.

They were both just too quick for their lives.

af

(written with pen on paper, experimenting a bit)

I’ve tried the other ways
I have tried -
the solace silence sublime serenity shit show -
I stare, eat, stare, eat, sleep then stare some more

Chaos

The noise
insanity blistering sound frequencies
against me reverberating like rubber bullets
off these walls

That’s the fucking inspiration, man
Screaming kids, Boisterous old ladies
the Mentally ill on the corner screaming
because he wants his voice to be heard as well

That’s the gerbil wheel that keeps me going
after I sit with my pen
and accidentally drift away

af

(written with pen on paper)

As much as we try
we, as children, get hurt;
we begin by living in a world of purity
make believe is our reality
and it is all as serious as it ever will be
in those young moments;
we are not deficient because of our age
we are tender and wise

whether we are loved by our parents
or ignored
or just simply lied to for our protection
there always occurs something that peels off
that first layer of blind hope
shrouding all of our beliefs
of what the world seems like
and exposes
the corrosion of what the world really is

When we lose naivity for the first time
what we also lose is the memory of
what our minds were like
what our beliefs were like
what the world was like
as a child

As a parent, there is a line:

Forget the actual maturity of your child,
ignore the precious delicateness of their impressionability
and you take the magical late-night dreams from them too soon

Protect them for long into their childhood
too long
and they quickly begin understanding the truth
for themselves, their way
and it errodes through your intentional, well-intentioned lies

Let them raise themselves
with guidance
to open new dreams, new lives
possibilities we never had the chance know

It will never be a perfect life
so
how long should a child believe disneyworld is real
before the truth is learned
and that child becomes the perfect individual
who was meant to be?

af

(written on computer, reading omens)

It burns so horribly
the heart
the esophagus
the stomach is on fire

It sounded so good
then smelled so good
now I am not feeling so good

The indigestion and gas and nausea
edible barbed wire
tearing along the way, down the tube
everywhere inside
making me regret what once tasted
so wonderful

This agony
from consuming
late night drunken pizza
extra garlic extra gluttony extra agony

af

(written in little notebook drunk and in pain)