In Me For You

And, I will take a picture of your shadow
watch you dance along the wall.
And, I will understand our place in this,
some truth gathered from inference.
This is all that matters, that some fire burns
and it burns in me for you.
and it burns in me for you.
and it burns in me for you.

Now upon the shores of fear I begin to see
something new learned about you.
Now where love banishes old fears I will
go around gathering flower and youth.
This is all I know, that something grows
and it grows in me for you.
and it grows in me for you.
and it grows in me for you.

By Love, and You.

If there, above clouds, there are stars
stuck to their crystalline sphere like
diamonds (repeating their cliche).

If there, where solar winds buffet
the atmosphere, and tear away,
eating oxygen and magnetosphere.

If there, man passes on his way,
a doorway, and stopping point
a danger, a place to jump from.

Sing me this song, let me know.
I am as amazed by the world
as I am amazed by love, and you.

Dust and Debris

Stir some wind
so you can breathe it in
the dust and debris
of an unused heart

you know fate will take you down
a painful way, you can't avoid

I'm no prophet, but anyone can see
you're lying when you're talking to me
the things you pretend not to be
will kill you eventually

Stir some wind
so you can breathe it in
the dust and debris
of an unused heart

like the better parts of a book
I read you over and over again

Stir some wind
not a sin if you never
miss the mark

A Husband

Lets run away, the night is young
and we can compose songs, too.
Walk down the isle in our minds
be married a hundred thousand times.

And, then I'll sing the songs to you,
lyrics I composed when asleep
dreaming of how it feels
to be with you.

Oh, I know life is never as it seems,
but it seems not to matter when I'm
with you.

Like a silver ring, upon my hand
I'll wear it a thousand days,
I don't mind if we are poor,
as long as I get to wake up next to you.

Oh, and this is never as I imagined.
They forgot to teach me how to treat
a husband.

Somebody Wants to Fly

Never wanted to be a bird
scared to fall from such great heights
Don't you know Icarus fell?
And, now trying to escape won't work.

It's painful to be a sparrow
when songs don't come easy.
I should know, my wax wings
never cooled from the heat.

And, there's a song in all of this.
Something about life in a cage
and the monsters behind the bars
might just be you.

Nothing like falling to let you know
you're human and gonna rise again
like getting love from a stone,
you'll never get farther than that.

So, sing about your blackbirds.
Somebody wants to fly.

Shape of You

don't want to hold a hand
that won't grab mine back
don't want to be a friend
who won't have your back
don't want to change my life
just to change it back

and somehow with you
I know nothing could be
farther from the truth
here we're different

now the world won't back down
I know I've changed things however simple
at the heart of my heart you appear
and life, the best thing I've ever had
could be in the shape of you

not afraid
of a new life
in the shape of you

Drank Your Wine

I breathed your smoke
knew your ghost,
what an angry spirit.
Drank your wine,
knew at the time,
and it was all a lie.

How did the dark
touch my heart
when it's not gold.

If this is a test
I should've asked
for all you knew.
Things you told
we all knew untrue
but let you speak.

How did the dark
touch my heart
when it's not gold.

I breathed your smoke
like heat from a stone
after the sun set
Drank your wine,
knew at the time.
I loved every lie.

Coming of Age

Keep your body turning blue.
Love is something you only lose,
until some change in the night
you don't know how, but it finds
everything you never knew
you wanted and gives you another
chance at making yourself
something greater than the sum
of all the things your mother said
would do you in, again and again.

Now, I'm coming of age.
After a few trips to a place where
no one knows how to be without
pills and therapists, you never know
what you're missing til you do with
everything, I think you'll find.

And, it's better now that I'm alive.
Wanted to take so many pills
I'd wake up in 1955, but I find
there's nothing quite like this place.

Now, I'm coming of age.
And the money makes the world different.
I don't forget where you signed
away a soul I never knew I owned.
It's better this way especially today
singing along with Etta James.
At last, at last.

Stone Half Heart

Half a heart and saving for
the other piece I'm trying to
find to replace the empty places
deep where I don't admit to being
incomplete, you'll know when you
ask me.

I'll never let you know that things are
never as they seem to be when I'm
singing like a sparrow caged amidst
the lilies like some Christ that hasn't
been born or sold for silver, yet.

And all the world you can see has
nothing left for those of us who dream
when there's a heart of stone waiting
for us to offer up some blood.

I know you won't see the ways
I've bent a thousand times like
strong trees in the wind.

Summer Demise

You never said "It's all changing"
love into a nightmare
living every moment afraid.
I wish I'd known before
all the things I'd have to face.

And, someone let me know
your blue-black dreams have
teeth and claws, your last
request to be torn apart.

How about some solace?
Soar like a heart without weights.
Weighting on the baggage
not in the compartments of my heart.

Winter is the only time we'd have,
I used to believe in seasons
but know better in a summer demise.
You were the last of the painful loves,
I've no doubt about that now.

Lotus Eating

I tried to call,
but your phone
wasn't on.
It's all right
at least for tonight.

I tried to write,
but the pigeon
was gone.
It's all wrong,
at least for tonight.

Living on candlelight.
Lotus eating, like
ancient stories.
And your heart,
something to break mine on.

I tried to forget,
but your face
wouldn't go.
It's all right.
I got a light.
Smoking you away
until dawn.

Living on candlelight.
Lotus eating, like
ancient stories.
And your heart,
something to break mine on.

Bad Alchemy

You missed the ting
and could not understand
the gold turned to silver
all in your hand in the space of a night
your voice turned too loud
for the rest of us to comprehend.

I know, I know, I've been there
before, when the wolves were less feral
and the rest of the forest forgave
all your strange movements in the dark.

But, things have changed,
and I can only say I'm sorry
that you've died for the thousandth time.

Lofty, Vaulted Arch

Float upon the water, lover.
Let us enter the temple, slowly.
And, then, we shall see the stars.
The lofty, vaulted arch
will give witness to us.
We shall circle each other,
in patterns like the stars,
but, we shall touch,
we shall know the feel
of each other's skin
(and within, within!).

Black Lung Moonlight

Black lung moonlight
hung around like fog.
A bad moon above
your perfect smile.

I'm not drunk off your spell.
At least not tonight,
when I'm at my best.

Half-heart smiling
see now so clear.
The picture better
only in my mind.

Not dead, maybe immune.
To charms I thought
you'd lost.

Machinations

Though at first with hesitation,
Recent history whispering said,
"Live, fear abandoned."
Not the words, I thought or felt.

You know some things are left uncertain.
And, good that god made it so,
For, uncertainty is the soul of this titillation,
Renewed vigor the fruit it bears.

I only know hope for love,
All other things too quickly come to pass.
And, we the objects of Cupid's machinations,
We dance our fools dance til he says we're done.

Helium Balloon

There was a time when everything I wrote
let out an emotion I had not expressed before.
There was relief, a feeling of sending off
a helium balloon into the sky like some
low-tech Voyager satellite out of the solar system.

Have emotions grown heavier?  I don't know.
But, it feels like nothing I write takes the weight off.
I want to write an opus, I want to free the entire
inner world that I can only give you glimpses of.

I think I see a future where I have changed the world.
I think I see that opus I want to write outside of me,
and that has changed me more than it has changed the world.

Soon enough, we will know.  The future is not far.

Ricochet

it was beautiful
not like you
but maybe your mother
would understand

and you changed it.
I lost it somewhere
between stolen
puffs on your cigarette

make up a new name
just the sort so you
never stay  the same
like the zombies
make you their king

and it's hurting like you
never thought it would hurt
when you're firing a gun
the bullets always ricochet

I guess you didn't know
not to cut your hair
we're all watching the weight
of the world you can't seem to bare

I'm not out to get or kill you
not yet, but eventually they'll
come and take more than your car away.

All These Houses

All these houses, row upon row upon row.
Places, barely suburban, where people,
and all those strange little things they own,
sleep and, eat, and pee, and LIVE.

All these houses, row upon row upon row.
They are like mouse traps, once you're in
you're in for life, I feel like maybe we are
only the homes we inhabit.  I wonder.

Old Love (Shores)

The flotsam of old love
washed upon the shores
of my heart.  Strange,
that memories do not drown
after all the years they
sit there in the water
of my memory, my soul.

Some reason comes,
I suppose, to distract,
and I touch the something
that sends chills.
It must be some part of me
that is now his.
To reclaim, or let sit there?

I work near.
I live near.
He doesn't even know.
Unbound by the light years
between any two hearts.
Closer than I shall ever tell.

Whole Tapestry

Not sure if it's just a thread,
or, the whole tapestry of
pathos, determined pain,
a measured cost I paid.

And, I'm the only one measuring
all the little things, double entry
and I have to wonder if I should
have ever made the first one.
I used to think it was worth it to love.


I don't know any more
if my math comes out even
when a heart is involved,
broken calculus could
make this all feel better.


Maybe I'll just go back to writing
half-hearted love letters, the kind
you'd wonder if it would ever be sent,
and I'd hold on to them for
the rest of eternity.

Not Much Anymore

Well, I don't miss you much anymore
cutting ties like wrists and push ups
are just there to bleed the poison
from my limbs faster then light
travels from my heart to my bed.

Well, I changed my world one night
and you were never in or out with
or without a fight, so I guess I know
the answer to meant-to-be questions
that I used to think I was done with.

I wonder when will you bleed?
For all the wrong that you've done?
I wonder when will you see?
More to the world then what we've been.

It took a fist full of nights, good luck,
bad drugs, and a fighting heart to get
me past all the bullshit and pain that came
down from loving you like rain. Still
I don't know if I'll ever be done.

So, get me high enough that I can't feel
anymore.  I guess you tried when we
were something more complicated
like sticks and stones and throwing
my heart into the night of your love.

Fooling Myself

And, so I guess we're dead.
And, it's taken months.
Or, has it been years?
My heart doesn't know.
Keeping time in beats
that never seem to slow.
I don't think I ever imagined
blindness the way you presented.
I don't think I ever thought
this could have been me.

The very thought of love being
such a lie, the way you presented
everything you thought you wanted
is the antithesis of my life.
Here, where trust is the basis of everything
I have ever done, hope being
the only light to guide me and you
don't see the light the same way.

I loved you even when I knew I was wrong.
I loved you despite everything I had proof of.
I do not regret that love, only the fooling myself.

Love Inspired Words

Lately I've wondered why
love inspires words that aren't
so complimentary, anymore.
Words like fear and pain,
and phrases like, "Fuck you."
instead of soft words and
caresses on warm skin.
It seems to me that when
I wrote of light years and
of passions that move the
stars to take notice, I was
meaning only young-man-lusty-things,
things that do not last,
things that grow in the dark of
not-being-yourself,
things that only seem to change
not the eternal this-is-what-we-live for.

I was afraid what writing these words would bring.
More afraid of the consequence of others seeing
me as a broken man, when I'm fine
(maybe a bit angry)
and I'm free again of excess weight.
Every day I clip a cord that tied me to him.
If I ever knew passion in his kiss,
I do not now remember it.

Not Babel

And, so I was right.
Though in the middle
I would not assign us
a half life.

But, not dreams of
despair, ending, hoping
like I thought I'd have.

If you were really Babel,
I'd be dying today.
Unable to say why.
I don't mind you gone.

This is a different universe.
I can build castles in clouds.
And, I move mountains
and build ladders
getting to them.

My heart is free.
For the first time in years.

Eye-to-Heart

All that want could summon,
in that place where you do not
see eye-to-heart with all of your life
I found some little piece of freedom,
a fleeting light place you cannot hold.

So, I shall cleave the rock and find
a god with no scripture within it.
And, this love I have searched for
in every nature'd corner will
afford some sleep like I've never known.

It makes for better conversation
when you don't know the words
but, I think we'll get by.

And, it changes all your logic
when you forget to sleep
and that's something of which you could die.

I will never be the only one
Reading old poetry.

drinking til I throw up.

No one ever said
you had to know
how to die before
it comes your time.
But, I still think
Sylvia had an idea or two.

I'm still listening to the Suburbs,

we both know that's not where

I'm meant to live when I grow old.

I hope the people who know me

when I live in a big city will see

the same things small town people do in me.

Low, Low, Low.

You could get caught in the wind
or worse, this bad geometry
love triangle I'm fucked up in.
You could get caught up in me.
A good kiss, and never wish
for anything else, I know I can
see the same reflection in
your eyes I saw in theirs.

And, I will leave you low, low, low.
And, I will leave you, you know, know
before the Sun sets on Venus again.

You could take a train, locomotive
and run away cause I'm a bomb
and the fall out could be you.
I could be something nuclear,
you could be something sad dear.
If you choose to stay around.

And, I will leave you low, low, low.
And, I will leave you, you know, know
before the Sun sets on Venus again.

Nothing like here comes the sun
nothing left to burn in me, so run.

Success

I have decided to live in a way in which success is inevitable.  This is the only way to live, for me.  Other people get by living in ways in which they are protected from failure.  I have no problem with the little failures that get in the way, they do not scare me or stop me from moving forward.

When I say success I mean it in so many different facets of life.  Perhaps for most it means monetarily, and that is one piece of it, certainly.  But, there are so many different pieces to life that to focus just on that one just feels short sited.

I want to be successful in love, too.  I want to be able to keep an open heart.  Wiser for my failures - there's no reason to repeat the mistakes of the past or be taken advantage of - but still able to trust and give and receive love.

I want to be successful in friendship.  To have and keep good friends by offering all the kindness in my heart and sharing the bounty I partake of.

It is clear, I have failed in these things in the past, and likely will in the future, but ultimately I will be successful.

Bankrupt

Looking
for a fuck, put
your money
where your mouth is.

Or, I'll go bankrupt
with a hard-on,
still searching for
a man.

I'm still tired
from last year.
It's been ages
and I can't count that high.

Let Heathcliff In

It feels quite peculiar
elegant in some way.
Books about storms
and your bubble breaks
to let Heathcliff in.

It's not the same this time.

The road is well traveled
by all the seasons changing.
Half-hearted love remarks
and you're mostly blind
to literary references.

It's not the same this time.

Is it that you don't need a heart?
Better be all lead and lost than
pretend you never had a part.

And, me I'm of different stock.
I only know nothing changes
when you can't stay the same.

A new name, a sort-of-but-not-really new look, new and different stuff to be posted.

It occurs to me that there are things missing.  Things I think that never get out.  For most people that seems perfectly fine.  I'm sure I could learn to live with it.  But, I don't really want to.  Nor do I have to.

I want to share the strange things I see.  The other night I was at the bar and spent a couple of hours staring at the pool table trying to figure out how to hit one ball and put them all in a pocket. No, seriously, I spend hours on this shit.  Most people suspect this is how my brain works, few people see that it's undeniably true that I am a neurotic half-Jew who should have a room next to the Rain Man some days.

I think I need to get over the narcissism inherent in blogging.  I've never had a problem with being a narcissist before.  It's probably a good thing that I'm worrying about it, even if I'll ignore it.  And, if it annoys me I'll just put some concrete shoes on it and toss it in the river all mafia style.

Some inheritance from Adam
of serotonin flowing like mud
- a craving for a drug.
And, like chromosomes
still seen by science
a microscope, DNA
sequenced in absence of proof
of Hebraic certainties.
I do not know where
this thing comes from.
Or, why I can only take a pill,
spill some wine, feel a body.
Now I dream of a cure.

To Stand Amongst Mountains

To stand amongst mountains,
and conquer their awe
where man has yet to take fully his hold.

And, beasts, their eyes brown,
and shoulders taller than a man
live through high winters.

There are slow movements in the trees,
green for their short time
in the altitude's truncated summers.

There is air that modern man does not know.
Still I would breathe it,
in those granite temples.

That I Am With You

I used to envy stars
in their loneliness.
I found some solace
in knowing they
survived alone.
But, now with you,
I know the stars and comets
live half a life,
though it is measured in millenia.
I have few words left,
so like the hermits in their spheres
the only thing I know to do
is to exist,
but I am lucky;
I get to do it with you.