The Perks of You

As daylight wanes, and night begins

there’s rapture in the air.

With static thought, and moonlit eyes

I see it all too clear.

What’s written in the stars, is written in the sand.

What’s written on the heart, is written now by hand.

My love for you is twilight.

My love for you is snow.

My love for you is many things, my love for you is old.

I’ve kept it in the shadows, of poetry and light.

I’ve kept it in the darkness, to brighten up my night.

Just know my heart is dancing, like fire unto stone.

Just know my heart is breaking, each night I am alone.

As daylight comes, I feel you near—

the darkness goes away.

The perks of you are endless still, your love’s a weathervane.

What Could Possibly Matter More Than Meaning What You Don’t Have The Answers For?

What’s the point in asking the question

If your voice is already defeated

I’d go blind just trying to see it

You know everyone is trying to beat it—

If there’s pain then that means there’s a reason

If there’s truth then it’s hard to believe in

Still it’s hard not to relive this feeling

Where everyone everyone’s stealing—

It’s like selling your grief for a grievance

Why the hell would you even break even

Doing all we could to deceive them

It’s all wasted time wasting time healing—

It’s like playing pretend dressed in your skin

Or saying the pledge of allegiance

When there’s no one to please or believe in

It only matters as much as you mean it

Tchotchke

You read my sadness

Word for word

Like I’m a novelty

Then put me down

Back in my place

Some oldtime tchotchke—

And I wonder how it feels,

Window shopping too?—

From the corner of my gladness

To the outskirts of your sadness

Where nothing is for certain

And no one is to blame

Except we don’t glimmer anymore

Or sparkle like we used to—

Ornamental at our best

Tokens from another life

Failure of odds

I was in love with the odds of failure

so I did all I could to succeed, and did.

And didn’t.

All in the same go, all in the same stop.

Holiday On Ice.

Now all we have’s the memory.

I’ll keep the one to forget

if you keep the one to remember.

The one never to forget,

the ones kept best from afar,

and the occasional Holiday on ice.

Tongues

I’ve tasted many tongues,

but saved the slammed doors

and holes in sheet rock for

the one’s I’d somehow outgrown,

knowing them sincere like

an afternoon alone or

tastebuds in the morning sun—

after enough drinks to make me social,

after enough drinks to make me honest,

after enough drinks to make me pure—

unwilling to apologize for the bad taste

tongue tied like a little kid hoping

to be lost in the shuffle and left alone,

where features seize to be and

voices make no sound where

nobody feels and nobody hurts.

Nowhere

We’re all just kind of nowhere, aren’t we?

When we convince ourselves we’re not,

that we’re somewhere worth being?

Then like flypaper pulled apart

time disconnects from space

and we’re left stuck

sticking to the things we swore we’d part.

And just like that

we’re nowhere again,

left waiting to forget how good it felt

to be somewhere.

The Boys Who Left Town

There was no hope for us then

We were already too far gone

Gone from where? Neither could tell

But going gone, regardless.

Your Cynical Smile

There’s something cynical in your smile

as if I rubbed off some and forgot to say,

that I’m not that kind of cynic.

And I feel no joy from any of this.

In Our Time.

Remember— oh brothers and sisters

that we are the philosophers of our time.

Us haggard poets of principle and measure,

no matter the plight must rise.

Through tears of understanding

with honest eyes do I

accept thy pleasure’s burden—

to see within our time.