The Haunting

When it storms,

it’s foolish to trust

that the ghosts

in the backseat

will lead you

to safety.

I mean

I’ve made a few deals;

woken up with my nose

half-gone,

let Hafner’s wife suck me off

in the foyer

while he, that miserable prick,

was upstairs fucking Sherry –

my dreadful neighbor

with the two screaming kids.

In the middle of this blowjob

fantasy

is when I open my eyes

to my reflection

fist-pumping in front

of the bathroom mirror at work –

Flynn looks over his shoulder

bewildered;

piss still streaming like icing onto
a pink urinal cake.

The Tenderness of a Sociopath

Tonight at midnight

I want to kiss someone

who makes me feel

I can take

the tape

off of their lips.

Someone who watches bugs

panic and shriek at the sun

and thinks of friends

rotting

in their own lives.

Some one who watches

fireflies send off their struggle

in rain

collapsing under the weight

of fluttering summers.

Some fun:

don’t be scared,

you’re just a human

without skin.

Grave Opener

With one hand

          on a black garbage bag

                   full of dead rats

I used my other hand

          to brush my fingers

                   through your shadow’s hair.

We exchanged

nightmarish pleasantries

in that hollow

June horror;

I knew I needed

you then

the you

in the dreams –

the you

that left

the small shards of glass

in my lungs –

last night

when we slept together

and awoke

apart in black sand.

To Aria & the Universe

          Our car fell off

the cliff

          thrice;

the last time

          into the lake…

The water has a hole in it:

I’m cutting windows out

of the passenger seat.

I’m cutting glass

out of your throat

where the clicking

eccentric pulse

is swiveling like a rogue planet.

Gargling blood

and treading water,

I hear your garbled voice

but I need advice

in hypothermic mint.

I kissed you

your dying lips

during the erratic dusk

as your eyes

fluttering and parasitic

glazed over the mountains

into reverie.

Perfunctory

Kant said

          said “can’t”

when you can’t

move that lead moon

on running maple

singing to scale

floating redwoods

lost in October

beneath drinking elms

at chilling dusk,

the cul-de-sac

echoes

her voice:

          thicker oak

          splintering orange sky;

when I couldn’t

remember it

it was all

I could hear.

deadmoon

That drop of silk

that silken rain

distorted

just enough

or below

the scream of sound.

The drop of sound

the sounding sky

starless

far enough

or absent

that crash of awake.

Name the song

and I’ll just

scream it.

Dehumanizing Static

I smoke them until

I breach the filter

until I burn my fingers

until the smoke

comes dancing in

between open windows

swaying back and forth

between you and night

freeing sweet, lonely you,

sweeter still than

dark.

I don’t know what hours

have said to me in morning

why in the span of miles

there is a dehumanizing static

that I throw out

in buckets.

And I smoke you until

I break the thin song

under your porch light

until you burn my feared whispers

away in brittle branches.