The Devil's Dance

You always carried
on your shoulder
the weight of the storm
as it got colder
and the icy chill
that sent me reeling
bored you still
as if you had no feeling

and I see you now
walk in the room
the little cherubs
like ironic doom
follow at your heels
strum their lyres
those pretty things
with their own desires

Oh, how the violins
they whine and sing
to herald your
coming in
and set the tone
that I've never known
but held on to just the same

And had you any
understanding
you'd recognize
my wingless landing

so permanently
I'll be here still
but I'm indefinitely
at your will
and disposal

There's Always More to Come

Come take me out
take me out
of this viscous light
into the night
I've walked these streets
without you
for a thousand years
so listen dear
I've cradled the taste of you
inside my mouth
haven't spit you out
so who are you
to make such demands of me
just let me be
I'm invulnerable to
the cost it pays
to make amends
for this fragile dance...
...and then it ends

roadkill song

desperate hands
reach out to me
that's all I see
in my stupidity
my ruined heart
is where you
left me
wringing out
a discordant plea
haven't you
had enough of this
crushing my
wounded lips

The breaking of summer

The leaves, they fall like golden rain
and pierce like the sunlight
of a thousand days
shudder in the wind
and pool at my feet
where the air
and the sidewalk meet

Arrival

I've tread here before
the rambling streets of
a new city
the champaign puddles
mingling with yesterday's news
everything looks anew
with the light on
but here
in the dark
where the wind whips down
the alley between
my feet
and somewhere
The nighttime pumping
out its desperate heartbeat
The smell of sangria
wafting through my soul
I pull out my
unused ticket
and catch a train
I've never ridden on before

Muse

Music
my beautiful seductress
sinking her wanton fangs
into flesh and sinew
and I am howling
with her harmonic reverberations
though my soul
deep inside the knowledge
she is never letting go

keeping up with expectations

idle here
where the world drifts
off into oblivion

The Pauper Plays

Tear down the stage
break out the boards
bleed the script
send off the hoards

Take the pauper there
in the empty chair
juggling with his
last affair

he pawns away
his last coin
for one look at you
before your'e gone

will you spin your web
of deceit
leave me listless
on my knees

The actors here
on stage commence
with lethargic words
that have no dance

with military expertise
take down the King
and kill for peace

the crown of gold
its shattered price
release the bleeding
hearts rejoice

this town of apathy
makes us weak
give me music
give me release

Dali meets me here

purple
where the sky and the desert meet
exploding riots of color
at this crossroad
beneath my feet
howling winds
enticing siren's song
keep me turning my head
guessing where the music
is coming from
what path is next,
and wondering at the
path that led me here;
where have my footprints
disappeared.
The restless and the weary
souls lay down
their burdens to the sand
and sift their hands
to turn the time again.
I have come here with
the knowledge
that I know nothing,
but still I wait for
always something.
This conflagration is igniting
and burning and catching
and swirling and fighting
swinging upon the breeze
and I am thirsty
crying for my soul
to quench this need.
The light begins to fade
as the clock ticks time away
and I lift my leg
keeping stride with the desert
whispering in my ear
to just keep on going.

untitled

We are the loose feathers
springing into action
once the wind picks up
take me with you
on your flight to the unknown

Swinging Intermission

tap tap tapping
my fingers to the beat
cigarette smoke and
syphonic notes
circling at my feat
the crescendo breaks
and the saxophone aches
burn burn burning
through the room
twisting notes
lingering like red wine
on my glass
and my fidgeting hands
playing with the band
tickle the tabletop
sticky with the atmosphere
rolling through the jazz guitar
and pounding out the bass
I've left my seat
and wandered through the halls
I'm out walking the night street
scuffle scuffle slide
I'm on the west side
I'm on the east side
my feet barely touch the ground

the Island

Waves stand like sentinels
upon this beach of ours
we've claimed this kingdom
for our own
our toes intermingling
with the water
that is lingering
in calming caress
When all else is lost
you can find me here
when fate has other plans
you draw me near

Weary Battle Song

This is a battle I can't win
like tossing a flower
into the wind
when I am ready
when I am able
I will see
When you have found it
you will have lost it
and you will see
go around
and go around
and go around

Come back for me
come back for me
I am ready
I am ready
I am

she isn't like you or me
she keeps her hopes
like single pennies
and drops them down
drops them down
into the sea
I wish that I
could be that free
follow me home now
I open my door now
won't you please come in

Come back for me
Come back for me
you are ready
you are ready
you are

This is for You

You are my love
my never ceasing breath
you keep me afloat
when the waters flow and ebb
I turn my palms
into your quiet kiss
you've held me here
so many times like this

Sinner Confess

In this silent confessional
I await my sentence
pleading mercy with my eyes
in this betrayal
soflty turning tides
letting my fists fall to my sides
In this quiet defeat
I collapse into submission
given up my will to fight
now end this neverending
night.

In the Twilight

The Golden sun is dripping
below the earth
the sky bleeds red and pink,
then brilliant purple
I am standing awestruck
in her radiant trance
she has consumed me
speaks to me
and I must stay
but licking at my back
and crowding around me like a cloak
the darkness waits to turn me
from the sunset's silken caress
for now I am lost
caught in her color riot
but oh what blissful obsidian
I am caught in
if this is lost
I wish never to be found again

New Morning

The dawn breaks violently
through my open window
the pale moon softly fading
with the light
this is just the begining
with visions of the horizon
I am lifting
with the ever growing wind
that whispers to me
I am awake
I am awake

Untitled

This is coping
this is coping this is coping
rendering your knees
to the pavement
fear that has frozen
its icy course
through the spine of
your latest inhibition

this is losing
this is losing this is losing
with sanity and reality
and the persistance of
your feality
to the road your are forever
wandering

This is lost
this is lost this is lost
on the highway with
no direction but the swerving
of the lines that continue
their diverting

This is surrender
this is surrender this is surrender
to the infinite divine
mapmaker
take my feet and lead me onward
this is hope this is hope this is hope

Imminent Release

In this moment
when the rain pours steady
voices merging with the wind
eyes glazing over
from to much being seen
in this moment
the bullet hits the fan
and the echoes spin
and spin and spin

Awake: Part I

The sign on the toilet paper

dispenser

Reads:  tear gently

As I rip and        

restore

My image bent on the     

floor

From the  light

splintering

through the crack in

the metal swinging door

Desperate Abandon

She is down there
playing chicken with the tide
her white calves glistening
against the moonlit water
I am up here
with my fingers splayed wide
on the window glass
tracing words I won't confess
I leave my guitar idly
on the floor
always leave it wanting more
with no words left
I am muted to the core
I would be her music
if she would lend me
her words
I'd be a damned syphony
if she looked at me
with the desperate abandon
she reserves
solely for the beckoning waves

Tower

This tower, a stronghold
the defenses are up
the archers alert
till the dawn aproaches
silent come creeping
and our eyes meet
I know you mean to scale
these walls

Untitled

This waiting has consumed
all of me
my patience receding with the
tide out to sea
my anger like a storm
building grey to consume
and I'm swaying with
my rage
rocking back and forth
injurious fists balled
into themselves
and I burn and I wait
and I leak with the rain
boiling tears exploding
from my bloodshot eyes
running the length of neck
my stomache
my thighs
I can't stop this shaking
this violence in my
mind
you've brought this hurricane
to my door

This War

There is a cannon ball

Smoking in my living room

Where you laid siege

To my suburban battle zone

My calves are tensed

To the point of breaking

The back of my knee

Is burning

Like someone shook up my coke

Bottle with some mentos

My skin is crawling

And itching like

An addict in withdrawal

But I scratch until I bleed

And I feel nothing

After Dinner Dance

Twirling side by side

With the refrigerator

Back and forth between the sink

And stove

Your arms like bands

Around my guacamole and
Paint stained apron

There is no music

But I’ve memorized this dance

I know, by now

The sway your body goes

Across the Atlantic

I am basking in

A red Barcelona sun

Standing on the fourth

Floor balcony

Of my green and white

Checker tiled room.

A finger to my lips

and Sangria on my tongue

The rod iron smooth

under my fingertips

and I twist and twist

my hands around their

sturdiness

The morning air

Smells of coffee

Mingling with flowers

The light sweeps the night

From my watery eyes

Like a wire brush

looking down the streets below

a view of a city

I've just begun to know

The people walk with

Gentle purpose or idle perusal

Through the weaving cobbled streets

I want to uncover all her secrets

I want to replace my heart with

newness

The morning walkers’ noise

Helping me to forget

What stays quiet

Across the Atlantic.

The Usurper

I can relate
I've been imprisoned in
this skin for ages
charged with treason
When I usurped her
tragic throne
and took that bitch down
I would fix your broken-ness
build you up form this
shattered glass
I'll be your queen
I'll be your servant
I'll be your permanent band-aid
holding that gaping wound
inside your chest
I'll be the one left standing
when all the rest
have traveled distant shores
looking for something more

The Truth about Shark Bites

you tell them fifty staples
and they stare
with jaws
gaping

The Witching Hour

blue
where the moon greets
the fading day
there's something thick
in the air
like pea soup
and its swirling towards me
down the street
and taking up residence
beneath my feet
and now I have forgotten
the way back home.

The Orient of Flight

Somewhere across the sea

The sun is rising in the east

The man without any eyes

Sees the heat

Somewhere, in the upstairs

Rattling in caged defeat

Wings flutter from a window

Cracked purposefully

Across the Horizon

across the horizon

of a familiar, dieing sky

The sun bleeds

A deep red wound

into the trembling earth

Sunken underneath

a rotting tree

I breathe

with urgency,

then exhale into the wind

growing thick and heavy

My thoughts of you

wrapped around me

Catch flight ascending

Into the decadent air

with no remorse

And I, with eyes

dilated and dry

am waiting for the dark

because I can not remember light

before the artificial

A Sparrow

In an instant you dissolved

into the dawn.

I reached my fingers

into the light from the sun

            reflecting off the white snow. 

This is when I

Know.  Looking at you was like watching

the telephone poles whiz past the car window. 

Touching you was like falling

into snow angels.  

Every second with you was a bird waiting

            for the cage door to open.

Now

gray, they air between  

your breath and mine, grows stale with

my cough and your stagnancy,

            it dies inside the wind, floating away.

Walking down the alley

behind Subway, feathers

strewn across the ground

a decapitated sparrow.

Mostly

mostly we are space
hollow and quiet.
When you look at me
that way
I feel
I can put
my finger
right through you.

Amending my pen with the Ink

Design
my insecurities
when I allow
my hands to think

What Adam Duritz says to me while I lie awake in my bed

We all
want
something
beautiful