Distance

I'll hold you in my heart
Until I can hold you in my arms
I'll cling to every word you say
And wish you didn't live so far away

I'll kiss you softly whenever I can
Because I don't know when I will again
And who cares what the world thinks of us
When I think the world of you

So yes, perhaps distance is a drag
And yes, people can be too
But love of mine please give it some time
Because in time I'll be with you

What's a relationship?

What is relationship?
An idea of where we've been and where we're going?
But I'm on this couch
Where's the relationship now?
Does it only exist up here?
Is it only an idea?
Is it the gap between two intimate moments?
I haven't a clue, I'm on the couch

Chirp

The bird doesn’t chirp anymore
Perhaps it’s close to death
If we all knew how close we are
Perhaps we’d chirp much less

Last night I dreamt of the apocalypse.

I'd just come from church for some reason. I'm not sure why I'd gone into the church, but it was the weirdest service I'd ever been too. Everybody was there. It was a packed house. Rich people, poor people, criminals, middle class folk. It was all people who didn't normally go to church. I looked into the coat room as I walked in, and some guy was snorting cocaine on this little counter top. Right in a church. I was like, what the hell? I've never see that.

I sat in a pew, and looked up. There was no minister. They were just playing a movie of an old church service on the screen. Some little old lady was playing a hymn on an organ, and the minister was applauding her. She seemed happy. But the audience was restless, not really paying attention, not sitting down, just kind of wandering around, talking to everybody.

And then I saw a woman I used to know, someone I worked with years ago. I went to sit down next to her, and she sort of jumped on my lap and hugged me, saying she was so glad to see me. I wasn't sure if she was sad, or drunk, or terrified, or just lonely, but she whispered in my ear, offering me sex, saying she's always wanted me, ever since she'd known me. I sort of pushed her off my lap, thinking this was hardly the place for that kind of cheap pick-up. And then I got up and walked out. There wasn't really a church service going on anyway, I don't even think it was Sunday.

And then for some reason, I was in a car with this old lady. I don't even know who it was, or why I was with her. She was old like my grandma Connie, but it wasn't her. We were driving down the street. She was driving too slow because she was kind of lost. I don't think I was in Baltimore I was on a large street, almost the size of highway with several lanes. But they all seemed to be deserted, like very early on a Sunday morning. I'm not sure if it was early in the morning or near sunset, but the sun was low in the sky. I think it was late in the day. The streets were mostly clear though.

The lady pulled over and for some reason she got out of the car. I think she was going to ask somebody for directions. I looked at the GPS thing she had on her dashboard, and suddenly the direction went all fuzzy and scrambled, like the satellite was confused, or just no longer there. And then the whole sky got this weird greenish tint to it for about ten seconds. It basically turned green instead of blue, but only for a moment, and then it was back to normal. Everybody stopped and looked up.

I was still in the car, but I leaned forward and looked out the window. The sun was over in the west, low in the sky. And I saw what looked like a second moon fly over the sky in a direction that was diagonal to the sun's normal path. It was huge. And my stomach got queasy for a moment. It made your stomach sick because it was so big, it actually pulled on you with its own gravity, like the moon pulls on the tides, but much bigger, and everything inside you just got tugged around.

But it went straight across the sky, without hitting. When I realized how close it was, though, I knew it was gonna hit somewhere, probably on the other side of the world. The gravity of the earth pulled it in, and it sling-shotted around to the other side somewhere. I jumped out of the car and grabbed the old lady's arm.

"Come on! We have to find shelter! It's gonna hit!"

We just abandoned the car in the street, and I dragged her toward a nearby fire station, or police office, or whatever it was. I'm not sure which it was, but there were large utility trucks, with lifts on them. It was also deserted for some reason, except for two guys loading one of the trucks. We banged on the doors, but it was locked up. We ran from door to door trying to get in, but everything was locked.

And then I felt a great rumble under my feet. It nearly knocked me down. I've never been in an earthquake, so I don't know what it's like, but it felt like the entire planet shivered. Car alarms started going off in every direction and I heard a weird sound like gravel tumbling down a hillside, except there were no hills. I think it was pieces falling off houses in all directions. We were able to stay on our feet though.

A few moments later, the sky in the north went dark. If I assume the sun was setting in the west, and the meteor or asteroid or whatever flew over the sky in a north-west to south-east direction, then it was north the black came from. And I mean the entire sky. Like a wall of blackness, smoke and ash suddenly filling the view from the ground to the upper atmosphere, from west to east as far as you could see, in one huge wall of black cloud. And it was coming toward us. Well, sort of going towards everyone, everywhere, I guess. It came over the horizon like an charging army, fast and steady, advancing.

"It hit on the other side of the world somewhere! Come on! we have to get indoors! We won't be able to breathe!"

The air started turning yellow. Ash started raining down, and bits of rock and debris from the blast, where ever it hit. I took a deep breath and held it as I was running. I could already smell a weird burning rock smell, like sulphur, like burnt matches, but more metallic.

Me and the lady finally got into some doors, but it was just a little foyer. We ran in and shut the doors behind us. The inside doors were locked. But it was somewhere to hide. There was a fire alarm. I pulled it, not really knowing why I was bothering. But I was sort of in a panic and not thinking straight. The sign said, In Case of Emergency, so I pulled it. The alarm went off, and we looked out the window. The yellow air turned brown, and then dark red. Then everything went black. The black cloud fell over the whole sky with a clattering rumble that sounded like it was raining gravel instead of water. And all light went out of the world.

The world as we knew it was over. Even if we survived, life as we know it would never be the same. We'd be set back 10,000 years, reduced to hunter gatherers again, living out of caves. If we survived the impact that is. I honestly don't think anybody would have survived the shockwave. Something with that much gravity hitting the earth would pretty much end the story for everybody.

Of course, that's when I woke up.

These feelings inside of me are so vein,
But what you see seems so plain.
Forgive me for not being so open,
As you may know I am already broken.
So look into my eyes and if you can see the passed,
You will surely know we will never last.
Not because of normal things like family or bills,
But because I'd like to drown myself with all these pretty pills.

There's a crawling in my skin,
That causes me to sin,
And though I may look sweet,
I will certainly bring you defeat.
Please give me some of your Heroin
So I can feel free and bare myself again.

RIP Jaime

On falling in love with strangers

I become aware of you,
standing next to me on the street corner,
and I become aware
of my own breath.

It's forty degrees out
and you're wearing a t-shirt
and I am the one
out of place.

You light a cigarette. Self-destruction,
but the delicious kind. The only
kind.
Barely there bite marks
and dark under-eye circles.

I've known you for a grand total
of thirty-six seconds
but I want to write you a letter
(do people still do that?)
of words I don't know yet. I feel like
I’ve seen you before,
but in a passing car
or a barely lit window
at dusk. Caught
in a moment of humanity.

I close my eyes and I can see us,
together,
laying on cold ground:
nearly dead
but never feeling more alive,
watching vultures
circle above us
before they move on,
in search of something better,
fresher.

Our eyes meet,
streetlamps flicker,
and your lips part,
smoke rolling out
like a beckoning finger:

"Come,
have a taste
of my
mortality."

I wrote this about a cab driver I met once.

Being drunk enhances the chances
That I’ll ask you uncomfortable questions
To make you squirm a little bit
But I can’t make this man squirm
This man tells me he’s been driving his cab
For longer than I’ve been alive
The streets of this city
Are so familiar to him
That he can navigate through it at night
Using only half of one headlight
And I know he can, because he’s doing it
And he’s talking to me while he’s doing it
Every slurred question I ask
Is responded to
With skillful oration
That’s nearly matched by his driving
What is life all about?
I ask
Because I know
When I ask that
People roll their eyes
And tell me to shut up
You’re drunk!
Not this man
Even the pause he gave
Before answering
Was executed with grace
And he said
Life is like this road, my friend
Sometimes it turns left
Sometimes it turns right
But you just go with it
You drive where the road is
And that is all

Deep.

I stare longingly into her eyes
But she says nothing back
Because she is a pizza
Those are pepperonis

Little memories

I was sitting outside,

smoking a cigarette
with three of my favorite pals,

and I looked at each one of them,

and I told them,

"I love how,

right now,

we're happy.

And how,

when I look in each of your eyes,

I can see the smile that isn't even on your face,"

and then we smiled,

and I went back inside.

To someone

I was never a sinking ship, just the remains

of an ocean liner, settling on the sea's lips;

at least that's what I think.

I am not a tragedy, no,

but so many of my pages are empty and, my god, I need

you to know that if I am a book,

I am half-complete (not half-unfinished--I'm learning, you see?),

but it's the back half,

and a few scattered paragraphs before that.

Now and then I write in my own history,

just for others to read and believe

there's something more to me

than a leather bound cover over cheap poetry.

That's all I am, really.

I'm just trying to keep my head above the water.

I keep my secrets close, and my happiness bottled

for the nights when I need something stronger

than spirits that burn on the way down,

something that can keep these ghosts

from crawling back out my mouth

to tumble from my grip at last.

Listen, I'm really not hard to figure out.

It's broken glass,

it's the smash of a car crash,

it's the smell of smoke and ash,

it's a statue of a person learning to laugh,

and how to know, and how to venture

into love. I count the number of times I've been sure,

on my knuckles instead of my fingertips,

because it wasn't the touch, it was my fist

that first said: I am better than this

(fires will die but they fight harder than all else).

Besides, my fingers are not for counting out,

I think they're for you

to weave yours through,

and to feel on your skin

when I spell out **I love you**,

because my fingers do not flinch

as easily as my mouth does cringe

and strangle truths in anger.

If you feel I am pulling into myself,

remember I'm likely collapsing inwards,

and know this:

broken homes beget broken bones,

but more often they spit

broken boys and girls from their lips.

My body is new,

no longer mould and mildew,

but steel, mortar, and brick,

and stone

and stick.

I am almost always cold.

My wrists look too bare for the weight of my world.

I carry on, but I am not strong,

fuck knows how long those days have been gone.

To the person that will, somehow, fall in love with me:

I am not a tragedy,

but a mess of a story.

I write dumb rhymes to make me feel like I'm growing.

I speak like a cynic, but at heart I'm all dreams.

Sometimes I take a minute to listen and, slowly,

I think I'm becoming someone worth being.

I seem bare as a clinic and empty as glossy magazines,

but it's all a set and some props, one day I'll end scene.

I'm not ready yet, but on One Day, I'll be.

Love, I swear, I'm almost there;

my world is readying,

like winter prepared

to yield to spring.

-SGD

Grand Canyon North Rim Time Lapse Photography

https://vimeo.com/75255880

Time Lapse Photography of the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.

Shot with GoPro Hero3 during my 3 months and 15,000 mile road trip across the United States.


**Make sure you go to the link and play it in HD!**

Grand Canyon North Rim Time Lapse Photography from nick durieu on Vimeo.

10 words

but
"just
friends"
don't
look
at
each
other
that
way

Honest Poem

1. My name is Nick, I have a middle name that starts with an 'R' , but something about having it said out loud makes me feel like I have an identity crisis.

2. I say a lot about nothing, but I swear the way I say it always makes it sound like something.

3. When I was between the ages of 5 & 13 I knew the lines of my smile by heart... Nowadays they take a few minutes to rehearse.

4. I don't like the idea of getting weighed, but only because I'm polite. See I know that between the burdens of my soul, my thoughts and my intellect ... It would be far too heavy for a simple scale to comprehend. Putting that much pressure on it would be rude.

5. Old school Hip Hop always makes me feel like I was born a decade too late, like I missed the "Soul Train" , caught the commercial & got off at the wrong station.

6. Sometimes I feel like an Orthophoto amongst Topographics, like I'm the only one without signs of convention...but then again we're all just maps, failing to see past each others' physical boundaries.

7. My friends to me are like Velcro shoe straps to a 10 year old on their first pair of Nike sneakers. They never get old , I can't get over how they seem to enhance the swag in my step & they're always there to hold me down no matter how much I mess with them.

8. All broken things intimidate me, they never have the audacity to break the same way and I must say that their originality always makes me feel a little unworthy.

9. My fingers are sore from trying to touch people's souls.

10. I learnt to tie my heart strings before my laces, every now and again I suffocate.

11. Finding myself often feels a lot like looking for Waldo in the dark with my eyes closed.

12. My heart is like an old dog, you can't teach it anything new.

13. I swear the heavens were trying to test my patience, like me, on the sixth day, on his birthday. Some call it fate & my friends say we're star crossed, but I've never had a thing for destiny ... Something about it smells a lot like death & reality at the same time, so for the sake of my comfort I'll call it all coincidence.

14. After trying to photocopy my feelings into the body of this poem, I've created a mass of several paper planes  that are way too drenched in the sea of my emotions to fly, so instead they decompose into an ocean of confusion.

15. I don't quite know myself but I know that I'm a natural disaster, a training bonsai and a lotus rolled up in one. I have the ability to wreck things with passion, trying to understand the bends and folds of my being will take time, and ever so often do I reveal my being in the rawest of states. I'm stubborn and ambitious and real. I say whatever when I actually care, I'm weird and complicated and I think a lot.

I hope to be half the person I am today in future. Something about growing up feels a lot like loosing....souls.

The girl who fell in love

This is about the girl who fell in love with the moon.
Resting against the cold glass window at night
To get a glimpse of the light on the side she laid eyes on
And wondered about the darkness she would never get to see.
This is about the girl who fell in love with the stars.
Watching them sparkle and shoot across the sky.
She shed a tear knowing these stars were long diminished
And wondered if she as well would leave such a lasting mark.
This is about the girl who fell in love with the rain.
Falling fast asleep to the quiet drops on the pavement
With colors forming through the heavy mist,
And wondered if she could ever be as beautiful as a rainbow.
This is about the girl who fell in love with the ocean.
Sinking her toes in the sand while breathing the salty air,
Noticing the fish swimming easily through the blue water
And wondered if she could glide through life the same way.
This is about the girl who fell in love with the sun.
Lying in the swaying grass, feeling a soft breeze on her cheeks
Only to be shaded by the birds flying free under the light
And she wondered if she could one day be as free.
This is about the girl who fell in love with solitude.
Curled up with the dusty pages of her favorite book
Reading of the lover's who share their lives together,
And wondered if one day she might share her solitude.
This is about the girl who fell in love with you.
With the way your body wrapped around hers,
How you could command a room with the warmth of your smile
And she wondered if one day she could call you hers.
This is about the girl who fell in love with too many things.
Realizing none of them would ever be hers,
Knowing she had no one to share them with.
And she wondered if she would always feel so alone.

 -Danielle Frederick

When it comes to...

I'm not the optimist.
I'm an artist,
struggling
but not starving,
not for nourishment
anyway.

People tell me
I'm a good kisser,
but I think to myself:
shouldn't all poets be?

You don't like poetry, you say.
Too unsatisfying.
But I feel you overindulge
every time my lips touch yours.

So I bet you'd know a good poem
next time you read one.
It's not unlike a great kiss:
blissful, ephemeral, satisfying,
like the start of a great journey,
the perfect metaphor
for love.

The best I've ever known

I've only known you
for about as long as
it will take me
to finish this second
cup of coffee
and cigarette number four.

Only four and
it's already sunrise!
This is the start
of something new, exciting, longing, yet

I can't help but wonder
if I will twist you
the way I broke
the thermostat last winter
manipulatively
out of curiosity
(I only wanted to see
how high the heat would go!)

or worse yet,
if you will drop me
clumsily like I did
my precious iphone,
at the movies
relaxed from your fingertips
constantly parting the hair
on my head.

I don't know you,
and you certainly
do not know me.
You see the mannequin
I dress up and put
on display, but he
does not speak of the ganja
in my nightstand, the erotica
on my hard drive,
these scribbles of cynicism.

Of course,
I'll continue to think
of you, ideally
as much as you'll think
of me,
and we'll invent fun facts
about one another for
sharing with our friends 'round
the table with drinks before our bitter
truths reveal themselves
like 17-year cicadas
digging their way to
freedom

and we'll try not to
be too disappointed like
the tired waitress I left a dollar
with my number on it
or a lousy poem
bestowed with breath,
cruelly made self-aware.

Sitting. Thinking. Sunsets.

Sittin' on the dock of the lake,
Watching the sun slip and slide away,
Cheeks blushing flushing from orange ray-guns,
Drinking blush wine to oil our eyes
For the subtle story the sky shortly will reveal,
For the subtle story the sky shortly will revel.

*(The clouds were magnificent. No, I cannot write a poem about the cloud colors. Their shape shifting inexhaustible.  My eyes high on their creativity.  I'm just not good enough a poet to tamper with that sky.)*

If you're brave enough to
Call yourself poet, then
It is audacity, not blood,
Warming your extremities,
So foolishly try, always be prepared to fail.

No impulse. We pledged that tonight, ours,
One hour of sunset over the lake.
Brought the wine, forgot the pillows,
So the mayans were prepared to sacrifice
All feelings in their butts for the greater glory
Of love and one of nature's great poetic challenges..

The conundrum miracle of every sunset
Over the bay, lake or ocean, is its special,
Only-In-Nature unique way of customizing
Its descent just for you.

No matter where one observes,
No matter where you worship,
Wherever your temple, mosque or church.
Maryland, California, the Philippines,
Germany, Colombia, even in the ole U.K.,
The very same setting sun we all see,
Sends a magic dazzle gold orange path invitation
To the exact spot you are voyeuring,
One sun, all destinations equal before human.

How can that be?

Agitation and tremblingly,
The clouds.

She leans on me, a perfect fit,
My back resting against a pylon,
So we see the clouds
With common exactitude,
But it is a quiet time, silence only shared.
Images stored silently within ourselves,
For we see the formation, man, woman,
Precisely and exactly, totally differently.

The clouds.
A fleet moving gracefully and imperiously
At a stately speed, saying I am awesome, fear me.
The largest cloud bank is an aircraft carrier,
Miles long, painted horizon blue-grey unsurprisingly.

The small white wisps, fast destroyers, stealthy submarines,
Moving fast to protect the mother ship,
Running random to confuse enemy radar and the
Pathetic, limited, human eye.

The colors.
Here I fail willingly, unashamedly.
So many sunsets, so many hearts,
All different, all the same.
Lacking knowledge, I cannot tender,
I cannot offer you tenderness to love
Enough,
The variety of oranges, gold, varietals interspersed
With pinks singeing the cornea,
And mock myself for all my meager brain yields is
Good Humor creamsicle...a delicious irony

You who write after midnight
Of razor blades, pills and shotguns,
And barely marked two decades even, on this planet,
You want hard,
Write a poem about a sunset in ways never done before.

You, who are wracked with despair
Speak to the man with no job for months
And mouths to feed and a life insurance policy.
Speak to me.

I want to tell you to get over yourself,
Get onto to yourself.

I have walked the hallways of deep despair,
Heard the bells ring between periods that signal only the next
Hell,
And to this day, still do,
But still I try to write external of sunsets and greater glories.

How many depend in you? Are you proud of your weakness?
Do you hate me yet for acknowledging out loud,
We are both cowards?

What do you have but to
Grow yourself?

Yeah coward.
To yellow to write about a
Yellow sunset, cause that is hard in a way incomprehensible
Until tried.

If you come here to share, well and good.
If you come here to find comfort, good.
So gaze upon these words and feel
The love that only experience has earned.

What do you know of heartbreak?
Imprisoned for decades in a loveless life,
I walked by the water nightly,
Yes, the same waters where I scoped out
Yesterday's sunset, and walked away.

You can read about if you look it, look me, look here,
Look up!

So do something hard, something external.
Fail but love yourself more for just having tried.
Then try something else.

The saddest poem ever wrote
Was not yours, where you titillate with daring words
Razors, pills etc.,
The saddest poem ever writ
Was this one, a meager vanity to capture a
Sunset that keeps trying every day to
Surpass
Supersede
Its previous glorious failure,
Like we should too.
Keep trying

Now, I shall rest,
For I know that soon I shall see, feel, think,
Of something new that will make me eager to
Write a new poem.

Roads

Though down many long, sometimes crowded, 
mostly lonely roads
of life in seasons spent, in the dreams
and memories, bittersweet in plans and schemes,
you, of one, and of some of a few,
touched my life
forever,
and you still now do,
with your hand outstretched,
I take it and in gratefulness,
thank you for your friendship,
and graciousness,
and though the road still before me lies,
it's not so lonesome with
you all in my mind. 

Colorado

your fingertips danced across my skin
like children in the snow
you caressed my traveling soul
and slowed my rapid heartbeat
the light in your beautiful eyes
twirled about as our lips pressed together
your tongue sought solace
inside my mouth
and my teeth grazed your bottom lip
as payment for your loves newfound home

your fingertips stayed firmly inside
our locked hands
you traced my smile with your lips
and I promised to write about you
I'd describe how my heart soared
when i first saw you.
How I noticed the lines that formed on the sides of your mouth
when your smile lit up as you first saw me.

Now your fingertips only move for me while you slide them across your iPhone.
As I am hundreds of miles away and only getting further.
I wonder if the day will ever come where your fingertips are intertwined  in mine once again.

How could I know?

I was going to start off with
"i once knew this person"
but he was not just any person
nor did i ever know him

i knew him by his late night drives
rain racing down the car window
just him, his thoughts and the road
his laugh that was like quiet thunder
the songs that would run through his mind
and hum of it on his lips.

i never knew the person
who built up walls so high
that no one could touch him
whose monsters would dwell
in the darkest hollows of his mind
who lays wide awake at 4am
heart thumping against his ribcage
so wrought with abandon
he couldn't even breathe

He was living somewhere between reality and all that he had ever dreamed
This person used to be me.
I thought I knew him.
But how could I ever know someone who did not know himself.

The trees dont sleep.

The tree's don't sleep at night
they photosynthesize , by moonlight.
Leaves drink in the cool wise light
And give off dreams of a softly fading starlight

Whispers of secrets , monthly unfurl
A single blossom falls at new moon
Hurtling to the ground, awake before noon
Ever noticed? The very word has the circle
Curled up in the center , twice to make sure we remember , two full cups , not one.

Gecko's slip off old skins
And the croaking frog adds to the din
As thunder rolls in
Triggering the dogs bark
Guardian of the stark naked couple
Asleep in their parallel worlds
Together under the umbrella of ambient lighting
Not the natural kind either
But a shameless copy of pure sunlight
That emanates when their bodies collide
On the material plane.

Astral visions lead the way to headquarters
The address? Fax? Phone number?
I'm afraid you'll have to dial again ,
Unless you've meditated on the vibration of emancipation
Then you would already know, you are already there
Doors are open , for those who care to try
No lock on this baby ,
Ain't no safe to play safe
We bask in our humble glory
Under the shores on undulating tides
Rhythmic pulsations
no where to hide
The emanations come from within,
Without , a shadow of a doubt

There is a war coming , in fact we've already been fighting for decades
Just like the change of winds, nature knows her stuff
Tip the seeds too soon and you'll end up with a field full of fluff
But just in time and a harvest with enough to reduce every super market shelf to dust
Even though they already stock that kinda stuff
Clean up on Aisle 4, Aisle 3 , Aisle 2 , Aisle 1
Return the purchase , we've discovered the shit
In the cake
And we found the frog in the salad,
At least their habitat is intact
Or did you think I was still talking about the shops?

I kinda sorta think I'm falling for you

There comes a day in your life where you find someone special…
You try so hard not to admit it but you just can't hold back the way you feel…
I like you.
I mean..
When you get all those feelings…
Those butterflies you can't stomach,
That heart rate you can't put at ease,
So oh baby..
Sweetheart with the beautiful smile.
Sure, with your stunning eyes.
Yes I loved sleep
But dreams couldn't compare
Not to talking to you until my mind screamed for rest
And the butterflies in my stomach settled
Darling with the endless amount of love.
your love could fill the oceans and climb the tallest redwoods.
Or at least, could fill torch lake.
but could your love belong to me someday?
Be given to me?
Can you feel the way I want to feel towards you?
& girl, sometimes I tangle my insides.
Closing my eyes, losing myself in a eternal daydream.
Where your presence is more than an echo in my mind
And I even believe for a few seconds you're here with me.
I am a lover, who wrote poems about you.
You should know by now I write about you.
I write about you until my fingers ache.
And still after that I keep writing
Because there's just some people you could write about forever
And baby, you're one of them.
the way I daydream about kissing your lips...
I can't wait until the sparks of your tongue burn my mouth
send electric shocks through my body
Cutie… with the funny jokes.
Your apologies about nothing.
You make me laugh.
Today you made me laugh.
Can I expect more in the future?
Baby, with those sparkling eyes,
Your eyes haunt me whether I'm dreaming or not
And what haunts me more is the fact that
I cannot have you now
I want you this very instant.
I hope my body can wait 2 months before I see your sweet face.
I hope.

The cycle

It's an addiction 
It can't be understood
In its exterior it is simplistic
In its interior it is complex

It is something that can't be understood 
By those outside it
Because they don't know the highs
Or where it does take you
All those outside it can only see
Just how it will break you

But they can't see
They can't see how good it feels
The stages are easy to know
When you can follow me

Stage 1: The first date
Always the best part 
The nerves
The preparation
The mystery
The first time that I touch her hand
A rush
I feel high again

Stage 2: The first kiss
Always a favorite
Because I mastered it
I take her to the perfect place
She loves it
An overlook
A stream 
Nature surrounding
The kiss happens
It's perfect to her
She loves it
As do I 
I feel that rush again

Stage 3: The convincing
The dating 
The kissing 
The sensations
All are easy to see why it's sensational
The feeling of her skin against mine
The listening to her perfect breath move her chest
In and out
In and out
I tell her I love her
She isn't sure at first
But I try harder
As we continue 
And succeed 
I feel the euphoria coming in

Step 4: The love
That comfort
That security
That feeling of serenity
It cloaks me
Wraps me around 
Its sky blue blanket
And lays me in 
A green field
She's there too
Next to me 
Feeling the same earth
Beneath us 
I turn to her
Eyes whatever color
It nonetheless dazzles me
It fills me with something dangerous
Hope
That rush is gliding me through

Stage 5: The loss
Parents get in the way
She loses that feeling
I'm a bastard
But either way
That feeling 
That was once with her
Is gone
She walks the thin line
Performing a balancing act
Trying to find reason to be together but can't
She calls me up on the phone
Tells me how everything is wrong
I don't see it
I can't see it
Our love was perfect!
We both made it!
And now you're killing it!
We meet up
I beg but she's stands her ground
She walks up
Leaves
I'm alone
Left to sob 
Yell 
Get angry
That adrenaline rush from the high rises

Stage 6: The hate
The pacing 
The change of thoughts
I still love her one day
I despise her the next
I feel anxiety kick in
Try my best to hold it
But can't
I call her up
Yell at her
Scream at her
Tell her that
She threw something great away
She hangs up
Blocks me 
Never speaks to me again
I still keep pacing
Feeling more often guilty
Than angry
ineverwantedtohurtyoualliwantedtodowassaveyoufromanyoneelseiknowthatisaidiwantedyoutosufferbutthatsnnottrueatalliddoanything
Sometimes I still feel that hope
But it's fading
Fades fast 
It's all over

My high is going down
I need to go back 
And cook some more

She moves on quickly
I got her addicted too
She feels that addiction to
It draws us both in
And we can't imagine 
What it would be like to leave
It is the cycle
That helps make us
And the cycle
That can break us

Someday

Phases of faces, captured moments and instances
I pass by, so swiftly, so fleetingly
Caught in the crossroads of paradigms and decisions
I stood paralyzed, terrified.

I meet intense eyes that bore through me, knowing me, knowing us
A smile as warm as a sunflower that has the power to melt me
Your presence is strong, comforting…strong, unsettling…strong, terrifying
You have me without even trying, you mesmerize me.

You bring me to my knees with a sigh,
you can crush me with a word.
You can bring me to bliss with a touch,
you can bring me to ecstasy with a kiss.

You command me with a whisper, I am drawn to you
You break down my concrete walls, one by one
You undress my layers of failed expectations
Of shattered dreams, and broken hearts

I stand before you, naked, vulnerable
I look away, not bearing for you to see
My helplessness, my hopelessness
All my imperfections, my fears, my desires.

You wipe my tears away, and kiss my bitterness away
And yet the fear descends on me…I've been here before
Fear of hurt, of betrayal, of disappointment
Fear that this is all an illusion…or perhaps just my delusion

And so I put on a smile, cool and composed
Hide behind my fast-paced life, run far away from you
Going so fast, so fast…so I won't think, I won't feel
Until I fall, exhausted, to sleep a dreamless sleep

I need the noise, the meaningless clanging
For in silence, the longing creeps in…
To be in your arms, just us and nothing else…
Nothing but warmth and the sound of our hearts beating.

So I welcome the numbness, welcome the pain
Punish myself for the choice I've made in my weakness
Someday I will find my happiness, someday I will find my strength
Somehow…I will find you again.

going going..

I like a woman with fire in her bones
And where her head should be,
There is a home.

And I wax and wane like crescents of the moon
If you turn away you might miss me,
I'll be gone soon.

bio

Let me start with a cliche: I love to write.
Let me edit it: I love writing
Lying on the floor
Truths in my head
Think
Of me
Baggy Pajama Pants

Frustration

The frustration you get
When you wake up in the middle of the night
And can't fall back to sleep.

You look at the clock,
Hoping,
It'll soon be time to get up.
But then you realize
It's not even near that time.

It's like the sun knows when you're awake and,
Just to be grim,
Takes its time coming up.

So you lie there...
Trying to get some rest.
You squirm and change positions,
But still...
Nothing happens.

You begin to think about
Your life,
Your future,
The world,
Everything...

Then, all the bad thoughts become worse.
You think...
Maybe something might happen,
Or something may already have happened.

You try harder to fall asleep,
But you can't stop.
Can't stop thinking.
And you feel...
Troubled...
Overwhelmed...
And you can do nothing
to stop all the horrible thoughts from coming through.

Then you're at the stage where now,
Your thoughts aren't coming in patterns anymore.
They scatter...
Like a pigeons in a busy street.

So you lie there.
You've given up.
You feel hopeless...
Like no one could ever help you.
So you just wait...
Wait for everything to be over.

But just right then,
You fall back sound asleep,
Without a worry in the world.
And wake up 2 hours late.

Frustration.

Little Spouts

Surrounded by such wasted people,
hard to believe we are one kind.
I view them through a peephole,
un-relating, may as well be blind.
Cannot comprehend
their pretend.
Pretense
seems like nonsense.
Small talk is too formulaic.
Maybe I am primal, coming off archaic,
wild, like prehistoric jungle cats
(even those have since been molded flat).
Must be tamed, she's gotta be insane.
Right, *I'm* insane.
Cause I don't want to waste the precious time I'm given
fighting for approval by spouting words with no real meaning.

I told her to strip

I sat down in my most comfortable spot
The love seat that perfectly fit two
With the red suede glimmering
I folded my legs
Laced both hands in front of my face
starring into her eyes

And I told her to strip

The lines of aversion and horror
Spread gleefully across her brow

She did what she was told

First came her shirt
Up and over her head
Her navel winked at me

Oh what a lovely tummy
I kissed

Next came her leggings
Down one leg and down the other

I saw remnants of a forlorn misery
Carved into her thighs
I traced them with my tongue

Her face turned crimson red
Her skin turned to goosebumps

And I read all her failures and faults
Like the saddest and most beautiful braille book
She moved my very soul to weep
I saw in her what I neglected in me

I stood and walked to her
Taking in her entirety
Embracing her fully
Inhaling her hair
Which sent me to meadows
Tasting her lips
Which sent me to the moon
Feeling her hips
Which sent me dancing among stars

We didn't fuck
We didn't make love
We embraced each others souls
We fell into forever
Together

Last Wind

Sit back. Relax. Take a breath. Take a minute. Take a hit. Take a drink. Take a sting. Take a shot. Take a line. Take a day. Take a time. Take a mental Picture. Take a pill. Take something you've always wanted. Sit back and chill..

Sit back, watch the ashes, their crumbling down.
Keep your head in the sky. Keep your feet on the ground.
Keep your buzz going. Don't ever come down.
Keep your face smiling and don't ever frown.
Keep the toxins flowing. Keep your head held high.
Keep your thoughts clear. Stop wondering why.
Keep your hopes up. Drink that whiskey and rye.
Keep moving yourself forward. Live life 'til you die.

Sit back, watch the ashes. They fall to the ground.
Take a listen to the birds, its a beautiful sound.
Take a minute, sit back, watch the world go around.
Take a look at the sky, so vast and profound.
Take a drag of your cigarette, and let yourself go.
Take notice of your freedom, and let the wind blow.
Take off your winter coat, go with the flow.
Take off your mask, let your true colors show.

Sit back, watch the ashes as they land on the earth.
Feel the rediscovery, and feel the rebirth.
Feel the wind on your fingertips, for what it is worth.
Feel the world, what it is, it's incredible girth.
Feel yourself drift away, feel the grass on your toes.
Feel the sun on your face, feel the wind as it blows.
Feel the love in this world, as it blooms, as it grows.
Feel the light on your soul, see the beauty it shows.

Sit back, watch the ashes, their coming, their due
Realize, though, that it's beautiful too.
Redo all of the things, that you love to do.
Remember there's people that truly love you.
Replay all of the memories that make you smile.
Revisit your best friends, and chill for a while.
Resign from your deviance, cunning, and guile.
Relax in recumbence, sit back, reconcile.

The ashes will soon, cover all of this land.
Theres nothing to stop it, no curing command.
Theres someone who loves you, so go hold their hand.
Theres a shortage of love in this world of demand.
Theres only one thought that comes into my mind.
Theres nothing new out there, theres nothing to find.
Theres everything I need, right here, am I blind?
Theres people who love me, people of my kind.

So the world can go ahead and crash down around me, I'll just look Away. I'll just take a look at the things I love. I'll just take notice of the beautiful Day.
I'll just take another shot, I'll just sit in the beautiful green Grass. I'll just look up at the sky and let the ending pass.
I'll just be sitting with the people I love, and we'll be letting our true colors Show. We'll be feeling the grass on our toes, and letting the beautiful wind Blow.
Get ready to watch the rest of the world fall to pieces. To watch the ashes fall. Prepare for the Show. But Don't worry...Just Sit back, relax, and let the last of that beautiful wind Blow.


---------------------------------------------------


Fall with me. Drop with me. Drop like the rain descending from the pregnant clouds overhead. Fall like an avalanche, free and uncontrollable. Fall like the waterfall, endlessly powerful. Fall with the world, but not in disgrace, we're falling like leaves into a beautiful place. We're falling into eternity… discomforting but true. So enjoy the descent, it's the least you could do, for out of this fall comes a beautiful view...

Fall with the leaves. Fall peaceful and slow
Forget everything that you don't need to know
Form truces with enemies, befriend every foe
For now is the time to let everything go
Forbidden are thoughts of a peaceful demise
Forsaken, the image of peace in disguise
Forgive all the subtle and meaningless lies
Forego a renewal, re-open you're eyes

Fall with the Rain drops, now finally freed
This is the beginning of the end indeed
This peaceful decline may be just what we need
This fall from our old withered branches of greed
This pressure discharged… our old ways replaced
This wind now uplifting, this beauty embraced
This Government Tangle, this Empire, erased
This Is the End of the struggles we've faced

Fall with the Waterfall, Establish your voice
Pro-life… Pro-love… Pro-strength… Pro-choice
Protest your opinions, don't let them devoice
Progress now possible, so revel, rejoice
Provide the necessities, laughter and love
Produce something new, something unheard of
Proclaim your new freedom, and wake with the dove
Promise to fall with the rain from above.

Fall with the Avalanche, plush and severe
Don't let the ending take hold of your fear
Don't forget, there's people that still love you here
Don't let these people, your friends, disappear
Don't be afraid now… The grass is still green
Don't take your eyes off the beautiful scene
Don't let your colors be shaded unclean
Don't let the distance grow vast in between

Fall with the ashes that cover this earth
Be Born Once Again, re-discover rebirth
Believe in true beauty, for what it is worth
Beware of this world, its incredible girth
Below you are roots from which you can grow
Beyond the Horizon is the end as we know
Belong To A Bigger Picture, go with the flow
Become something less… Sit back… Watch the show.

Fall with the ashes, but not in disgrace. Finally we can escape from this place. The government gone, the Empires erased. We can Fall with the raindrops, with beauty embraced.
Take off your masks, let your true colors Show. Let the sun shine bright, let the moonlight glow. Revisit your best friends, Let yourselves go.
and let the very last of that beautiful wind blow…

Untitled

I’ve reached an unknown.
Where measures of distance haunt me eerily.
Where I feel the wind make its way around the nape of my neck.
Where I search for memories of searching lips.
Where the sound of susurration keeps me attentive.
Where love means loss, hurt, and longing.
Where soft touches remind me of eyelashes wet with tears.
Where rough touches are just another ripple in another ocean.
Where unhope is unlove which is un-me.

And as I am lost in this unknown,
I beg of you, please don’t hurt me.
Because here fragile souls attempt escape from love eating monsters.
Here words fly off seeking to make love to butterflies.
And here is where I’ve reached,
A place of deep infatuation.




---------------------------------------------------

memories do hurt when lost finds a way in you don't escape yourself
love will come and go
it reminds us how much we can love someone yet
get the hurt to how we feel
place a thought in your mind deep and sorrows look
ahead
we all been there and know
do not escape from you're heart eating monsters time to time
if words can only speak loudly who will seek
the person within you
butterflies fly freely on their own as you can to
take it step by step
to be unknown be clear to yourself love comes once
again patience is there
no need to beg
let the one come to you don't chase after them
even though you start feel
let them feel more to you

Realization

And the thing they never tell you is how hard it is.
growing up,
finding your place in the world,
accepting your fate.
But if you're lucky you have someone in your life who gets you.
Who accepts you for who you are.
Whoever so gently nudges you towards your destiny.
So yeah, I guess you can say I was born to be a writer.
Which is weird, because I definitely wanted something else for myself.
Something big,
larger than life.
But its a waste of time,
wanting things.
Because sooner or later,
the thing that wants you is just going to come up and tap you on the shoulder.
And you might want to be ready.

You Have a Beautiful Mind (10 words)

Sometimes I wonder if you're aware of it.


Are you?

Gone fishin

Some place quiet
peaceful

Preferably
I would like to
Walk
Or maybe
Ride a bike there

If I have to drive
I think too many people might know about it
It has already become too popular
Its purpose
The reason I would have went there
has already been defeated

I’m not trying to give an impression of exclusivity

Sometimes

I just want to be alone

In a place where
I can take a book
Read for hours
I can take a pen and note book
Maybe my laptop
Write for days

I’d bring my headphones
Or
Listen to nature’s symphony
A radio would be too much
Too loud
Not something I would want to carry

I won’t do what I did to my last one
One became two
Two became a few
A few
For me
Became too many

I won’t tell anyone
Ill just leave a note,

Gone fishing

Be back
Sometime between
Now and Then

I'm a little preoccupied tonight
sat at this computer with nothing
but a single beautiful
girl on my pretty
mind

there is no roar from the sky
to shake me from
her

there are no desperate cries
in the deepest depths of hell
fit to stir
me-

all I can think about is why
I'm always falling in love
with all the wrong girls
at all the wrong
times

when everybody else seems
to make it look so much
easier
than
this

as the rain continues to fall
as another ex-hero
dies

as the peacock
struts--

as she passes through my
mind again and
again

and
again

now, they insist, just move your tongue behind your teeth

but only to the silent so all the words become clear

It only takes a moment to learn what they can teach

meaning is just shyly hiding in places we can’t hear

in a soft caress flowing slowly down your skin

a coy affection as the racing heart begins
the pursing of the lips, the gentle leaning in,

the offer of a kiss and a little taste of sin

can you speak the smile that shines through a lonely glance?

or hear the heart that’s losing beats whenever you’re around?

wait with me a moment to give the silence a chance

our faces can tell these stories without a single sound

Penny

I met a woman
tonight -
the shingles of sorry
her fading
copper face,
glistened with
stories of a
thousand owners.

Mathematics

They say, infinity minus one equals infinity
and: infinity minus two still comes out to infinity

I've never had a thought
as clever as that,
but this morning I noticed:
The city buses kind of
look like loaves of bread.

by the mathematician's formula,
that means absolutely nothing.
This thought is something
to be proud about.

What "never" really means

there is a match
burning on the table
in the house
we're locked out of

my hands are cupped
against the dust-encrusted window
i'm watching it
closely

the house
is on the branches of a tree
the tree is on the summit of a mountain
the mountain is its own island

You're standing on the ocean floor
your arms vertically out towards me
waiting
for decades

I am a butterfly
You are a starfish
we've never met
we never will.

The Split

She slipped it into the conversation like it was an afterthought, but it served as a perfect coda to end our latest of many arguments.

She said that she needed a vacation.

My girlfriend informed me that she would be gone for a week. She would be traveling with some friends to a nearby beach and would return that Sunday.

After the initial pang of hurt and jealousy subsided, I became excited.

I still love my girlfriend, at least I think I do, but lately I haven’t been so sure. A week long break was exactly what we needed. The constant bickering was getting to be too much. I was in dire need for a week to get my bearings and reassess our relationship.

It's not one thing in particular that irks me about Ana. It's just a bunch of little things that have added up over the two years we have lived together. Lately it has reached a point that, at times, her very presence can make my skin crawl.

In addition to this, she is a loner by nature and I constantly struggle with her hasty decision to move in with me. I should have spent more time getting to know her before rushing into living together.

In any case, I was very much looking forward to a week all to myself.

My own private vacation. My time to do the things I wanted to do without having to hear Ana's complaining.

The week went great. I did not do much else than revel in my isolation, enjoying free rein of our apartment.

Freedom, sweet freedom.

Words cannot describe the jubilation I felt. On Wednesday, I remember staring long and hard at our photo we took on the water, which we displayed prominently in the living room. I turned it face down. There were some cold hard truths percolating in my brain.

Before I knew it, Sunday rolled around. That morning I woke up with an all consuming melancholy. I had enjoyed being by myself so immensely. I was sad from the anxiety of seeing it go. As emotion continued to overcome me, I realized what I had to do.

Ana had told me she would be arriving around 7pm. Though we didn't talk all week (not a good sign for our relationship clearly), I assumed she would still be coming home at that time. I left the door unlocked and mentally prepared myself for what was the best way to tell her it was over.

Cowardice overtook me. I swallowed a triple dose of sleeping pills and got into bed. Our inevitable confrontation would have to wait for tomorrow as I decided to extend my vacation one more night.

I awoke at 9 to the slamming of the front door. Confusion was replaced by anxiety. However, I was resolute in the fact that our life altering talk would wait until tomorrow. I pretended to sleep, expecting to be greeted by the sound of the bedroom door opening, instead the vibration of my phone on the nightstand cut through the silence of the dark room.

Though my eyes were dry and my vision was blurred from the effects of the sleeping pills, I did not need to see my phone to know who was texting me.

This was something she did that drove me nuts. We lived in a very small apartment, but she would insist on texting me if I was in another room, hounding me with multiple messages when she could just get off her ass and talk to me face to face. I had chided her for it before and was furious about it at that moment. As I continued to lay in bed feigning sleep, it struck me why I detested it so much. It was emblematic of the breakdown in communication between us, another symptom of a relationship falling apart.

As my phone continued to vibrate, I let sleep find me once again.

I awoke at 11 to the sound of feet shuffling outside the bedroom door. The footsteps going back and forth up and down the hallway. I could hear Ana talking to herself. I could barely make it out, but it sounded as if she was just saying my name over and over again with increasing anger and fury.

This is another thing she did that pissed me off. She would pace up and down the hallway talking to herself. My choice to end it all was becoming clearer as the right decision by the minute.

I looked over to see I was still getting texts. I had had enough.

Fuck her for being upset!

If she has something to say, she can open the goddamn door and say it to my fucking face!

If she wanted to be childish and send me passive-aggressive texts, I would return in kind.

I finally picked up my phone to release a torrent of malicious messages. My anger channeled into my fingertips. However, I stopped cold when I saw I had missed 30 calls and as many texts.

None of which were from Ana.

As I began to read through them, the horror began to build in me reaching a crescendo as I read the last text from my father It read.

Son, I am so sorry for your loss. Ana was an amazing girl.

With unfathomable fear coursing through me, I dropped the phone. I turned my head slowly toward my bedroom door as it began to open.