everything is dripping here
(you know)

(steady)
like my cunt
like the clouds
but just the ceiling
sagging steady
and i could be crushed here
an end
in a bathtub
as romantic as i’ve always pictured
ribs stuck with
drywall wood
caved dust
crushed

and i could be somewhere
tropical

(i’m sweating round my neck)
i’ve got curls
forming round
my skin
and i could be a desert
(i’ve been one before)
all sweaty Saharan cold night swan song
and i could be a desert
and i’m just in my alley home
(curled up under sagging)
and i’ve got beer here
and i’ve got tea
i’ve got enough (to keep) me
and this is an incessant blossom
(clementines & coyotes)
and it hardly ever rains here
and I hardly ever reek (weep)

but i am sweating trainwrecks
i am swallowing
road side bombs
i am crushed
under
lamp post kisses
and i am gusto here
all hopeful coming stories
dripping salt
like it’s mine
like i’m not my alley hole
and i’ve got beer here
and i’ve got lost glories
and i have tidepools at dawn
(crushed into my armpits)
i’ve for long dream kisses
and maternal demo derbies
and i’ve got no idea what
(the inside of)
the walls are dripping of
(i know i could)
cold-cleave
out their entrails
copper guts and aortic valves
and (then) i’d drip steady
steady
(like underground rivers – like secrets lockkey passageways).
(and i’ve got)
sweaty sweaty
(and i’ve got) frizzy
hair
(and i’ve got) areolas
like hot buttered
rum
like my stepfather’s
beer
and i could be on a plateau
(drinking tea on mesa mesa)
and i could
wear pjs
in the bathtub
and i could
be crushed
under the weight
of arctic snow-bath
under the weight of
thirty-thirty

and i’ve got no lover nowhere
(and i’ve got)
slowly slowly
and this could be in texas
and this is on the shore
and this is in my ruins
(dripping out my pores).

we were lands
without borders
histories lost
and state-crashed
we fought wars
and wrote treaties
in the skins of our backs
that would smudge in the rain
but when it was all over
we were peoples
we threw weekly revolutions
with stones
and pitchforks
and spatulas
anything our little fists could hold
we’d overthrow our minds
and fall into the mud
and sloppy and splashing
we’d claw for a future
in hearts without chambers
and rooms without walls and
countries without borders
until our tyrants
and tin can soldiers
would take over
and we were always
refugees not
you and just me
autonomy
sticking my fingers
in the promises of your back
i’d kohl up my eyelids
and walk tiptoeing
cupping poison in one hand
treasure in another
but today is a new day
but today is a new day
but today is a new day
but today is a new day
i can build fences and bridges
i could scrape out roads for thighs
and dam up my hair
and i can stop flowing
into you
into you
a handshake
a kiss
this is it.

your fist fell on me
and the moon fell out of the sky
and my shoulders are scraping the clouds raw
so i am extracting details of my life from

cardboard boxes
and my shoulders
broken shoulders
look better in the cracked mirror of my old friend’s pick up truck
than they ever did riding you
and it’s not so much black and blue
as it is gold and green
jewels and ruddy violets
of you
on me
to where i really wonder
am i pretty
enhanced by the spectrum
not grey
everyday
everyday
all grey
but lively like
fighting and fucking up
and making up
and fucking
and making out
and i am fucking out of here

like arms thrown back
surrendering to the drop
the wind of the rollercoaster’s climax
and here we go
and i’m outta here

and then you lift me up again
cradled
up
up
shoulders scraping heaven
shoulders reflected black at me
from the mirror
in the back of the truck

one road atlas
and freedom and a map of here
9:30: across my cheek
9:58: “you fucking asshole” landing on my spine
10:02, 10:03, 10:04: rib, pelvis, knee, head
moments etched across my skin
ride me
landscape of tuesday two weeks ago
and last thursday
and last night
til it’s morning sunshine
two coffees
hands of friends
soft horizon
cardboard truck
full of socks, hair ties, love letter, photos
notebooks screaming “why”
and the poster that hung over the hole in the wall

leaving you
details distracted
no moon in the sky
one hole in the wall
no me
in the fridge, in the shower, in the laundry bag
just hairs on your pillow

10:06, 10:07, 10:08: making up and getting out

now i’m getting out
shoulders scraping
the thick pink sky
swollen memories
not quite black and blue
just you

like juniper berries strung like bracelets from the limbs of my trees
i drop
falling
shiftless elbow elbow hip
and softness
transmuted into sky
into the color of steel
and i’ve pulled the blue out of it

won’t you join me on this caravan of falling
there are the pillows of winter laid out in front of me
and i’m sailing down the asphalt
from the golden fruitstands and thunderstorms of september’s breakfast

that simple
it’s poetry
for my family
for my lover
for my friends
poetry
shiftless
less than a love letter
more than a prayer
the good news
you got it
it’s gotten
in the cool seamless cotton
of tomorrow’s blanket
yesterday morning’s
bacon and eggs.

coffee melting like a friendship
like earth
the rough spots
on my tongue
it’s something i can count on
it’s one thing i know
and although i crave it
my body needs it
and i teeter on the safety of addiction
i can count on it
it’s mine
like love letters to my friends
like bracelets of remembrance
between me and what i love
until bracelets fray
and drop away

between no name and meek
i thought about you
picked at my cuticles
and busied myself with the left-side moon

at rifle i hit a dust storm
which lasted until silt
splayed across my eyelids
on this seaside of the mountains
and you’re over there and i’m over here
thinking about whiling away the winter here

locked into a camper trailer
i could pack myself down under the arch of red
and imagine i never knew you
pretend it’s winter two years ago
and i am so sweetly fulfilled by your absence
and not lacking

lattice slats
shadow my view like you
in light in dark
crisscrossing my summer
if you’re not too busy being the sun in my sky
will you be the flowers in my garden
you’re taken root in my earth
i know that the seasons will change
i know that the seasons will change
i will clip the pieces of you that are wilted
you will find solace on the sea
but the roots will still be
dormant but deep
they will seep
into the sands here
outside my trailer
between my junk pile
my burning tires on my left
my burnt out neon on the right

but i just passed meek
i’m in the cradle of the desert now
the desert that rocked me softly into adulthood
and burned me brutally through my adolescence
the desert
with the moon
the cliffs
the little candle in my trailer window
i will burn here
my skin will change forever
and it will have something to do with you
no shedding can change that
it’s July and i’m burning
burning until the ashes of my fingertips
fall into the soft desert sand

it’s meek and no name
and that’s who i want to be
friendless
in a trailer with the howling
and the sand
to blow my ashes through
i want the bluff i’ve been
to see
the dry riverbed reflected
in the moon’s watery gaze
first dark then light
crisscrossing my winter
on this flatbed trailer
where i lay my remains
to whisper my dreams to the moon
to speak of heartaches just soft enough
so the coyotes don’t hear
so that the wolf at the door
of my January trailer
doesn’t sing to me
of twenty-six years of heartache
doesn’t vomit ashes of meek into my garden

it’s just that it’s midnight
and i’m somewhere between you and me
and the moon is pouring ashes through my fingertips
turning the mountains into a dust storm
and it’s not January
and the arches in the snow are just like
the latticework of
you across me

i’m sweating in July
no home but my garden
my burning tires cradled in the desert sky
no wolf
no whispers
just a rifle
and i’m thinking
it’s a good day to die
ashes
sand storm
moon.
it’s a good day to die

today
crushed into the folds of my cunt
are three slips of paper
one with your name (of course)
one with mine
and one with the name of my god
the one with your name was written with my blood
the one with my god was folded neatly and then twisted and thrust
forced open by the fingers of the divine
held open there by my own
fucked softly by the fingers of the divine
held open-hearted with my own thin hands
the one with my name was written in invisible ink
and dropped into my own development
before i sat on it and it slipped

so here i am full
so full
fucked into constancy
it’s the little dirty secret behind my smirk
that i am always pulled open
sipping tea
waiting on people
buying groceries
talking to you
erotic and uncomfortable and full
with you with me with the name of my god
cleaning my house
returning calls
with you and with me and with the name of my god
meditating
driving
writhing
walking to meet friends
with you
with me

so here i am full with burning
with three slips of paper dripping out of me
and you can’t fathom what i know
what i know
here i am full
and you can’t fathom what i know
sipping so full
waiting with writhing
walking with burning
sipping so full

today i crave

today i crave heavy darkness and cool mint tea

today i crave heavy darkness unsalted
and cool mint tea

cool mint tea unsweetened and spaghetti thoughts of you
thoughts of you bending through my psyche and under my skin
warm vascular you warm my interior surfaces
the planes of my body
ablaze with your drunken desires
defeat those fireworks baby
they just crackle like you
like you like your fingertips
twisting at my elbows my hips my recesses
you pound into me the beat
of pulsating balance
of anxiety
of meat and potatoes
cold beer and hot sex
you know how to do it

all over the litter on the floor
the lowest plate on my back
bruised from you squishing
screwing your fingers
into my deepest recess
rightie tightie
left alone you unloosen me
now fucked out and careless
panties smeared with your taste
the sunlight is hotter
the sweet tease of the trees fresher

today i crave the way the radio is more true
my quiet meditations more wholly
more utterly fearlessly
humbled
i put my face to the ground
my butter in the heavens

melting like butter
she drops her graces onto me
mercies onto my bruise
this has so much to do with you
and yet last spring and this autumn it had everything to do with me
i know that
so you
and me
we’re riding sidesaddle through the boxes of the days to October’s first dawn
it’s then that on the overlook
on the precipice as you say
in the drizzle of careless yesterdays
we may share on full real deal kiss on liponmylips
that smacks of November of even December

but its Tuesday and i get ahead of myself

right now it’s you over there

me: spaghetti thoughts and daily cravings here
twisting thoughts of you in the winds of my mind
you sway
this way and that
chiming in and out of focus
if it weren’t for the butter
the heat
the grace

of every moment
we may not notice that divinity is whispering herself hoarse at my shoulder
scraping her teeth against my fingertips
she’s here and when i’m not
occupied by you
laid siege to by my incessant you
wavering
tripping though my winds
i’m obsessed with her foreverness
her constancy
perhaps that’s all we mean by divinity
that which we know to be there
to be there and ever-changing

you think i’m a genius and sometimes i think you’re a mess
in my eyes we have a lot in common
a lot more common than our locking horns
and beating the hard dirt with our hooves
rather beating into each others’ softness
til we’re a little stronger again

so again
i don’t write
i just crave
love poems
wistful letterbox hearts
birdhouses of you swaying in the branches
through my winds
nests of you dropping from my limbs
snarled twigs resting in my creviced places
let’s just find each other therelet’s unwind the pieces of twine knotted into our fingers
let’s drop our dried yellow leaves
press blossoms out our lips
trip roots through the earth and for the sake of goodness

drink cool mint tea
drink cool mint tea with me today
for i crave
the heavy dark shade of your limbs
the sweet spaghetti strings of our conversations
and the cool divine restlessness
of all of this