Humanity is the Intermission

From a puddle to a plan,
Where do we go from Descent of Man?
Carve a scar onto the mountains face;
Launch some garbage out into space.

Humanity is the intermission,
Deaf to crickets but we'll say we'll listen.
Pretentious lines in groups of four.
Yeah, a song will stop those wars...

From that ooze to the Lourve,
When'd we lose the sense to keep the roots?
Scratched a bruise onto the bark;
A name won't keep your soul bright after dark.

Humanity is the intermission.
Blind to sunsets but we see the fission.
A disease or a break in rhythm?
What's the use of a plea that's written?

A kid never really needed a purpose.
"Fuck your reasons, what's on the surface?"
Trite rhymes  thrown back to back.
Yeah, a poem can paint logos black...

Humanity is the intermission.
Mute for conscience but we'll voice opinions.
Apathy or indecision?
How could labels make thoughts existent?

Humanity is the intermission.
Maybe soon we'll lift the curtain.

rue

the incense burns
lambent in the twilight.
circumstance spurns
a man who forgot himself.

the voice shakes
stirred by obscurity.
the heart aches
driven by absurdity.

the past is an open door.
the present a closed mouth.
the future is not what it used to be.

the road unchosen
paved with sketchbooks, dreams,
things less concrete.
the life he picked,
tamed by bills, sidewalks,
the fetters of routine.

empty canvas, empty cans
shamble to the grip of the everyday.
contrived an identity, for
the sake of practicality.

laying back, with empty hands
regret chews upon his brainstem.
looking back, full of lament,
a fool would choose reality.

take

when rain buzzes round me
like the slumber, I put off
when the day, falls around me
like the lumber of malaise

I'll just wish for clearer waters
keep on treading, churning flight
till the bags under my eyes,
the ones I ask for, take my face

and the grace, of that prostrate,
pose I dream in, takes the maze.

when I trudge through my classes
and I feel naked, stripped to cut-outs...
when those hands, tick around me
and I steal shut-eye from the day

I'll just ache for the next time
I lay down, I forget
and the face of recumbence
casts my shadow off, takes my daze

when those feet, writhe beneath me
taking orders from, faceless bells
when the street, stretches stolid
out in front of me, I am gone.

when I hide behind sandbags,
come and find me
wake me up

Shut Up, Wilco

[a short story I've been writing for a while. it's a bunch of maudlin bullshit, but there ya go.]

Shut Up, Wilco

The smell of smoldering roaches hung in the air like marionettes from some illusory desire. Wilco sat, a stilted mannequin on his old couch, trying desperately to fill the sleeves of his late father’s leather jacket, and to leave an impression greater than he thought himself.  Smoke from his cigarette slithered into his mouth, and poured out of his nostrils like time from a broken hourglass.

Beside him sat Persephone. Her father had just died two weeks before, and grief still hung heavy on her head. When she called Wilco three days before, at the end of the Fall semester, she didn’t tell him about her father’s death, and her unexpected request to see Wilco rekindled a feeling he thought he had forgotten. Whenever he was stricken by this hybrid feeling of hope and uncertainty, and the flies of lovesick speculation buzzed around his head, he swatted them by telling himself, “Shut up, Wilco”, a mantra he wished could dissolve the let-down he was afraid he would face.

Wilco and Persephone found themselves together for the first time since the summer of their high school graduation. They had been close, but after choosing different colleges, a year-and-a-half of estrangement now stood between them. Now, she held his old guitar like an injured animal, pouring out derivative but pleasant melodies that rang like the enchanting static of a detuned radio. Trite but indescribably charming lyrics pervaded the room, filling Wilco with the same longing that continuously hollowed him. Wilco’s mind once again turned to his unwanted but undeniable attraction to Persephone; he wondered, as her voice scintillated about him, if he would ever affect her as deeply as she affected him.

Shut up, Wilco.

Her listless vibrato spoke the end of her siren song, and Wilco searched for the words that would do justice to the awe he felt. Despite his sincerity, what sounded was awkward applause, trailed by ten-cent compliments much more superficial than all the truths he wished he could’ve spoken about her. After that, the conversation slipped back into the circuitous and stale musings of two sleep-deprived misfits. Over tired guitar chords and half-hummed songs, their words continued to circle about the platitudes of youth. But as the night grew old, they sank slowly toward one another, until they traded that year-and-a-half of distance for the comfort of an overdue embrace. The night died slowly like that, with every instant that eschewed Wilco’s longing and doubt feeding those flies and that hybrid feeling.

Shut up, Wilco.

Their exchange of stale but genuine words persisted until Wilco no longer had the forbearance to ignore the flies. At that moment, every instant of stupid, blissful affection that he had ever felt for Persephone burst out of his mouth.  All the sickening drivel, all the repressed sentimentality he had pent up within himself, now hung in the air with the smoke and the desperation. The confession of his malformed admiration for Persephone raised her brow like an alarm, signaling to Wilco the beginning of a speech he had heard countless times before. Persephone began to hum the dissonant hymn that was the truth of this circumstance, the sirens of bereavement diluting her words with pain and confusion. She had no real consolation for Wilco; the signals he thought he heard over the phone were the distressed vibrations of a mourning mouth. In the wake of her father's death, the weight of her grief had made her unable to be alone.

The amorphous letters that spelled the names of Wilco’s conflicting emotions rattled in the cage that was his head; Hate, love, ignominy, pain—His lips parted—deceit, regret, disdain, derision—but nothing would sound. Finally her words began to trickle to a halt, but as her mouth churned hurt and spurn to Wilco’s ears, his mind could focus on nothing but the deeply enigmatic gaze that could never fully dispel his attachment to her.  When her words finally stopped, Wilco could muster nothing more than “I’m sorry.”

Persephone assumed that was an empty consolation, but while Wilco did feel a trenchant sympathy for her, that was not what he meant. Wilco felt weak and apologetic for his own blunders. He was sorry that he didn’t listen to himself.

Shut up, Wilco. 

waiting for the bell to ring

my tongue is tied down--
like a dog on a leash.
the verbs and the nouns,
you call a disease.
like polaroid portaits out in the sun,
they faded to sweaters
that spiraled undone--

sit in your desk, like idols of glass--
forget yourself-- forget the difference
between mirrors and magazines,
and don't you stare out the window--
ignore the sensuous song
of the scintillating sun,
the wilting breeze,
the gossamer grass...
let the dull deafen you to the lonely bird who beckons,
"poo-tee-weet?"

hide your disdain
in slanted smiles.
cover your scorn
in a chorus of cankerous yawns.
of course you'd be insane,
to differ from the vile--
call you "reborn",
in a cage of hollowed-out pawns.

spite?
no--
rebellion?
no--
there's just something I've been wanting to sing:

while you were lecturing,
we forgot who it is we are.

...when is the bell gonna ring?

jigsaw

life is a fucked up jigsaw,
I'm just reaching for some scissors--
it's easier to cut it to tessellating bits
than force it together;
so I burn my reservations
down to stems and seeds,
and I leave the lucidity
in the grass and the reeds--

latchkey kids shoot joy in their veins,
purging the noise and the novacaine stains.
the heatseeking junkie preys on shivers,
with heroine bows and chemical quivers.

find Grief in man, the shaking walls--
release him in treble and bass--
not wasted angst on bathroom stalls,
or fixes filling the space.

sanity needs escape,
but escape is insanity--
find Balance on videotape,
even in stale humanities...

if life is a scattered jigsaw,
it's okay to use scissors sometimes.

teeth like piano keys

with teeth like piano keys,

bought her soul at a cornerstore.

in a hole of concrete and routine,

she paints on a grin,

like poison come to supper,

like a convent cat,

like a crack in the pavement,

like a crooked high hat,

like a worn out washboard,

like a twisted cassete,

like diamonds in the dirt,

like an empty pack of cigarettes.

a heart that drains

at the rate of a battery.

with teeth like piano keys,

she rains down a melody,

all up and over me,

resonates everything.

a self-written eulogy,

she tried to forget--

but held it up in effigy and

polyethelyne regret,

like a homesick angel,

like a bubble of air,

like an unsure sine wave,

like your unheard prayers,

like a lonely balloon,

like a cold satellite,

like a sigh from a cherub,

like the poems you write.

an energy that dies

at the rate of autonomy.

with eyes like LEDs,

she transplants her soul

to a prozac bottle,

half empty, half full.

old souls

in billows of smoke

I waited--

in pools of fears

I drank--

she took a sip

and she took a drag

and I took a glance

and I tore myself away

she's an Old Soul

and I'm a heart in a cage

mixed signals and alien rage

she's an Old Soul

and I'm a blank nametag

tangled feet and sleeping bags

fires burn, I fall apart

I wished--

friends leave, trickle out

insist--

her mouth spun tautology

but I hung on every word

stale guitar strings

woke up every bird

she's an Old Soul

I'm another dart in the board

she plays with hearts, tugs the cords

she's an Old Soul

and I'm a fucking fool

legs dangling in dirty pools

I took a breath

I held all night

I took the hint

and swallowed hope--

she's an Old Soul,

and I'm a bed of coals,

lit in vain.

it's better than nothing.

wishcoin

in hot summer air
that sticks to you like bad dreams,
I threw a coin in
the sad ashen mouth of the wishing well

but I wasn't making a wish,
I was letting it go--
sometimes you have to throw out ideals
like moldy old candy

in cold, callow hands,
the Wishcoin can burn,
heated by every disparity
between life and love, castles and condos

so I -- dropped
the Wishcoin and I waited
for a settling splash
that would never sound.

So I trade singing lullabies
for the spite of spitting diatribes;
Saccharine daydreams
for the sleep of sullen routine.

So I went home,
and I put on a suit,
and I grew a few feet,
and I gave up.


They call me a grownup now.