I was never ignorant of sex. Not once

   in my life. I was innocent but not

in the way other children were.

Instead, I was innocent to the violence

   inherent to my existence, like a loaded gun.

It hurt, but I didn’t know that.

I wonder what it would have been like.

   To have known a world before. Maybe that would hurt too.

I died before I was born. I died without knowing

I had died. Exposed early should have meant inoculated.

   Instead I was sick, with no idea how obvious it was.

You take the heavy feeling for granted,

thinking you're lucky. The sky is blue.

   I think I’ve been bearing the weight of the sky

on my shoulders my entire life.

I want to learn what I already know.

   Everyone else is growing up into who I already am.

It’s too late for me to learn what I already know.

i dont wanna look at myself in the mirror no more

   cos i always look the same way i always did-

Like a child. Like a child that doesnt know it's a child.

Un-leash me, red hot hand pawing me down

like water pours down yielding cliffs of clay.

The tightness leather brings my throat can drown

the knowledge held of rightful shame away.

Don’t collar me surprised; instead, pursue

my throat to soak in rich unravelling hues.

Lush saucers welcome my sly swipes for your

unfettered, full attention darling, or-

Your milk, it tastes too sweet to handle, oh

good G-d, that’s good, my form, now-full, can’t start

to take the blazing of your eyes. Please sow

your seeds, your threads, so deep they thread my heart

& knot up into balls & strangle veins—

Don’t make me say the phrase, “Please take the chains”.

when I was seventeen,

my family moved into

The White House

motel: work for

rent, rent for heat,

not cheap on that

unrelenting plain,

empty except for the

cows who tongue

cold metal bars,

no trains left on

the track, the

empty track

that bars no man,

beside our house

with no glass,

glassless, curtain-

less, we’re locked

inside with the wind

-ows broken, the wind

unrelenting.

no trains left

here, no hills, no

tongued thing.

Immortal Heart,

tin mimic, still-beater

—even when cheap,

this Love lasts.

I’m nineteen

& you are a lustrous gold

with a streak of kaleidoscopic

lime, electric purple, magenta,

swerving up your dented slope

like a stream-lined slice

through an arrowhead.

Did you know you were coming with me?

your cheap elastic unsnapped even now.

Though your mouth stands floorwards,

sucking the head of my giant stuffed bear

like a stubborn & vigorous limpet,

you cup Time,

wrangle it like a snake,

& proudly hoist it

skywards.

When you start to undress in front of me,

I imagine a paper curtain between us.

Your silhouette could be enough.

I could follow your every movement,

the rise and fall of your chest,

I could almost feel the heat

of your skin, like winter sunlight

—subtle, gently persevering,

I could almost trace the give

of the shadow of your stomach,

it’s pressure against my back,

and the heavy scent of your body,

I could feel your low voice resonate

through the muscles of my neck,

Through the paper curtain, never missing,

I could know the bounds of each contour,

And it could be okay to want you that way.

My dim stare, pulseless yet

fretful, barred at a safe distance,

never splitting your shadow.

But there is no paper curtain.

So instead I look away.

When I allow my body to soften, breathe in,

It pools into the blackest hollows of my psyche.

Shadows of forms my waking heart can’t bear,

Livid nightmares, dreams I deny myself, set aglow.

it hurts to let go — it hurts to remember.

I confess this to you by gripping your hand,

tentatively. You grip mine back, interlocked, and say,

“I already know you.” Your palm’s edge, breathe out,

matches mine exactly. I already know you too.

the wind on the sand makes a ghost of its face

   tracing it’s surface and hailing my skin

this beach laying flush has a featureless grace

   the pockets of quahogs sigh softly within

the weight of the residents driving their cars

   squishes the muscles from out of their skulls

fractures run deep here, the haunt of their scars

   in arteries bloodless fill borer-dug shells

violence a gentle thing, subtle and sweet,

   all that it takes is a second of load

how do you suck your tongue under your teeth?

   the roof has collapsed, your cracked chassis enclosed

suppose there were ways we could dig up your bones

   show the whole township your jilted remains

they treat tender flesh like wet trash or like stone

   “put that thing back in the ground whence it came”

but you were here long before human or wheel

   tunnelling ceaselessly ‘neath the seabed

nothing is barren, the sand just conceals

   the catacombs sprawling, lush, inhabited

though others regard you as vagabond wards 

   for eons your brethren have laid down their claim

lovers and brothers and children of lords

   have passed you all over, yet still you remain

   Of the thousands of patients nurses meet each year,

Do they remember 200? 80? 35?

   When we breach the plexiglass wall at reception

with a name and an order, is there pity for us?

   Or do we remind them of a tumor, a paralysing cyst,

a dead infant? Our sulking faces a caricature of the cases

they tuck beneath their eyelids

         (to avoid violating confidentiality)?

Neither.

They man their plastic stations

like McDonald's drive thru workers

"What can I help you with today?"

Suspended under the artificial light

of their office, performing care & warmth;

They cannot see the audience.

  and much like lighthouse operators,

tracking distant blips, they can only forget us

or hope that when our ships drift from view

   they have landed in calm bays

 and not fallen into the abyssmal horizon.

My memory captures in long exposure.

It warps all forms like molten glass.

Each and every grain of sand digested

into a blazing warp.

The belly of the glass is womblike-

it does not knock. It does not know

permission, dignity, or death. It simply

homogenizes.

To maintain an object's integrity is futile.

It is a war of your will against the bleeding

of ink & water. You must learn to love

new hues.

  but can I learn to love this?

  & can anything be salvaged from a man who loves

to lose?

Clouds like clenched fists, tight around caged water.

Piercing clap of a thousand mocking waves.

Barren cliff, you bursting dam, faller, breaker, trembling under weight of gull

Look down on me.

Body but a breathless anchor

   heaving with the sea.

Moved by cryptid currents

   twisted puppet of debri.

Becoming but a shimmer now

   succumbing to the shore

Look down on me, look down on me,

   my hurt reduced to gore.

Breaking down's not easy

   it requires special help.

They know not what they feast upon,

   my friends among the kelp.

Blooming like a plume of smoke,

   erupt, snuff out my flame.

Shunt my shell with childish hands,

   please shake me out my blame.

Ashes but a school of fish,

   to swim the open breeze.

Fleets of flying seafoam;

   it's the joy of fresh disease.

Loss is but a looking glass

   that cracks the brilliant sun.

Bounding off each ripple,

   waning crescents join to one.

Your likeness is a memory

   of someone now long dead.

The leaden burden borne by fluff,

   the pliant strength of thread.

Your ancient body perseveres

   as mine proceeds to grow,

Yet I only hold you tighter

   'gainst the beating of the snow.

On nights where fever seals me in

   I ponder in the dark

If my lonesome body heat

   retains your faithful mark

How long will you remain with me?

   as if you had a choice.

As if there was a person there

   when I can't hear your voice.

Echoes of a vaguer time

   the tender heart forgets

Are pressed into your blackened paws

   like footprints in moquette

That yellowed wool pulled out your chest,

   a gift from me to you,

Makes your loll unstable, yes my friend,

   you're empty too.

I've forced myself into these reins

   For half a decade now.

I force myself into my reins

   And fastened to the plough,

I force myself into my reins.

   The leather's buckling scowl

Taunts my aging body when

   It threatens not to bow.

Everyday the farmer calls.

   My ears flinch at the sound.

He sits atop me, armed with spurs,

   A petty tyrant crowned.

The field's spanning evermore

   A pockmarked skin of brown

And in my senseless plodding

   I begin to spite the ground.

I force myself into my reins.

   Years pass as I forget

There once was something joyous

   In the meager chance to sweat.

A body like a flexing oak,

   The folly it abets.

I force myself into my reins.

   I'm paying back the debt.

I force myself into my reins

   As no one else would care

To pull me from my stable

   To the chilly, clinging air.

The workers, they must see me

   Pressing through the snow severe

To know my legs still function.

   As the night draws close, I hear

The gnashing of the closing gate

   Upon the faded truck

That spells the fate of anyone

   Who dares to fall or buck.

I force myself into my reins.

   They'll know I earn my keep,

Though the plenties that I sow

   Are less than what I reap.