Such pressure

    to write

every moment

    of every day

and make them

    beautiful

even though

    I am afraid.

I link these

    severed chains

and toss the stone

    into your lap.

Drag me

    down the halls;

sweep me

    across the floor.

Two waterfalls,

    and a single flow.

A centered spiral,
    where we converge

into paper

    and into color.

tangle of arrows

In the time of a thoughtful, bearded lecture,

for a moment I saw the clarity

     of chaos

behind the pacing of the speaker,

and the small crowd of souls

unrestrained, and I wondered about
     mining carts.

Would we suffocate? Could we

handle the tangle of arrows?

       A blue fuzz

powdered and consumed his head

and spread over my vision.

I had to look away, flinching,

to hang desperately onto this sight.  

     Clustered cosmos

all sitting in a classroom

listening politely, quietly,

     violently shaking,

and the blue consumes the room,

then settles into a quiet hum,

then dissipates into the words that once again

fill the air and take away my attention.

Postcard

Boiling excretion
from the glowing walls, organic,
pulsating fungus, pooling to the cavern floors.
The smell of acid and rotted flesh.
Fingernails torn at the scraping
horror, through iron barred freedoms.
Lights above smothered, and now a growling
heard from the tunnels below. It hears us,
crying, bathing in tears not our own.
Wish you were here.

Introproduction

I am a liar of my craft.

Here is the world, and there I see

hung vertically down the empty walls

long black hair, shining and

knotted every few feet down

pooling on the floor like tar.

Oil never meant to burn, now

staining the rug.

And now I hear the orchestra

from far down below, echoing

across a valley outside somewhere.

And I want to be religion,

and these are my myths.

Islam

Mumbling from the doorway,
reaching forward with a dusty broom
towards the floating men and
hidden women of
the old library. She
refuses to step onto the floor
of unhatched eggs,
empty and void of life.

Dusted Chrome

Inspiration precedes creation.

Condemnation secedes, forcibly,

ideal structures, growth and lucid rapture.

To capture the impossible etiquette.

Motivate our hands and eyes to action,

this commonplace in need of support.

   Intellectual disparity, appetite for originality,

   gives worth to papercuts and an extra hour over coffee.

     But desire does not grow from expectation.

     A stern draft, grading for enlightenment.

        Hatred burns at the root of tragedy-

        its fuel, repetition;

        its catalyst, displaced education,

        and the climax is dissonant

        from superstitious reality.

           Bliss is a catastrophe, unworthy of compulsion.

           Especially alone, waiting ahead in the night’s meaning

           with a pillow for your aching head

           and a cleaver for your beating heart.

           One does well to remember an adage:

              The value of a text is brilliant.

              Failure is a necessity.

              Perfection rides on the backs of dragon-men,

              and their eyes is spelled “fire”

              not of a literal tribe, but of implication.

              A fact not lost on the versed and critical.

             Which, argued, should be social.

                 My friends, I urge for the sake of the modern

                 Not to leave life to the flies

                 but instead express, explore,

                 and for the love of all, think

                 lest we pray everyday

     for the fortune of the world to shake us alive.

Angels, Never Slow

There is, and will be, a blind conductor

Riding, pushing along, alone

Familiar with the tracks, the turns, the

Bumps, the gentle breeze that rocks

The beast across an unsteady bridge.

Paths never seem to change, only ever

The destination. Another left turn,

A small wave and a smile that sinks oceans

Forgetful, always forgetful, never cautious enough.

A shudder from the cars; phone vibrations

Everything right on schedule, but never the cliff.

There is a certain pity that is often felt for him.

Mostly by his own self, to which is used as

The coal for the warming fire.

Outside, he feels a chill, and maybe it is winter

But there is no ice, only soft snow

Drifting in the air by strings of love.

Behind me, the horn erupts.

Engines bellow, and the tracks

I walk beside quiver, convulse with excitement

Or anxiety. They carry a burden not for me.

The train passes, speeding ahead. It is not for me.

Only for a moment, brief as spark’s life

Do I feel the heat of the fire,

And assume the engine’s passion, its commitment

And I see the slick, black pain(t) on the outside, inviting me.

And then I see the wheels, and I know they’ll never stop pushing.

An impressive engineering marvel, years of construction

A design with no instruction, but plenty of recorded failures.

It will stop soon, and I will hear the crash from a safe distance

From my spot in the snow, huddled in an igloo

Carving angels with my boots.

Poetry/Art Exhibit at ISU

A few months ago, I submitted the poem "Candles and Ink" into the art history club as part of a collaboration set in our school library. I hadn't heard from them in awhile, so I figured they were still planning the set pieces. Tonight, however, as I was buying a bagel and some milk, I saw a new set of pieces lining the walls of the library. Lo and behold, my piece was hanging with it's companion sculpture, of which was my first time seeing. This is really amazing, and the art piece (titled "Sifted Clamp") is incredible. I'm so pleased to see it up and I figured I should share immediately. Thank you to the art history club for this collaboration, and special thanks to Jeremy Lampe who created the sculpture. To say I'm excited would be an understatement. I'm not used to my pieces being recognized like this, so my gratitude is tremendous. :)

Princess

In armor sewn with dragon scales

Within walls of diamond and metal

Surrounded by armies mounted on valleys

A tender soul that won’t settle.

Oblivion

The days and the nights never end

The pendulum freezes in its place

The air is filled with yesterday

I have stopped the world.

Time is nothing to me

Gravity succumbs to reality

Power in impossibility

I have stopped the world.

The starts have abandoned us

The moon breaks free and runs

Fire fills my lungs in sleep

Please, please, stop the world.

This world is falling apart, but Earth will never change.

Shuffling Stars

At the foot of the path of future

In a time when desires were imprisoned by my objectives

Unawareness clouded my every step

But my intentions moved towards the heavens

And the key to my mind’s cell appeared

For the moon rose above, white with a pale brilliance

With only an inch covered by necessities

But this eclipse did little to collapse this moment

And as I questioned why I deserved this reward

My feet reminded me of their existence

By testing my very balance on this Earth

And as I corrected their mistake

My eyes drew away too quickly

For when I returned my attention to the heavens

I admit, for my own fault in temptation

For better or for worse

It had disappeared behind shuffling stars

Leaving me in my spotlight of conscience.

I've tasted its bittersweets and should be content

And in a way, I have gotten my fill

No more do I need, no less I should accept

The memories are there coupled in my thankfulness

And this is all I need.

Candles and Ink

Physically, inspirational.

Metaphysically, equally so.

Whenever lost in absence of muse

We wander wherever it points to go.

Does the fear of the dark

Stem from the horrors that hide behind?

Or simply the possibility

Of the hell that we must grind?

Yet what if instead

As fear of isolation?

From the visible world;

From the spotlight of creation?

In all it is witnessed,

Giving loved the life to think.

Transcendence is as analysis claims

To flow from candles and ink.

To the Lovely Girl in the Window

It strikes me as surprising how I’ve never noticed

The gloomy shadows of this dark neighborhood

Until I discovered the warm summer’s light

From the window where she stood.

During a casual, nightly drive,

I took nothing more than a glance

And in that moment, to see you there

In your beauty, and your brilliance

To spend an infinity in mere seconds

When my modest peek turned into a longing stare

As I saw all I needed in my life

Standing at the window, combing her hair.

Her eyes drifted out into the night

Oh, how the urgency rose in my to catch them

To pluck her vision and keep it close

I would treasure her attention like a valuable gem.

“Do not judge a book by it’s cover,”

Is a relatively flawed and dated phrase

For in that moment, I felt as if

I had read her entire story, page to page.

Perhaps, if only out of desperation

The only end I could possibly see

To this plotline that she has beautifully crafted

Would be to end it with me.

But, as forever drew to a close

And reality continued its forward motion

I realized the flaw of my captivating fantasy

And the foolishness of my lovesick notion.

Because it wasn’t until my vision of her was broken

That I realized, to her, I was nothing.

I wish I could say I saw her again

But sadly, I would be bluffing.

To her, I was simply another, aimless soul.

Traveling through a nightly void of nonexistent dreams

A background piece for her own life story

A speck of dust on her life’s support beams

Obvious, I know, that I wanted more

There was only so much I could’ve taken

It is best to move with the flow of time

Instead of deeming my heart a forsaken

So I move ahead with her tucked away

In the recesses of my mind’s eye

Since I couldn’t say it then, I might as well say it now

To the lovely girl in the window, good-bye.