Characters

Astrin & Estelle. Two "just friends" that end up rooming together in my new comic, internet is for lazy. Once I finish refining to first several I've drawn/written, I'll start looking to post them online somewhere.

The She Character

  And while  she's busy singing   hymns to  Him
 we are  slowly   swallowing  Lithium
You  laugh about  the bunny  on the battery
  and I   pass out     counting  scratches on your ceiling

Heaven   would be out to get us     if it existed
  but there's no  God   just love     no one   just us
 no comprehension of sin     just and endless amount of time
     to explore our emptiness

Girl With Dragon Tattoo Played With Fire

Watched The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo toady with Antonio and Cody. 'Twas awesome! Then we went to the Music Box to see The Girl Who Played With Fire. Also awesome. All-in-all, a great day.

(s)Existence

It's so easy to sleep next to you, which surprised me. I figured the nerves would devour my exhaustion, keep my wide eyes wide all night. But the entire essence of our whole situation has forced me to turn away, advert my eyes; but not shut them, just see thing differently. It's fucking philosophy, but a new angle gives new insight. We switch angles all the time, trying to hit new highs. Hit to get high. And every time we do, we screw--in your too hot apartment. The drive to it--to Pilson--is our lame attempt at foreplay. We seduce each other with aforementioned consent and a bottle of Jameson. Your shaky hands are clumsy, so I remove my pants myself, with my shaky hands.

If We Are Ever to See It

You said we must become the change if we are ever to see it. And we changed, became everything we said we hated. Everything we were afraid of; now it defines us. We are our own monsters, bred in childhood bliss and ignorance. How often those two overlap. Change, we must. And not because of our fucked up past, but because of our fucked up future. We can't escape the present. The one time we tried to plan ahead, we broke every promise. I never wanted or meant to, but I had no choice; you wanted to see the change. We became.

This is Healthy

I thought I was chasing love, but I was just chasing you. And though I was obsessed in a zealous desperation, I had never been more honest. I squeezed and dripped more drops of truth into those three words than they should have been able to hold. Build up one thing and strip all others. And all the fragmented bits of personalities--the fractions that are supposed to form a whole, don't. There is an almost person with a missing piece the size of you. You used to crawl inside. I'd stroke your tiny ears, protect you from the rain. Until one day, you no longer fit. Not entirely. Not perfect. It was a struggle for us both. I tried to understand, tried to keep the panic tucked away where I thought it--and you--belonged. But I learned you can't keep yourself a prisoner to yourself. Not forever. I was holding on in a hopeless hope.

"If it means anything, I think I fell first." "Nope, doesn't really mean anything."

Trembling and alone in the Wal-Mart parking lot, you read every word on the package of Trojans you bought. You wrote me once you got home safe in your ’88 Camry and said that the expiration date was in 2008. I thought at the time that that was a weird piece of information to include, but looking back now, it’s all I remember, and only for the irony that they lasted longer than our relationship.

Our love was outdone by a box of lubricated latex.

It’s hard for me not to laugh at that sentence and lose faith at the same time. Possessions are supposed to be the things that fade on this temporal plane, and love is like a diamond: forever. Or at least until it is thrown aside by an irate ex. Forever doesn’t exist, it’s just a primitive misconception, like perfection.


Still, we tried to push all the fucked up shit from our past to the back of our minds and focus on the happy. Tried to be that perfect couple, strive for that non-existent perfection. But autumn breezes came and blew change, not kisses. I always get pissed when seasons live up to their connotations.

Fall is for falling out, and things starting to die.

In the spring, we didn’t see a rebirth or any new growth, just the same slow decay of last year. Everything else was starting fresh, growing out of dirt, but not dirty. Like there was no sin last summer to be reminded of. I hate it even more when seasons don’t live up to their connotations.

The First Time

Even though it was summer, we were shivering. Our white knuckles interlocked like the couplers of a train car. It was so early but we were so young it seemed so late. I tried to be patient, but you hadn’t taught me how to yet. My foot bruising the concrete.

I kept secrets from you. Never told you that I knew what it was you wanted to say almost every time you couldn’t—or wouldn’t. This time was no excuse. I knew, as soon as your Kelly Clarkson eyes looked up to meet mine. You were struggling to form the words, choking on their absence. I wanted to help you out, and say them for you. I knew, but I knew that I would ruin it. And I wanted it to be perfect for our first time.

So I waited—I was learning—for you to chase the fear away and come clean. You could still keep your secrets, just had to let out your deepest. And yours and mine overlapped.

I repeated. Repeated. Rinse, lather, repeated, until our smiles made kissing impossible. We were so young that we were whole. So I ran the eight blocks home. My feet bruising the concrete.

The graphic and text for the chapbook cover.

He Said Hi To H

 our hearts are helium
   heavy next to hydrogen
smoke in lungs
we suck   on tongues
  tons   of     love
     lust   to   lust
turned over and fucked
or burned down     up
     up   and   decay

Electric Ashes

Our hearts
   just carbon constructs
   as old as  our  star
 dust to dust   formed us
I wanted to play God
  build you a new   one
 pretend   I could save you

Innit?

I saw the pictures of your new place
and recognised all the furniture
 remembered the colours   textures   and how you looked  naked on them

   It was the wording that threw me
  "Our place" you said   like the one we had
 shared after four years

You've only known him one     I guess that's enough
 It's enough for me to slip   into depression
 picturing him  slip   his     hand

I can't be fine with this finish
Sure   I'll smile through feeling like shit
  but polished shit's still shit

What Can Be Said That I Already Haven't

Our bodies like continents     grind   drift
like pioneers   we pretend     places are important

  You can't make land        your home

 I am   a stranger     anywhere   other than your arms   heart

More than anything   means   more than anything   to me
It's  you  and  me  It'syouandme     We knew   each
 word     forwards   backwards        Weighed your worth
  against the world  and     the world never seemed so light

M&M&M(&M)

This once  fed  fancy  was never  physical
the extreme proximity   just leading   to leaving
eventually we spoke     that's what killed it
        for a time
   cycle   same ideas     we looped our mistakes
into a long-term relationship
Building and collapsing
   like societies
     wiped clean     white noise
We are lazy but could be skyscrapers
 and stand for a lifetime

Anniversary

Tomorrow came   and so did I   to
a vivid memory of you     your already faded tattoos

  the alto sax I drew
forever pinned to your side     like I was for a time

Angelo below your ankle
   orange sea turtle   I named after my childhood hero
 You shortened it   made pretend it stood for something different

Most days they stayed  hidden     like us from the sun
  locked under layers
 the way you have to dress in the Midwest

 but I was there when they first got wet

   cream on black on cream
a thin layer of ink   describes a curve
 we form our bodies around     it     each other

You used   to play jazz   out your alto sax
and I would kiss  the one on your skin
pretend I could play it     or my bass
  the deep E's drops to deeper D's
 and  hang   in this hollow space

 I never had an hard shell case for anything   I loved

  to write you the words   you were against
my prose   poems     even more of those     I kept
to myself     and        carved the ink into my chest

I always burns this time of year

XGFALARMS

Christina

Sirens haunt me   in every colour
though I don’t  know  which  hue  or  key    major or minor

you’re better  with the music     we sorted on your living
room  floor     circa  four

our  organs   matched clocks
at the time   they both stopped   (is 8:17 significant?)

Lips  for the first  time   though I slept with you before
hand  in your pants   for a two hour nap

a morning shoot   means a morning commute
 lonely        exhausted        I tried

but as I looked  in  your sixteen year old  eyes
 I lied


Juliana

My tongue raw     you
whispered     no one’s   done  that before

I’ve  never  been     that person
  and you were serious

(why this rush?)   I know I   spoke too sleepy
I can’t  see you and  smile

like a good boyfriend     I shut
 up and pretend

Truth is   it was dark   and   you half
looked  and  sounded  like   Melanie

so I  spent  years of  pent
 up impossibilities


Melanie

   (ellipses)
permafrost   presence

 regardless  of it’s working status
my heart shivers     winters

     timber!  as we came        crashing
  (the  neighbors  always  knew)

 said I  should  be louder
but my voice  was an alien   in that space

   though there was no
   hot  tub  threesome   or   stripping

We both became what we
were afraid of

Summer Some More

I compiled a Summer Sampler for a Chicago Winter
plucked out the strong songs     all five of them
   (I'm just glad one wasn't about Melanie)

  We used to put the CDs on repeat
  to hear our 90s childhood over again     as we
  did things     kids didn't

 Sin on my skin     I welcome it   sit back
 drink it   and you  in     like naked sunshine
 moonbeams   raindrops     any setting's fine with me for us

   Glitches like clockwork every six/eight months
   the relationship equivalent of the blue screen of death
   I was trying so hard to find a solution     permanent

  I lost
           you     hope     everything (I thought at the time)
Colour faded from my screen of death eyes

Listened to the CD till every note     memorised
 haunted me     waking     asleep
  burned disc  burned in my mind

  I just wanted   some     some more
  Sodom     Sodom   Gamorrah

I (still) Do ...(fuck?)

July   of   '05
  it was already past  my curfew
   but like most nights
 I could barely  care less

 as we stood there
   bodies separated  by your backyard  fence
the wire intertwined     like our fingers
   above it        and   below   the surface

  our hearts touched   as our minds crossed

 my lungs dropped   to match your jaw
then we'd both draw        breath     (conclusions)

I thought   I knew   what you wanted to say
  like most times     (I was right
   but like every time        I never said anything)

 I never said anything

I wanted to wait     hear the words in your voice
before I     (rinse   lather)     repeated     deeper     with a too

Past Tense of a Davis Guggenheim Documentary

I love the loud sounds
   your over-enthused moans   in you mother's house
  (that time Traci walked in on us)

  I laughed   felt half bad     you thought nasty   (sexy)   thoughts
   and laughed

We always  laughed  in the bedroom
  giggles gave way  to euphoric silence
     subtle let go of breath

   I could never catch
 but you were fast     had lungs that'd last     so you took it

I wanted to play the rogue     stealth     steal yours as well
seal it away        between my two hands     behind my back
  attempt to tease   through lightning teeth
   I'm all shock   no sting

  Jokes     unintended things
costly side effects   to our skinny love
We fucking        broke the bed     (and several others in)

metal bars bend     louder than laughs
we can't mask     the truth   or lies
  said my  stupid  skinny  lines     and
  the  skinny  sounds  died

Asshole

same sexy brown   hair   eyes
   though yours filter  out  the lies
 coming  out  but not in

you said you wanted   this   and so did
   I        but didn't mean it

Sure I'm Sure

You can't have irony   without certainty
and I lost     what I thought
was mine

Comfort redefined     found in fears
slow scared proccess   taking years
or days     I'm still not sure which
I held sacred in this   or other lies

Eyes on the empty     spaces
between   ourselves   and so many things
I can't see black     I just don't see white
colour-coded cones   of mine

sculpt and redefine   my
ironic?     uncertain
comfort

What We Should Be Doing

I should be happy     it's as simple as that

but instead I find   myself   filled with fear
I've wanted what I thought I've wanted for years
to get back to that place   (though it's no location
just a figment of my fragmented imagination)

I can't have what doesn't exist

I know you had hope   lost it   got it back
and I'd feel like an even bigger ass to steal it again
but I just can't think of any other alternative
(What     this working?)

I can't hide my pessimistic optimism
I feel like shit now     but it'll all fix itself somehow   (maybe)

I should be happy     it's as simple as that

But I can't fight the fear     of having the fear
of losing someone     (just give up)

I know I'd fucking ruin it     (Fuck   that bitch did it
she fucking ruined me)     it's as simple as that

Same Simple

I     a man of simple taste(s)
a pen     a page
frustration at the correlation   (or the lack of)
   between the sheets and the screen

(Bastard html    expelling my [coded space]s)
(so I type them by hand)

How lazily I employ these fingers
Click   Clack     till the bones show

I sit back   and laugh   at how sad
I am     same simple pursuit

She's just a muse amusing herself

I Slept with Osaka

The “m” in the center of the back of your sweater
formed the perfect curve     I want to form my body around     yours

(You’re my)   Xylem without the Xy   (okay   so you’re not mine)

You and me is how I read the “U” and “M”
(talk about selective seeing)

“Co” and “Co”     as in my imagined habitating
oh my god     how come I can only think of Oh My Goddess

     Here I am   with my friends   laying next
     to the girl I like   (sober me screaming
     telling drunk me to act)   and all my whiskey powered
     self manages to carry out is playing a joke and placing
     my dick on her shoulder and head
             God   I’m stupid          but you have no idea how much

I’ll beat myself up     over not speaking up
   while I had the courage

I’ll drain the liquids from my veins come morning
so I can go back to just yearning     not acting
never living into my potential

I wear size 6 or 12 shoes     (length or width)     (they’re different)

My feet don’t overshadow yours as much as my hands
(though I’m far behind them in terms of talent)

I saw your hair from the back     at night   it looked black
I froze   then shuddered     A flash of nightmares
came back     I thought you were Melanie     and not
   my not mine   Ellie

Eating Airwaves

Apply my chapstick   (Blistex)   smack     throw that shit in a chapbook
feel the high fahrenheit     to write   one of my own
but it won't belong in the same     (what's bigger than a ballpark?)

I feel     but can't quite capture it
   two separate lives placed on two separate shelves

You talked of God and Cain     cause and effect events
linked by chains     affecting our carbon bodies

I flip through copies of your inked paper
reading incessantly     praying to sink
   so that they may seep into me

I want to feed off you     your talent
eat the airwaves we create with rants

I can't hold water in my hands
   or a belief in god

I've read too many pages
of books     (I didn't find the good one that great)

My hungry eyes made it audible
and my mind decides it doesn't sound right
coming from my lips     I can't apply   it to my life

like chapstick to my lips     to kiss your chapbook
in my leaky hands   goodnight