chemically concentrated

"everything about life -- eating, working, sex, it's all turning my stomach right now." he said.

"the only thing staying down is that single feeling, the one where two people sit across a table, chemically concentrated and bonded by lust, insecurity, and attachment. There's no greater sense than the clean knowing of that person, no matter how many times you've heard em ugly, that clean knowing."

he said to himself.

the character

in hot tin, was chasing the click every night. here, close to the ocean it feels like crashing. the wave is distinct, enjoyable and difficult. and every fixation finds it's home, even orphaned amongst the multitudes. lost in place. at one with space. friends exchanging letters in the modern sense, our stories drawn with crayons. we talk like warning labels, each one of us, basking in our own mistakes. so this is my last pack, turkish documentaries, procrastination and nightlife. this asshole said that artists never tell their secrets, i'm simmering. the tobacco burns to a nub. liquor store, american spirits, coloring books. the good news is we were children. our problems start and live there but we get to be children forever. and that's good news. I stayed awake while you coughed because I loved you.

nostalgic bout/bohemia

do you remember when i told you that you belonged to me? we were parked inside your mom's black car and of course you do. it was exciting that i finally owned you and you me. we recounted our final indiscretions, squirmed, then soaked each other up. invigorated by the possessiveness, between the steering wheel and leather seats, you clung to me for hours. how intensely gratifying, finally capturing the once elusive. you lit up. i caught fire. termites chew my windowsill. body hair accumulates on white tile flooring. i play guitar from my bedroom window to an alley full of louder noise. the starving artist is not romantic, he's self-serving and diffident. there is no johnny depp pose, only neglected health insurance premiums and dishes. a lack of resources or energy, the beats are stubborn, waiting for gems amidst gas bills. department of water and power. dead car battery. battered by the turbulence of the coming days. withstanding a barrage of realism for a single line that'll light up the inner sky. We laid in the sun. We made love. Over and over again. We staggered through those days in a serene haze. An old lady took our picture. Both of us staring in opposite directions. our deepest womb of dopamine, even then, existing on different pages.

be a time capsule

my nights are ricocheting between tremendous fits. waking, sleeping, bothered. you should feel the difference between calm and madness. the spectrum's wide and webbed. travelling happens at the speed of light. but our eyes aren't to blame. they're innocent bystanders to the triggers and mechanisms of our lower brains and higher minds. haircuts. nursery rhymes. desk jobs. the time you were lost at the mall. it all contributes to a furthering sense of tangling in the briar patch of trivial experience and flawed perception. i knew a girl who made her men go crazy. i knew a girl who lived alone above an abandoned gas station. i knew a girl who rode her horse around the orange groves of the san fernando valley. the days melt into splendid gasps of orange and the birds that that bird used to chase with her arms out on the sand, they fly overhead. the sails cut daggers on the horizon, and i'm jogging on the sand and i know it's the end. i know that watching this sunset, as it leaves one last pink slice and aches into the night, it's our end. i have no idea the consequences of beginning but it's a welcome notion and it loses itself in an errant text message or nostalgic bout and it dims and brightens and it's the invigorating quality to the sunrise.

sunset and sunrise

sometimes

only catching a glimpse of this overwhelming beauty when you're drunk enough to dim the staggering brightness of your pain. nothing good gets away. so they say. and i think about being enclosed in some contained environment with her, be it a parked car, rain slamming down on windshield and hood, or a bedroom with our bodies tangled/knotted, loose hair glued to skin by sweat. even surrounded by this planet, committed in a ticking-time-clock of certainty and conclusion. and i think about these things, only so that i can find a little secluded corner of relief in my mind. but it's not much and it's quick.

babushka

physical or invisible. storms of electricity. eyes blurring back and forth. vision muted grey with black lines. wavy like the scream. ghosts impassioned from the shadows of our faces. breathing in her mouth. swallowing her breath. lips in delicate brush strokes. exhale. inhale. exchanging breath like two junkies.

we talked about a bunch. what worries us. i said she's brave. she said she's just all over the place. i said she's brave but it's ok to be afraid. its good. asked me if I was afraid. i told her no. i worried. she said she just had to be more grateful. that's why i yelled thank you at the mountain. an hour after she'd put her hand on my face I told her "gratitude. thank you." for what? thank you. she said thank you.

"i like your energy, its good." i mumbled.
she cooed.
"i like yours."

my hands gripped and caressed the mountains and valleys of her spine, waist, scalp, dug deep and warm gentle and strong.

neighbor snoring.

the greek yafo pepper story whispered in her ear. laugh. the rush of hungering. caring enough to stay away but hungry.

wanting her to leave then come back.

she left my motel twin bed in jerusalem at 4:30 am.

i waited for awhile. she didn't return that night. the music played and she didn't return. then, with my heart, a feeling of my heart coming and going, showering heart. jeff texted me while I wrote this. celebrate it all.

Jaffa

late afternoon wanes. greek drunk energy. we're old men playing backgammon. slouched over the board, slamming marble on cork wood, lose, win, lose more. spill into houses warm with dinner. one, two, cognac, stumble bathroom. in the mirror, dull reflection, wrinkles cut deeper on these mysterious faces. parents gone, feeling alone, nubbed cigarette, smoke dancing from ashtray. there's no one sometimes. the day swallows us in fragments til we surrender. wash face, brush brittle teeth, sleep, dream everything, past failures, things we couldn't see, dark, touch bottom, don't rest, never settle, find a way up, finally wake up, wake up by grace of god wake up, eyes will open again, optimistic with sun.

i didn't fall in love with the mediterranean sea.

in between the moon and you