For Emmaline

You are like a car crash
and I am a train wreck
and you just for a moment
tried to align our paths, to
crawl onto my tracks and
brace for the impact.
But it will never be that
because I can see the inevitable
from way way back.

Part II

The Octopus came to you in a dream
and touched you.
He lit you a cigarette. He said:
but you didn't hear him.
His accent was thick,
His words further impaired by
the clacking of His beak,
which you fixated on.
You wanted to listen.
He was telling you the future
which has always interested you.
But you couldn't.
You always have been ungrateful and
it was sinister of him to assume otherwise.
The Octopus queries you.
The musculature around His oily eyes twitch
and you imagine the orbs
rolling without focus.
You wonder, do they move independently?
He could see so much, if he tried.
Do they?
The Octopus eventually tires of you.
He gathers his props and
prepares to leave.
You are saddened.
Even though you don't understand him,
he always seems pleasant enough.
You always enjoy his visits.
As he moves to the door, you
reach your hand out.
You open your mouth.
But he is already gone.

The Octopus.

You, the octopus.
You with the broken teeth, with
your closed tight jaws of regret.
You, the monster who has only
a past and a future,
because your present is unaccounted for.
You, the octopus,
with your tangled paws of inadequacy.
You, the sea demon
with the rage they speak of in legends.
With the sour beak of hunger and
the slow movements of an untold weight.
You, the octopus.
Terrifying because that is all
they have ever made of you.
A sadistic beast of you,
an unfeeling mass of sinew,
a thoughtless pulpy death machine.
You, the octopus,
you remain silent.

Drug A

This is a dangerous, illegal substance.
and so we say, "yes."
Give it to us, we
must have it.

Learn everything now.
Learn every piece of it.
Do this in a white room.
Remove all stimuli.
If you don't completely internalize this,
you will pull apart the patterns
all around you. It will be worthless.
You will gain nothing.
Bring someone who always
agree with you.
Discuss everything.
Don't move at all:
there is no reason to.
If you find your head is buzzing,
listen.
Buzz back.

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rubbing our bodies against
eachother, pushing
flesh together repeatedly.
to touch
and retouch
and adjust
just checking,
but scared.
we understand fragile.
we play with this in our hands,
this round idea of failure.
to impress you.
we lay together like children
with that childish wild flying trust
a future which is always
secretly holding hands with terror
deep and clinging, something defiant
something a child would never understand
but that we do.
that this is the most natural
to be WITH rather than WITHOUT.
we understand it is not forever
it is not long enough, forever
so we devour
we press harder.

Monday nights.

when we walk in a pack
we jangle like janitors
our keys swinging with our hips
the sound of defiance.
we are the working class.
the tough guys in the opening sequence
strutting to our next drink
in slow motion like.
we own this town with
our low expectations and
open bar tabs.
our work boots and
dirty t-shirts.
daughters love us and
daddys hate us and
we are drunk and
indifferent