more than trees
            miss rain
than feet
            miss socks
than shadows
            miss light
than pucks
            miss nets
than tires
            miss roads
than guns
            misfire
than scalps
            miss roots
than gloves
            miss hands
than gums
            miss teeth
than time’s
            mismanaged
than love’s
            misplaced

more than mouths
            miss tongues
than webs
            miss spiders
than statues
            misshapen
than bricks
            miss vines
than stoics
            miss nothing
than puzzles
            miss pieces
than brains
            miss bodies
than Murphy’s
            misfortune
than addicts
            miss asking
than cards
            miss tables
than spoons
            miss soup
[or days when they could still
be bent by the mind; days when folks
still believed in it]

more than irons
            miss ore
than cliffs
            miss touching
than stars
            miss youth
than idols
            miss meaning
than bones
            miss moving
than horns
            miss halos
than scalpels
            miss muscles (and ligaments)
than caves
            miss echoes
than Sundays
            miss mail

—hold, one second, please, let me catch my breath—

more than hammers
            miss nails
than children
            miscount
than clocks
            miss moments

more than ana-
            mis-mosity
than trains
            miss tracks
than reporters
            miss everything
than graves
            miss space
than facts
            miss fiction
than tubs
            miss baths (and bathing)

more than most folks
            miss fine print
than colors
            miss canvas
than puppets
            miss strings
than sounds
            miss ears
than markers
            mis-mark

more than maroons
            miss burgundies
than vices
            miss versas
than Miss Liz’s
            missed miss
than chimneys
            miss smoking
than notches
            miss belts
than wicks
            miss wax
than functions
            miss forms
than eras
            miss ’zonas
than pris’ners
            miss homes (or make new ones)
than Siskels
            miss Eberts
than Sonnys
            miss Chers
than Curlys
            miss Larrys
and Larrys
            miss Moes

more than Mrs. Jackson
            Mrs. Robinson
than the optimist’s
            misanthropy
than Mr. Lynch’s
            Missoula,
Montana then
            Mississippi
more than “pi”s
            miss cakes
more than my
            mistakes
more than i
            can take
more than earths
            miss ’quakes
more than four “i”s
            can see
more than your eyes
            can see
more than u miss q
more than you miss you
more than you miss me
more than Mississipping
more than Mississippi
more than q miss u
more than i miss you
more than i miss me
more than Mississippi

(miss-us-sitting)
(miss-us-listening)
(Mississippi)
(Miss Issippi)
(miss-us-glistening)
(miss-us-fishing)
(Mississippi)
(sis-is-whistling)
(disc-is-spinning)
(disgust-ing-ly)
(gets-us-wishing)
(missed-us-in-me)
(Mississippi)
(Mississippi)
(Mississippi)
(mississippi)
(this-is-fitting)

something’s missing
missing missing

            —issippi

Mass media (therefore,
our government) wants us
to choose sides—black
or white, left or right,
death by drowning or
burning, etc. etc.—
and really, we should!—

if only we could,
together, against them

                        You are so tough
                        you are always pushing

                                    forward forward forward

                        I can do the same
                        I am tough
                        I can push

                                    forward forward forward

                        but if all we are ever doing
                        is pushing
                                    forward forward forward
                        when do we ever

            stop

                        to soak in the scene—
                        freeze frame, cinematic
                        on silent celluloid—

            pause eject return                        

                        and never mind
                        if we forget to
rewind.

grips you from everywhere—
it bursts through your doors and
screams through your phones
it creeps through your
windows, won’t leave
you alone

fingers raw, fatigued
and aging, second-
guessing your first
impressions and triple-
checking your quadrilaterals,
just to be certain you’re
right and congruent to
what they told was true,
doubling back 360°
to square one (if only
for a slice of pie)…

it’s this, it’s you,
it’s me, it’s them—
it’s everyone and everything!
if you let it—

I believe Palahniuk said
it best, something like:
there will always be something
in your way, there will
always be a million and one
reasons not to do it—
to put it off, to let it sit,
to do what’s essential first (as if it’s not),
or what’s insignificant beforehand (maybe it is)—
even more, to determine
which is which,
to spend time deciding,
always some excuse
while life passes
you by…

Allen Saunders understood, right?
“…life is what happens to you while
you are making other plans,”
not to be credited to Lennon—
and you saw what happened to him!

anywho—it was Bradbury
who was writing so as not
to be dead, every single syllable
an epic battle against death
itself, a crusade he
could not lose…

but you know what?
fuck ’em all:

z. don’t submit to the countless
reasons not to do it,
surrender to the one reason
why you should—

y. making plans? don’t even bother;
plans are pointless—we are
far removed from the Reader’s Digest
subscribers of the 50s, and
that wacky beatle can keep
his stolen quote with him,
buried deep in the ground—

x. I am not afraid of death;
that is not to say I am ready
to go, rather that I am not
seeking immortality—
in fact, I recognize its
necessity—I welcome death with a
warm handshake as my primary
motivation, my finest
reminder, that I have
much to do before
I lie down
and belly
up.

filled with those still
yappin at me,
from beside where
I sit

towering down,
menacingly
cruel, scowling
prowling, waiting

their way with words
immeasurable;
silent

records of insanity
scriptures and prescriptions
they could only fill
on their own

black magic tapestries
and peculiar anecdotes
of misery, agony
where what’s beyond our control
takes hold

break the mold; there are
            other ways
under the gaze of
            gray skies and eyes
pointed toward them

a cosmic gavel
unlikely and incomprehensible
the epitome of every—
single— little— thing—
with a sinister smile
that suggests otherwise

a dominion not yet
            diminished, spattered
in tar and not finished
an instantaneous wishlist
            wishing for all
            that it isn’t

just conjure enchantment
            if you can
and hold on to the illusion
            while you have the chance.

[insert the sound of a door opening and closing, footsteps echoing away down a long corridor, the smashing of glass—a window—and a scream that never ends]

I’ve always been
an open flame
at an oil rig
the stick that
pokes the untamed
unbound hungry beast

the real estate
of my gray matter
is exclusive
but not expensive—
we’re looking for
a specific buyer
and we’re not in
a hurry to sell
to the highest
bidder or the
most desperate
or needy

it’s not the
best land
I’ll have
you know,
I cherish my
customers and
always wish to
remain honest
with them, if
nothing else

the dirt is haunted;
there are ghosts—
you can see
their faces and
smell their skin,
you can hear
their whispers—
just like the
first time
every time
and they
just
won’t
go

the ground is dissonant;
there are earthquakes—
unmarked areas where
the land groans and
parts, opening up—
split skeletal
fragments, wisping
muscles from bones,
where people
and places
potential
it all
falls
right
in

the weather is volatile;
there are tornados and hurricanes—
swirling and smashing
crashing and bleating—
lightning and thunder
rolling through often
roaming at will
knocking out power lines
and knocking down homes
without a single
storm warning or
any warning
at all

the air is hazardous;
there is radioactivity
and toxic sludge lurking
in most nooks and crannies
cracks and crevices
eroding the economy
and causing cancer
making it hard
to breathe at
times, but
you adapt

the winter is grating;
there are tundras—
freezing, frozen
regions where frost
rules and there
is no exception—
all foams up to fade,
to froth, to be sifted
off with a butter knife
or shaved off with
a razor blade,
all white and
gray and
gone…

and there are fires—
oh yes, there are wild, wild
fires, engulfing everything—
everything

leaving nothing but ash
floating daintily in
the breeze, and
sterile, fertile
soil, for a new
seed to drink
and grow.

It’s the “Big Fish” everyone
exaggerates about—oh, the
languish; oh, the hyperbole—

but that’s the exact fish they all want;
that’s the exact fish they all wish to be—

’til they’re hook’d ’n cook’d

caught ’n crucified

(it’s odd they claim not to be cannibals, because)

they act
like they’ve
never tasted
caviar.

The essential problem with being
human, is having a mouth that can say
anything, or maybe a body that
rarely follows through, trailed
by a brain which harbors shame,
though when in the lead it’s all
reversed—

still, with a skin porous and
thin, and a heart on the run,
arrested with longing—

the antithesis of this,
makes it so much more
than worth it

maybe i just really like the name
maybe her laugh is creepy lyrical dopamine bubbles
maybe it’s those bright round pieces
of cosmic quartz she calls eyes—
showstoppers—

maybe it’s the fake lashes around them
and how she only buys certain ones,
how she gets mad when they don’t have them—
she shuts down shop—

maybe it’s because she’s so tiny
or her adorable lisp—
the son of a hardworking barmaid and a lazy sailor—
or that she used to strip—
showtime, i won’t show up—

maybe it’s her muddled drinks
or her panic attacks which
present themselves as rage
maybe she’s beaten and battered
a mother of three
but she holds it together
and she holds it down

maybe it’s how she deals with me
and shows me her tits sober
and her ass drunk—
curtains closed, encore ensues

maybe i’m just hopelessly obsessed with
disaster disguised in the form of a woman
and she’s the best one yet

maybe i’m just too late
maybe… maybe…

but i know, i know for certain
that this time, this time,
fantasy is better than reality
and that’s exactly how i’m going to keep it.