a poem — 14 socked steps from the heavy door to the radiator across the room under the window layers of white paint and red rust dripping down lonesome manic brains jump on the bed and tell good stories and cry out in the deep of night we trade in packets of salt in…

a love poem — the smell of a peach and her skin is flames I don’t think I’ll ever be the same her orange hair cool under my fingertips and the moonlight trips through the windshield of my old chevy truck outlines her pretty face in silver and white hope she can stay out late tonight…

Scraps that fit together nicely — peasants stone the captains all butterflies roam the cabin walls seasons rape their final hues children saved by midnight dew I told the man I said listen, jack from where you’re goin’ ain’t no goin’ back he said he said — now listen at this — I’m just the kinda fellow ain’t nobody gonna miss…

Mother Ocean and the dark cycles of our souls… — mother provides hydraulic structure walls I can lean on slippery sand that doesn’t deceive like ground salty breath this may be the last chance I get before the water gives way and I drown I tried this life this line on the land plows sailing in the cool dirt soft hard work in…

Letting my demons do the writing — I scream to hold the razor for the devil he had a room in heaven once, you know? I wonder if he punched holes in the walls at least he had the balls to rebel to jail plum down to hell just as well they’re all moot these days anyway …

The narcissistic tendencies of a damn dirty dog — a rainbow is eaten by wolves yanked and jerked to the left and right dragged down into the slickest mud and buried like bones out of sight decomposed over a pot of gold I’ll put out the light you should have been told sometimes fright is a useful response to the dogs that chew on trees sharpening-chipping away…

He hadn’t yet adjusted to the physics of the situation… — he’d had a river-wild coors light boat day drinking fishing basking in the sun beer after beer after beer with his friends ‘ol ernie had him some glorious fun now, back at the fire department parking lot friends abandoned him sleeping in the boat I walked outside to feel the setting sun…

The night the mud stopped the love… — it was the night of the van halen mud slides when I first laid eyes on you drunk fucks were sliding down the sides of the hills in that rainstorm amphitheater stew you were the prettiest thing in nashville as Vince Neil opened with a few (you know, the guy from motley crue) then Van…

The hottest July on record… — July earthy evenings, eighteen sticky hot messy clean Alabama heat was boiling mean and not just the steaming engine in my truck, but the way we moved and the way we — the way you moved-grooved-slid on that red bench seat gyrations, no limitations, electric hearts pounding beats strip down…