note

that i will always answer your questions

even when you are not asking me

when you say something that floats in the air

i look

and speak

but if you have no mind 

and your thoughts are not here

my words will float on back to me.

happiness as i see that which never moves for me stand and dance

sadness and madness

when it falls down after the breeze had gone

a mockery

of breath.

dead things.

easily

persuaded to go that way to do that thing to drink that cup 

you nudge me, yes, sweet,

once, 

another once, and another, another, another once

and i 

think

and stop and go and stop and think and

and you

here

smile at me looking at my hands

the spaces on my face

the spaces in my mind 

you guess

you presume

and i don't know

but you ask

and i

shake my head

and nod it no 

diagonally off

and you give

me

an okay

then i try to 

throw it all away

spill 

my mind.

lighted fools.

i walk with you in the snow on the fields where the trees are tall 

enough for lightning roots to touch

forests of snow 

you would take me 

in your robe speaking

the language of silence 

apologies too long forgotten

fear of the vast 

blank of unknowns

existing in the dusk

till dawn

soft sounds sinking in air

down down

on your head

light shadows run on

to me

soon, i will prove me wrong,

and tomorrow become

one more lighted fool.

tongue

in cheek,

i thought your mouth was too sweet.

i thought your eyes were too pretty,

like crystal waiting to be dropped and broken,

like stars, too many, too attractive, too far and unreachable.

your deeply complicated

voice

sounds

words and languages

all those tones i do not understand

all those meanings i won't ever find.

to be talking to you,

but not telling you...

you hide yourself well.

too sweet, too deep, too attractive and far for me.

soy crisps

i chewed and bit my tongue mom i miss you and want you to come and visit and maybe then i can tell you what has happened but it'll be too difficult because you wouldn't really consider it to be anything and i think it's not a big deal it's just...

everything.

everything i realized at once. they don't want me and i'm just tagging along all the time.

and i'm just here by myself and walking and i have no place to go and i want to know what i did wrong and why i could not control my life better and why it's all going away, all that i had had once, why it all just left and now i'm here, somewhere i don't really belong but this is the best place for me anyway because then it hits me that i don't belong anywhere and even my thoughts and tears are running away and they're taking away my eyes and i can't see and they keep running and i just stand here wondering why i am here, why you brought me here, why i had to be the one who came, why you thought the one before was a mistake and if you know that i am the real mistake.

i slid down a step and the whole train of stairs ran down under away from me, and i keep rolling along, and my arm, and my leg, and my back, but just not my neck, so i could feel everything that ran into me. i run. 

but get nowhere.

so i stopped.

and here i am.

chewing on my tongue.

baby name

quentin juneau ray.

pictures

so many of them, all on a screen i should not be staring at, all frozen with moments of you when you weren't looking when you stared back at the lenses, and at me, staring at you, thinking, i have work to do.

i learned from all of them that you are beautiful, that i like it when you scrunch your nose up, that i am jealous of all who stand next to you, looking almost equally beautiful, at the thought that you might've loved her, that you might still love her, she's beautiful, she's funny in a good way, she's childish enough to beat you at your own game and beautiful and she's right next to you in that one and that one and that one, and looking so happily content to be close to you.

i found some comfort for you, and you gave me thanks, and i wonder if i should dip my toes in the water, and if the water's nice and cool and warm if i should slip in and if you would be behind to pull me up and out if i can't handle the water. i wonder if you could find some comfort for me too. and be happily content in a picture with me.

murder

so i screamed neither sharp nor painful.

it trailed off in my mouth, slid down my throat and shot up into my head.

then it ran around, and floated, eventually back into the trap door i had opened by mistake.

murder without blood without violence without sound.

murder with all my heart and all that was left behind, with reason and thought.

murder, because you grew taller and i grew older, and you grew deeper and i grew darker.

murder with your voice, with my jokes, with your innocent yesteryears and my future in the present.

murder! letting myself go looking one way and not the other. 

murder...your mind too far from my chamber, pulsing with time's meaningless leaps.

murder! trap! always dying, never dead.

not of importance

when it happened where it happened why it happened we can't ever explain.

all i know is, she said it first, to you, and i sat there, listening to your conversation, listening from a place out of your sight, a place where i could've cried if i wanted to but i didn't. i wouldn't have been able to keep my quiet calmness, to hear the words flowing between you and her. i wanted to know what she felt in you that pulled on her so strongly, and i wanted you to say no, no, to say no to her. instead you looked at her, and smiled at her, and i knew i was such a dastardly being to be listening to other lovers. 

remember that time when...

i made up a love story

that didn't actually happen

that was perfectly plagiarized from another woman's dreams

the ones she had every day and every night

where you continued your pursuit incessantly

(instead of the other way around)

and said what you felt and meant what you said

and you erased the shocked, tense, bursting silence

with a...

happiness.

happiness on my feet,

lightness on my head,

a swoop deep in my stomach,

fingers frantically typing,

a blank

blank

page with short

short

sentences

without this,

or that.

the fan spins,

the air circulates,

and all that i can do

is breathe in

breathe out

breathe in 

in

in.

silence.

remember that?

rays of something

sharp and warm, painful and sweet, that one with your jesting frown. your beautiful eyes.

your voice.

it's happening again.

movie date

i'm going to take you to see wall-e.

i'm going to make you feel light.

i'm going to infect you with smiles.

soon.

(if an hour goes by so quickly, how long would a lifetime last?)

one and the bad number

you're going to take my order for jack johnson's banana pancakes.

(and uneven silence for the bad memories.)

off.

i watched your breath, how it gave life, and twirled round and round and round, up and left, right and back, my nose, my mouth, on my tongue and inside my head somewhere, twirling because that's what life does.

i saw your discomfort and smiled sourly because my eyes didn't agree. all those tears needed to go somewhere. i wondered if i can help make you cry if i did so first, but you didn't look at my eyes. then i balanced them for a second on the thin ledges because i didn't want to raise my hand. 

i wish i could cry for you all my life.

i turned off the lights.

then i jumped off.

i see spots.

i need more time, more air, i need your hands off of me, your touch on someone else, i need your words to be cruel and inconsiderate, i need you to turn yourself away, i need you to chew with your mouth open.

i need you to leave.

my door is not open, not for you, not for you and all that candied gilding your face your hands your warmth your words words words in my ear my mind my eyes your words on my eyes you look prettier with those words those words you said as you learned i am easily taken away with words words words false words copied words meaningless yet beautiful empty airy and heavily condescending who are you to say who are you to take who are you to pull me out of my corner.

take your hands off of me. take your lips out of my hair. take your breath out of my ear and your looks out of my eyes your promises out of my head your fingers off of my chest my heart my leg my heart my arm my heart my hand my heart.

they are mine, my mother gave them to me, to keep, to keep safely in their place, my mother told me to live, and i live i live i live for her.

you are shameless.

and i will face you with smiles.

happy

to see you walking in front of me, walking with confidence, walking with the sunshine on your hair, your shoulders, splashing on your shoes as you put your right leg out, then your left leg.

i like to stand under the tree and watch you walk, to see how long it takes you to know that i'm stationary, fixated on you, in the cool, passing shadows of a nice summer day, of dying heat slowing giving way to autumn and the wondrously romantic fall of things that prepare to be born again in a matter of one hundred days of icy rest.

calm, lively, you walk on, and when you get too far, i take a few steps, out from the shadows. just so many that i can keep you in sight for a little while longer.

just so many that i can see her hand holding yours.

and then you turn, and you wave, and she waves too.

so i wave, and smile, and wait for autumn to come.

then

you should not have let her feel that way, you should have been there for her, for you had as much fun as she had, and you should pay for what you enjoyed, don't you know that you are a grown man, don't you know that you should act like someone with responsibilities, don't you know that i can't tolerate excuses for everything you do and do not do?

strike a few white and blacks, i hear you through and through, in that room that is not a room, for if it has no doors, it is not a room. you should have finished, you should have let your hands run, you should have done this and you should have done that but in the end we are all cowards, afraid of what others think, afraid of what others see, afraid of what others interpret from our movements and decisions, our opinions and mistaken ideals and values, more innocent than a child, more ignorant than a tombstone.