every poem i've ever written is a metaphor 
for whatever you'd like to diagnose me with

i've been trying to monetize 
my sense of dread which 
doesn't look nice on anyone.
by that i mean, 
this is a *mental illness* poem
as rachel & i would say. when was
the last time you measured 
the weight of your organs 
against the weight of an angel 
on the scales of justice?
there is no such thing
just a forked-tongue
& a wheel of guilt circling 
back to you. once, i built 
a house of fire & slept inside.
now, i am the house of fire.
my organs are made of fearful longing.
by brother is an airplane 
blinking "goodbye." all my skin
is prickling with a fresh rash--
purple & blue & gold. paint a nice
picture of me, uncle. frame it
& hang it in the coat room.
when you are falling
from a mirror who breaks first
your reflection or your teeth?
this is a long spelling bee
& you have no idea what word 
they're asking about.
my heart is a bag of plums.
a bruised bruise. when will
we really get to know
the ceiling & all its contours?
walk backwards towards 
the skylight. ache the sliver 
of july left in each iris.
who is going to bleach this tongue?
my friend tells me 
a corpse takes at least
eight year to be just clean bones.
every poem i've ever written is a metaphor
for whatever you'd like
to diagnose me with.
i had an extra finger once
but i traded it
for a front porch. would you like
a tablespoon of midnight?
i prefer not to share my own.

several occupations to consider 

my job is to kick dandelions
what's yours? there is no dandelion season
but they arrive mostly fiercely in the spring.
little bright faces across the grass.
what kind of machine do you dream
of being? i want to be something
compact like a pocket knife
or a button. my dad is a conveyor belt.
i have his eyes & his hands.
have you seen where your parents
keep the capital? mine hide their coins
in eggs & then place the carton
at the back of the fridge. back to
the dandelions. once their seeds are scattered
it's only a matter of time before more
are staring up at you like kittens.
where should we go for dinner?
should we save the spoons &
sleep empty? there is some merit
to skipping every single meal.
well, no actually not but you tell yourself
what you have to in order to survive 
sunrise to sunrise. the dandelions
respect me unlike everyone else.
they spit on my boots to shine them
as i explain i only destroy
what i'm told to by my boss.
the dandelions just nod. 
is this cruel? it might be. 
really i'm helping them.
the wind stopped years ago & they need
to scatter. i'm yearning 
for a big forest to get lost in
& never come out. all those
tree mechanisms sprouting 
& climbing each other.
i love when people say 
"i miss you" when i'm right there.
it's the most honest thing.
i miss you, dandelion faces. i miss you
triumphant circus. drawer of pressed
butterfly wings. where should we
take our rusty springs?
wash them in the river till they
dissolve. i want to be
a dandelion in my next life.
watch myself turn opaque 
& fragile waiting for a strong
wind that will never arrive.

your parents yard is always a cite of [ ].

is that a bat or a bird
making it's way towards 
the crown of our backyard tree?
blue june night. phoenix in
the garbage can.
a bond fire's ghost twisting
in the soil.
our tall pine full of secrets.
your parents yard is always
a cite of [  dandelions   ]. where do you
take your runaway shoes?
i buried a lot of barbies
& never dug them up. how did
i get to be this old. 
play the time lapse video
of my just standing back here
& getting taller & taller.
your parents yard is always
a cite of [ creatures ].
taller as a tree (no no not quite).
more like tall as a dandelion.
who mows your heart?
if it is a bat will it come down
& please tangle itself in my hair.
i want a jolt of fear to get me through.
bats are kind creatures though
or so i'm told. keep to themselves
like all good animals. our attic
used to be brimming with bats
until my father scared them away.
all animals are easily scared.
especially humans.
your parents yard is always
a cite of [  attics  ].
soon i will live 
in my own special attic.
so many places are waiting dormant.
if it is a bird though,
i hope it sings. nothing fancy
just a few hopeful lines 
of a hymn or pop song. it's all the same. 
just no country music (unless its gay).
what am i going to do with this night?
oh darkness carve a firework for me
or at least a new planet.
i want to discover something
before i try to sleep.
is it a bird or a bat up there
watching me between the thin arms
of the ghostly pine tree? 

mirror, mirror

all the mirrors gave in to exhaustion.
their big sigh knocked over all the trees
& the world was flatter than ever before.
i talked to my mirror to ask what it was
that broke her? was it my constant preening
or all the hours i was gone, walking around
without a faint idea of my likeness. 
yes, this included iphones too & cameras.
my reflections departed elsewhere.
i tried everything. drove to the lake
to peer at the grey-blue water
hoping for a glimpse of my own face.
who was i again? where did i buy groceries?
did i look like my mother?
how did narcissus die? gazing gazing
at the hood of his car. i needed 
some confirmation that i really did exist.
a fragment of body shown back to me.
followed a river to the ocean
where the water foamed white & green.
the waves laughed at my face & showed me
nothing but mermaids & kelp.
what did lacan say about mirrors?
something about self recognition. a moment
when you are aware that the creature
in the mirror is you. this is my hand moving. 
this is my tongue. this is a bug bite
on my forehead. the blank mirror reflected nothing
but the white light of my bathroom.
did it not miss me at all? all its muscles
slack with sleep. i thought about how
living alone must tire my mirror 
with all my worries. lately, 
even the mirror does not convince me
i am a real person. i would watch
my eyes move back & forth & believe
someone else lived on the other side
of the glass. 
my house gets smaller on every tuesday.
maybe soon i'll be reunited
with my portrait. 
i'll stare & stare
& stare & stare. will a flower grow 
where my body was? 
will my silhoutte
leave a shadow 
on the mirror's face?

r u busy right now?

when ur friends tell you to start a friday
u should tell them u r very busy 
with the moon. there is so much of it 
to sever & u r tired of being
the person everyone goes to 
when the week is killing itself.
u step out into a red scheme & count
ur blessings on ur toes. everyone u know
has been really down lately. 
depression coils in the freezer 
next to ur pints of ice cream. provisions
for the coming ice rage.
u r looking for a new lover
even though u still have an old one.
at the Good Will everyone is hungry
for a heart. u buy sneakers
& put them on a ghost so you can see
him walking. keep an eye on
that fucker. this weekend
will turn itself inside out
& u will see all its organs.
this morning the planet is getting thinner 
& the forecast calls
for dead pigeons. when u find one
u need to bring it inside
to make ash of its body. 
paint the ash on the inside
of ur front door for safety.
there r so many precautions these days
to stay alive. all ur friends
with their glowing friday. 
choking on marshmallow & dares.
the bound fire shrinks 
to the size of a period. a blood stain
echoes on the ceiling. 
u r done all ur musts & u r lonely.
ur thoughts echo back at u.
maybe u should have gone to the friday
but they r wild & violent people.
who knows where it would have
ended. u might have lost ur whole
october to that kind of fever.
then again, someone might have kissed u.
someone might have
touched u with his, her, they teeth
& turned u into the bright obelisk
u want to be. the moon 
weeps in daggers. goodnight.

shadow 

i do not believe in underworlds
though i might be one.
i turn off all the lights 
in my apartment at night-- feel my way
down the hall to my bed room.
in bed, i find myself, laying 
& staring up at the ceiling.
eyes glass & pried open. 
close the lids. tell her to sleep.
all the walls here are white.
when i was little i used to want
to paint my bedroom black
but my dad said the room world shrink.
i want a smaller den. the darkness becomes
a kind of language. when Jung talks about
the shadow, does he mean 
the way i can look in the mirror 
& see eighteen of us, standing deeper
& deeper? or, maybe he means
how lately i can walk into a room over & over 
without any idea why i arrived.
i should be more careful
with peeling apart. everything is water
when you get down to it.
dip your feet in me. my shadow 
is often a girl's shadow. my shadow sometimes
eats the bones of snakes.
once i caught my shadow laughing
& i told him to swallow whatever it was
he thought was so funny. 
find clams in the bathtub.
someone is always awake. what should we do
with our faces? i'm setting mine
in a pool of salt for safe keeping.
i kind of want to be psychoanalyzed.
what would they find wrong with me?
it was probably my childhood of
glass & tree trunks. that's why 
i'm a boy. my shadow gets hungry 
in the middle of the night.
sulks to a corner & stands there.
good. leave me alone. 
always the feeling someone is
inching up behind you. 
i turn to check i'm alone. 

piranha feeding time

i am so eager to meet you.
we've been texting for weeks.
i send you pictures of my body:
pale in the dim light of my dorm room.
the curve of a thigh. legs open.
here is my chest. i am 
a special kind of delectable boy.
do you like girls? do you like boys?
where do you keep you mouth?
at the aquarium with my family,
i am trying to pretend i'm not sexting.
we stand around the touch tank
& i reach for a starfish. 
cool water. a single sting ray
circling, staying away from our fingers.
the last boy i messaged fell away.
less & less responses on the app.
he never gave me a picture but he said
"i want a boy like you i always have."
there should be more sharks here.
we look at the quiet octopus 
& she stares back at us. 
my brother admits he is scared
of the ocean. everything is blue:
walls, floor, lights. i am worried
this is just a game to you--
that tomorrow you will be bored
& moved on to another meat.
will you drive to find me
in this deep dark water? 
finally, at the piranha tank
we get to see them feed. 
their thrashing. their need.
blood in the water. all the piranha eyes
like little earrings glinting
in the pool. i imagine them in their 
natural world. dense forest.
rushing amazon river. you ask me
what i'm doing & i say i'm waiting
for you. you say "another picture?"
& i say i am in the amazon right now
but i go to the bathroom
& take just one. neon light.
strange shadows. in my pictures
my body is not my body 
but maybe just blood & aesthetics.
a cloud of piranha taking bits
of my skin. piece by piece.
you say, "yes that's so hot
you're in public." a glass tank
rises around me. i join my family again
& we linger at the piranha tank
a little longer. the fish glance
at us with curiosity 
or disdain. i know you won't come.
my phone vibrates again 
against my thigh pocket.

on swallowing

red tail lights reflect off the ceiling
of the holland tunnel. rows & rows. 
a necklace of light. in the back seat of my car
all my books try to sleep in their boxes.
my apartment folded into a trunk.
all last summer, there was a tree 
that swarmed with bees. we stared at it
through the bathroom window. a train horn
blared like a ghost. i left 
a mark on the wall from where i tried
to pull off a little painting of a seahorse.
it is never a good time to leave new york.
i wanted to cross the george washington 
but my GPS took me under. a reminder
that there is always more beneath.
that october night when
all the subway cars were held still
& we looked at each other & out 
the dark windows. dense traffic 
in the tunnel. choking on vehicles.
i grip the steering wheel
& try turn off the radio in my heart.
listen to car calls ahead & wonder
how long i will sit here. 
aloud i say, "please please please."
there was no air. i am becoming
a fish. i am becoming a brick.
i feel all the necks of the buildings
peering down at me. no movement.
ceiling's necklace of red lights.
above i walk
like a fragment. car moans. 
do i want to leave?
no where to turn around. the tunnel
narrowing into a throat. 
regret is an easy motion. arises
ready as an obelisk. take me back
to what i know. i am always aching
for an old life.  
did i leave the light on in my bedroom?
will i miss the little benches
outside the post office? 
slowly, cars move forward,
one at a time. a little nudge of escape.
i cry & wipe my face
with the back of my palm. i don't know
where i am pushing. take me back
to june when i thoroughly believed in green
dark of the tunnel. the length
expanding in the silences 
between car horns. 

GPS 

i said i want to go home
& the GPS carried me to the mouth
of a river. drove through the mountain
& back down & into a vortex of blue
& through the head of needle & in & out
of parking lots & through 
the front door of a walmart & back
to the deep tall woods. all the while
the GPS said, we are almost there
we are almost there. the radio
looked for a hymn & spun static. 
windows peeled
like lips. everyday 
is a sunday from now on.
i miss the way my doorbell sang
like a tin bird. right there is where
the mailbox would be & here
is where i'd tie a pink balloon
to its neck. who is going to try
being a woman with me? the GPS 
is dainty & she wove map.
she pointed to a cliff & said town hall. 
she found an abandoned church
& said this is a university & now
here i am at a river 
in no country at all.
do i want to have an address? 
who sends me letters anyway? 
the junk mail is sulking off
into the ether. the sky is bruising for me.
or, maybe that's selfish, it could be
bruising just for the sensation.  
i am dreaming of those signs that signal
you are crossing into one state 
from another. we passed eight 
welcome to pennsylvania signs,
prying back the state's layers.
will anyone miss me if i never arrive?
oh, GPS, what do you know about 
home? i could drop you like a rock
into the river & walk myself to dust.
i miss every place i ever was--
even gas stations & parking lots.
the river is widening now. no horizon
just water. the GPS is saying
arrived arrived arrive. cold water.
floating like a leaf. 
take me somewhere bright,
are you listening?

bleeding heart dove

o phantom bullet where did you exit me?
all the trees turn into hands reaching
to pull down a curtain. soon it will be night
& i will count street lights & guns.
a dagger floats nearby ready to carve flesh.
fish lay on dinner tables with their eyes
all glossy & afraid. 
i find a stream to look at myself.
if i'm not careful the mark will turn
into a true gash. a wound is often
originated in the mind. that's where it turns red 
& blooms. i have seen deer shot & stumbling.
i have seen boys fall limp in open fields.
a scab forms over the sunset. 
i'm preening myself of saddnesses
& dreaming of the right kind of weapon.
bow & arrow maybe or a spear.
someday, i hope to return as a poet
or at least a diamond. something sturdier.
on the forest floor everything 
is stretching above me. find a berry.
find a grub. whistle to myself. 
ache is spreading across my wings
from the blood mark. soon i will nestle
in the brush & try to think of nothing
but feathers. feathers falling
from a tree. once, a friend told me
every death becomes one of our feathers.
i tried to count mine but fell asleep.
there must be a tree that grows guns.
o gunpowder. o fire. o ambush.
o man trekking through the wood. 
let me be your omen. 
guard your colors. bleed alone.