DIGGING A DITCH

there's a rift in that field
that just gets deeper and deeper.

and it's not a sink hole.

and it's not a creek bed.

and it's not a drainage ditch.

an old man dug it.

i've seen him.
he lives nearby, across the river.
he comes to that field every night and digs
for hours on end.

his eyes are rimmed with red skin
and he's been digging in that same spot for as long as i can remember.

if you ask him why he's digging,
he'll tell you:
"THERE'S AN OBVIOUS X"
right there in that very spot.

and then he'll go back to digging.

digging on his X.

and the sad thing is,
everyone knows there's nothing there. 
it's just a field.

the neighbors, the police, the passer-bys...
we've all looked at it a million times.

it's just a field.

nothing above
and nothing underneath.

there is no X.

 

 

 

My In-Between

you are my in-between.

the pages between the ends.

you live in-between my daily endeavors
and between my distractions.

and you are the safest place there is.

and the closest I've been
to purpose.

you are my in-between.

a place i can go
when the clouds unfold.

and i am so thankful to have found you.

my in-between.

the one person that
lives

between
everyone else.

The Majestic Walrus in All Its GLORY!

A huge Walrus,
adrift on an Arctic ice floe off the coast of Scandinavia,
the paired white spikes of its ivory tusks
contrasting the chocolate brown of its
chalky, rumpled skin,
can be described as nothing less than
the perfect metaphor for
our
Universe.

Like an old man's
fat, wrinkled thumb
or a cracked, dry
hot pocket
caked in mud and
garnished with two
broken, plastic googly eyes,

it is clear, even to the most untutored eye,
that the Walrus was designed for one thing
and one thing only...
Who among us can deny,
that the Walrus, by virtue of tens and millions of years of its own
turbulent evolutionary trials,
carries the grace of a soggy, drunk lincoln log,
and the musk of a
petrified cinnamon roll
DOUSED
in Old Spice?

And still,
behind the bulky, heavy folds
of rusty hide
and the besom whiskers that
arch and bob from flaky, gristled lips
rests the heart
of a Looking Glass Queen.

A saucy Queen.

A LITTLE SMOKEY Queen.

And
like most Queens,
the Walrus likes to eat.

The Walrus is a voracious eater.

It will routinely feast on
785 kilograms of
discarded rubber tires a day
with a preference
for white walls
dipped
in K.C. Masterpiece.

And it will never stop...
until we are ALL DEAD
or
driving around
on our rims.

Yes, the Walrus is an enigma,
a riddle,
and we as a society
are achingly ignorant about them,
YET
this much seems reasonably clear:

The ways of the wild Walrus appear to be
fundamentally incompatible
with the majority of most modern, human technologies
such as keyboards
and
ski lifts

but the IMAGE of the wild Walrus
continues to fill
important gaps
and answer
dire questions
about
the
UNIVERSE.

After all,
the Walrus is very similar to our Universe,
in more ways than one.

It is a confusing thing
and ultimately...

a stupid invention.

Making Honest Art

You cannot fake honest art. You can tiptoe around it, flash some gimmicks, impress people with presence or production, technique or design, or parade appearance and performance. But when it comes down to it... the music that people remember... the art that people carry their entire lives... are pieces that not only possess the aforementioned qualities, but also hit their audiences

in the places

they

protect

the

most.

Pulling Upwards from the Hooks

The sky pulls on you.

It pulls on you mercilessly.

So you remove your anchor and strap your chains to it.
You set it on the floor and brace yourself,
holding steady.

And the sky pulls.

Slow and unwavering.

Unspeakably violent
and always on time. 

It's dispassion and unconcern
as reliable as
erosion.

The sky pulls.

And it never lets up.

It's pulled for years, lightly tugging on your ribs,
heating up your limbs and forcing them to sleep with
spicy, warm pin pricks
-until the final day-
when your bare feet give way and separate from the sand.

And at last, when your anchor crumbles and burns to powder,
and the coins in your pocket become nothing more than music,
rattling and jingling as you rise,

you will gaze down with love, sadness, and surrender
to the people below,

all strapped to their anchors and holding steady,

fearful and reaching.

The First Day Above Freezing



crispy molds of frozen dew, icing the limbs of the neighborhood trees,
are breaking, dripping, and slipping off their sticks like sleeves.

i hit the brakes and a slab of ice separates from the roof of my car.
it slides off and smashes onto the pavement.
and when i pull over to check the roof,
the sight of my car's wet, blue paint,
now exposed and freed from the ice,
reminds me of how cold air feels
against a palette of fresh, damp skin
the moment it leaves a medical cast.
 
frozen footsteps are everywhere.  their numbers are in the thousands,
like bleached pumice, a cacophony of pitted holes and craters,
salting the streets and sidewalks
like the face of the moon.

i am standing under a buzzing street light at 5 in the morning.
and though the city is asleep and silent,
when i listen hard enough, i can hear the neighborhood trees
crack their knuckles,
crunch their scabs,
and break themselves free
from the terrible weight of winter's splint.

Empty Warehouse Noises

It's 4AM and the cold, empty,
abandoned building I call home
won't stop making noise.
I go to sleep alone, with a loaded .380 in my hand.
There have been 4 break-ins in the past couple months.
And I don't trust the sounds I am hearing.

Sections of the roof crumble and fall throughout the night.
The rats knock over rusted tin cans.
I hear taps on the windows.
Half of the lights have stopped working,
and shadowy figures appear everywhere.
I often wake up to the sound
of the motion sensor alarms,
screaming.

I cock the gun in my hand and call out to nothing.

I shout with anger.

And for a minute, the noises stop.

But that peace doesn't last.

And soon, my senses are being attacked once again. 

And I find myself laying my head on my pillow,
staring at the walls of my tent,
waiting to die.

there are no sugar plums here.

 

DRY SOCKETS

your mouth becomes stale bread
and your nerves rusty, corroded electrical wire

your teeth become metal
and your jaw calcifies into an antiquated railroad line
rife with old, copper pennies, stagnant and dull,
pressed firmly into the steel.

roots and cables are frozen to the ground
and all the hinges are locked in place.

there's nothing to think about but fossilized pain.

that's what a dry socket feels like.

that gap where your teeth used to be
that now forges a frozen, coal mine deep into the bone,
down to the core of your being.

and with every wisp of air comes a frigid shard of razor
and with every hot drink stings a honed needle of fire.

like hooks in your eyes
there's nowhere to run and nothing to look at
and with every direction turned
you find yourself uttering again and again and again
those two, brazen words:


FUCK THIS.


Making a Cake

 

mixed up cake batter
inside my bowl.

not sure what to do anymore.

gotta keep from feeling too safe and secure as
comfort can lead to laziness.

gotta keep from risking too much as
risk can lead to vanquishment.

can't fall into repetition,
yet can't live on a whim.

mixed up cake batter
inside my skull.

it's not a cake yet.

it tastes damn good from the swipe of a thumb
but too much batter leaves the taste buds numb.


A Blistery Storm

 

the city is being sand blasted by tiny chips of ice
and i can hear the shards seasoning my windows
like ivory dice,
or wedding rice,
or tacks spilled across a table

and the wind is blowing stiff across the vinyl siding
and rubbing the shingles like braille
spinning rooftop vents
into circus tents
and winding chimney smoke to sable

 the Earth fell asleep on its side tonight
cutting the blood from Autumn's limbs
just like video snow
or cold cookie dough
or trollies frozen to the cable

The Escape

oh my goodness
how i love it when the leaves are sitting quietly in my yard
and just as i step forward
they run away from me,

scattering like prey.

it is cold outside
and the gasoline colors of fall have begun to
BUURRRN away

a river of hickory smoke has risen into the sky,
from the soot of the steakhouses. 

it's as if the world is suddenly hanging in mid-air,
asleep on a wooden feather,
quixotic,
soft and welcoming.

with each exhale, the fog of my breath reminds me that my heart is still beating hard
and that my coat is keeping me warm. 

and it's times like these i feel the electricity,
the GRAVITY
of being alive.

 

THE CIRCADIAN DEMENTIA OF THE HOMELESS MEN MY NEIGHBORHOOD


There are unhinged minds, coming from one direction specifically. And I hear them speaking to themselves every night as they pass along the west perimeter wall of 1610 North Gatewood Avenue.

Currently, I sleep in a tent, inside an ancient, decrepit, industrial building on the periphery of the worst slum in Oklahoma City. It is a large, empty hanger with four, thin garage doors. It is a variable ampitheater of a warehouse. And you can hear everything in there: the pitbulls, the addicts, the helicopters, the gunshots, the fights, the prostitutes, the gangs, the sirens, and perhaps the most disturbing of them all...
the men the courts have ruled "non compos mantis" or...

not of sound mind.

There are too many to count.

And their voices come in through the cracks, the boarded windows, and the gaping holes that pepper the rusted, metal roof above my bed.

Once these voices enter my building, they are amplified.
They eclipse all my distractions.
They riddle the metal and blur the concrete.
They carry jars of rusted bolts in their broken hands.
They smash beer bottles against the curbs and
they punch the solid brick walls with closed fists and ground teeth.
They want in.
And they want attention.

We keep a loaded gun nearby.
For there are nights when they whisper in my ear
while I am asleep.

I tell you, they can be unspeakably violent,
unflinchingly sad,
or worse...
show no vestige of emotion at all.

When the voices pass by my front door, I hear them twice.
They are captured by the directional microphones on
the security cameras mounted on the perimeter wall.
The voices then emerge, inside, on a pair of small monitor speakers along
with soft bursts of uncommon static, which sound akin to
the tearing of tissue paper or the brush of a corn husk.
It is an old system and the audio has a slight delay.
The result is such that
a horrendous echo of madness can be heard
between the live audio feed on the inside
and the actual world on the outside.

This is how the voices whisper into my ear every night.
They are a horrific yet beautiful cacophony of lost dreams
and discordant sounds.
Headless screams and static.
Mindless cursing and despair.
Everything doubled over into a repeating echo,
like a mirror gazing in upon itself
and casting aspersions onto each reflection.
These voices are the inner monologues of the schizophrenic
swinging desperately at unattainable peace,
lost among the dross,
unknowingly whispering
through the 3 inch speaker grill
of an old black and white television.

Each passing voice marks the
last remnants of a functioning mind.
The songs of failed bodies and failed lives.
The songs of humanity.
And although they fill my chambers each and every night,
and although I stand prepared to defend myself lest their
mental mutilations manifest themselves inside my home,
I will always fix my eyes on their actions with an almost childlike wonder,
as if I too may one day grow up to be
truly psychotic.

Christmas by the Downtown Scraper

a lone businessman with a broken candy cane
stirring a cold volcano
in a sterile, steel bar with no patrons.

it's a modern and clean place.
the drinks are priced high but
he likes upscale joints.
mostly though, he sits there because
he doesn't know where else to go
after work.

he's doing well at the firm and the guy on the second floor
is going to set him up with a date next week.

he hopes she's pretty.

his drink is empty.

the room is empty.

should he go home now?

or should he wait and see if
any potential friends will
walk through that door?

the air conditioning kicks on.
it's cold outside.
like polished chrome. 

for a moment he thinks about the Christmas lights
he wrapped around
his mailbox.

for some reason, only half of his lights
are working.

and for the life of him, he can't find the bulb
that ruined the strand.

 

AND YOU GET OLDER...

and you get older.

and what used to take minutes suddenly takes days.

and your schedule fills up quicker
and the world becomes a blender
and lives get mixed in
with each other
and then strained out.

and you forget everyone's birthday.

and you suddenly remember
your first pair of shoes. 

and you fall in love with your old favorite
colors again.

and you lose all your digital pictures.

and you finally accept that it's time
to replace your favorite
pillow.

and the others just aren't as soft.

you suddenly enjoy the foods
you once despised.

you still sing
though your voice is gone.

you enjoy sitting outside
and doing nothing. 

and you grow old,
all the while,
you grow old. 

and in the end
you leave with a little gasp
just like a quick breeze
through the foyer.

just like that wonderful autumn breeze.

just like everyone else.

 

 

Predicting A Battle Between Dinosaurs and Cowboys

WHEN PREDICTING THE WINNING TEAM in a battle between dinosaurs and cowboys, there are many variables that one must take into consideration.

1. How many cowboys are there? How many dinosaurs?

2. Do the cowboys have guns and ammunition?

3. Can any of the dinosaurs fly?

4. Can any of the dinosaurs understand a topographic map?

5. Do the younger cowboys have a curfew?

6. Are the cowboys emotionally fragile?

7. Do the dinosaurs fit into the upper income tax bracket?

8. Do the cowboys own any sharp objects?

9. Are there indians hiding inside the dinosaurs' mouths?

10. Are the cowboys extremely tiny?

 

It is important to be properly informed before attempting to predict the future. 

 

CELL

trace the skin
around the top of your head
with a sharp knife
and feel the thoughts
seep down your temple and tickle your cheek
like silent lava or
hot, crimson tar.

like the cages of a poultry plant

where prisoners have been locked up so long that
their skin grows around the bars

there is a dividing line.

there is a line that marks the day a prisoner,
with all his regret and suffering,
can no longer be confined to his cage
because he's ultimately become

the cage itself.

 

Kidnapped in Dreamy Llama Country


Recently I just finished posting a shoot I did back in July called
A KIDNAPPPING IN DREAMY LLAMA COUNTRY.

This is the first photography shoot I've ever done using what people in the fashion world call a "model".  At least that's what I'm told.  I thought they were just called "hot girls that make your pictures better without you having to do anything".  I guess they're called something else in the fashion industry. Though I tend to lean more towards the marred and scarred side of life, the use of this "model", also known as Angela Renai Comer, represents a vast departure for me.  Due to my lazy eye, missing teeth, and hook hand, I am usually forced to resort to photographing old abandoned structures, the rats in my tent, or men of questionable motivation.

A Bite of Cold

 

it's 6 degrees below comfortable
inside the house on Shoulders Hill.

the air is icy enough to slide through the fibers of my shirt,
slip through my sweater threads,
and snip my skin.

nibble, nibble, nibble
little frosty canines
bite, bite, bite

last night, i stepped into a cold, shallow puddle
on the cement
wearing socks

flop, flop, flop
little soggy sheep
squish, squish, squish

the curls of my pajamas are filled with crushed slush
and while I'm asleep
my joints clench their jaws

my nerve endings shrink,
my lips become raw,
and my fingers, steel.

i want be warm and dry and joyous 
like that impossible Snuggles Bear
but tonight

security is a long way away.