Healing Machines

“Our bodies are, if nothing else, healing machines” –Cassidy Bowman

Our bodies are, if nothing else
on death row
waiting for the gas.

In Texas, praying for a piece of pink paper,
or a pardon
from a lover,
or a friend
who wants to
watch us go,
a mother or father to politely blow their nose.

Nightly we accept our plastic wrapped,
pistol-whipped complacency
brush quietly past strangers
(our hushed eyes avoiding the dangerous truth)
that we are afraid to take the simple steps into the
dark womb of human communication.

Our bodies, long stretched when laid out,
internal organs playing the loud pulse of our spinning thoughts
caught grinding gears in the cement mixers of our minds,
chattering our rotting teeth like loaded dice,
between which we mutter under the lonely breath of alcohol
“When,
if ever,
will it rain?”

(And so,
we wait.)

Clenched fists eventually calm under liquid rhythms
clammy palms reach to touch innocent skin
twisting handshakes into tunnel vision pyramids.

We find ourselves in black rooms staring at blank screens
begging for a connection we refuse to embrace;

wound in, (lies)
bound by, (time)
mummified but still alive,
praying to be saved.

Blueberry Patch

I’m leaving my mind for your sweet streets
running red lights to shallow depths
my body a clock tower expressing shadows in the
cloud breaks bleak daylight

I want to call your swift name
in my soft voice.

in sentinel languages
our words are media viruses of the mind
spreading slow jam ancient blueberry riddles
backwards through time between our mouths

cracked liberty bells for eyes
stone columns for limbs
smacking together at the hips cackling laughs
where pendulums in the back of our throat swing
twisting time away into little bits of paper
inside a snow globe being shaken
like a snake slithering out of it’s skin
we find new beginnings
at the end of blueberry patch roads
and make bramble love
our eyes full of halos
in the bushes of your
tangled hair
I let my bent fingers run free
like ten naked meadow children dancing
weaving common sense and circumstance
into afghans of courage and love.

I don’t really mind today that I don’t understand.
you take me places I have never been.

Cities

Sick how we change this magnificent world
so it is prettier to look at;
(this font and tone, intentional)
clear cut shear shrub
make way for the city.
When we drove into town yesterday
Mt. Rainier was peaking out from behind
the east side and you said we were in the city now.

But I have been to Johannesburg
seen Boston, Austin, and Egypt’s cryptic tears
and this is no city, though we cross a bridge to get here.

And now the normalcy of listening to you
scramble around in my bed like a hard boiled salmon
is becoming the vague sensation of home.
And I think I like it
(but I’m not sure how) to
get used to (loving
or living) with anyone
but myself.

Well, (how deep the sound
of a wave’s falsetto) another
day (rippled by a tiny
pebble) is coming,

and with it, the blind intention of utopia.

Dead or alive alternative take

Do you even think about me anymore?
Because even in my dreams I can’t ignore you.
Not that I want to,
No, I still want you,
Dead or alive.

Do you obey traffic signs
in the middle of the night
in the midst of a country
when no one is driving?
Do you still dream about
the first nights we spent
in your bed?

I haven’t slept much since then.

oxygen

When you arrive:
(Bringing breaths of life
Into my tattered lungs)

Realize:
(Your presence is my oxygen)

Broken Lantern

Loving you
is sickly vague of detail.
page after page
I flip, reading the
ancient script
of an empty book.

You are not the canvas
and I do not paint.
Great soul mates
never are alike
you might say,
but together
we are here at last,
in the mural
eyes focused
in permanence
on the same empty
space of a room
looking back at us,
and no one
but the children
in the café
knows we’re lovers.

In a nauseous way
like one might feel
nostalgic towards
the planet earth,
after days or nights
lost at or in
space or sea
kissing the dirt
through invisible bars;
the imprisoning
freedoms of gravity.

The archeological disappointment
of perhaps having found
everything that was
meant to be hidden
leaves me digging
through my dreams,
searching for a word
without a language
or a language
without words.

And like a
broken lantern
flickering on
at the bottom
of the ocean,
I wake up
grasping your hand
like a glass of water
spilled across the desert,
which sounds
like a shy cat
playing a broken piano

Lunacy

I am about to go off a ski jump made of
hard plastic on roller skates in an attempted

back flip over the moon.
We forget to hit the anti-gravity switch and

I land on the desolate ground looking
up at the building from fifty yards away.

I try to explain to the operators that one over
infinity equals zero, and proves we do not exist;

proves that numbers are as useless as words,
and the moon is not the only lover I have kept a secret.

You invade my mind with blind meaning
I cannot find beyond midnight behind morning (I was tripping over

last nights bottles searching for a non-existent
glass of water when you iron horsed my heart)

my pulse a jagged fractal of imagined
chain reactions to your touch

which I have only felt in the much awaited dreams
I cannot force on myself as I sleep.

And when seeing your reflection each time
I look into the moons eyes is not enough;

I touch the wooden box inside my heart where you are pent up.
Are you waiting for me to set you free or am I waiting for you to let me?

Each day I polish the tarnished silver key.
I make sure you’re awake and watching.

Cackling a laugh like a crackling fire in my chest,
whose flames and smoke make my heart beat and pump my breath.

The moon’s steam works the clock gears of my bloodstreams venom
screaming inside each lunatic is the lunacy that makes him

(human?)

Casino

I went to the casino
because it was the only place
I could wear my sunglasses indoors

clay chips like crickets chattering
Bells and whistles lights and air conditioning
absolute control
just as once I wish I had cold fingers
the rattle of bones is frantic
monuments to money built in deserts
an empty ocean sand swept
a vast swarms of lonely people like ants
who have lost so much they leave their last hopes to chance

Bells and whistles lights in their eyes
a flicker of addiction that will never stop
an empty ocean waiting to be filled.

Scarf

All my memories went missing
so I'm listening again
trying to collect vital childish information

Why doesn't everyone just come to me
arms open wide with shining eyes
that scream "I'm ready"

because some days I want to die
and some days I want to live
and other days I just want.

and those are the worst.

I have not suffered enough to say:
"I have suffered" but it's enough to say this:
I'm ready to have a reason

a reason to die
a reason to live
today it makes no difference

give me a banana
call it dinner and movie
call it a night and drive home

sleep with the lights on
call my doctor and tell him that there is a
malicious virus eating away at my heart

take two pills - the red and white ones -
wake up in the morning
but don't set the alarm

drive a different way to work tomorrow
maybe you'll show up early
maybe no one will notice you're invisible

and if they do, don't blame them
everyone opens their eyes one day
sometimes it's just to light a match

to cast shadows inside of their grave.
other days we call it by it's seasonal name
assured that we will remember details

time and place. ready the hovercraft
set course for any ocean that lacks waves.
sit back, relax, and enjoy the guilty

weightlessness of air. take notes and regurgitate.
pass with flying colors. fold the flag carefully
set in on the mantle above the fireplace.

teach your children to lie in many languages
tell them you don't believe in the internet.
make sure they know the difference between

things that exist and things that don't exist.
make them tell you stories and take notes in
the morning while cooking eggs and pancakes

pouring mugs of orange juice. tell them snow
is beautiful but let them wear a scarf.
remind them to forget what they learned

lying in the dark.

Swing 01-17-06

Underneath the dock
in midnight bath water
our skin is slippery
when we touch
which is
as often
as possible.

Water flows below the skin of September
the eye of mars, a voyeuristic pleasure,
for whom
I do not know.

But swing we do like children towards
the silhouettes of trees.
Intrinsically our hands hold as close
as molecules allow,

and then we push science somehow.
In the hope that Orion
will take off his belt

and find the corners of our bodies
like a good game of chess,
expressive porcelain horses running helpless in my chest.

Only seconds left before you slip
back into the human grips of airports and cars
children; but not ours, not us.
The swing in the dead wind is helpless

to centripetal force.

All is well

They say
time heals all wounds
but time leave scars like question marks across my body

oh yes,
I've read the news
the flood is killing thousands
and the fires coming soon

sorry love
I've seen all the nothing
I can bear
so I'm staring at the air between us these day

and god is windsurfing on waves of pollination
with a toothpick holding up his turquoise sails screaming:
"luxury and life and love and lips are all the same;
just ways to measure movements that are modern and mundane!"

but
all is well that ends well
and all is well that doesn't end well
as well

Pittsburg Greyhound Station, 7AM

The child born in the bus station cried out
something that sounded like rumor,
it was yesterday then but only
the chipping kiwi paint can remember.

We were discussing the flower farms
of dream, as I traded places with her;
the smoke automatic in its quick
cynical switch of direction.

She had been jealous of the Swedish women
in their perfect multi-lingual blonde bodies
swinging birds of paradise from their ear lobes.

Outside, the stained sky
rained the window sideways
sweet talking the Plexiglas into streaking.

In a vain attempt at capturing romanticism
in that night we played love under the made moon,
I follow our footsteps but only find dune
and the skeletons of broken rules
smoothed soft by remembering.

I find myself walking home by moonlight
with heavy pockets full of secrets kept
and the way you make the smallest perfect sense.

erupting lungs/unaware (in responce)

unaware of nothing
fully in bloom
watching time
slowly move
out of tune

For E.

come lay in the park with me
and close your eyes
violins and taxi wind

your imperfections are perfect
the house with the broken heat
is warm and welcoming when you are here
we brew coffee at midnight
play scrabble and light cigarettes with
the candle that keeps us alive

1-800-Suicide

Please consider donating to this cause.
Or at least check out the website: Hopeline.
The government is basically trying to take the number over, and they have made no statement about privacy concerns when questions have been raised. This means they could easily keep a database of anyone who has ever called the number, and honestly, the last thing we need is the government invading our privacy even MORE. Anyway, other than endorsing Barack Obama, this will likely be one of the only "Support this cause..." posts I ever do, because it is important that this number stays, and stays private. I am also looking for a way to contact hopeline and become a phone volunteer.

Thanks to Frank Warren from Postsecret:
For bringing this issue to international attention, and for his humanitarian work in compassion (for lack of a better way to express what he does). We probably can't imagine the amount of lives that have been touched just by reading a secret that hits us hard in the chest. We probably can't imagine how many lives have been changed just by the simple act of letting a postcard go out in the mail, but we walk back to our houses feeling free, light, forgiven.

And on that note...
"True compassion is more than throwing a coin to a beggar. It demands of our humanity that if we live in a society that produces beggars, we are morally commanded to restructure that society." - Martin Luther King Jr.

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LD

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