What the fuck is going on inside my body?

sitting in a parking lot
engine ticking
some old song leaking through the speakers

trying to read
the same paragraph
for the fifth time

chemo brain—
like somebody rearranged
the furniture in my skull
and won’t give me the map

it’s getting harder
to pretend this is ordinary
harder to act like
the body isn’t running
a side hustle of betrayal

i eat crackers
because they’re neutral
because they don’t argue
because the stomach has become
a small, suspicious country

life keeps moving—
traffic lights,
coffee cups,
people checking their phones

and inside me
cells are holding meetings
I wasn’t invited to

what the fuck
is going on in there

i’d just like
to clock out of this skin
for a minute

and come back
to something
recognizable.

Having a Tough Rewrite

close all my tabs

and rot in hell.

sip rooibos 

in silence.

boredom doesn't exist

in my business.

I crave creativity

and constant motion.

having a rough go

of writing my future.

but I still hold the pen

and punch the typer tonight. 

Breviloquent

I scroll bookstagram
And feel my chest as I breathe.

Inside is a heart
And a bunch of other shit.

It’s just a muscle
But it carries the weight of my world.

Stupid little thing,
Keeping me alive.

And I’m here just adding books
To my Amazon cart.

And farting in Walmart sheets
While she is in the shower.

Maybe I’ll eat a bunch of cake,
Add to the arteries’ story.

She/We

She was from Long Island

and looked like Chloe Sevigny.

We listened to The Antlers

and told stories about who we were

back in 2010.

She drank wine

and read my poetry aloud,

much to my external dismay

but my internal delight. 

We gave the night

a welcomed cadence

of youthful optimism. 

Turns out we both

frequented Sessions 73

around the same summer.

We kissed at 11:11

but that's about it. 

the belated tide

roses are red

and I am not dead.

sorry, Longfellow,

I got shit to do!

when I find myself 

swimming in your sea,

i say this is heaven. 

so I wont be meeting you

in hell.

Poem

been at my job for four years.

been battling cancer for almost two years.

been sober for 5 years. 

been grateful my whole life. 

been better.

been worse.

Tensword

I am wrecked 

like a Dodge Stratus

that has seen

better days.

I was a cowboy once,

convinced to be

an outlaw

inside. 

One hundred pancakes

can't fix me,

but time can,

cuz it has before. 

Just gotta get

through this week

to live the next,

whatever it brings. 

Finally got my pal, the actor, Jorge Garcia, on Bothering the Band!

i put the CAN in cancer...

i work three jobs, 

host a podcast no one asked for, 

hammer at a script, a kids book, a novel, 

stack pages like unpaid bills, 

five years sober and still thirsty for something better, 

pack school lunches, help with school projects, 

stare down the dark like it owes me rent...

if this thing wants my body it better clock in too, 

because i’m not done.

Asking What's For Dinner At Breakfast

Diverted my stride 

while navigating a Cliff Bar

with my mouth, no hands, 

because I didn't have time

for breakfast before

bolting for Port Authority

to get the hell outta here

for a spell or more.

Saw someone that looked

like her, but with red hair,

while The Stone Roses

were singing in my ear

about sea lemons and such,

as if I needed a reminder. 

I am never present,

and everyone outcome 

is a come down,

but what's the difference

between Mexican food

and Cuban food?

Lord have mercy 

on my rough and rowdy days,

how stupid of me

to forget how far I've come

just because I still have

far to go. 

Teeth in Heart

Ethan Hawke's daughter wears a Smith College shirt

in the final episode of Stranger Things.

Early one morning the sun was shining
I was laying in bed, 

listening to Bob Dylan,
wondering if she notices these little reminders.

opening up a book of italian poems,

all the while the past is always close behind.

I’m still here counting the quiet like it answers anything at all.

There’s a train rolling somewhere past the treeline,
it don’t stop here no more.
The screen door’s humming like a nervous witness,
dust dancing on the floor.

I got a coffee going cold on the nightstand,
got your name caught in my throat,
like a harmonica bent out of key
on a long and lonesome note.

They say time is a clean white highway,
but mine’s full of side roads and sparks.
Every sign points straight to the future,
but the rearview’s lit up in the dark.

You left your poems on the rumbler,
like evidence I can’t ignore.
Teeth in heart, babe, teeth in heart,
and I’m bleeding metaphors.

The radio’s preaching redemption,
the preacher’s asking for cash,
I’m thumbing through saints and strangers
in a paperback smelling like ash.

If love’s just a ghost in the circuitry,
flickering blue in the night,
why does it bite like a memory
and glow like a dashboard light?

bad half dollar

I hate money.

and I hate that my health costs so much of it. 

from scopes up my butt to gnarly surgeries.

I will be paying to live.

until I die.

I don't know no snakes

I imagine Hashem saying,
I will make it up to you.
I will give you three wishes.
Let me have all the days

with my daughter
Let me stand at the kitchen sink,

eating cookies, and watching

the squirrels out the window.

Let my backyard

be filled with little creatures.

That's it. I am simple. 

Devils, you are not a fool, I am!

I thoroughly enjoyed

talking to her on the phone,

while waiting for my car

to be "fixed."

It was a solid hour

of poetry and boners,

wondering whether black people

binge watch Yellowstone.

But this is what happens...

We chat, I fall in love, 

then she goes and dates some dude

that looks like a douche bag on IG. 

Hummingbirds, like God, need to be wild

The ocean has so many moods, 

and so does the sky.

Humans are such a small part 

of the bigger consciousness 

of the natural world. 

We tend to see only ourselves 

and our own concerns, 

but there is so much more going on.

Right after the funeral, 

a hummingbird kept buzzing by. 

My friend laughed and said, “Maybe it's Ross!” 

I even wrote her a big poem 

about a hummingbird falling in love with her. 

I've loved Voxtrot since like 2008 Tumblr days, so of course I am stoked to bother Ramesh!

in the calm light of mild philosophy

using reason to temper my impulses.
and especially emotions.

got a flat tire this morning.
which put my impressions to the test.

our life is what our thoughts make it.

from the bustle to the busts. 

I shall view the busy world.

as free from the intrigues of villains. 

My fake friends channel Montreal cool and post-punk edge while listening to an LP

The world is crowded,

friends drift in and out of the vocal stacks, 

lifting the choruses without turning life into a guest parade,

people who’ve shared bills, basements, cheap beers, 

and bad shifts adding their voices 

because they were there and it made sense.

It is nostalgic without looking backward,
modern without chasing trends,
a vibe that hits with confidence
earned through years of loud rooms
and coming out the other side sharper than when I went in.

It feels like standing outside a venue 

in the dead of winter, steam rising off your jacket, 

friends yelling your name across the street, 

and the city humming under your feet. 

The quick, unsentimental reflexes of a survivalist or the mien of a thug?

I have seemed to float on an unquiet sea,

borne along a dark tide of alcoholism 

and violence, abuse and shame.

I’ve inherited things I wish not
to pass along to my daughter,
as daunting as it is to suppress
or better yet heal from the fissures.

I cannot keep pretending that the years of my youth
have not long affected me in heart, soul and spirit.
It broke my heart, it broke my body later on,
It changed my perspective and made everyday hungry 

and hard as coffin nails.

With the heart of a wayward poet
the comedy of a existentialist,
the philosophy of a prisoner,
and the happiness of a doting dad
I persist in passion and sacrifice. 

RIP JVDB

I tried to incorporate big words

due to Dawson's Creek.

His character liked movies,

like me.

He died from the same cancer

as me.

I try to make myself

the hero of these poems.

But I am either the villain

or the victim.

Fatal Follies of a Former Scumbag

She taps her High Life

with her navy blue nails

along to a Broken Social Scene 

song on the outdated juke. 

Hours ago, she blew me

in the bathroom of a bookstore,

as if it were any other

night in Brooklyn.

Ten years prior,

I would've pulled an irish exit,

but now I have too much respect

for the wicked. 

I make the same mistakes,

but don't have the excuse of booze,

so I just fall in love for the night,

and write her a poem in the morning.