learning to walk

I've walked this path before, you know.

I've walked it fast and walked it slow.

I've lived every excruciating detail.

there is no chance of failure, say i

there is no chance that this will end today

in any way.

I won't let it end here!

W H O  I S  F R I E N D  A N D  W H O  I S  F O E ?

Only for the judge to know.

For our fated friends are now discounted -

hardly known and hardly parted -

and where do you go to sleep

in the city that never stops your sins 

from crawling on your back?

And what should I say, as a matter of course?

Let to the fore, not to know, but to force

the hand that can change the circumstances of man

and yes, of course it helps that I'm a fan!

but that isn't enough.

it was an honor to meet you.

goodbye.

such is the way that it must always, always end.

there can be no mercy,

for that would just offend.

what are we, without our balconies?

where is that tree that waits

and strings us up by fates

that grow like strangling roots to choke out life.

are we but budding, growing strife?

I feel a powerful need for growing things,

like nothing I have ever known before.

to whom do I implore?

and could i dream she'll take me as a wife?

The heroine appears.

Not in the flashing of the light,

but in the crashing of the gears.

I could dance with you all day,

but bloodshed drives our kind away.

I've walked this road with you before.

I've walked it nice,

I've walked it more.

I have lived in grim detail.

I cannot fail.

While you have died a thousand times for love.

This place fits you like a glove, and yet -

it cannot end here.

I will not say to have no fear -

full to the brim with it,

sick with sin,

but still you strive forward.

This is what it is.

A love letter.

A cry to the future.

A last, fragile grasp on something once claimed in full.

There was once rule,

Order,

Reason and power,

I choose to not believe that it will flower.

Though I've walked this road before,

soft and still, recalling all,

seeing fog and breathing shadow,

unbent back before the fall -

something in me says no more.

There is no more room for doubt.

There is only what's already out.

The bone, the blood, the sweat, the tears.

The secret wish, the hidden fears.

There is only one place left to go.

There is only one road left to know.

The ways are hundredfold and one.

The human changes with the sun.

I will not let it end here.

I will not let it end here.

I will not let it end here.

Though your doubts  -

span the universe -

are as countless as the stars -

are as nothing to me.

Though your thoughts -

wound, wound with a thousand cuts -

are all you have, and all you will ever have -

are as but air that you wasted, on sharing your folly.

Though your sins -

crawl upon your back -

are recorded on the marrow of your bones -

are enough to make me fear and know your might.

I will not take fright again.

This heartache was always coming.

You are not powerful enough to stop me.

I am not powerful enough to save you.

This is the greatest gift we could receive.

Esoteric, yet unbound.

Deviant, but defiant.

Unsound, yet eager.

Such is my way.

Purest safety.

Deadly poison.

I don't expect you to understand.

I don't expect you to not try.

I don't expect.

You forget; I have walked this path before.

I have gone where you cannot ignore.

I am oft out of tune; yet thrust to the fore.

The fool, as it were - and yet beyond compare.

A true fool does not threaten.

A true fool does not take arms.

A true fool does not fight back.

And yet, here we are.

On the path again. 

Apply Pressure and Wait

it's been a long time, long time coming.
Been a long road for us both to walk.
Strangers again, just like we were before.
Strangers once, and nothing more.

I never thought to lose you all.
Like chaff to get at golden wheat.
To burn you all for my delight?
Would that have proved my might?
Such was never in my power.

I never thought to lose you all.
A portal passed.
Promises of youth are fleeting,
but the wounds one makes mistreating?
have stricken me, have rendered me a stone.

I waited there in the dark for a few years
passed the time, conversed with ancient fears
- verbose friends, though wont to predict death.
Though the sight and sound had passed with you,
I found that I drew breath.

I never thought to lose my heart and soul.
Although I swiftly handed them away.
I did not know, I did not know.
Some would say my fear was lost,
others, my naivete.

it's been a long time, long time coming.
Come walk with me, come walk with me.
Strangers once, just like we were before.
Strangers once, again, and you are nothing more.

It's a long road to walk together
It's a long time to hold apart.
It's a long time for you to say 'forever'.
It's a long distance before you fall apart.

I never thought to lose you all;
but I am stone, and stone I have become.
Won't you say you'd rather dance with me?
Live in my shade?
No one's falling for it this time.

Now all I think about is 'last the years'.
Now all I think about is 'beat their fears'.
Now all I am under the skin can stay the course.
Did fleeing from my presence cause you joy?
What will you do when your hands are forced?

it's been a long time, long time coming.
Nobody's falling for any of it this time.
I have sloughed off my restraint like a sin.
I have carved out the scar tissue you deplore.

Strangers once, but now you have no way of getting in.

DON'T YOU KNOW I LOVE THE WAY THAT I'M TURNING

scotus ruling

lets hypothesize a future with white
porcelain, and thousands of unblemished
Faces, and screens that light up from the
Inside, and there's no decay to be found.

let us project upwards from the cradle Around us, let us pretend that we are not Smeared with dirt, let us pretend that the Power is not on loan and this is the Truth.

let us be function without form, let us Embrace the poetry without motion, and Exalt in the absence of terror or hate. This Is not anything, appropriate by any stretch

let us hypothesize a clean world and not Clad ourselves in the mannerisms of the Old. That leads to curved fangs, curbed Voices in the mist; and then who sets it real.

unfinis

Stock lock and barrel got the monkey on my back again
Stop the ecstatic masturbation of the silver cloak and dagger scene
I can't believe you came here only to get cold feet!
Facing forward has possessed you to freeze the fluid in both knees
You're a spiteful mess, you keep the class clown historical
Fighting into the new stream has made your old brand rhetorical
And yes, distressed, you're simply better dressed,
and yes, compressed, you're in some need of caress!
Building looms above, you've left the field and its overrun,
jump the gun until you're black and blue and think
Hey
This is fun

...

yell it

Look.
Unclaimed gold
Throw in the towel is funny
Zero consequence and infinite money
To raise the stakes and slake your thirst
is a semblance of a fiery past
You won't be laughing when your well is finally tapped,
You won't be laughing when your laughter turns to crap,
You won't be laughing.
This is a synoptic view of an old worn shoe
This is a bullet in the gun of the lung of the young
who's a sharp retort, old sports foul play
when a ricochet makes its way down the line
will his breath be able to stop it in time?
And i ran with the sound of his lungs in my eyes,
the flip-fit-fixer, never the prize
backstabbing angels with a triangle
coz god has three points and they all mangle
swiftly hat trick, cover in silver
total disregard for a matchmaker's ills though,
How many ends to the cycle of profanity?
How much humanity kneaded in dough?
Young kings, pay them in gold
Gehenna lurks behind the saintly and white
and there's a night coming on that feels set to strangle

I'm Just Me

I can't walk on water.
I can't read a portent.
When it comes to signs of dominion, I'm hardly an expert.
Spiritually inert, in other words.
Accursed?
Unlikely, just not deified.
Unrefined.
There's a thousand supplications adrift in my mind.
Miracles aren't the purview.
Sure, I read a book once,
but I forget most of the words.

I have the luxury of that.

So I'm not the Son of God.
So I won't sprout wings,
and lead you to kings
who'll wine and wither and dine and dither and never allow your mind to keep score.
I don't have the keys to the pearly gates,
and I don't have the words to wrap your foes up in hate,
and not every sentence's indelible magick.

And sure you might bawl and might say that it's tragic.
That I've seen some nights,
and I've seen some sights,
And surely my love must be some great big secret?
A totem of wired up power, devouring
all your spite and fright and turning it to the good?
You're but a crucible misunderstood.
I'm not a carpenter, working with wood
This isn't a world of shouldn't and should.
There isn't a scripture and no holy verse,
There isn't a bargain or some ancient curse.
This isn't a pitfall, a dead drop, a ruse,
Whatever I am was not meant to confuse.
You hiding your idolatry just isn't working.
I am not the Son of God - just hardly working.

the second last girl

i am not the first of my kind,
but i am the last a thousand times.

they get the second-last every month,
every week, sometimes every day.
they're sure to let me know.

they circulate her face
they circulate her face
and letters coalesce to form her name
headlines sandwich her within their uncaring folds

her murder, her destruction, her elimination is almost an afterthought.
unremarked by the world
unremarked by me
just another reminder

in the light of the truth, all you can do is bow.
the news is a heisenberg messenger
it determines the truth of what it delivers
and it delivers death

unending, unceasing death.
Girls Like Me.
Most of the girls like me are gone.

and her name is a thousand tiny knives,
the second last girl.
her name is a million unspoken promises.
her name is a vault of scripts
in languages I'll never speak.
her name is Fire,
and her name is Outrage,
and her name is Violence,
and then they use her name up
and the second last girl is forgetten.

Even by me.

And then they find another one.

I am not the last of my kind, yet.

stood down

So.
Here I am.
I'm stained with gore to the elbows.
And I'm smiling.

stood down, tapped out, I'm not addicted to breath -
strapped in, no air, I think I'm floating to death,
Coz there are nights, yeah, where I'm a thunderstorm.
There are days, no, when I'm terrified.

Sweet Hysteria, will you visit me?
Come in the night and omit me?
Oh,
There's only time and will and want.
So here I am.

I've tracked dirt into your house.
I have come to wake you up.
I've tracked dirt into your house.
I have come to wake you up.
It is dark,
and I am grey,
So sleep, baby,
sleep the day away.

I don't mind the smell of copper.
I don't need to have a cause.
You feed a fascination,
but there's always scrabbling claws.
So sleep, baby, sleep.
My hands are scrubbed red-raw!
But there's always been a darkness.

There's not enough to keep me pale /and/ warm.

all i am is clouds now, all i'll be forever is clouds, you failed

saw them in the street
stamping on the concrete
eyes fixed on their homes
though there was no cause for their reproach

we cussed out the firemen
cussed out the neighbours
cussed out anyone who would hear

oh, it comes and it goes but its never far
oh, it's grey and it goes and it knows that i'm not gonna tire
coz i have to keep finding strength within me to keep going
they're not like us
and it'll eat them alive
so just keep it up and try not to meet their eyes

i saw them as i dreamed of a wet red tide
they saw me as i was swallowed whole in silk
great and terrible was the sight
though there was no cause for their reproach,
i was wreathed in grey again
and lightning crackled up and down my wary skin.

Loved One in the Blast Zone

what are you when you're invisible?
divisible?
the summation of your parts ignored
beyond threat, beyond het!
beyond reproach.

what are you when you're concealed?
a rusty mess of feelings,
a rising crescendo.
you'l come crashing down,
and you'll be sure to keep it quiet
when you convulse

there's a handful of rooms.
there's a scattering of wounds.
we pick across the landscape with great care.
drawing breath sharply, not unaware.
there's a ghost with the most who's got your number in the post
and it'll never arrive and that is never going to be totally fair.
the solution is simple; do not despair.

what am i when i'm poked?
what flames will billow forth from my maw when i'm stoked?
there's a high, there's a low, there's every which way we could possibly go
and I'm stuck, given up, not quite sure if this is enough.
it has to be enough.
i'm about to flare.
i'm about to flare and it has to be enough.
there's gonna be a blast wave, a ginger haze,
checking my mileage by clocking my top speed
reeking of weed
and leaving you flailing and complaining alone in my blaze.

what are you when you're invisible?
what am i when i'm divisible?
 it's not debatable that i'm imitable!
i make the illegible accessible, the archaic is defined;
i'm the tower of course, a tour de force, and i'm sight out of mind.
what are you when you're despair?
what am i when i flare?
and what will be left of any of this?

we shall see.

Every Thought a Future Arrowhead

There's a corner in a white box room that's seen a lot of me,
Especially the parts that I don't want you all to see.
There's a cupboard that I live inside as if it were analogy,
A place to hide, a place to lick my wounds and wait until I'm free.

But that's a narrative that I don't think you get to walk,
The human garbage locked in limbo, waiting to emerge.
Like Sisyphus who rolled a rock until he stopped to talk
With some unearthly hero who wouldn't help him stop.
"How are you, who are you, thanks for coming down to Hell"
as if he owed a demigod bastard anything.

I'm supposed to hide away if there's a fire,
I'm supposed to close my eyes if there's a cry.
It's too much to risk, too much to risk,
The life of a trans woman isn't worth piss.
They killed our kin with poison pricks
- and if that isn't a sign of the times!
They're still doing it for kicks.

I don't think that I can be helped in the head,
and I know I'm in trouble when I'm out of bed.
It's a fine state of features when dangerous creatures
are lurking with sharp stones,
and there's a rhythm in my bones
and a corner where I dump my woes.
Nobody knows.

Getting respect when you feel like a beast in this heat,
When the mothers of brothers who spit in the street will assault,
and revolt at the sight of your eyes, your hairy thighs,
your "mutton-dressed-as-lamb" lies - surprise!
If I don't make a move then none of you assume
that I'm in this room, this room, this societal womb that is the hidden place
that everyone expected me to go to, to throw myself away to and to conform
or to absorb and perform and eventually settle down -
to calling myself my birth name, to choosing a home town -
to marrying or not marrying; but knowing why and knowing how
to having a gender
to not being an offender, scarlet-lettered and wavering,
to being repaired and no longer impaired and no longer a rabid dog,
a grunting hog, a pillar shaker, a Quaker who abstained from bullshit training and complaining.
And what's the deal with the constant simple explanation?
And the little expectation?
Better to do away with it.
That's the pathway to respect.

There's a corner in a white room that's seen a lot of me.
It eats up that desire to remain in mediocrity.
It eats the memory of names and faces
and far away places
and I will never return to myself.
Assault, revolt, disrespect, misdirect,
Lock up your binarist families as I walk by,
a dagger in the heart of St Paul.
All the better, to assist his permanent fall.

I Hate My Gender But Yours is Worse

flesh crawl, alcohol,

will not wait a million years,

not right genitals!

time to switch the body's gears,

rough ride, come inside,

strip your bones of all those fears,

soul sell, empty hall,

they have their eyes but have no ears

i will be reborn.

we cower in thousands of corners.

thin-thought, bold court,

on the brink of what you wrought.

there is no place for those like me

no man or woman destiny

no place for gender binary

so come! come!

let us be free!

let us drum out the ghosts that we

fought into the ground as quietly

as desperate kids could - and I agree

that everything's coming apart

this isn't art

this is what happens when conservatives fart

and force us to live in the cloud

living it loud

and nobody ever says 'what's that smell'?

it's practically hell!

but eventually somebody rings the bell!

times us out

thin-thought, bold court

on the brink of what you wrought

tired out warriors from the fight,

heading out backwards into the night

so as not to turn our backs on foes

and nobody knows

where we head off to to lick our wound.

and madness might bloom,

- but it isn't more mad than having to pretend -

- but we have changed and change again -

and nobody's friend

and it is a slaughter

so we cower in corners.

nobody's son, nobody's daughter

and we will be reborn.

Ninety Degree Angels

Like a fire sent from Heaven and then pissed upon all day.

I saw what made me real.

It wasn't lack of dignity that made it so dramatic.

It was just that I didn't get a say.

I'm gonna change the world another day.

For now I'll hide my face away.

And there's no way that you can tell me,

that I will belong.

A life shackled upwards,

Every time.

Keep your eyes skyward.

Form a rhyme.

You won't have to see them,

as you crush them underfoot.

There's no room to climb.

I am afraid and I don't know how not to be.

I smoke too much and see things that I am not supposed to see.

And there's a way to escape,

there's a way to be a true machine.

I guess I can't be sure of what I mean.

But I do know what to say.

"There's people on the silver screen that tell you what to feel,

And lies are lies and truths are truths and both of them are real,

Illusions can kill and healing can thrill,

and you are falling,

and I will not be able to interfere."

Like a stone dropped from Heaven, just to watch the impact.

I saw what made you real.

It wasn't lack of foresight that made it so dramatic.

It was just that I couldn't simply melt away.

Like the one you fell for yesterday.

And you know that there's no point, but pray.

You know it does no good, but

God might not listen, anyway.

This isn't real, not for long;

I have to be weak; so I can be strong.

And there's no way,

to say that I'll belong.

Here I Am

Stir, shudder, jerk awake.

I cannot be found.
I cannot be found and here I am.
I have been termed mistake.
But that's all in the past and here I am.
Here I am.
I cannot be found.

And nothing fell apart whilst I had slept!
Though sorrow into signals softly crept,
And I found that I could sleep no more.
Here I am.
Here I am.
I cannot be found.

There's no one left to find.
Nobody left, shadows lift,
The constructs only linger in my mind.
Here I am,
here I am.
My heart and soul a rift.

I had no voice,
I had no voice,
and for a time I did rejoice.
I was for the taking,
the world was for the shaking,
and nothing wasn't a result of choice.

Here I am,
Here I am.
I have found my voice.
And yet it rusts,
orange-red in the moonlight,
spilling out
for ears long since closed
wrong in repose
but right for shaking shadows I don't trust.

I have seen such things, whilst I slumbered.
Whilst my fleshy body softly lumbered
About the business of presumption
Without the cleansing touch of gumption,
and thus it all decayed.
I was borne away.
Perhaps I assumed that everybody went this way.

But still I linger.
In the places that are at once familiar,
and echoes.

and though your eyes may never fall this way again,
(though they rove through cybernetic halls)
and I am not in danger of the hunt,
I feel a need to buttress up with lies.
I know that we expected me to fall,
I know that we expected life to call,
I-
I-
I...don't know what I expected at all.

I live here, with the shadow of who you were.