Seaburn

A shot fired across the deck
a weakened hull. A turning tide.
Well, all our anchors hang on chains
and dangle off our changing minds.

I'm not swimming back to shore,
     not this time.
Claw at water, grabbing sand.
Spent all this time with seaburnt eyelids
squinting back at conquered land.

     Squinting back at conquered land.

I am just a paddling rogue
awash in charges, lost at sea.
My toothless mouth just won't stop smiling
as this makeshift life raft starts to leak.

A swimming rat begins to sink

Fire a shot across the deck.
All this ocean and no drinks.
Fire a shot across the deck.
Fire a shot across the deck.

Shipwreck! Shipwreck!

Do you hate the way
     that our magnetized times
turns us all to metal shavings--
     push and pull--charged each
day to fill up negative space
with negative attraction?
Were you repulsed when polarities
                                          changed?

Or was that me?
     Flipping switches
                     switching sides
                                      siding
with pivot points showing, caught
with pants down?
"Be a man now!"
          While the female end
          of the port calls out,
          "Shipwreck! Shipwreck!
               All men down!"

Count me out at minus 4
     it leaves a balance: minus 3
At minus 10, our blood could freeze
and fall back earthward; blood red snow.
Caught on the tongue it tastes like pennies.
          Tastes just like
          the metal shavings
          we become
          in magnetized times.
               Polarized
and "Family Sized." Underpaid
Overfed. Neutralized America.

Greatest country in the fucking world.

                    Right?

Siege Engines

Befriended street lamps' static hum
Timed steps slashed through electric buzz
Fled from the dawn's grey stain
chased night with anxious breath
                                              erupting
Out­flanked and pinned down
                                         by the days

Strike up the band, roisin the bows.
Compose another tired piece.
I dread the melody
and cringe away
                              from the next movement
I'm only up for burned out wandering.

     Another balance overdue
Took out a loan for time well spent
     Roll out the carpets for the doomed
It's unforgiving turf where our steps are bent

I'll draw these lines
     of ghostly profile night
and coax the specters out
We'll roll on with the tides
     where we can dance macabre
until the core unwinds.

Defend the fort for sleeping ghosts
I'll man these walls until the dawn.
I'll fight these memories
beneath the banner of
                                  some others
Shell-shocked with gun arm
                                  growing sore

Outside, the sidewalks glow red-orange
I throw my shadow on the sparks.
Charred homes on cindered streets
I draw my bow
                           across shaking half notes
Chart out a map of burnt meanderings.

     Default on friendships I misplaced
I'm wrapped tight in familiar fear.
     But I'll warm to those familiar strains...
Because it's 5 o'clock somewhere, and Summer's here...

I'll cross the lines
     into the ghostly night
and wake the specters up
As fires kiss the night
     so I can sleep real sound
and let my core unwind.

Authors & Architects

          Past
     closed up pizza joints
Past laundromats, through the dying noise
the nights tick on like clockwork
watch the calendar as my steps unwind

I'll wait for my thoughts to ferment
pick my words, hope I don't slur them.
Flip back past the page of these days
     get a read how I got to this age

From the summit where I'm stuck and posted
          reread the books where I come the closest
From the shelf spill my guts to ghosts here,
and relive old nights in Bozeman

          When I found a place
where the nights grew longer--
grew confident that I wasn't always wrong
and just drank the moon
          under dawntide tables
rolled the dice with the greatest friends
we said,                           "We're not old yet."

          Through
     crumbling bones at night
past skeletons of the city's size
the nights fall out like sand grains
curse the hourglass as my fate unwinds.

I'll wait for my brain to discharge
its contents on hospital charts.
Glued the book shut, stuck in the time
I gained my crutches and misplaced my mind.

From the bed that I'm fucking glued to
to cluttered basements I can't wade through
The foundation just won't hold up
against the cracks formed in Missoula.

          Ran off the rails
where I stumbled and stammered
grew comfortable beneath pint glass hammers
I still drink the moon
          under dawntide tables
grown apart from the greatest friends
who said,                      "You're not dead yet."