bodies break too easily

no one sings like nat king cole anymore.
when was the last time you pressed your fingers in your eye sockets until there were purple shapes flying at you, and you felt like you were traveling through space like the future travels through the present?
i sure could use a drink out of one of those big water fountains with the foot pedal.
i want my brother to search for a wash cloth that i hid in a drain pipe until dinner.
no one has thrown a crab-apple in my swimming pool recently.
this winter, i am going to fall asleep under the christmas tree with my dog and pretend she understands english.

don't break my bones looking for me inside
don't crack my skull and rip away my hide
there's nothing behind my ribs but a bloody pumping fist
when you finally give up on me you'll wonder what you missed

i see that sweat beeding handsomely
it usually makes its way around your nose
and then you smear it all in with a flash of palm
melting flesh that drips onto your toes

come on in, just follow that sound

don't close your eyes too tight, you might see

She usually swirls her drink at that thought. The sunset behind the tower. The life beyond the sea. The love within her chest. Some people don't even need the drink, but they take it anyway. Might as well, right? Most people learn to forget about the sunset, and they see the ocean as just a large body of salt water to make movies about. And the things inside their chests are only stimulated by Steele or Sparks. But she hasn't forgotten. That's why she swirls her drink.

"I know this isn't what you wanted me to say," she says, "but how can I get closer and be further away from the truth that proves it's beautiful to lie?"

"Thats a song."

Swirl.

ever will feel like today

when i'm in the midst of a slow motion shuffle,
oh, how i turtle neck at my past progression!
if only i could wear flexible wooden shoes
and dance on a dock of the great bay
with seven or eight hand raising spirits,
but i owe too much
to just leave.


i wish i was nine
or ninety.

an ode to misguided tears

while you were lying
i was believing and never knowing how much i was loved

while i was leaning
you were crying on clouds and never knowing either

swimming pools

there
must
be
a way
around
this
while
you
talk to me
through a
wave
of
grass and crooked rain.
I'll throw one out there for you
and hope
that
your feet
prune
slowly in
the
deep
end.

idea

i have an idea -
let's put the top down and drive to a place where
we've never been before and lay

in grass and leaves that arent yet
dead, they still have colors
red, and yellow, and orange, and brown,
for the autumn won't count its dead before
the winter darkness beckons them.

until then, i have an idea -
let's grow our hair and shout our secrets from
the bottom of thick-trunked trees

whose bark is cold to the touch when
we climb into its carousel of
twisting arms and forgotten fingers that
we give names to and make remembered as the
western wind bends them in its shivery chill.

i have an idea -
let's drink steamy coffee and tangle limbs when
no one sees us watching the gravel

that covers the ground in a seeded
chalk bed where travellers stop and
take a breath and wrap their hands
and brush their cheeks and cover up when
no one cares to build a fire.

hey, i have an idea -
let's gather jackets and vests and scarves
and pack our bags for a trip where

we don't know where we're going until
the train stops screeching in the central
station of some great city with soft-white windows,
and bearded men with newspaper sleeves,
and taxis honking in the pale-lined streets.

i have an idea -
let's learn to dance before december arrives
so we can foxtrot through the wintertime.

tv's are full of me

the television bubbles in and out
casting its grey glow around the shadows dancing over me.
I feel their rythmn tugging inward;
as bleached reality gives way to kaleidoscopic fantasy.
galloping closer, I take in air,
(indian-style anticipation)
an owl watches from somewhere overhead
and cranes its neck at my awkward duration.
if you could crawl inside the tv set you would see
a bed, a lamp, and a potted tree;
a table, some chairs, and a kitchen sink -
it all appears in an eyelid's blink.
I only had to leave to go see the HMS Pinafore
in a cushioned seat that would never compare
to the indention in carpet
that formed, through fascination, my favorite chair.
every night I left my mind; I said goodbye to dreams
and entered the daylight of ocarina melodies.

broken waves

truth, arise!
where mine ego dies,
and flow through the company of my sighs.
I'll come to thee
on bended knee,
with swans and willows and waves of the sea.

max patch

all photos - © adam brimer

(click the thumbs for larger image)
& keep in mind that most of these were taken in the middle of the night....

the helium inside

please be quiet, thief
as you swindle, swipe, and pussyfoot
and open teeth that slither words like
knives into a creamy belly
you stab and slice and call for help
so no one knows the bloody truth
and while you wait between siren cries
a fleshy pink flab of dripping tongue
combs through the lines of a notebook page
and hunts for loathsome crumbs of words
to spill on an unsuspecting world like
a pistol in a tight coat pocket
firing rounds into a spiritless heart
unbuckle
unzip
reveal the stench
saturate the source of all that is rich
some hot afternoon, you will surely find
that no one cares about the helium inside
you will try to pull passion right out of the air
but you can’t create anything that’s not already there

my friends just left me for their boyfriends

la dum dum
la doo dum
humming down a window pane in broken strides
tears collide in cold motion, shum da dum dum
they came from eyes sinking in their mistakes
chilling in a flurry
dee da da
frailty of a floating china plate, duh duh doo da
frigid trough to bitter crest
cracking in the stinging breeze rythmn
salty residue streaks the glass, doo da
la dum dum
feeling all too dissonant
weightless, crisp air, ahh la
pounding the little streams
sqeezing fresh laments
shhhh
caught by a colored leaf
sodden in the icy soil
balancing light in a fractured maze, hmmmm
da dum, the morning pool will soon overflow with you
just imagine
it isn't sad, its lovely