you are a record store

You know what song I like? That one about you sitting on a shelf.
I listened to it about twenty times on the record player yesterday &
& got naked. But yeah, I still wanna drink a whole can of red paint
& jump from the freeway overpass just to see how big my heart is.

you are television

I wrote a letter to your sister. It began like this: “dear sister.”
I’ve never seen her TV show. But I did see a commercial &
your face. & though I can’t remember what all I wrote because
I think I might’ve asked her something awful embarassing.

you are shot-reverse-shot

Sometimes I wonder if I will ever be in a movie & if I am
like I’m from Kentucky & then I wonder if you would be
in the movie would there be a scene where we stand silently
& you blow into your hands to keep warm while I make

you are high lonesome

I promise I can keep a secret for, like, forever. You can whisper me
between your thighs makes you feverish or all purple plumage. I got
that says Can I bite your bottom lip? Please check yes or no. I would like to
I would like to bite your bottom lip like it’s all of Appalachia.

you are undertow

My friends tell me you are not a river & I am supposed to believe them,
right, but it feels like a sick ventriloquism two-by-four’d from my throat.
you’re not a river & I’m not a thicket & together we’re more alone than
one of them old time preachers, I’d drown myself in you & grow a tiny

you are 31 flavors

This girl once told me that somewhere underneath her sweater a piece
ice cream. We were outside in the snow & I was thinking so hard about
hollowed me & that I was all echoes now & the things I say are dusk. I
jack-knife & I wanted to call you on the telephone & tell you every lie

you (you you) are a bombshell (oh yeah!)

Look! I shaved off all my hair for you. I wanna be your punk rock &
I want my knuckles to bleed motor oil & buckshot. I wanna look that
with my tongue & say go all cement brick, you fuck. Paint my body antifreeze.
grief is the shape of my skull, the taste of paint fumes I wake up to,

you are graffiti

Today my doctor told me I am not a hornet’s nest, told me I am not
the gang signs spray-painted on the stop sign at the end of your street.
to make me feel. I wish everyone would tell me something about me,
sad. I think I’d like to sit alone at your kitchen table & write you a very

you are a gallery

There’s a treehouse in my backyard I like to sleep in when it’s cold
sounds empty & I’d be lying if I said I didn’t get scared sometimes,
foil & imagine you are asleep in a museum. I sleep beside you &
in tiny red lights. Your arms are koi. My legs are an octopus. I think

you are where there’s music & there’s people & they’re young & alive

What is not a secret is a mess of hummingbirds in my throat
in the hospital. When I lie down on the front lawn of your
& staring at the light from your old bedroom window. It means
I’d like to gut myself like a fish. I’d like you to write that on the

you are my favorite wallace stevens poem

Would you believe there are trees outside my house that whisper
real close some night & carve your initials in one of them. The sound
projectors we used to have in science class. Or maybe the trees are
a little girl. I wish I could transcribe every word the trees say, but I

you are boxcar

If you really think my mind is full of gunpowder, just say the word &
all my Jawbreaker records instead. Or you can ride my skateboard & I
inventions no one has invented yet. I get sidetracked, though, & will
would be like if you were a radio & I was that one song by that ska band

you are insomnia

Part of me wants to ask you what your favorite river is, but part of me
wonder what if it’s a river I’ve never been to, or what if it’s the same river
This keeps me up at night when I’d rather burst like fireworks over the
narcolepsy, & then I’d be red & sulfur rain & there’d be no more questions

you are second base

Although I cannot make you, you have to swear you won’t tell anyone
breathing is bike chains because my face is numb & I’m fucking dizzy &
to the side of your skull? See, it gets so very emergency when I think about
French kissing when all I want is your medicine chest, your magic 8-ball,

you are carnival

I wish you’d squeeze my hand so you could feel how I beatbox for you.
tornadoes & shit. How they is all a cacophony of oysters funneled down
& tilt-a-whirl. The lawns are so green here they make me wanna file off
are windows, giant flatscreen TVs, & I wave to everyone like I wanna

you are hardcore

So goddamn, I been waiting forever to be honest with you, to confess
your mattress, your bedsheets white as autopsy, your spine, your interstate,
your jawline, your face, your middle name, the chain link fence around
the unbuckled black jean music on your bedroom floor, your bird, your boat,

Thank you to Karyna & Adam for doing awesome things. And to Alex, my pal.