emaciated

Your emaciated eyes looked at me all stupid and doey

Expect to fulfill your dreams or just settle?

Please do not pressure me like that or I will shoot you down.

Your emaciated body wanted to be nourished by me

Admire everything about who I am for a while longer

Please let me enjoy this ego moment and bathe in glory.

Your emaciated soul dragged along like a wooden leg

Trust me to amputate it mercilessly gleefully

Please know I will carry every broken piece of you in my arms
to traverse galaxies.

milk 'n acid

You carelessly poured a can of coconut milk into two glasses

Let it dance with OJ and scotch

I looked at the concoction about to protest

You replaced my shirt with your lips

The milk settled from the acid

Untouched.

Won 1st Place for Poetry The New Physician Creative Arts Contest 2012
Published in The New Physician Summer 2012 Edition

Ghost

Prime real estate I reside,

Afforded by a hurt that convulses the body, gasps for air,

A cleansing soak.

At its doorframe I stand,

Looking back with a hint of shame, a pinch of pride,

A temporal ease.

Dawdle at the driveway I do,

Languish in this transformative phase for once or twice,

A quiet halt.

Buoy into new stratospheres I float,

Rule out nothing but the past and a ghost or two,

A natural rise.

Originally written 2.5.12

Thanks but

I.

In holy matrimony, they hold hands
Because

They are in love, they are to raise children together,

They are to be envied by all their single friends,

They are to feel the safety and comfort of having someone to come home to.

We march, rally, and protest the law

We use media, literature, art to spread our plight

Because 
We too want to hold hands,

To rear love, children, envy, safety, comfort,

As reassurance that they and we are now equal,

That we are so quickly progressing towards societal acceptance,

Thanks

But

Slow down, step back, a mathematical logic problem, an oft-overlooked given,

Did they make the right assumption?

In holy matrimony.

II.

Selfish is my freedom,

Take from their investment

In marriage and commitment.

Wallow in childhood comfort

Created for me

But not from me

To unborn children.

Selfish but great is my freedom

Laugh all the way to the grave

With cradle cake still in mouth.

Care and wisdom handed down

Cumulative receiver am I

Walk with each step,

A gem in my belly.

But they, a man and a woman, 

Trudge through remaining days,

Taken of their investment

In marriage and commitment

Sallow in stagnant stability

Created for society

But not for them

Walk with each step,

A stone in their belly.

Yellow Feathers

Large blue sky and one yellow speck,

Nothing in my way, nothing out of my way, fall in hard, fall out hard,

Because I am flying of no check,

My little yellow feathers raped by the wind, a violent love.

An immeasurable freedom that hurts inside this bosom,

Lest I bash this small yellow chest against the brick,

Fly with large speed to abrase delicate body against buildings and mountains,

Smear blood and feathers, smear freedom and greatness.

My sharp beak rips lovingly, yes ferociously, at these soft feathers,

Such delicious-tasting feathers I grow on my useless cage of a body,

Let my useful gastronomical system turn yellow feathers,

Into golden colostrum, golden excreta, golden perineal ooze.

Look at me, now a bald non-eagle, exposed skin or dermatomed prison bars?

Scent of freedom emanating from my flesh as it begs to come out and play,

Hurts so good to drip yellow blood that turns into liquid gold mid-flight,

Scatter my golden freedom, let it grow into nothingness, 
Then shall I be most free.

Let's Play Pretend

He expounds his writing experience to the class, pausing unnecessarily,

Tones his voice, shifts his leg, downplays ‘Like, it’s no big deal, really.’

Oh but really, it is a big deal, to you,

And that is okay,

To celebrate the ego.

Call yourself confident and assured, insecurity a foreign thing,

You in a white pencil skirt, purple top, white purse, interesting combination,

So someone broke into my closet, to compare, to prove,

To very confidently prove that you cannot pull it off like me

And always knew it.

I lean back, stretch arms out, widely, obnoxiously,

Express discontent at this drawn-out class.

She leans back, stretches arms out, widely, not as obnoxiously,

Express discontent at my discontinued interest in her.

You know where I live, babe.

Woozy, attemptingly seductive eyes, she wobbles,

Lean against pool table next to me, looking straight ahead,

Place hand next to mine, barely touching but touching,

Alcohol as absolution from morning-after sins,

That is not going in my bed.

He feels the need to juggle one too many balls,

To fill the empty crevices left by his own,

From where stemmed platitudes for might and strength?

Small and weak being quaint and endearing,

I’d welcome that into my bed.

Black Lacquer

I.

Bright sunny day humming to the neighbor’s hose,

Her beautiful face surrounded by light full of love for the park and me,

We feel excitement hearing the ice cream truck.

Grey rainy day beating to the TV commercials,

Her pristine face danced with the aroma of food prepared from scratch,

We feel joy sharing beef congee.

White snowy night hibernating with the beat of our hearts,

Her soft face resting on the pillow cushioning my fear of a big scary world,

I feel safe attaching my soul to her soft body.

Bright sunny day humming to the neighbor’s hose,

Her beautiful face transformed by darkness full of ferocity for life and me,

I feel the quick force of her beautiful hand against me.

Grey rainy day beating to the TV commercials,

Her pristine face tainted with the frustration of life cooked with wrong ingredients,

I feel terror as I swallow words from pristine lips that tremble with hate.

White snowy night hibernating with the beat of my heart,

Her soft face exploding like gunpowder catapulting me into the big scary world,

I ask why attaching my body to the hard table leg.

II.

Two chairs pushed in across from each other in between two leg posts,

I have my four walls.

The under surface of the tabletop and the floorboards,

I have my sky and my earth.

Two miniature arms and two stubby legs in a ball,

I have my new womb.

Paint my new walls using wet fingers, don’t miss a spot,

Tears evaporate off the black lacquer, an unending canvas,

What luck,

Unending paint.

Feel the edges of the leg post, so sharp and smooth, soothing edges,

A hard, durable, shiny material, always reliable always predictable,

What safety,

Black lacquer.

III.

Suit up, on board, cab it; Game face, knock, handshake,

Own it.

Safe.

Blame Greenspan, praise Bernanke; Talk fast, walk fast, think fast,

Move it.

Safe.

Suited up, on board, cabin lights off, forty thousand feet in the air,

Journey of safe routine ad nauseam, nausea idiopathic,

Nausea mysterious,

Shaking voice, shaking hands, shake and sink,

Blood draining from my head light as air, air I am catapulting through

With the speed of gunpowder.
Terror and confusion in blasphemous consummation,

So fast, faster and fastest, fasting heart

Starves more blood that leaves me, disappears on me,

Head is gone, legs cannot feel, see only black,

Black lacquer.