Trembling Tyler

Trembling Tyler,
he sits
in the center of a living room;
Tyler walks his tremors
into bleached sidewalk
across naked grass
grasping for thick threads
of sun
or wallowing in shade;
Trembling, Tyler
pours ice-water
over etched diamonds of glass;
a sporadic splash
of minute droplets
containing light
interrupts the uniform
of summer heat
covering his forearm.

Feeling deadly, crumpled
but not crushed, his
pulse full of alacrity
and acrid with burnt blood,
barking shins and hooking
sore insoles on hardwood doors,
trapped by the heat
of hot-boxing his own head,
clad only, as ever,
in backdrop black,
a skinny shadow
wades through summer afternoons;
Tyler tries to remember
the last time he wasn't tired.

More Tired, More Tyler

As you may know, I've been working on a cycle, series, or epic (whoa) poem solipsistically titled "Tired Tyler." Despite the numbered nature of my previous posts from this series, it's become less of a round arc and more of an ongoing diary (but more pretentious, naturally). In light of my recently reticent blogging behavior, I've decided to pull from these poetic journal pieces and share them with you, even some experiments in different voices and frames of mind, of which "It Blooms in the Gut" is an example. Thanks for your continued reading, and I hope you enjoy.

Still Writing?! What?!!!

Hey there poetry party people. I know it's been a while since this blog has enjoyed any kind of regularity in posting (possibly since I've begun the damn thing), but the sporadic nature of my posts follows the irregularity  of both my living situation and my flirtations with the creative muse (who or whatever that may be). Apologies to all who have suffered for this lack of sweet, sweet poetry (and my inherent laziness). I've got a whole bunch'a poetic junk built up that I intend to dump on you guys over the next couple of weeks. And if that beautiful sentence didn't get you guys excited, well just wait for what comes next.

It Blooms in the Gut

Kelsey kills
another five
in the kitchen bathroom, not
using, just sitting and
mopping sweat
with rough paper towels, her hair
slickened and dark
across her brow.

Hangers with ties, rumpled
white button-ups, server
shirts, hair-gell, and paper
for bodies in need, this 
is a utility closet 
with a porcelain throne,
she muses silently,
and I'm its temporary queen.
Wristwatch, shaving-nicks
on her pearlescent shins,
bussing apron stained and strewn
like her laundry back home.
I make my mark
wherever I go. She touches
the tender scars
of her lower legs, stands,
sways for the thud
of a few blood confused moments
and undoes the latch, kills
the light, and walks out.

The sluggish bedding slips
her pale shoulders
in turning from open space and
coffee table lip
to plush furniture backing,
a vertical frame of foam
for her face to press against,
or pretend to rest as
soft voices whisper defferential
to her faux-insensate form,
sluggish and crackling
teeth
like enameled tectonic plates;
and she crumbles, and
half of her head feels thick
with unseen tunnels
ore-laden and too close
to fault-lines or
buried nerves.

The coffee taste
still burns her mouth, but
cool
water
doesn't exist in the mouth; it
blooms in the gut, an
icy bath of clarity itself, and
that's her center
for five seconds; for five seconds
she revolves around it
tranquil as a top.

Curiously (or not) cocktails
reach that spot, flowering
in hot amber and subdermal violet, or
stung red by the salt-rich sea
(only oxidizing rarely) sea-sick
with the punch-drunk
revolutions wobbling, tripping
as their centers grow.

Eyes open,
throat hot
with the thick cord of liquid
downed
in a triumph of thirst,
steady, weight
pinioned against her small, padded hands,
fingernails
too long,
trying to sink
into a frozen quicksilver pool.

She works to wright her sway.
Sails of sleeves,
white, billow in breezes
and cling to hollows
where air has escaped; her
hollows rasp breezily
and she shifts
and tugs at her bra-strap.