elegance.

there are eleven days in a week,
and the months pass by in fiery torrent
with only the moments spent sleeping containing the only clarity
that keeps the eyes of dreamers 
peeping for youth.

a transient & solitary sunflower sits
on the broken mass of a windowledge planter box
next to the spot she planted her engagement ring,
hoping to watch happiness and fidelity sprout 
into the yellows and violets and sunbursts of
long-lasting fulfilling and matrimonial promises,

but no home can bloom when it doesn’t rain,
and the months have been temperamental 
at best.

Claridad

Hoy, yo veo con la claridad
de una prostituta embriagada,
convencida de que el dolor simplemente

es un beso de Dios,

y que la mejor forma de pedir perdon
es con las manos atadas,
de rodias,

con la boca abierta
y los ojos cerrados. 

Self Fish

fishing for my self
in melancholic low-tide and the surf
is swimming me in reds oranges & yellows
and there's not enough oxygen
no there's not enough
and i'm running out breath
and there's still so much i want to say
but there's not enough time
and i'm running out of oxygen
and i thought today would be a perfect day
to fish for self
but i caught the high-tide around mid-day
and all the purples and blues and greens
were chaotic
and i can no longer feel my toes
because of the cold
and i can no longer feel you
because of my fishing self


don't drown, kid. don't --

Still-Life Study

file your nails down to the wick,
grow your hair out past your dreams,
try to outrun the fire burning inside of your fever,
bat your eyelashes at the missed opportunities passing by,
close your fist trying to hold on to the last sound of my voice,
listen up for the sound of the last train that could have taken you home.
tell me all about your sunflower’d sighing and tempest coughing,
disguise the obscenity of youth inside that smile you keep on your nightstand,
dress the wounds your past has left with that beautiful dress
you hold at arm’s length as you ask me if I still love the sight of your voice,

i swear

i Swear by the moon with a
tumultuous      rabidity and mediocre
Howl; i Swear by the hand
of the     seven seas     , where veins are
full of the    charity of gratitude -- thunderous drapes

that linger with the sound of
the wind;
i Swear by the
nine birds of fate     which i do possess
and know nothing about; i

Swear by the whimpers that escape
the corners               of my mouth
when you sit on my belly, &
feel the         warmth of your

sex

which ignites passion
and disaster;           i Swear by the
solemn toes on your left
foot which has not received
any of my attention;

by all of This, i Swear
that i do, in fact, love Thee.

2.

what a roaming delirium
we are drowning in,
enveloped by the fragrant melodious harmonious 
toxic weather — that which does
remind me of your lips
and the way they smell

when you stand behind an
opened door.

O! Delirious nature of Destruction.
Whisper the many colours of 
the dreams you had
into my ear
                    when i’m not 

         looking;

i know what it means
to want,
everything and nothing.
i don’t want 
that. i will give the 

Universe everything back just
to touch smell kiss

& entice you with me.

7.

a drunken disillusion

to know that you and i
and us and we and them 
are nothing more than strangers

who have (or have not) met.

i hold my tongue always
when i, i, i, when i am afraid
that you will not hold your tongue.

i want to hold your tongue.

xiv.

       o, what grandeur, what palpitating
              intrusion this chest mine feels,
     what weightlessness, what pressure
 my heart feels, tripping over its footing
   causing the doc to worry, causing the 
clock to slow down, and all the moment
                                   to catchup. God!

Estoy envenenado con las ganas y el deseo
De mil hombres, no dos mil, no diez mil, no…de todos los hombres que han tenido ganas,
Y de un miedo que explica la
Razon en terminos
De el idealismo magico,
El realismo fatigado,
La tortura dulce,
La misericordia divina,
La revolucion cotidiana,
Una paranoya perfecta,
Y un simbolismo embriagado.

En donde te encuentras, y como te encuentro? Me has dejado moribundo, paraplegico,
desolado, desmallado, debil, anonadado, sentimental, y con la sabiduria de un cojo,
que se le ha olvidado como era el
Caminar sin tropesarce con
Sus propias ideas.

Mira, lo que estoy diciendo es que
Al fin me siento completo,
Y es todo gracias a ti.

To her

What a fecund and glorious yesterday 
I will wake up to tomorrow!
Full of the living, breathing, teething, 
mesmerizing, rehabilitating  memory
of what life brought us today.
I am terrified of the reality that we now live in 
but I am willing to fight against 
every drunken urge 
that they throw our way.
This will not be easy
and it shouldn't be.

When I said you are a type of magic
I meant that you are truth.
The kind of truth that leaves little 
memories around town,
on my clothes
in my beard
against my skin
wrapped around a finger
in my subconscious.
I am still finding your hair everywhere.
I have grown accustomed to it,
but it still surprises me.
It still scares me.
I am raving mad.
I am drunk but I have not touched a drop of alcohol.
I am a wolf dressed in sheep's clothing.
I am drunk with thoughts of you.
You are eyes, ears, mouth, legs, breasts,
freckles, hope, stomach, flesh, blood, 
whispers, dreams, a fantastic ass, 
passion, a midnight tremble, the space between words
in my favorite book, the loud silence
I hear when the world is quiet, a forgotten
goddess, a moment of peace, a fierce wind,
an answered prayer, magic.

You are a type of magic
which bursts with the beauty
of a thousand pregnant suns!
Yearning for desire, passion, knowledge,
sex, flesh, lust, love, a fuck that will leave you
exhausted and sleeping for a couple of nights,
until you wake up,
kiss me again,
and whisper at me with your eyes.

I am left hollow just imagining
what you taste like,
what you feel like,
what you look like,
what you dream of,
what you want out of this,
& what you keep from me
in between smiles and laughter.Don't hold you tongue.
Give in to your bursts!
For heaven's sake,

burst! 

Exodus I & II

Exodus I & II

i have been asleep for the past few years.
Not physically, but mentally, spiritually, incandescently,
  radiantly, gallantly, arrogantly, etc.
i missed the entire era of self destruction, of degradation,
  of a time where it was okay to tell people they were
        acting like shit eaters! Instead i woke up to a burning
        soliloquy of blatant disregard, elegant euphemism, and
        drowning hypocrisy. In this era, the shit eaters are
        the Kings and Queens and we are merely holding the
        electric candles to create their shadows.
All i want is true nihilism. i can't even get that. All i
        get are fake tans, bleached hair and bleached assholes,
        pseudo social independence, mock class, and a whole lot
        of incomprehensible sensitive bullshit. Not even the
        good kind. Not even the kind i could tolerate on the
        other side of a bottle of whiskey or rum or wine.
There are sights and sounds all around me that coincide with
        my desire to sleep and sleep and sleep until i can
        sleep no more and then go back to bed and keep on
        sleeping, but instead i sit around in my underwear
        daydreaming of the last time we fondled the night away
        undressing each other in metaphor and we both came to
        the conclusion that sex is the only respite and then we
        would fall asleep pretending we knew who the other one
        was only to realize that either neither of us had a
        name or we were incapable of remembering them.

i thought of you again for the first time since the last  
        time. i thought of you in Black & White, then again in
        technicolor.
i thought of you in the same way a moth might find itself
        thinking of its pattern of flight, curiously inspecting
        the leaf on which it wants to land, or perhaps my
        thinking of you is more closely related to the way a
        body's radiation might stop to think about the
        condensation building on the window dripping water and
        lust onto the windowsill.
When i thought of you i got a sharp pain in my pancreas and
        my gull bladder started leaking out the naked memory of
        you, because that's where i feel you on Monday mornings
        when it looks like its about to rain... Perhaps
        tomorrow when i think of you my intestine will begin to
        function again. Maybe next week when you come to mind,
        as i'm crossing the road of some busy intersection
        where i don't even bother looking both ways because
        thinking of you is really beginning to take a toll on
        me, maybe then i will feel the need to have another
        bowel movement;
Meanwhile, you might be sharing your precious flesh with
        someone else and maybe for a brief moment you will
        think of me, maybe you will close your eyes and in that
        moment of pure ecstasy and bliss you will mouth my
        name, not even causing a break in the still and quiet
        surrounding you.
That is enough for me.
where are you now? what have you been doing? are you happy?
        is it still winter?
Can he penetrate your bones and hide behind your marrow the
        way i can?
i feel as if you just left me here, sitting on this
        proverbial bench which could very well be my need for
        you to come back. You just left me here and the months
        have passed by aggressively, with a subtle resentment
        towards me. As if i could control the weather or you or
        myself or my erection for that matter.
Perhaps if i could, you would come back to me in the form of
        shadows in the rain.
Oh! it is always fucking raining here, even when there isn't
        a cloud in sight.
I'm still thinking of you when the guy walking across the
        street drops his bag and from within the bag falls
        pages of words that hide eternity in their disfigured
        symbols. i'll never know what they were or what they
        said, or if he wrote them or someone else did, and if
        that person wrote them for a lover or for some cunt who
        broke his heart. The same way I'll never know what you
        think of me.
i think of you now, but not as your own person. At this
        point, i'm not even sure you ever existed. You are
        nothing more than an extension of me. You are an extra
        finger on my right hand or a third leg or perhaps a
        second chin. You are my memory.
You have shown me that there is no way to prove the
        existence of God, and yet you have inspired me to look
        for a theory that explains what isn't there.
A way to explain you.
i can smell the eggs you had for breakfast. That is to say,
        i am sitting in some symbolic cafe, listening to some
        woman yapping on about her husband's new assistant and how
        this young nubile creature might be exactly what
        her husband wants, with the sun burning my skin through
        the glass and I am picturing you had eggs for breakfast
        and i can smell them on your breath. i still remember
        your breath. The faint underlying notes of slight
        disillusion, and a hint of the mint leaves you like to
        chew on at night with your tea. i can still smell the
        aroma of what you had for dinner last night. It's
        embedded in your skin. i can even tell you the names of
        the cross streets of the place you ate at last night. i
        can remember the tones of the way your breath sounded
        when you breathed heavily after running or fucking, and
        believe me, no symphony will ever be able to recreate
        such inspired unadulterated morbid beauty.
i haven't seen you in ages.
An eternity really.
And still i see you wherever i go. i'll be walking past the
        Veteran's hospital and think of all the wars we never
        fought in; the thoughts replaying in my head like the
        loudest silent film. i walk past the hospice and i feel
        older than the undead statues inside and more calloused
        too. i walk by the theatre on Main and my memory starts
        to act up again, but this time by reminding of all the
        movies we never saw. And yet i know how they all end.
i know how everything ends.
You told me everything ends horribly and i believed you. Is
        that what you were trying to prove with this?
Where are you?
The Past & Present have all become obscured by the reality
        that tomorrow is going to be the Future, but even then,
        this moment, these goddamn fucking words were once my
        future, You were once my future, but now this is really
        what i'm supposed to be looking forward to? working
        towards? Every moment, every insignificant scratch to
        my face, every yawn, every meal i've ever had or
        skipped, every fuck, every shit, no matter how hard or
        soft, or burning piss i have ever taken has been
        leading me to these words. This moment.
God! i sure hope i'm using the right ones. i wish i could
        say at least two words of this to you in person, but i
        have no idea where you are.
Could it be that i will find you under the bed? i haven't
        looked there yet. Maybe i'll find you at the bottom of
        a cereal box right next to a hooker's smile and a
        decaying old man who still has the ability to dream.
        i'm writing all of this hoping you'll care, but i know
        the reality of this: you've forgotten me, and why
        shouldn't you have?
You've forgotten all about the time we waltzed through
        museums and aged alongside the crooked taxidermied
        priest and the rotting alter boy with his pants down by
        his knees, the Mona Lisa and that figure of Elvis that looked
        as if he were melting, and then out of sympathy
        we started melting too.
We tapped our way amongst the jaguars and the lions, past
        centuries of orphans who were too busy looking for
        parents to notice us.
We jived past the useless prosaic librarians in their
        thriftshop flannel, and we stopped for a cigarette by
        the three lovely lesbians who were discussing Pompei,
        the wooden cock, libertarianism, chicken noodle soup,
        life, liberty, and the existence of the Five Hour
        Orgasm, all the while writing obscene stanzas of
        verbatim'd vernacular and jibberish on their arms in
        the name of post-existential feminism and the sexual
    liberation movement.
We lived an eternity in that museum.
We aged like we lived;
with balls, with dreams, with endless swagger.
We remembered our past lives along the hallways; how we
        wrote the earliest creation myths, and now people
        insist on calling it religion.
You still call it bullshit.
Do you remember when we lived on the moon and we would spend
        entire afternoons, days, weeks, months, years, laughing
        at all the imbeciles who needed oxygen to survive, when
        all we needed was each other? Do you remember the first
   time you read Kafka and you cried because you said he
        was talking about us?
The last time i saw you you were walking into a sea of out
  of tune pianos, all of them playing some baroque garb
        on an infinite loop which resulted in this catastrophic
        symphony which brought tears to my eyes, and reminded
        me of what it means to be human, imperfect & horny,
        unaware of all the limitations i will never know, like
        my inability to ever use words to express the emotions
        my bowels feel every time they think they catch a
        glimpse of your silhouette through department store
        windows, or the desperate flowers of thought that will
        never bloom out of my ears.
All of these are the worst forms of torture God or anyone
        else could have imagined.
That was the last time i saw you.
Do you remember when you told me it was okay to be a
        bastard, but to always be a gentleman about it? Do you
        remember how you told me that it was just fine if i
        couldn't believe in God, because at least you do exist
        and as long as you existed i didn't have to believe in
        anything? That it would be enough for me to breathe in
        your eternal youth and to slowly open my eyes to you?
Do you remember any of this?

Where are you?

April 2013

The Last Cannibal (Excerpt)

  Ruben Aguilar: stalker of the dolled-up skeletons that prowl the streets by night, renting out their sacred
and lived-in skin to the empty shadows of men, who by day are the geniuses of finance, impeccable bankers, devout Catholics, and alchemist poets. 

Ruben Aguilar: lover of film, theatre, literature long forgotten by time and a generation of bastards, arias so beautiful they could resurrect even those who are most dead, mid-day siestas that remind him of a happy childhood he never had, and a faithful client of the local brothels that have more in common with the out-of-town festival meat markets than actual houses of pleasure. 

  Ruben Aguilar: embittered inveterate, crotchety old bastard, ritualistic loser, and barbaric manic depressive. 

All in all, Ruben Aguilar: professional motherfucker. 

In his youth, Ruben Aguilar, had been in love with a woman who was, both, married, and a mother to three children. Two of them died in a house fire less than a  week after Ruben Aguilar had declared his eternal love to Esmeralda at the end of that radiant spring. 

Even though the fire had been caused by her husband's abusive drinking and his incessant habit of lighting a candle for his family's saints every time he opened up a new bottle of tequila, Esmeralda blamed Ruben Aguilar for having spoken words of love and herself for having entertained such beautiful words from a boy who was only a few years older than her oldest son at the time of his death. 

Both Ruben Aguilar and Esmeralda spent a summer of hell, feeling a violent void so deep within themselves that they felt, both, every emotion and nothing deep in their gull bladders. 

Not only had two of Esmeralda's children died that spring, but a short while after the Holy Fire, as everyone began calling it, Esmeralda's husband had to be taken into the city and admitted into the insane asylum because he had suffered from a nervous breakdown that had left him with severe paranoia. 

Esmeralda's husband spent the rest of the twentieth century alternating between clinical trials of electro-shock therapy and experimental, stress-reducing waterboarding. In his downtime, he was strapped to his bed from where he helplessly watched as the Germans he had killed in the Second World War surround his bed with the violent demeanor of demons that wanted to hurt him. 

Esmeralda, on the other hand, tried to fill the void left by her two oldest sons and husband with the son she still had. Unfortunately, the young child was more scarecrow than child, and they spent the majority of that atrocious summer in the cineplex, run down by lack of maintenance and overall abandonment  watching foreign films with scenes much too violent and pornographic for the young boy, but Esmeralda was so deep within herself, she never saw what they were watching.
     Ruben Aguilar, suffering from his first broken heart and struggling through his first bout with depression and nostalgia, found the secrets of the modern man: alcohol and cheap meaningless sex.