Vices are great.

Wake up late, grope through bottles
that go clink clink clink
while you think how great a night
it must have been
to have left so little for its 'morrow.
Inhale through stained fingers
and feel it linger in your chest
before it stretches out
like a cat after a nap
and fills your body.
Your gullet sprouts legs and feet
and your lungs take arms
while your brain suckles,
like a newborn to a teat,
the fluids and chemicals it has found.
And, bound in the skin of a man,
the vices walk out and shout,
“Here I am!
Bow down before me
and be free from this world.”
And you walk,
an idle statue of flesh and hunger
for what used to be a heart,
but is now just a part
of some feeling
somewhere,
an urge to see your world burn.
But your vices will keep you warm
by the fire
while you sate that hunger
like a ravenous dog with a piece of steak,
because your vices are your face
and hands
and oasis in the desert.

Sodium Chloride in Dihydrogen Monoxide

and she was fading and flowing and falling
through fingers she gripped so tightly around
a chest that heaved and groaned.

Her chest heaved and groaned
and croaked a warbled tone
that Fate had let her down.

Fate had let her down,
let her walk against the tide
but only for a time.

Only for a time
and then she was
fading and
flowing and
falling, a

pillar
of dry
for having one
compassionate eye.

For having one compassionate eye
turned back on those who were passed
by the rushing waters and the rushing tide.

The rushing waters and the rushing tide
that said who would go and who would stay behind
and for looking she faded and flowed and fell.

She faded and flowed and fell
until her body and her eye
could be washed away.

She washed away
with the others.
No one could stay.

Not even those who obeyed.
When the river said move
and they moved,
or became a pillar for a day
to wait for the waters to come
and wash it all away.
But the waters always come,
even for those who obey.
The waters will come
someday.
No one can stay.

The Moon Will Make You Blind

The morning dew was drip dropping
from the leaves outside,
and the blood was slish sloshing
through his temples.
There was a pounding behind his eyes
like his head was full of Muppets
and Animal was playing a drum solo.
He had dreamt of a hill of grass
and a birch that branched
this way
and that way
and this way again,
feeling its way across the clouds.
But always,
always,
it missed the sun.
Teased by the breaks of its cover,
but always,
always,
it would be covered again,
or the wooden fingers were pushed away
by the northern winds.
Always,
again and again
until the tree crooned to the setting sun
and was left only with the rising moon.
And it grasped it tight for another night
as a starving man would an apple,
but the tree would bear no fruit.
And so he had dreamt while he had slept,
and so now did he wake
to an empty bed and the empty bottles
he measured his days by.
And so too did he now curse the sun
that left him blinded
and dazed
and sticky,
and living a life of regret.
Staring at the sun will make you blind,
but so will living only at night,
and grasping only for the moon.

Six Seconds

One second.
Two seconds.
Not that my mind counted then,
but it does in reflection.
Three seconds.
Four seconds.
At seven seconds the heart stops.
Five seconds.
To find out they shocked mice
and extrapolated for people.
Six seconds.
Six seconds and it stops.
My heart keeps beating.
In the movies sparks fly,
lights flash.
They shake and they convulse,
dancing to some sped up techno remix
that no one else can hear.
They experience it,
putting on a spectacular show,
and they forget it.
I experienced it,
but I put on no spectacular show
and I will never forget it
each time I cringe from a power cord,
feel my lungs empty of air from bare copper,
or the blackness fades over my eyes
at the sound of thunder.

One second.
Two seconds.
Time seemed to slow down
as I counted the seconds away.
Three seconds.
Four seconds.
A soft breeze licked the nape of my neck.
Five seconds.
My hands were damp, but I dared not to wipe them
out of fear of missing a single moment.
Six seconds.
Six seconds and she freed herself,
pulled her snagged skirt back down
over her white flesh and green cotton,
covering her flushed face with her hand
(her nails were green too)
and disappeared,
her shoes going click click click
against the pavement
to the beat of my heart going tick tick tick
against my sternum.
Thirteen years had been lived
before the shock of puberty
and seven more after
before the shock of stupidity
(although it can be argued they are the same)
and still,
in just six seconds,
your life can change.