1.

Ten haikus on breathing. Go.

I. Inhale angel breath
wingtips tickle my nostrils
resuscitate me


II. Because today's air
smells of lemon redemption
we could use rebirth


III. Souvenir from space
never able to go there
never able to


IV. Involuntary
brain thinks for my benefit
repay it with beer

V. Because I believe
you breathe the same air with me
I'm life, volatile

4.

checked the back door.
checked the front.
dead
bolt.

this is the mantra:
namaste namaste namaste namaste.

chin lift throat catch,
the friendliness of silence.

fingers trickle, lung heavy,
gargantuan cats all of them black
sifting into a realm i call bedroom.
where i was is not where i am.

the wintry brevity.
the slowly turning wheels
of Pharoah's army. behind me
a feline snickers and moses splits a sea.

i recognize you God, there in
the bathroom mirror.

3.

I have incriminated myself
I need an out-of-body experience
to shed my snakeskin to sprinkle sawdust
suck it up in a transparent
vacuum

so everyone can see it.

My putrid tornado of wasted energy
laced with sweaty headaches &
a Holy Bible opened to
some page in
Exodus

Exodus(t)

not even
cold air
feels good
right now

2.

about those rotten pears i
lathered them into my hair when i finally did
(yes i did) take a shower and now
everyone has been asking me what
sort of products i use and i can only say
sadly

the shit of flies the pungent
rotten flesh of fruit long gone the
choking pesticides and

on my hands the dust of dead cells the
sticky cannabis stuff the semen
from last night when i masturbated
and couldn't find my way to the
thunderstorm outside and the
dry and coagulated blood of christ
that i have always kept in my fingerprints

1.

I don't have the heart the
heart to tell you certain things like how
I brood with fruit flies swarming around in my kitchen
sucking the remnants of rotten pears and I
haven't showered in four days because this is
as clean as I'll ever be (who me? yes
me)

5.

stuck to the soil
or concrete (if i am lucky?)
my duration, and you may
call it life if you want, will be
chalked out on the ground.

stuck to it, something about gravity,
the same thing that makes bird shit
drop onto
my car.

despite this,
and i say damn the birds,
my head is up there in the sky
isn't it? that must count for
something. (my car is clean)

cawcawcawcaw says a blackbird
(in english this is fuck you stupid human thing!)

and then, of course, rain.