all the children flew when i touched their hands.

red curtains.

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 17:39:04 GMT

the flickering of the light on a third story window. clap your hands, tap your feet if you know how the words go. it's the same old story, it's just a different day. you call your children to your bedside, smile at them and say:

son, someday.

little black book.

Tue, 26 May 2009 03:22:52 GMT

a few days ago, i stopped to talk to a humble couple from a town near where i grew up. they gave me a very small bible. in speaking with them, i deduced that they were not academically learned folk.

with earnest and weathered eyes, the man asked my name. i told him. his quiet wife moved gently to touch his arm. she had long, rough hair that was parted in the middle and pulled into a pony-tail.

he asked if i wanted them to pray for me.

i looked away, up the street. cars painted yellow were resuming their southbound procession after holding at a light. i thought it couldn’t hurt. and that maybe it might even work.

so i said: sure.

and the weathered, earnest man smiled big and shook my hand.

he and his wife both said: god bless you.

i hadn’t even sneezed.

sightings.

Mon, 18 May 2009 01:43:43 GMT

i saw the back of him. flanked on each side by the backs of his roommates. as i left a cheese store.

i walked the other way. his hair is longer than what i think looks good. but it's not my hair to cut.

i saw him on a photo blog. i was clicking through pictures and suddenly, unexpectedly, he filled my screen.

i closed the computer and breathed to myself for a while.

i saw him walking towards me with his roommate. at a street fair near our seperate houses.

she saw me first. before him.

she whispered under her breath, alerted him of my proximity.

he said:

hey, how are you?

i said:

well.

and kept walking in the direction i was headed.

and i did not look back.

i couldn't. i'm sorry. i couldn't.

i had not meant to be rude.

but i just couldn't.

sleep with meeeeee pleeeeeease.

Sat, 18 Apr 2009 22:26:11 GMT

all of the angels.

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 17:46:21 GMT

i heard a story
of all of the angels
walking along in a
thin straight line

and the captain
implored them
not to fail
all alone
on a cold winter night

go
go
safe flight
goodnight

so the 375th went ahead
and the next ones to go
watched them leaving the ground

thommy was crying
jimmy was laughing
and johnny just couldn't help looking around
at them

go
go
safe flight
goodnight

the fight or the flight
the fight or the flight

romanticize and destroy.

Wed, 18 Mar 2009 20:36:56 GMT

sun has resumed streaming through my windows. there are trees with bits of bright bright green beginning to show. and the animals that live in these parts are running around everywhere, reacquainting themselves with each other and with the world sans cover of frozen water.

i am reassembling, i think. i no longer have a beard, or a boyfriend, and stiff new denim wraps my legs when i walk the avenues. i smoke cigarettes and feel dreadful about it. and cool. and embarrassed. people choke and cough when i walk by; either out of protest, or out of judgement, or because they have a lingering cold and aren't even thinking about my bad habits. god, if my mom knew... my dad figured it out when i was home. he locked me in the backyard. later i found an empty can of diet caffeine free with recently stubbed butts in it. i put mine in there too, dad.

down the stairs into cold, wet tunnels that only amplify the howls of public rail transport. shaking and jolting and starting and then stopping until i rise to my feet and walk off. up the stairs onto a famous island that people romanticize and destroy in cinema. they romanticize and destroy it in real life too, actually. i pass monuments and carts teeming with cheap food and countless strains of bacteria. through front doors into a little metal box on a chain that pulls me up several stories. in and out of rooms with the most advanced technology a tripod can support, i go.

i line up with men close to my age and physical appearance. some people i know, some people i don't. some people i want to know, some people i don't. the people in the rooms tell me to "slate", which means say your name out loud in the air so that the camera can hear. after that, i read words off of a card or words that i have memorized before arriving. then i walk back out into the hall and feel everyone size me up to figure out how it went in there. put the jacket on, take elevator down to the street and kiss it up to god.

when i am waking, or walking, melody and messages in bottles present themselves in my head and my mouth and lungs push them out. my fingers work out something to hang them on, and i sharpen them in my room. bounce them back and forth in the small space i have to myself and get them closer and closer to what they want to be. my friends say, go boy, go. do it because it's in you. and i say are you sure? are you really sure? and they say no, but you are. which is more than good enough.

the security guard in the courtyard makes noises with his personal electronic device. he's focused. maybe he's training for something big. i can hear him gaming well into the night, his slice of technology blipping and cooing out into the giant brick bowl that makes up my building. the bowl is lined with trees, some grass and some doors. one door leads to me. but before you come in, you must traverse a threshold with a cross broken four times, arms pointing to the right. it used to mean good luck. until someone ruined it for everyone.

the arrangemnet.

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 00:38:55 GMT

Hello,

Yes i just want to let you know that you are qualified to be our house cleaner for atleast a month.We just bought the house and i will like you to know you will be responsible for general cleaning of hallways (dusting, vacuuming and mopping), doors, windows, pick up trash in common areas, sweeping and snow removal at building entrances, and changing light bulbs etc. Must be able to climb a ladder and lift up to 25 lbs. Also you will be working for 2hrs in a day at the rate of $15 per hr,so you will be earning a total sum of $600 per month. In order for you to know we are very serious about this we will sending you a upfront payment for the first month via a bank official check issued by my financier and will be mail to you via UPS next day delivery. The house is a 4 Bedroom 2 bath Duplex unfurnished, so i have made an arrangement with a painter to paint the interior part of the house. so you will be working with the painter in cleaning of the house in general. My financier will include the cost all expenses in your check.

My financier will effect the payment as soon as i give him the instructions to do so..The payment you will be receiving will be for your one month pay in adavance and the rest will be for the painter coming to paint the house. The keys of the house is already with the painter and you will be duely informed on arrangements made to get inside the house by the painter when all arrangement are set. I believe that both of you can work together to make the house as clean as possible and also the painter will set up a date and time for your meeting. Get back to me with the information below if you are truly serious about the job, so that my financier will issue out the payment asap:

Full Name:
Address:
City:
State:
Zip Code:
Home Phone:
Cell Phone:
Possible Working Hrs:
Email:

Kindly let me know if the arrangemnet is okay with you and i believe you will be at your best in cleaning the house for me and my family.

Thanks

of emeralds.

Wed, 04 Mar 2009 06:12:08 GMT

down the stairs
down the staris
auntie em
storm is comin
houses goin
all the hens

you got a ticket
to a colorworld
of lions and men
made of metal
crush the petals
in between
your hands

for all the world to see
for all the world to see
this city is so green
this city is so green

son, someday.

Thu, 26 Feb 2009 06:37:13 GMT

he said son, someday
a woman'll come and
wash you away
into the ocean
and you'll fight back
with all the emotion
that you've saved

until that day
you're coiled and wound
and you're set in your ways
the rushing, the sound
of the sea and the waves

you'll lose yourself in the best way

it's black
below
and sometime so so long ago
there's a ship
that sailed
it's crumbling now
red rust on the nails

and the people sank
or floated away on a wooden plank
to start anew
which is just what you are about to do

he said son, someday
a woman'll come and
wash you away
into the ocean
and you'll fight back
with all the emotion
that you've saved

until that day
you're coiled and wound
and you're set in your ways
the rushing, the sound
of the sea and the waves

you'll lose yourself in the best way

trust me

trust me

My iPod touch

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 06:10:12 GMT

My iPod touch works perfectly,but my iPod touch had the same problem once,but what I did was unpluged the electric inlet out of my Linksys router and my cable/internet modem and the wifi connection to my iPod touch worked!

The ground beneath your feet is not new. It's been beneath millions of other people's feet. And they had problems too. You aren't alone in any sense.

i sometimes want everything all at once. a crashing wave of color and sound. like god's gentle finger pressing me into the soft ground.

green wood.

Sat, 07 Feb 2009 20:02:58 GMT

there's parrots in the cemetery spires
and you could walk for miles
bein on your own

with just company of your shoes
your treads, your tires
and the lives
of everyone down below

everyone calls me a hero.

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 01:42:59 GMT

what i told you was the truth
i put the head in a bag
i brought it back and that
is whatcha got in your lap

you shoulda seen
the dog that she had
with eight eyes
three heads
and fuckin mean and fat

i gotta family
that i gotta feed
now will ya pay me whatcha said
for gettin blood on my feet

i'm tired
and i wanna lay down
just let me rest a while
and i'll come around

you can stand pickin stones
for your crown
but i'm gonna sit and watch
the world go around

i gotta look at my kid
and tell him what i did
to get the shirt and the shoes
and all the books for his school

and in the town
where we settled down
everyone calls me a hero

i am tired
and i wanna lay down
just let me rest a while
and i'll come around

you got yer castle
and your crown
but i'd rather sit and watch
the world go round

i did what anyone else
woulda done
i just got stuck in this
specific situation

it's not my fault
i ain't have a choice
that my name got
written all over the walls

blood
stained
all over my clothes
and when
i've
got my eyes closed
all
i can see
are the ghosts

song for little bicycles.

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 19:53:07 GMT

everyone's got stories to tell
so stand in line and repeat all the words to yourself
while you've got time
remember to speak loudly when it is your turn
you'll only get so many chances in this world

and as long as what you say is true
light will find you
be happy that you get to do
things like breathe and read and cry your silly eyes out

no one's gonna blame you if you have to go ahead and
shout shout shout shout

and over and over again, you'll hurt yourself so bad
and keep all the birthday cards that you got from your mom and your dad
and dreaming will help you get by
make you what you want

but it's harder than you'll
believe
believe

invisible electricity
is all that makes us
pick and talk and tick
and meet for tea

and when the sun sets inside
inside inside of me

all the leaves
release the grip
that keeps'em on
the tree

getting groped on national television.

Tue, 27 Nov 2007 01:54:23 GMT

you know that t-mobile commercial where the guy gets frisked by the dad that's an ex-cop? yeah, that's me getting groped. by art carney's son, actually.

if you want to see what it looked like when i was shooting it, go here.

weird, huh?

baller, shot caller.

Wed, 25 Jul 2007 09:07:09 GMT

“Yes, I’m surprised,” he said, “but I think no more surprised than the head of the F.B.I., the head of the C.IA., that rogue employees turn on their country in criminal activity despite the best investigative procedures you can possibly imagine.”

Wed, 25 Jul 2007 08:23:50 GMT

the only thing.

that is a result of sex.

that you can't get a test for.

is love.

XO
EN

until you know when.

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 22:06:09 GMT

a fictional old wise man said to me once:

"listen. all you got it this life. right? it's all you got. and whoever gave it to you, god or jehovah or bozo the clown or whatever - whoever's responsible for the spark that got you here in the first place - they gave it to you on one condition. on the condition that you keep going. that's all! all you got to do to keep this... this amazing thing that can't ever be replaced ever, is to just keep going. keep. going. but what you gotta know is that as soon as you give up and stop going, it's gonna get taken away from you. just like that. so no matter what, you gotta keep going. no matter how bad it gets, you still got yourself coz you kept going. and you go and you go and you go. until you know when it's the right time to stop. until you get to the end.

"that's pretty easy, right?"

i'm here.

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 03:44:35 GMT

i don't know if anyone even reads this anymore. i know i don't.

but:

i can hear people practicing drums for the chinese new year. somewhere in my neighborhood.

because:

i moved to new york city. so that i could try and do more acting. and because of a young man.

who:

looks good in green.

anyways:

the drums i heard reminded me that every year's got an animal attached to it.

and so:

i looked up what year i was born in. and i was born in the year of the monkey.

monkey-yeared people:

"are charming, cheeky and clever."

but i desperately miss:

san francisco, my dog, my parents, my sister, my friends, my bed, my california blue sky.

and i need to keep remembering:

that this will be worth it.

mark:

i'm sorry.

bugs:

i can't wait to see you again.

sadie:

you beautiful, strong woman. i will see you soon.

d. lynne and j. frank:

i see more and more of you in myself everyday.

d. ray:

i see more and more of you in myself everyday.

everyone:

i love you. and i've probably thought about you a billion times.

I A N

thought left and right.

Wed, 02 Aug 2006 14:47:25 GMT

I don’t want to leave these flowers here

I want to take them with me

He’s on the roof
He's on the roof

In a room with yellow walls
Framed in the window above the bed
The sun rose on a terrible clean slate
And turned all the walls red

We had to crawl to breathe
And the dust from the carpet
Snaked through our lungs

At the top of the arc of a swing
in a park at mid-day
The corner of my eye betrayed me
And knelt my mother to pray

And I wondered why now at noon
Would she kneel so slow
And my little mind thought left and right
And I let my hands go

Slow crawl now
We crawl slow now
Don’t cut your hands now, no
Slow crawl go

Now in our living room packed with everyone
it seems
My collared shirt dug in my neck
and left a mark on me

and in the years to come I will find that
I’ll breathe this all out
But there I remained the child

happy right now.

Sat, 15 Jul 2006 18:43:20 GMT

one time when i was a teenager, i was sitting in the living room, doing something. i could have been organizing comic books, or doing a cross-word puzzle. i could have been reading, or drawing. i don't remember.

but my dad walked by. on his way to doing something. organizing tools, or fixing a plumbing problem. he could have been gardening, or working on a car. i don't remember.

but he stopped just outside of the archway that led into the dining room and looked at me, smiling. and i sensed this, him stopping and looking at me, and i looked up and said, "what?".

and he said, "are you happy?". he was still smiling.

and i said, "why?".

and he said, "you just look happy right now."

and i said, "yeah, i guess i am."

and he smiled and looked at me for a little longer and then walked away, happy too. and i went back to what i was doing, intensely aware of how happy i was.

the sun part of it.

Sun, 06 Nov 2005 06:35:36 GMT

from the other room, i can hear her laughing on the phone. she is leaving her friend, her soon to be roommate, a message. i am moving through all the doors of this empty apartment i am helping her scout. the real estate place gave her a key in exchange for her credit card and we are here by ourselves.

the doors have old knobs and the wood is finished with a thick yellowy stain that is no longer attractive. the carpet is relatively new and well cleaned, but even with a very good paint job, you can still tell that someone who lived here, at one point, smoked a great deal of cigarettes.

i go back and look again at things i already looked at, expecting to see something that i did not before. when we came in, i went from room to room and looked quickly at everything. making sure there was no one to meet, i guess. or maybe just to get there first. to see everything first, so that if she asked me questions, i could answer them. she might ask me where the bathroom is and i could say: over there - the tile is pink and the toilet is pretty clean. there is also a skylight. what else do you want to know? because i can tell you. i got here first.

in the kitchen, there is a brown stove and oven and a brown dishwasher. i say to her, she is still in the other room - there's a dishwasher, which is kind of fancy, don't you think?

she yells back to me that that means she won't have to pay anyone. i laugh because the thought had never crossed my mind. paying someone who is most likely older than us to come all the way up the cavernous hall stairs and wash dishes in a crappy apartment with doors that are too yellow to look like real pine.

i check in the cupboards this time, which i didn't do the first time, just to make sure i know what they look like inside and how spacious they are. i run the water in the sink too. good water pressure. learned that in our sex ed class senior year in high school. they taught us about condoms and checking water pressure when you look at an apartment.

i turn back to the big bedroom that has windows on two walls and see her curled like a cat on the floor in a big pool of sunlight. she is smiling and stretching her arms out. i can see her belly button above her jeans.

i ask her what she thinks of it, and she sits up, looking at the carpet and the walls, regarding things and trying to form an opinion to hand me.

after a moment, she looks up at me and says: "i like the sun part of it." i smile and she sees that it is a weak one.

she asks me if i am ok. she is asking about my break up. or my break. or whatever it is my boyfriend and i decided to do on the phone the night before. i look at the carpet and the walls and sigh. she is alright with the fact that i don't answer her.

she points to the pool of light from the window on the opposite wall. i walk over to it and sit in the middle. my legs don't fit in the light, they are cut off mid-thigh, dark with shadow. i consider being an amputee or about the sun evaporating everything it doesn't hit. i lean back on my arms and thing about how hard and heavy my chest feels.

there is no sound other than the traffic outside on dolores. car engines working harder to get up the hills. it's quiet here, i say, that's a nice thing.

she looks at me with narrowed and sensitive eyes. sympathy is spilling from her, and she can't help it. i look out the window at the upward slope of noe valley. trees competing recklessly with church spires are trumped by cottages set further up the hill. i may be modest and boxy, they say to the churches and trees, but i am higher, and i will remain a home even when you are exposed as fallacy and lie and are forsaken, and when you are felled and your skin and limbs are torn from you to make paper.

she sighs, and looks over her shoulder at the kitchen. standing, she brushes lint that i cannot see from her shirt. she checks her phone and puts it in her purse. i can see her make the decision to force herself to look at the rest of the apartment. i can hear her walk through the space, opening and closing doors.

her sneakers pad along the carpet and i watch dust float through sunlight like the way i imagine plankton float through saltwater. her shoes squeak on the linoleum of the kitchen floor and the pipes in the wall shudder as she turns on the kitchen sink.

"good water pressure," she tells me, wiping her hands on her jeans.

looking down the barrel.

Tue, 16 Aug 2005 22:10:06 GMT

hey, remember this?

and after i shot it i posted this?

well, they changed the name, and i guess pretty soon when you go to see movies, you'll see this.

oh how it's coming down in this city. the rain.

Thu, 19 May 2005 06:04:05 GMT

at 5:36PM on friday the 13th of may 2005, i became the last living male mcgregor in my family.

an aneurysm burst in my grandfather's chest and that was it. as they say.

god.

kiss the people you know, ok? and look them in the eye. make sure they know.

make sure.

being a little bicycle.

Sat, 23 Apr 2005 07:29:44 GMT

you are sitting at a cafe with a cold used to be warm cup of something in your hands. you are watching the rain come down outside and how it sometimes hits the window and how it sometimes hits the benches instead. you see how gray the skies are for this time of day and draw cliched comparisons to your own feelings.

you notice the bicycles on their racks and how the wind is blowing them back and forth, making their chains taut and slack. taut and slack. they move with such a weight, you think, for little bikes in the rain.

you curl up your toes in your shoes and think of the time that you and your sister and your mother put big thick blankets all over the floor in the living room and lay down on them and were comforted by the rain outside and the soft thickness beneath you, one that smelled like sleep. and you did sleep. you played records and slept.

you think of that poor boy and his face when you tried to explain burning in your chest. you felt like burning and couldn't do it any justice. sand was falling out everytime you opened your mouth. and he started to cry because he was innocent. and you thought you were too. he kept turning away and you could only see his tears because they were reflecting street lights. you felt heavy for just being a little bicycle.

you think of the time you were riding to school in the morning and a small indian girl stepped in front of your tire and you hurt her heel. and she looked back at you, unable to tell you in any language you could understand, how much you had hurt her. she held her books to her undeveloped chest and turned beautiful, dark, thick eyebrows into a horrible expression that you tried to shake all day. you, suddenly, in this cafe, are overwhelmed by the foolish desires of finding her and grasping her small shoulders squarely, and telling her in a language that she can understand how sorry you are, how sorry you were. and she would be released from that face. and you would have destroyed it in you too.

you feel the rain dissipating outside and the wind losing its nuance with leaves. people slow their running.

you think of laying on an awful pull-out bed in a london hotel room. you are watching a documentary program about a very young man who had recently been paralyzed in a car accident. he had decided it was time to move out of his parent's house and be on his own. he had saved. you watched as he and his father visited apartments for let. the father was pointing out certain things to his son and you could see how proud the father was. how he was moved. and you were moved too, almost to tears. and you turned to your best friend who was on the pull-out bed with you and saw that he was moved he was. you remember telling this story to your own father and being caught off guard by the welling of your eyes. and being more caught off guard by the welling of your father's eyes.

your hands are clammy and they grip the cup. you think of the violent old cartoon of the windmill in the rain storm and understand it more as you look back out of the window. they only made that for themselves, you think. kids never liked that one. you never liked that one, until now anyways. those poor baby birds that everyone was so worried about getting crushed as the wheels met the cogs. and then suddenly the wood is missing right there so the nest is fine.

your eyes take you to a sweet-looking girl across the cafe looking out the other window just like you. and you want to stand and sit with her. you have no desire to talk, really, just to stare out the window and share the view. maybe, you think, you'll learn something. you think maybe she'll eventually leave and tuck her hair behind an ear that is pierced in two places.

and as she leaves, her path will take her right past the window you were sitting at before you moved to sit with her. you think how you would probably make eye contact with her if you'd still been sitting there. you toy with the idea of reading something scribbled on her napkin and it reads cryptic: so i tore down my house and put up a tree.

and you struggle with wanting to stand and walk to sit with her. and while you're battling with your manners and your urges, she rises without your notice. and she clears her cup and saucer and wraps her scarf and buttons her jacket. and she pushes out the door and turns left.

and you are still deciding whether or not to sit with her, when she passes by your window. and you look at her, thinking how familiar she looks. and it's only when she pushes her hair behind her ear do you realize that it's her. and that she doesn't have pierced ears at all. then she's gone for good.

you sit back in your chair, realizing how tired you are.

not by me, but by my own true love...

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 02:42:55 GMT

In Miami, there is the feeling that one wants to be rescued from something - a delicious and insufferable desperation. Ice Baby thumping from a 5.0. There is an ache from the luster of so many pastel hotels and apartments. Lizards wander, stray kittens die on the doorstep. Girls are frequently wearing less than bikinis. Breakfast nooks are overtaken with palm trees, flamingos. Our hosts offer directions to beaches, malls, giant fiberglass sharks. In the morning sun we wander into the Vespa dealership, the Armani Exchange, and strike the kind of hollow, vacant lust that crops up -- the kind that causes you to question how you got by on so little, how we haven't been wearing Fendi sunglasses the whole time. In this vaseline haze of sun we're suddenly paler, more prudish, and decidedly 'tight'. We've arrived in the midst of something. Planes have started crashing into things, and people in Florida [and elsewhere, as you remember] have started keeling over from piles of powder, so there is a kind of abstract dread. There are no vacationers in town. We are the only of your kind. We see a cosmetics convention near the University: a woman with a fibre optic camera shows the scalp of a hapless convention attendee - projected huge on a widescreen television. It is a very clean, organized scalp.

Holding a point and shoot camera up to our ears, we mimic the Floridians who hold cell phones, convinced we are hilarious. We are not as well connected. There is a whole world of tunics down there, a world of tunics that we don't know about. Yet. But we are learning. There are beaches down there. Empty beaches. Wandering through beach grass, we get the sense of a blunt dagger hanging just above our blond-ified heads while stumbling upon acts of public sex.

Not so far from one of these empty beaches is a friends house, one he's inherited or taken charge of under cloudy circumstances - from his parents. Some while back, we are told, a particularly nasty hurricane [!!] totaled the house. Yet it stands. And on one of the more valuable properties in Miami. Neighbours might say 'eyesore', but would more than likely be predisposed to speak stonger words, as it has sat in disrepair for years now. Now ferets rule. And lizards. We ask for a tour because it sounds like a new theme park to us. Upon arrival in our 1998 rental vehicle the place looks too good. Our tour guide, the owner, shows us through the front gate into an overgrown front plaza. Animal droppings pepper the sidewalk, the steps to the front mezanine - like bread crumbs. The inside is a gutted, sopped-up palace, with a sort of elegance that no one in the area would appreciate. "No running water" might be mentioned. Dis-preserved paintings hang blissfully far from their frames - which seem to have been piled into a corner. The most lurid beauty, though, is the nearly drained swimming pool out back, now slick with iron and mould colored water. Things crawl out of it, wish us well.

Edging close to the bay behind the property, I avoid rotted out concrete and wood patch jobs, ambling across a ramshackle dock to the chattering of dolphins [real dolphins!] that are doing what only dolphins know how to do: frolicking. Clicking-on like tickertape, the dolphins predict stock crashes. Just across the water is a private island of condos. Next to us is a mansion with outdoor patio fans and what look like sterling silver lawn-bowling balls. The residents eye us coldly with the kind of scrutiny usually exacted on unsightly toes. Sitting here, it comes to me that we could tip ourselves into the bay and float off, past dazzled speedboats, past prattling Golden Girls in Prada Sport - to something else, somewhere we might die together.

But swimming submarine style in our near abandoned hotel, something feels glowing - like life is working, working hard at making the things that we want to happen happen. Tourist-free airplanes coast above our outstretched floating chests. We don't question it.