skonen_blades

My back is a forest fire of blown-out birthday candle wishes
I fly a flag of smoke signals behind me up into the sky
The charcoal ghost of a lighthouse
The absent student in my chest
Becoming a mirror that mattresses use for instagram
The orchard in my ribs accordions shut
And wheezes wide like the mouth of a monster
The one-two applause of my heart
Constantly losing its slippery, spasming grip on my blood
The sound of one hand slow clapping
These shotgun shells I use for eyes need watering
To dampen the gunpowder
The world clatters past and around me
A circus of shopping carts and lost pet posters
A new forgiveness needed every day
The spare key is no longer under the doormat
Or the flower pot
And I feel like I’ve become an avid collector of targets
Hoarding them shoplifter under my coat
I feel the sunlight of hope searing my skin with a hiss
The slow roll of my gift-wrapped brain
As it tries to snakeskin out of it
I improvise a few smiles
I try on a few more degrees of glee
It’s not a mess in here on purpose
I’m just trying to throw off the scent
Distracting the hunt too successfully
Like wearing camouflage
When no one’s even looking at you
Saving up for invisibility
When it was given to you years ago for free
I live in a greeting card
Where saving up for a rainy day is impossible
Because it’s raining all the time
Every finish line has ‘jk’ written on the other side
Don’t get me wrong
It’s bearable
It’s beautiful
It definitely has its moments
And I love being here
But patience is too flammable
Fear is too common
Facts are too malleable
And the forest is way too smoky
For anything other than glimpses
Of peace



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It’s the underappreciated forest storm.
The sword of sassy underpants prancing down the runway
Sprinting down the landing strip
Shaving the pubis mons, the Olympus Mons
On Mars the god of War
For shits and giggles
And veggie trays with fresh dip
And a kid’s birthday stuck in amber
Because we are nothing if not brief
And brevity, being the soul of wit
Means our briefness IS our soul
We live because we will die
We value life because we are finite
And we all know death is coming
It’s not a merry go round or a staircase
There was nothing behind us, below us
There is nothing in front of us, above us
This is the show that makes people insane
The stakes are so unbelievably high that we need to escape
Sometimes daily
Sometimes permanently
Because the truth is that it’s always raining
It’s just that sometimes we forget
And that’s what happiness is
Merely the forgetting of reality
I hope I’ve got it backwards and that it’s the other way around
That happiness and light are the default
And that the sadness is the aberration
But I guess that’s the tin and tang of it
The big and bang of it
The fin and fang of it
The sing and sang of it
The swirl down the drain is a whirlwind
Trailer-parking us all into the sky
And I can’t chocolate cake us out of this fridge
Just know that armour slows you down
Tanks can’t move fast
Dump all your stats into agility
Because even if turtles win races
What kind of life is that?



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I pulled a horse out of my mouth yesterday.
It was bright red and sad.
A sorrowful beast so full of heaviness and rain that it had turned candy apple muscle.
It looked skinned.
Or painted by a child.
The process was like a birth
I unhinged my suddenly snake jaws to make it happen.
It cries in my kitchen now
Whinnying with such passionate, chugging sobs
Snot dripping freely from its muzzle
More sadness than horse
Listening to the rain outside
Communing with a depth of emotion I can’t fathom
For if I go too deep into that ocean I lose my way
in the darkness and the pressure
Not knowing which way is up
or home
I’ve been blind for years
As this pregnancy grew
This blockage in my throat
This red buck of paralyzing depression
Feeling a magnetic pull to beds
and not talking
I pet the horses damp mane but
An oar of happiness in an ocean of weeping doesn’t make a difference
I don’t know what to do about the horse
And my family will be home soon



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Lightning wouldn’t kill us if we were better conduits.
That’s what it’s like with some ideas. They burn us to the ground when we can’t handle their brilliance. Or an insight that drives us mad. A top-down moment where our lives are laid out like easy-to-read maps and it’s so obvious and so sad that it breaks us.
Like knowing exactly what humanity needs to stop eating itself and destroying the earth but not knowing how to accomplish it.
Imagination can think us around corners and through the eyes of needles. Imagination can help us see through walls.
But it’s also the curse that binds us.
It is a weight we can’t swim above. It’s our ability to think that ironically keeps us from true, lasting enlightenment.
We are contradiction engines and it’s misery that fuels our flights into the future.
Happiness can guide us but it’s what we can stand that sets the rules. Where we want to go isn’t as concrete as what we won’t do to get there. And you might surprise yourself.
I’m no prophet but I’d say dark times are ahead.
Also good times but those dark times are going to suck.
Stay strong and remember that lightning needs a conductor. Listen to the orchestra and once in a while, try to dictate the tune.


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