I Don't Want To Be Loved For Who I Am, I Want To Be Loved For What I Can Do For You

First poem of the new year

I’m working on a new piece of critical writing, in the meantime I finished off a poem today. It felt right on the screen. It’s about this feeling I have, the title explains it. It’s a bit of a departure or maybe a return to some earlier works. I think of Buy Your House and Burn It Down being as direct in the needs of the poem. Several months of early mornings, exhibitions, conflicts are here along with a loneliness, grief, and reflection on the political climate. I prefer to talk about these works in conversation instead of writing about them, there’s a density that is easier to sus out with another mind. It’s a difficult time right now, my poems generally honor that.

I Don't Want To Be Loved For Who I Am I Want To Be Loved Because Of What I Can Do For You

Ideally your breathing suits your heartbeat so your eyes don't move, the foulability of dogs, the spirit through doors, the court seated, in those old world ways, less sacrifice, to the hand unseen, trying to outrun time any number of ways, thinking, it is never so deep, and the eye is easily fooled, a moment missing, that is worth repeating

I have enough people, family, life long friends, and such that, I'm not changing so much that they won't love me, I'm not becoming a different person in that way, what I'm moving towards is amplifying my gifts and sharing them, so I want someone that wants to engage with that, that I bring out something in because of what I do, it's semantics

Ground life into a thin powder, with the grains of salt, a depression, made into a large life, ground down, dullard, thinking fool, this ish is above you, a floor to ceiling, or wall to wall, wind, does the dressing, become set, and scene, called, aching, singing, I don't love you anymore, love is just a chore, someone to adore, reeling, beating the hell out of myself.

A rhetorical wall of flesh met with a flesh colored wall, the stall between phrases, betwixt paws, the play of claws, the pay of all the work I've done just to become monied, like a wheel of cheese, differentiating myself from the moon, satirical, as from enough distance, we smell the same, big enough to find my place in the sky

Future perfect, tense, ambition down the spine, i am here with you, divining from a dream, a reality, being, the driven mind, a crush, between worlds, divide, or on the verge of, homeboy saying that thing about shame and the steps, paces, significantly, like everyone is in front of another, in the way of a partition, the nation of beasts in submission, set loose

As the empire grew, beneath the feet, became rooted in, the dirt, of all things, the form of all things, shaped, little bits of me for a vessel, the ship of fools, or something else, they would call a drunk, breathing heavy, saying how much easier it will be, without me around, the calm center, panning value, toned, in repose, like some kind of Buddha

More potent than fire, the blood, cutting, wind, of the universe, of the ether, of all that wisdom, enacted, when we speak of ascension, the cyborg of the future, listening to trap music on the rings of some distant planet, not some lute, or another thing peasants played before white supremacy was, ill defined, diamond mined, valor.

Crying love, the words of a song not yet sung, to be again what we'd become, in err, the matters suggested, as fortune, listening to a voice, spoken about in perpetuity, sweet and mindful, a gap between the sentiments, leaving sentimentality for better things, a soul, the what is, or I don't know, or I don't care, a breath tired, rolling off the tongue.

Pieces of this were written under full moon, near the end of my mother's life i sat by her bedside daily, the way, I listen, condensed, the sounds of death, to mechanics, in a hospital, white noise, that sleep must be a kind place, and dreams somewhere fearless, how love is distilled to fractions of an existence, the whole of life an unknown consciousness enlightened

So I lay awake in a dark room, between my ears the ring of a television, mute electricity, humming, it's been so long, unresolved, gentle drum, persistently strung, plucking heartstrings, the instrument, a voice, I no longer hear, feel, sense, as I close my eyes, another on record, decaying, as commitments turn to ash, and ethereal movements in the mind

Trying to get through, doing the thing that I'm supposed to do to completion, the reach of vast commerce, hand like spades, trying to make a trump out of a heart turned round, this town is like a hundred others, the brotherly call for reconciliation when faced with an uppity bitch, a bandana over the face, baseball bat by the side, rifle prominently displayed, projecting will to the distance

Defending a constructed humanity as if we stood upright, carried tools, and stopped killing one another, to build a better world, like ants in a flood, finding common ground, or bees in a swarm, looking for a new home, or piranha in school, learning something about taste at the expense of those closest to you, lamentations look like laughter, living love with teeth bared and stomachs full

When the Black Pope died, I remembering who my friends were, especially when they became enemies, warming hands, the rub, a temper, passing fight, passing flight minding high brow assertions, that the best of me is yet, the worst, a butcher of live animals, the killer of mice, or birds, or deer, or men, if the time is right, hungry enough, to call cannibals to dinner, for a feast

I eat you, out of respect, this admission, a neglected silence, thinking of the words, to summon, through things already consumed, you pray, maybe, and I believe, post Christ, holy days, taking off, plague, on sight, healing, the week, service, work, strung together, a wave, cold air from the poles, letting the spectacle converge, to a miracle, streaming from an ass

How we all look the same, at one point or another, the action, facsimiles, speckled, carrying too much, load bearing, with fault, reaching into pockets, like a thief not a thief, something more, steeling a space between, what we have, make that tangible fungible, instance aggregation, hearing him talk you'd think it was the end of the world, but that's been said before

A test to make me the bad guy failing, and the following came, and to my defense, i am not the bad guy, and will put my hand in your mouth, make you a puppet, used the wrong way, to show you what is inside, of you and me, so when I die you can say you knew it all along, the real dope, saying I'd love to hear more about your lord and savior, Jesus Christ, weeping, with a giggle, the room trembling

Dem eager to make their mark, dem wanting to prove a truth, dem focused on being right, dem preaching a hollow proof, all the little fingers, poking pies, trying to find the hole, a dark spot, or make one, en la mode de fascists, la plaisir de pain, bread and circus, trying to get high as i can go, not seeing me, the race, a poster for a wall in a post office, less person than sign

The fleeting wreck lurching, as a way to disperse negative energy, not erase it, build condominiums, like ballast stones dropping in abandon, standing, a stride, to remain unmoved, the maelstrom, an errand, the kingdom possum, they move beneath a fool, in bureaucratic malice, of vendetta, and petty crimes, performing against a humanity, for birthrights, and profit

Slack rope, a bow, to confuse the word, as it wraps around your throat, apostate to something else, something else to the world, staggering, a heard of the other thing, digressing, i return through voice to  the cherished, a closer sound, moving, hum, whistle, while in conversation, nodding, intent, marked higher on the wall, then reaching, a grasped, or gasp, of fresh air

Cutting quarter hours from the fabric of time, constance, and prudence, the first thing you feel, is a small smile, is a scratch in your throat, is the course of blood, is a sign of things coming, sooner than you expected, expecting never, nerves and impotence, holding a hand, letting go, a flight, all lasts, all lasts, at last, coming along

A five year plan ending in suicide, the yoke always on you, a past time, the response to a question, a series of questions about life's worth, and luck, and some other thing, thats coming along, minding its own business, with a little push, of kindness, remembering I am not a kind man, a banner for trade, subordinate to none, you see it and run.