the center of the maze is patient.

@wall_gazer

the first two darts tore thru my shirt and snagged my flesh. i bled fish oil. on my left arm i found a hand that could still move. i made it rip out the things, the electric prongs of the taser. it felt like it looked cool. the police, they loved it for the rare and beautiful thing it was. granting them fatal force. ) the next four darts didn’t hurt at all. i was laid out flat with their shiny discount boots. behind us, a suv running a red light smashed into a construction sign and continued our way. it swiped a cruiser door clear off spotlighting out the officer last to arrive. still going. the suv fish tailed right into the one cop who had laughed with me. he was thrown into a back flip high enough to graze the lamppost. when all their attention turned to him the idea of escape arrived. adrenaline snaked through me. i slipped my cuffed hands from behind my back under my legs until i could push myself off the curb and bolt. eyes everywhere. also something to do with awe. a little black boy wearing an oversized fitted squealed and pointed. the white jeans i was wearing were now a creamy pink. i peeled them off my red leg bones. after avoiding security guards and crosswalk cops i found a freshly shifted town car. 

and when my chauffeur refused
to role another wheel further,
i exited
to the thrifts of chinatown.
happily
throwing dollars
towards a 3-pack of plaid boxers
that were my only
defense against
the patrolmen.





It was done.
my friend
the transit cop who had targeted me was most
likely neck-deep in
paperwork.


I had bet my
pretty
heart against his.
and through his
sniper’s
scope,
he saw no silhouette just a small gray cloud.


our consummation
was
sloppy
and good.


he had my blood and body
and i, his job.


nothing of us
could be
undone now.
not the oval of black rubber
not the look forced out his eyes as i escaped.
and not the kind pieces that remind. 

the lights were proven false tonight.
the sang to an
empty tree.
And at last the soot sky was beneath me.

when i reach
for water,
something else
makes its way
into my system.

it enters
through an ear
or an eye.

i pay it
no attention
though it is cold,
very cold.

also, it is alive,
I can feel
its tiny heart
vibrating
under my skin.

later
when i look
for it,
there is only
a dead stillness.

I figure either
it is hiding
or it is deaf.
maybe both.

I don’t know
when it started,
but I have begun
fighting a terrible war
for this unknowable thing.
this creature inside.

i balled up
my hopes and dreams
and set them down
on a crack
in the concrete
by the neighborhood hoop.

all my love,
all my ambition,
the entire future
i envisioned for myself…
gone. given up
for my secret friend.

sometimes, I imagine him
with a clipped flower
in his chest pocket
and a song
stuck in his head.

how does it hurt.

can you tell me.

has it built a lopsided home in your head.

is there a string of thorns attached
to each thought.

like a ball of spirals tangled in your back pocket.

is it an old hardened feather that fell from your one wing.

is it in your throat.
or your gut.

is it small.

is it small enough that it eats you whole.

is it good and stuck.

did you think it was some kind of seed.

did you let it rot waiting for it to flower.

have you tried to cut it out. ignore it.

does it point at you with its prosthetic finger.

a child wearing a striped shirt with a lollipop stain.

he’s making unfunny faces.

he’s spotted your hidden defect.

your red freckle.

your second row of teeth.

he isn’t put off by your phony smile.

he doesn’t know how it hurts.

i am not him yet.

tell me.

does it turn you into a stranger.

do you feel like you’re sifting though a landfill for a way out.

does it frighten you that you may never find the one who can remove it.

does it drive you ill that we cannot heal it on our own.

do you secretly admire
how it doesn’t care that it doesn’t belong.

have you realized yet that it does belong.

how it is perfect.

how it is the only thing that is right.

i look to the creepy kid
who talks

to walls
for advice.

when the caretakers
uncover his mouth,

a bat-like
shriek comes out.

it was the only
sensible thing

to say.

i wait for you
with my legs up,
like dead flies.

the room is teeming
with strange-made
mischief.

a ball bounces improperly,
against a hole.

a love song
about a coupled cage.

focus your ears.

my face
is unseeable.

my heart
beats a hollow knock.

the black crow eyes
in my head.

the rasp of dead leaves
in the corner.

there’s a boy
who’s been given
the wrong dose.

his eyes
are watering
with forgotten faith.

twice in the same hour,
i saw a voice
the way you see
a vague lapse of color
after staring
at the sun.

the voice came from
behind the radiator
and tore into
the kitchen.

i looked at myself
in the faucet handle
for the last time,
again.

my shadow was split into
three low-watt light bulbs
hanging overhead.

then, as i spoke,
i heard the voice -

your soul is too big.

it is big enough
to be made into bait
to lure the bloodless things
into existence.

my thoughts huddled
in front of their narrowed windows.

then the knives
whispered their points to me.

you only have
your entire life
to figure this out.

some days aren’t
anything like the others.

a small gray mouse
stirring in a glue-trap
gnaws off its last leg.

the steel sponge scrapes the color
from the dinner plates.

the sounds of tiny teeth,
working.

i lick the batter i’ve been
mixing mindlessly.

i add what i will leave out,
one wing from all who left.

what cannot be forgotten,
is put in a frame to be neglected.

we make hate that way,
at home.

in the three-corner room,
i color outside the lines
of myself.

arms, folded.

my black doesn’t compare
to yours -
other painters.

theirs has hints of sun.
mud.

mine is not sweet.

a little boy
hits the wrong key
on his toy piano
and everyone
just dies.

before i go to sleep my thoughts exit the room. they vanish down a hallway like a fast moving storm system. it has been a while since i have been left alone. i do strange things by myself. i look for you. i look for new beginnings. i look for pieces of me i have lost. i can see myself now. i have been destroyed. i am in little piles spread across the floor. the walls press close and put me together. a feeling i don’t know is there. it’s skin is translucent and i can see a mass of needles buried in its belly. it has been waiting for me in the heat with the lights off. i invite it inside me. soon i open a window and shout at the night sky. a scared couple hurries past. the trees have gathered to listen to me. i pick up a candle and tell myself to wake up. i am not dreaming because my hands do not shake. the feeling has a purpose. it lets me feel how my heart is wired all wrong. it brakes me open and throws me to floor. it leaves me as i am, as i was.  it shows me a future i will not move into.