Practice Makes Perfect

She said she wanted to sew
like the clothes she can buy in a store.
I said, "Sure, I can help you.
Get in my basement. I'll cut
you a break. We can pretend
you are a slave child
and I'm the master. I'll cut
off any idle hand and you'll learn
to love the pavement.

God, the original G (Mashup of 3 Seth Rasmussen Originals)

I took no pleasure to egg a blind hermaphrodite to death last Spring;
dissect it with one cut, but there it stands, budding,
typically -just scratchin balls.

I feel what he feels. Between us, a cold veil of air,
but I had to believe in lingering warmth.
Where I’m going, it’s easy.

“Have I been lost inside a dream?”
I asked, knowing I was out of line,
which is almost true.

and though I hate to bear the cold-
shaped halo of rot,
the apple becomes the worm.

If you want to know
I’m all allegory and he is almost real.
Stuck in a slice of film,

the poor solitary segment thinks he’s me.
The film becomes the apple.
I am the worm.

Application For A Beard Permit

I am not a man of a mountain, but a mountain of a man
and my beaming, chiseled chin must be concealed,
lest it singe the very eyebrows of God.

Every day from dawn till noon I shave, dulling
twenty razor blades as my pike-like stubble
can never be contained by mortal instruments.

By five o'clock my shadow is a beard and my beard
is two beards intertwined in a thicket of testosterone-fueled glory
requiring new words like "beardsplendant" and "other-beardly"

But, O, if my fertile stumps, my stunted seedlings,
my clear cut swatch of prickling hairs were allowed to grow unhindered,
you would most definitely agree with my doctor's testimony,

"Upon examination of this young man's chin, I was transported,
to a bushy wonderland so splendorous one must muster
every ounce of human strength to not gouge out their eyes in its magnificence.

Wind swept through each majestic follicle like a poem,
their melodious rustlings whispering secrets of the ages,
their scent: an odoriferous bouquet of masculinity.

I would gladly quit my profession to backpack around this wondrous face
mane, acquiring sustenance from morning dew and the odd cracker crumb,
keeping a journal to record its downy splendor, but that would not do.

My own measly life, squandered in dedication to this outgrowth
of perfection would be but a droplet in the infinite hollow basin of tribute
it deserves. So I beg of you, let this beard grow."

"Pop" Like A Party Balloon

In an awkward conversation
about politics or something
a murmur of agreement
runs through the crowd
as if to say, "yes,
this is the best party ever."
Face-first in a vodka tonic
I try to do the wave.

Already fidgeting,
my anxious bile wants to go
to another room, chewing
at a mucous membrane:
ceiling, floor, and four walls
continuously regenerating
though a dull ulcerous ache
penetrates my stomach.

I'll feel better over my dead body,
but more like when and within;
the drapes, carpet, paint
will be singed, licked clean
by my corrosive dread, then,
when my excuses, sticky at best,
are eaten and there's nothing left,
microscopic bodies begin to exhale

carbon dioxide: bi-product of my body's
desire to finally get to the meat.
My cavity inflates, creating pockets
around my lungs; my last, last breath
is dust, unsettling a cocoon of the same.
The pressure builds; my physical form
cannot hold what death has in store
so it blows open:

a) hole, no larger than a dime,
being raised from a well,
unzipping a body bag,
birth's first slit-shaped light
comes shining through. I am finally
free, the world is permeable;
I make my way not knowing which way
is up, which is down, which to go.

b)lood and gore line the inside
of my coffin; life begins as it does
for symbiotic organisms without
a regular host: uncomfortable,
riddled with obvious question.
There is plenty to eat for now,
plenty of bacteria to squirm over;
you could even call it a party.

The Highest Rung on the Ladder (I May Fly In The Next Life)

To die

over and over;

no time for error;

a moment to find

a same-species lover.

Alight on the water

among the gray cloud;

deposit your savior;

repeat forever.

On The Coast

Bits of kelp,
baked by the sun,
cling to rocks,
their long arms stretched
across the beach
like chalk
on a blackboard.