ORANGE SWEATSHIRT
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I’ve got an orange sweatshirt; I found it on the sidewalk
I wear it to the hospital every time I go
I missed your party ‘cause I had to inject myself
put the on back in hormones
Rachel’s on the cruise ship, faking smiles for rich folks
Mikey is home and he won’t mow the lawn
I was in the bathroom for three hours today
It’s a job I can’t walk out on
I feel like the moon is wiping its face on me
And fruits replace my organs, one by one
One day I’m gonna spit up a kind of cherry with no pits
and the next day I will shit out tiny suns.
I’ve got an orange sweatshirt; I wear it to the hospital
I joke with the man who does my MRI
here’s the good news: I’m no longer dying
but it’s a lot of work to be alive
Some nights I pretend that my insomnia’s a bear
and if I lie still then it will wander away
Some nights anyways it patiently waits by my window
and it holds up a sour grass bouquet.
DROPS
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The light was tawny; I drank a sweet beer
The possible dripped from the ceiling
We wore jean jackets and sneakers
I like to make jars out of my feelings
to finally get the nun’s attention
It’s not the skin, it’s the revealing
Dip in your fingers to break the tension
Make up a pattern, give it a name
Make it seem like it’s our invention
Still sinking backwards into that frame
a morning where I lie in bed
looking out the window at a passing train
So I was gay, what a waste, they said
like i was a spilled glass of white milk
how good it felt to be wasted.
MAKE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL
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If you’ve grown old and you’ve grown tired
of being important and useful
There’s a place you can go to shed all you know
and you can begin to be truthful…
If you wanna set your duties aside,
you’ll have to make a deal with the devil
You’ll have to make a deal with the devil
but I promise that he’s really nice
If you wanna leave your family behind,
you’ll have to make a deal with the devil
You’ll have to make a deal with the devil
but I promise that he’ll treat you right
Imagine you can have a lie-in on a loosened haystack
spend the afternoon gathering heather
Take your evening tea out with the bees
and learn to control the weather
If you want a way to scratch that itch
you’ll have to make a deal with the devil
You’ll have to make a deal with the devil
but you can become a witch
He’ll give you the dangerous black night to spread your wings in
and poisonous berries to feed on
A generous nest of bones and thorns
perched high up in danger where no one,
no one, no one, no one can climb to it.
DEAD HORSE
—————–
In the thunder, in the thunder covering the water
And the lightning fingering down from the sky
Am I a shade? Am I a shade? Am I a shade? Am I a shade?
Your face is growing familiar;
I have seen it before somewhere
The wet road, the swish of tires
something comes here to die; something comes here to die;
something comes here to die; something comes here to die.
It’s always like this, lights first, then noise.
we stand still as coins.
Dear in the skeleton; dear as a bone saw
as bits of bone that angle up from the ground
where they were buried
are bits of mine, and bits of yours
The pieces of birds will stand in for something
And if now you have to leave, you know
i will lay down in the rotten road
I will lay down; I will lay down;
I will lay down; I will lay down;
and wait for you until you come.