words

i’ve been lost in the woods of your dementia
while migratory winds blew soft and cool,
kissing the leaves softly in a whisper
of maple and cottonwood and oak,
brushing the limbs, catalyzing in my delicate brain
chemical eruptions, fountains of serotonin
that flood the outer reaches of my city
in crested waves of towering magnitude and volume,
flowing tributaries meeting high and low
and usurping the magnificence of one another,
endless streams this river of quiet elation
that i may drown in so deep are the waters.

in the evening streetlights blur like cobwebs
caught in the rain and sirens spark the nights coming,
strangers, bastards, whores, thieves and killers
emerge from their black and oily roots
and cold wet marrow runs now in the streets
where earlier rivers did flow and it is a mess
yet there is little to be done for it
other than to nod sagely as i pass
and know that my world contains within it them
and not the other way around.

still, had i but a choice
i would stay stranded in the dense wilderness
of your forest and chase sparrows
through the spires that touch the sky,
sleeping beneath stars that burn out
and are born again elsewhere in massive bursts of fire,
breathing deep the inky blackness of the universe
while dreams of catching those sparrows
and keeping them as pets play out in my head.

-S.C. Martinez

the light trembles,
an epilepsy of thought,
the air sizzles and sparks,
the words arc outward
and do not return,
if i live to be one hundred
the words will still scatter
at my approach
and i will try as i do
to lasso them in
with ropes made from smoke
that dissipate and vanish
before they’ve left my hands.

they are there, by god,
i can feel their shuddering presence
just beyond some mental dam
where all other seekers
must go fishing for trout,
where we cast lines and wait
for the water’s surface to break
and catch that brief glimpse
of aural lucidity,
pull their thrashing shapes
into the melting grass
and bathe in their iridescent glow
as they struggle for air
before throwing them back
so others may have moments
such as this.

and when i try to take them home
they grow legs and dash away,
their spines once delicate
go strong and their eyes
move closer together
and they inhabit the woods
outside my reach,
the impenetrable cluster of trees
wherein at night their strange calls
can be pulled from the wind
but no meaning derived from
the strange language of raw genius.

if i live to be one hundred
perhaps i will die
before one hundred and one
and then the words i have known
will come from all directions,
leaving little trails in the dirt
at my grave and weeping at my failure,
but know i will have tried, elusive things,
to capture your essence
and only when the end has come
will you notice the void i leave behind.

-S.C. Martinez

the television holds nothing for me
but i let it stammer on.
the sun bleeds through the curtains
and the cat stretches
and scratches at the furniture.
somewhere, atoms race
toward one another in beautiful finality
and we go stumbling onward
toward the dismal sunset of a mad fucking chapter
in human recollect
like those devoid of circumstance,
like things lacking foresight,
chimeras hiding in wilted flowers.
bombs break open the sky
like a cloistered coffer
and the world is gripped in hysteria
border to border
in a cartographed nightmare
of blood and bone and camouflage,
tanks and planes and bayonets,
everywhere, everywhere,
god tells them to inoculate their brethren
and so they do but god is not wise
and so neither is the world.
weep, you mindless men of forgotten words,
for your way is dead and gone
and these are the spasms of its final breath.

-S.C. Martinez

turning and turning
the dark centrifuge of this heart
separating fire from water,
brimming the surface with love
like suicides, martyrs, prophets
of self destruction.

this morning slips
through stained fingers
and it is cold beyond the dead,
a pale reminder of what lurks
just beyond the threshold
with open arms and killer eyes,
lifting being from each and every
this thing of absolutes.

burning with the sun
as it slips through
the thinning liquid dawn,
scrutinizing the consistency
of such fluid banality
in the strange moments
we are forced to share,
crossing barrier and bond
to meet that molten horizon
in its unyielding sweep and stare,
melting as i move closer
to the terrible center of everything.

-S.C. Martinez

chase it with sugar to make it go down,
stir it with your plastic spoon
the purple blood of doom
and still it kicks your tongue
and rapes your throat,
a burning current in your esophagus
its aromatic terror is like napalm,
watch it corrode the snifter
like battery acid at desert noons,
feel the rust in your veins
and the rot in your gut,
goddamn it is worse than everything,
goddamn it sears the skin from your lips
and goddamn it is worse than everything,
hear your soul collapse around it,
feel your lungs default at its mention,
but drink it, drink it,
drink it like a dying crow,
obey the jerk in your gullet,
just drink it till the end is dry
and the gnats go drunkenly home.

she is a dark-eyed crook
stealing my wine when i am gone from the room,
marking the placement of the glass,
hiding her fingerprints in mine,
listening for my predatory footsteps on the stairs,
the turning of the doorknob,
the lock cylinder coming home,
like a shadow smoking my cigarettes in the dark
where it was formed
then sitting on the bed waiting,
palms downward, smoke between her fingers,
a burning stalk rising from her silent hands
and maybe she confesses
and maybe i forgive,
maybe she is laughing
and maybe i laugh inside her laughter
as its arms trace round my neck,
maybe i am a violin at four a.m.
spitting sorrow at the walls
or maybe we forget these things
and drown within the wine
and drown beneath the sheets.

-S.C. Martinez

my cat runs from me at times.
in the dark hours i find her in solitude
chasing spiders or watching shadows race the night
and she finds my presence troublesome,
she flees from my outstretched arms
and disappears into the strange corners of this house
where i am not welcome,
though not always;
often i wake in the early afternoon
to find her studying me at sleep,
the slow rise and fall of my chest
as if at rest i am acceptable to her ideology
and she will lay beside me and stretch a lean limb outward,
flexing the pads of her feet against my sarcophagus,
her claws extending and retracting
leaving little red marks on my morning flesh.

her eyes are wet marbles that follow me
with great concern, as if i conspire against her,
and perhaps she senses a change in me i cannot feel
that causes her skittish opinion to change
at the whim of some feline ethos,
now i am safe to trust and she will curl into herself
against me and sleep to steal my warmth
and to feel the faint beating of my heart
that draws her back to the long ago
when such things were abstract, illucid,
soft dreams wrapped in prenatal vibrancy
until she was forced out into this place
sightless and crying and terrified,
pink and wet and newly lightfound,
marveling at the air, the sound,
huddled against her own calling out to the unknown.

she feels the shifting of the earth beneath her feet,
the wrecking of ancient mist-driven memories,
she holds in her tiny form all the world’s mystery,
contained within that little skull
and behind those crescent eyes,
squinting to keep them in place
against the force of my inquiries
and what we take for simplicity is contentment,
trailing a bright colored string,
watching the movements of inanimate things
to measure where their allegiance lies,
studying the habits of lesser things much as we do
and often i find her at the window
watching creatures storied in her blood
passing nimble and exotic in the world she cannot reach
just beyond the glass
and i know her heart beats the sad notes of a trumpet
or she will sleep in the sun
where it spills onto the tile
and she is one with the light, the warmth,
she meows in protest the caged way she is to live
and had i a greater heart i would set her free,
but i do not, i do not.

-S.C. Martinez

we are blades of grass
swaying softly in the breeze,
brothers of circumstance
we mutter amongst ourselves
some way out of this mess
but our plans are small and crude.

we are dogs gone astray of the pack
loping through the grass,
with great bounding steps
we bite at the world as it passes,
sleeping in the sun,
our paws stretched out in the dirt.

we are broken bottles swept together,
the shards of our greater selves
collected in some corner of the room,
we are whole only in pieces,
our glass forms glinting in the sun
remarking theories in the dust.

we are storm clouds racing overhead,
bearers of rain and hail
blocking the light from above,
we swirl about collecting glass and dust
from the forgotten places of the earth,
removing them from their dark coalescence.

slowly, slowly,
the winter days pass without a gesture,
the brittle wind cold and indifferent
and breaking the skin of our sanity
exposing it to new elements of wickedness
as we move about so broken and misplaced.

we are stale remnants burning in a field,
the smoke from our souls filling the air
with sadness ahead of reason,
we are but beggars of a simpler god,
pulling at the hem of heaven
in hopes of producing some favor.

we are lost in this place.

-S.C. Martinez

she’s a thousand miles an hour,
skin all gloss and sparkle,
cold to touch, her arm surrounds my neck
and pulls me every way,
her fingers trace my cheek,
her lips at my ear
she speaks to me in whispers, never a shout,
quiet, clean, soft as her throat.

she has no sight and i have known her well,
i have shunned her countless times
and it is always this way
through to the nexus of my ragged soul.

without her the world goes dim,
without her it’s all so slow
and i try to overcome the tedium
by outrunning her viral touch,
fast as this car can carry me
i plow through the darkness,
my life, the world within an inch of forever,
tearing the skin from the night
to expose what lies beneath,
my hands grip the steering wheel
until bones creak in protest
and her voice is clear as this evening sky,
whispering from the backseat,
her poison vernacular,
her silver tongue.

she has shotgun motives
and she aims to be the death of me
and oh would i but let her,
allow the embrace of her fiery womb
yet that i have chosen another road
has inspired in her a hate beyond hatred
and now it is to keep me here, burning alive,
to sustain this revolving madness,
to watch me unravel by my own willpower
is her reason for being.

she brings me to my knees,
i don’t want to quit but i want it all to end
and i ask for any but her for surrender,
to finish this terrible drought in my blood,
to enact some dream wherein she is only rumor
and holds no dividends to my undoing
but this is my nightmare,
grinding teeth and darting eyes,
insane, every minute of this,
and every minute of this i can hear her laughter
and her beckoning mantra of lies.

-S.C. Martinez

your arcane rituals hold no substance
and your methods have been obsolete
from the beginning,
put down your steeple and your sword
for there is no place for these things
as god is not an idea for combat or swaying,
god holds no prevalence over any nation
or principle for god is in all things,
god is in dirt and gold, in blood and bone,
god speaks in wind and in water and in fire,
god speaks through everything
at an octave beyond knowing,
god is not your brother
and god is not a keeper,
god is in everything and as such
we are all god and god is alone in this.

-S.C. Martinez

paint a smile about your lips,
precious phantom.

my hands are endless
tapping out morose thoughts on the tabletop,
in the air, upon your translucent skin.

the wine infects my mood
and i am savage, wise, mean,
a bastard at the turn of a wrong word
and everywhere i go there are faces
i do not like.

my words melt together
like wet blades of grass
and everywhere i go
there are faces i do not like,
an inescapable climate of old hazards
augmented by too many cigarettes
and my fading reflection
in the eyes of their memory.

the spirit is robust and red with madness,
perched on my shoulder the devil of my behavior
speaks only evils and i can not shudder him away.

i am a black maned lion devouring the night
and i roar in deep protest the coming of light,
and know this, know this,
i am infinite in wild blood
and i am easily frightened to the point of flight or war,
i frequently remove myself from the collective world
at the spark of my will and this is irrevocable.

i see it coming and i ponder its approach
but there is nothing in the way of governing
the sway of my spirit should it become estranged,
i simply am no more.

-S.C. Martinez