My skin, the jacket of my spirit, is a patchwork quilt to be worn for warmth.
The rough redness of my dry hands shows the signs of premature aging from all the writing I do while my hands are cold.
...
I sing words that do not exist
In a language that is not real
Belonging to a people not of our world
I sing in tongues though I have no religion
...
When I checked on my poems
A surprise was there
And it concerned me so
That I gripped my hair
...
The classes I attended today
Were French, Victorian Literature, and math
But no one learned anything
Because no one really learns at college
...
Have you ever noticed
How tired men
Walk defeated
Home?
...
There are certain times
When the wind gets high
And I tumble around
Waving my arms
...
I have tried and tried and goddammit, I can't figure it out
Because who I am is hidden to even myself
I wear the pale, pink skin of my French mother
And the black hair and eyes of my Navajo father
...
To live in the haze of a permanent depression
Is also to live in the haze of lies
Because when I hold down a job, it's just for the money
Not for the satisfaction it gives me
...
With the grassy Neil Young in my ears
And the rootsy Nickel Creek on the next track
I feel like I belong on this empty road
Even though I'll probably fail all my classes
...
I have starved my stomach for six weeks
For six weeks I have only craved water
Searching for absent soul at the bottom of the glass
I pretend the water forms a river that carves its way through my body
...