Phantom Mechanisms

Mechanism 1 Part #1 The things outside of my window dry out my eyes. The egg that I saturated has mold on it. The moon decays when I speak. The stars are all just God’s germs. Lately Holly has been combing her hair with a wrench and brushing her teeth with razor blades. I don’t remember the last time I was sober. Does it matter anyway? My nightmares are born in water and I can’t afford a boat. Money is just something you use to wipe up your brains’ blood with. My neighbor says the ocean is where civilization will be reborn. Mechanism 2 Part #5 Does happiness come with a warranty? It’s been so long since I’ve gone to the store, so I wouldn’t know. My neighbor is paranoid. He carries his rifle wherever he goes. What happens to feelings after you can’t feel anymore? Holly says that the shower nozzle feels better than I do. Last night I found an artificial word under my bed. I see faces in the winter. They all look at me like I’m spring. Mechanism 3 Part #7 Some moth keeps fluttering by my window, it can’t get out. The moon calls for its soul. It has to stare at its dream through inescapable glass. Just like the reflection does in the mirror. Do colors look the same to other people? What if blue for you was red for them? Then they would literally have a red sky, and they would still be calling it blue. Holly says my brain is as good as that moth. Which, I wouldn’t doubt, except I write poetry and he commits suicide by lamp Mechanism 4 Part #2 Some guy asked me if I had someone by the name of Frank sleeping in my apartment anywhere. What a freak. My neighbor says I should stock up on canned foods. He is a freak too. I think my pencil has been drinking. Satisfaction, for me, is like frozen alcohol. Holly showers too much. She is a freak. I want to drive to New York. Who am I kidding; I’m too sober to drive. Mechanism 5 Part #6 This hotel is making me go sane! Every time I lay down I hear the snore of the one’s who have slept here before me. My neighbor tells me that we are all going to be cannibals. Holly’s brain was spilling blood, so I cleaned it with quarters. This place smells like… well I can’t make out the smell exactly. Shut up Holly. Mechanism 6 This part is not in the instructions? …Uh…I don’t know...go away…stop reading this… You’re still here huh? I’ve drank too much solvent tonight. The casing will never get cleaned now. You probably don’t know what that is. I feel lkie cuittng fof my fingre adn puttung ut in Hlly’s wine. I’m real gone. Mechanism 7 Part # 4 This wine tastes like the blotches on the moon. Holly says I’m the worst person that she has ever felt. Her compliments are intriguing. That moth is still desperately trying to get out of the window. I’m just going to turn on the lamp. Anti-tobacco commercials make me want to smoke a cigarette. Last night my neighbor shot his T.V. and the recoil made him fall on his head. Apparently he died or something. That’s a shame, that was a damn good television. Mechanism 8 Part # 8 Are you even real? Are any of us even real? What is real? I see the ghost of Rimbaud sitting on the chair mocking me. Is he real? People would call me crazy, but it’s those same people who say that one guy died for us and then was resurrected from the dead by someone who supposedly created the universe. If that’s real, then where did the creator come from? I pour out all the rivers of the world onto the concrete sky. Holly says my eccentricity makes me abnormal. Is she even normal? Are any of us even normal? What is normal? Mechanism 9 Part # 9 Normal is someone who conforms to the shackles of society. Holly says that I need to **** her more. But that’s not the hard part; the hard part is pretending that I enjoy it. At what cost does a man finally enable himself to be free? How many bottles of hard liquor does it take? How many different drugs? How many different women? How many different faces does he need to wear? I guess the better question is; how many mistakes does a man need to make before he benefits from them? Mechanism 10 Part # 10 I am real gone. I am the static in your television. I am a creak in your house. I am a mastodon. I am extinct. I am a ghost. My mind is six feet under but my feet are still walking. I am the core of the apple. I am not the pit of a peach. I am poetry not for the masses. I am the book never to be read. I am the moth at your window. I am a mechanism. You are a mechanism. Holly is a mechanism. We are all mechanisms working together to form a machine. A selfish, ungrateful and greedy machine that will destroy the planet Earth in which we are only guests. We take advantage of this place but it does not take advantage of us. I am a phantom and these are mechanisms that keep me transparent.