poetry is a poem that has line breaks

i had some poems up at la fovea today.

my friend kate decided to give them line breaks.
since everyone knows real poems have line breaks.

[this is not kate's opinion. it is a joke. kate is down with the prose poem.]


here they are!




these days i barely get by


I kissed my wife and shot my dog last night.
After that who knows. After that the sky split open.
After that it went to sleep in a hole in the ground.
I was up late digging it. I dug it deep.
There was a mountain of dirt. I shoved it down my mouth
until it filled my lungs and then I didn’t anymore.
A note came crashing to the ground last night. It got lost in the mountain.
I shot everything full of holes last night.
I bent my knees in supplication last night. I tried prayer last night.
I walked around the corner and had a beer.
I met a friend. We got to talking and then I stopped listening.
Then I gave it another try.




there is a darkness on the edge of town


I was the space in between words
I was a vast encroaching darkness
and I swallowed up every word
that came spilling out of your mouth
and when they got to my ears they
weren’t there because they had
been swallowed by the vast
encroaching darkness. I was a chair.

I was useful. I cradled you. I was a cradle.
I was a baby. I was made out of clouds.
I was placed in a basket and delivered to a doorstep.
I was a series of steps. I was the series of steps
by the bridge at the point where the river
starts swallowing the ground.
I was the river. I swallowed the ground.
I was a flood. I came to you in the night.

Please do not blame me for the things I will do.
I cannot leave enough notes to tell you
just how sorry I am all of the time that I am
sorry and this is alright, it is ok.
I will cover you in a blanket
when you are tired and we will talk
until you fall asleep and when you fall asleep
I will cover you like a blanket and like a flood
I will swallow you.