(All poetry below has been registered with the library of congress as our work, so if you try to steal anything, the federal pigs will cut off your ears and genitals, and we will send the mob after you and you will endure strange sexual torture rituals for your lifetime. We love poetry and paintings and music... we search the world for ripoff artists so we can sue them, which is where we get our real money).

"America's Wrists Bleeding in the name of Fashion"
by Lauren

it's all capri pants and lipstick lesbians and dancing skeletons
neon all around and under
the city awakened by the sound of bones
clacking together
plastic swiping
the pretty girls are out today
clack clack clack clink clink
s-w-i-s-h s-w-i-s-h
i ask questions about their tears
it's all hunger she says
don't question it copy it don't hug her she'll break
she burns burns burns with societys' big bright
propaganda flame
the wick's gone down and now she's melted
four million girls in a short while and Gucci's won the
nobel peace prize for finding a solution to overpopulation
and now it's all about the PhOtOgRaPh the iMaGe 14 year old girls and size 1 and methamphetamines
whatever it takes whomever it kills they'll never know
and not our daughter and she looks fine the way she is

(justafewmorepoundsjustafewmorepoundsjustafewmorepounds)

try this it will numb the pain temporarily
but she doesn't forget and you can't forget
when you can't breathe on your own when you can't
breathe
the runway the magazines it's an incessant high
the Great Polyester Junk Trance
and then it's all you need
spotlight cocaine empty sex
applause from the audience
clack clack clack clink clink
all eyes on the cemetary
please power off all cellular phones
and electronic devices
she is beautiful in death
all photographic rights reserved.

~~
#
By Joel

all your noses get perfumed
and all the lassos go home alone
while the nooses get screwed
all your roses didnt bloom
but their thorns shake hands well enough
and all these rooms are holding echoes
hostage in the mirror and
pictures of the moment arent getting any clearer
instead the passions wallow endlessly through
some denial of a fiction that wont
hug you weakly on your warped front porches
and all the worthy upstaged cages are lecturing today
while the peg legged monkeys try to turn and climb away
but theres no echo for your footsteps and theres no candy on your tongue
yet you still squeeze hello out
while passing stranger chained
to shit caked scenarios and
defiant differences make you slink
into thoughts of separation
while the ugly scars turn and wink
and all the peaches preach of pear trees
while the lambs dine on tiger stew
and none of the shoes fit the footsteps
of the fleeting screams that slew
the sinking tugboat passengers that
did what was said was due
and all your shadows meet their darkness
on the corner where a lie is selling
off season calluses to aristocrats
nursing wounds back to health again
so all the shelves have fulfilled destinies
and all the waiting hits a vein
and passions of pertinence
catch busses in the rain
and all the worst of our knowledge
leans back and rests awhile
so when can get degrees of college and
prefer a table to a style
and all the stockings get filled
with the faces of the poor
who take all of the money
so you cant have any more
and all my wishes lose their lunches
while strolling around the facts
and the hunters gather the leftovers
and the land becomes a snack
until all of its dragons yawn and stretch
and all of them attack
and all the machinery will kill us
because we made it all that way
unless its used properly to shuffle
underwear and model it into clay
and all your lips get buttered and toasted
without any gauze theyre sure to keep quiet
about the handcuffs on your claws
and all the even numbers
gather to fight against the wrong
and all the meaning that we shelter is only freed with songs
sung by the last echo of the burp that set us free
so all of us are Now and no one else can be.

~~~
Downer
By Lauren

I want the sky to turn green and violet on my command Pills in the palm of my hand I took a step towards my salvation And it will bring me up until I fall Until I cant feel anything at all I dont want to come down from it If I carry the burden of a thousand years in my pockets then time will tell me the truth behind the lies and the ones who I once pitied will rise Their lives A mirror of circumstance To mine Ive crossed the path that the hands of time wont fix and I cant feel my head anymore I cant close the door I want to feel alive again like us making love in the rain and the trees in the forest screamed our names My blood runs hot and it seeps through the sheets And leaves a stain Well I never want to wake up from this state Im in Serenity in the midst of chaos is such a beautiful thing The world flashes by like the 100 mile an hour underground train and I am standing solitary against the asphalt my arms outstretched in the deep night Watching life pass me at photographic speeds while the winds tickle the soiled tips of my fingers and eventually die out and the sound of them remains stagnant in my mind and I just want to feel human again but my youth is only temporary and the sun is rising like a utopian wildfire Acid rays beating against the sky like a soul being born like a mountain too steep to climb but I reach higher and the ground breaks beneath me leaving a single speck of dust where there once was life but I cant turn back now...

~~
Underbelly
By Lauren

some people intrigue me and some people walk right past me without appearing to be any physical shape or form some people make me want to come and others make me want to come home i dont know why but i think i love you sometimes but it is just all about sex sex sex sex sex sex sex sex sex or sex nine times in the afternoon wearing nothing but our insecurities speaking in nothing but tongue sleeping next to one another because it feels safer than holding a pillow safer than staring at the ceiling wishing you werent holding a pillow safer than loneliness
vulnerability can be a bitch sometimes but then again everyone can be a bitch sometimes especially when you dont feel safe especially on nights like those nights when you wish someone would just touch you touch me because right now that is all i want the night and someones arms and straight vodka from the bottle seems to fill that hole temporarily but then you realize it is just an intermission a break from whatever shit life is digging up for you and weve all got
our piles of shit in our backyard behind the picket fences where no one can see and like the old man always says it looks like shit it smells like shit then it must be shit but its easy to ignore the smell or to turn your head when you are concentrating so hard on making your shit disappear it wont happen ha ha ha ha ha ha ha im just laughing at my own pile of shit not yours why does everybody hide who they are when the world would forgive them if we just knew and whats behind those doors isnt all that relevant when you realize we all hide it and we all think we are the only ones who feel anything i feel i feel i feel and you know what i want you to feel with me together we might be able to touch each others souls if we try hard enough we might be able to touch because i just want to be touched what do you want because i dont just care about myself you know i just gave myself a huge grin because human beings are selfish animals and i think we both know that at least i admit it sometimes i want to tell people something funny like the similarities between putting gas in your car and having sex something about a nozzle but anyways i am sick of getting blank faces blank responses this isnt
charades people its just a fucking joke and you know laughter is so addictive sometimes i think i say stupid things just to get my fix just for a good laugh and a snort and a burning stomach afterwards and have you ever noticed that you can laugh so hard you cry and cry so hard you laugh those two things are much more related than we thought they were for some reason whenever i talk about laughing i think of pussy i dont understand that or anything else and i wish i could run through a forest in the rain screaming ginsbergs howl like it could save my life like it could save anything like i could save myself like i could save her life from colliding with mine not at his speed not this time its looks like this ones going to be a doozy we better get out our insurance papers how much does it cost to fix broken glass or broken egos hearts spirits??? too much. too much.

~~

pome
by joel

these moments of rapturous decline betwixt
a monstrous indelible forthwith and an awful
meandering mess can capture these eloquent rages and surely enough allow them
to feverfade
its a miniscule derision of our omnip potent and
grafter sighs that leave the mixture to the creators
and the lessons to the vine
a mirror could subdue each canker on our wispy breath
and have enough to partake of the wilting stretches
of consciencous birth with each pace toward
a blithely and foreword gift that cancels all
affections only to passionately rearrange them and throw our own
reconciliation through the windows of our day
to the day catching eyes of mine are shapely human worlds
with calm eyes, watching themselves.
and children waiting as I do what I will to the world we share Im terribly
afraid theyll be taught to take a stab at it.
not much else frightens me, except perhaps half of what I have to say and
dont
Nimble hands help themselves to the food we dish out and the sustenance
is joyful.
I can add my glee to quicken a smile that might just be the most
wonderful thing I can say.
and as I do what I do my urge swells to feed every hungry mouth and clothe
every naked form so universal and only because we do not know those fears
Were not afraid of going without when we have the choice

what I need is your magic that keeps the worlds of you together, and what i
need is help helping people live and die their own way outside of these
digital walls
I need to help the peasants who still work the land to give us what we throw
away so they can die slowly- its not a joke.
and what I want is for you to think about it.
and what you want is a second helping and a second coming and a second chance
and a last dance.

To the morrow we will wake a foamy churning of the sea
our hindsight- our reconciliation with the presents firm grip upon its gift.
and somehow I will get up and do what I can to help you and teach myself how.
We dont need to realize what we have done we need our will to make what we
do now good enough.
Life has to grow, nothing needs to get any bigger except us.
I urge you to do more that your religious figures did, why else would you
follow them?
I want you to scream louder and march further that any protester has, because
those who presume power will have it if you dont threaten it
I need you to grow up and be like your true mother the Earth, give your love,
let people stand on you so you can understand them, and when people step on you
shake them, give and give because She knows and I know that there is a
universe of expansive energy and you and I will still be that universe
tomorrow
Irregardless and especially because of how endless we are
inside of ourselves.


poooeeeemmmm

sit here with a bittle little hope

~~~
?
By lauren

I drink alone
because drinking is all about
not being real--
drink alone
and your eyes are held open
red and sore
to peer at you naked soul
hiding in the corner,
crying for the darkness.

~~
Randomness in the Morning
When I should be Sleeping
By Lauren
I
The air is stale here
Ive been sleeping with roaches
I dont know if drinking makes me more or less
it provides distraction
Crawl under my sheets and you will find a lost one
rambling in the darkness
WHAT I ONCE HAD
medusa
goddess
I am woman, hear me SCREAM
I JUST WANT TO BE BEAUTIFUL AGAIN
this scar stretches from my body to theirs
the bongos sound out our desperate cry of freedom
the blues echo in every note we hear

II
I breathe better in the cold
gray days
fog entering smog on street corners and the town square
his obtrusive stare pierces my progression of thought
the Beats play in my head
and I begin to believe that being a junkie is a prerequisite for being a legend

III
theres a vacancy on the Van Buren sidewalk dusty street bench
stained from its tortured past
a cement history book bleeding with the harsh truth.



TRADITION
by chris

soar upon the eagle's wings
ignore the foul below,
arouse your feathers in the breeze
of a world i may never know.
paint the sky with your brush
of defiant earthen feathers,
placing shadows upon the earth
in the tradition of your fathers.
beneath the heavens exists a land
of crawling, down below.
a paradise on my knees and hands
in this world you'll never know.


PATRIOT
by chris
BLUE
for the oceans we've sailed across
WHITE
were the men who bore the cross
RED
for the blood thats endlessly spilled
FLAGS
cover coffins of the murderers killed
STRIPES
for the bars they put us behind
STARS
for the heavens that we'll never find.

UNTITLED
chris

there is something wrong with the way i live
im dependent on what technology gives
my food, my water, my sense of purpose
must be bought, i now feel worthless
what has gone wrong with humankind
is it all just in my mind
when did logic turn so illogical
and our lives so technilogical
i cant even gather my own food
something all other animals do
i rely on someone i'll never see
to supply my food to me
and i depend on a complete stranger
to protect me from natural danger
doctors are paid for their assistence
in altering my natural resistence
i cant even close my eyes
without hurting somewhere inside
where i go and what i do
is hardly ever something new
i have a job to supply routine
and spend most my time within a dream
longing for time better spent
wondering where my life went
i used to be so full of hope
i once experienced life's full scope
but now it seems i am quite lost
travelling through this concrete forest
i once had companions long apart
we pledged unity at the start
and now our seperate ways we go
to meet again i do not know
i often wonder if im alone
does anyone care or am i the last one?


UNTITLED LOVE POEM
by chris
I'
m (dearfully) afraid
I've u
n
f
a
l
l
e
n

out of
L,O,V,E,
with you
(again