Sunday, July 31, 2016

SPEECHLESS CLOSET DOOR

And then it was nothing again
And again this was how it came out
Didn't notice it the way you wanted
Got a part of it somehow
A very little part of it
no credit left
scratching just under the top
of the socket
a cut into skin a groove of bone
a groove of behavior
patterns in the life
dwindling or going back and forth
between laughing maniacally
and silence suturing lips together
underneath the bloated fetus
overdue everything is always
so fucking overdue
looking distracted obsessed
with the long hair 
hot wind blowing it around
a mirage in high definition
of never being able 
to go back 
and undo anything
walking alongside the one
who always knew better
until I dragged her out of the water
the hook protruding bloodily
from one of her nostrils
the one on the left I think
her left it was 
baited with fake commonality
fucked by the vapid universal
emptiness ignores us
waiting it all out
until we have wasted our 
final putrid breath
darkness grows in annoyance
of the clicking on and off
after the Sun and the light switch
brains chirp on the rock
eroding into the desert
of my insomnia


- Max Stoltenberg

Wednesday, July 27, 2016

WATERFALL FILTER

Couldn't recall to you or tell you when it dried up or when it became what you were after or thought you were after and you were after it much more after it or way later than you have given thought to and it has been arranged or worked out or bled through a sheet of paper stuck to a mirror in that room they can never seem to cool down with all those mirrors and the fans that haven't spun in years or pretended to move to even hover just hanging about over that one the one with the pen shaking in his hand scribbling on a thin pad of sticky notes yellow with fearfulness skepticism he calls it but it's really terror of having to answer for it or recognize that she sits behind him if he would just turn around and see her legs the ones that move even less than the fan blades just hanging about over that one the one with the pen shaking in his hand scribbling and grinding his hesitation wondering if any wonder can be flossed out and conjure a little thread of blood of past humor about the tissue of lies and he uses his fingers and a gentle cleanser for bringing forth or out an application when they used to spell it out when there were still walls or doors closed for meetings of personal touches of accidental contact didn't see you there or the original one who divided my attention between the above and below tendencies rendering me stuck.

She is looking over your shoulder for nonsense to reappear and roll her eyes and her skirt she keeps a copy in her breast that is left for scrambling for ideas baked outside in the searing walk thought I parked it there have nothing to listen anymore and maybe can keep walking and what was that coming down out of the sky the other day an expectoration of the rest of the universe rejecting our changes in anything staying the same for us each other and mostly the times when we avoid each other's resistance to staying out of it this existence and its intrusion into the void an invasion of emptiness leave us unthought leave us now too late way later than you have given thought to and it has been arranged or worked out or bled through a sheet of paper stuck to a mirror in that room they can never seem to cool down with all those mirrors and the fans that haven't spun in years or pretended to move to even hover just hanging about over that one the one with the pen shaking in his hand scribbling on a thin pad of sticky notes yellow with fearfulness skepticism he calls it but it's really terror of having to answer for it or recognize that she sits behind him if he would just turn around and see her legs the ones that move even less than the fan blades just hanging about over that one the one with the pen shaking in his hand scribbling and grinding his hesitation wondering if any wonder can be flossed out and conjure a little thread of blood of past humor about the tissue of lies and he uses his fingers and a gentle cleanser for bringing forth or out an application when they used to spell it out when there were still walls or doors closed for meetings of personal touches of accidental contact didn't see you there or the original one who divided my attention between the above and below tendencies rendering me stuck.

The jersey the blouse swirling inside her sip puckering her lips in lack of appreciation for the thrown together at the last minute next to last minute just another minute just another damned minute plaguing the compliant marching in your head stomping the moisture the stickiness through your eyes mail forced through the slot of your evaporating interest dried up or when it became what you were after or thought you were after and you were after it much more after it or way later than you have given thought to and it has been arranged or worked out or bled through a sheet of paper stuck to a mirror in that room they can never seem to cool down with all those mirrors and the fans that haven't spun in years or pretended to move to even hover just hanging about over that one the one with the pen shaking in his hand.


- Max Stoltenberg

Wednesday, July 20, 2016

NO OUTLET

Temptation building blocks of time and space choicest neglect eyes watering with misery or boredom more like disappointment under the stairs squinting between the steps wiggling the railing the house the building shrugs not budging the planet was his toilet paper as he rolled down the embankment most of the grass smeared into the dry clay dissolution of the exhausted pronouncement her face at the end of the sentence forcing a smile straight line of annoyed expression out of the socket and into the corner of the mouth grinding the teeth on the other side of the mood swing see-sawing along the table tabled idea holding one's vague breath steaming up the metal on the buttons to the right of the elevator door. She forgot what floor she was on and it made a difference in her mind the direction she was heading the elevator up or down she forgot what floor she was going to and it made a difference in her mind where she was coming from when she encountered them tried to break it down for them without being insulting although she fantasized telling them all to fuck off being and how insulting it all is don't mention until I am done saying that put another way as he speaks for her moving her lips while the words collide into each other silently just under the roof of her mouth not much beneath the surface pools cloudy with plans squinting between steps out of sequence for extinguishing oneself.

"What are you looking at?" she asked him.
"The TV," he answered her.
"It's off," she said getting up to crumple up another Pop Tart wrapper and sitting back down to stop herself.
"I'm looking at the darkness," he said trying to talk himself into staying put and conceding to another glass of warm water and then forcing himself to go to the freezer for a couple cubes of ice.
"What does the darkness make you think of?" she asked him turning on the fan on the table and realizing it isn't facing her and as she turns it a bug is spit out from between the plastic blades.
"It makes me think of the patterns on the bathroom floor while I was sitting on the can," he answered her remembering how the fish had churned in his stomach the night before or the night before that when he had the nightmare about the bar stools fighting with each other in the kitchen and how he wasn't sure if it was their kitchen and everyone stood there and did nothing and could criticize even though he knew he too enjoyed the crash of the wood.
"You shit on the floor?" she asked him knowing that of the three: guilt, nausea, and fish - nausea was the most prominent.
"Yes, I shit on the floor and attempted to analyze the patterns of wine and bent conjugation," he proposed not on a single knee.
"Bent what? If it makes you feel any better," she began to say in an enthusiasm that feigned no matter no matter as the side of the index finger caressed the cheese grater.
"No, I didn't shit on the floor. What?" he answered and asked.
"What?" she asked and also acted as though she had not heard what he said or cared about anything he had to say at least the latter was true.
"What were you going to say?" he asked her waffling between how many flushes was it? 3 or 4?
"I was going to say that I don't care if you shit on the floor," she answered almost talking about her private decay when she had decided that geometry was too graphic.
"Now you're saying that because of your apathy or because you think it's not that bad a thing once in a lonely while or because you were scrolling and your thumb accidentally gave too much weight to that option of course it was your apathy," he told her as he looked at the napkin convinced the stain reminded him of that presumptuous asshole from the graveyard shift at hospital no just the graveyard.

"I hate when that happens with the scrolling."

Diseased feet following you
to your next opportunity
taking you objecting
taking to you and whining
about this and about that
perhaps we journey
who are we kidding
when we look in the mirror
and at who?
who is that?
don't ask don't expect me
to know

On the rides we took
into the wasteland
filled with expectations
burst balloons of recognition
unregarded barking
nibbling at her 
the ends of her hair
the ends of her
and how she managed
when she was heard
ignorant reflection
look at it
the thing with the blank look
taking off the spectacles
and rubbing your face
until she drowns 


- Max Stoltenberg


Sunday, July 3, 2016

LOOKOVER OVERLOOK

Head applied to the corner of a table with a cutting board on it wondering asking the question having something to do with pondering who left the slices of cheddar not as sharp as had been described by the woman with the red hair and the way she used her thumbs and held her breath can't say that I blame her the cheddar with the dark spots more brown than purple depending on what you disliked the most or found the most repulsive when you stumbled across it and how you have stumbled head applied to the corner of a table with a cutting board on it wondering asking the question.

who is she texting?

What did he do or not do interrupted distracted by the metaphysics of it all the essence the bare bones and those had been buried a long time ago in his layers of what he did or did not do interrupted distracted by the underlying beneath the floor where he had spent most of his time while the rest of them did what he wanted most what he really wanted all those years after the therapist had asked him the adviser the face in the window at the counter was for them to forget about him so he wouldn't have to feel responsible for not feeling responsible or whatever it was when he scratched his ass and accidentally went a little too deep into the seat of his pants. 

who are you texting?
someone

Interesting? Interesting to who? in what way is it being suggested in a catastrophic sense seems rather boring when compared to standing on your feet all day and what it is that you do when you get home and not even that it's the thoughts going through your head while you are standing all day nobody asks about that and if someone fucking does then they scatter like the hugest corpulent bugs you can imagine into nothing or someone and that and that someone comes home with me and has made my side of the bed crack and the split waits until I am about to fall asleep and then it worms its way right up into my head applied to the corner of a table with a cutting board on it wondering asking the question.


- Max Stoltenberg