a little bit (a little weirdo)

putting all the hope out on the page
and then i read it
and then i rip it to shreds
whoever wrote this is not me because i wouldn't believe this

a ridicule of optimism. of a pantomime of.

that's not me. i don't believe it. only schmucks would believe it. and i'm not that kind of schmuck

(the happy kind)

i wouldn't say that, tonight, and i'm right.

it's not sappy enough. fuck being happy enough. the beat isn't bright and it doesn't flow strongly.

it gasps and it chokes and it sputters, bleeding, along.

even my poetry isn't a beautiful idea. even my false farces fail to be caricatures.

why can't i know something better than this? why can't i pretend a world better than this?

and i know the answer to that, already. it's that the only better world doesn't include me. i'm afraid of the people i love and i'd like to excuse me.

i'd like to exclude me but if i say excuse me then it's politer, exempting, get this out of the way.

a woman walks toward me, tall and graceful, clad in a red scarf balaclaving her mouth. i lope in the opposite direction, far too quickly, biting the skin and white particulate out of the corner of my mouth with a truly ugly abandon. we're both walking to work, but she will stand behind a counter and helpfully usher customers on. i will lurk in a dingy closet, leaping out to ambush unsuspecting clientele who don't even know my name, nor care to call it.

a little weirdo is hardly harsh enough a term for it. and even my art isn't beautiful, so who would dare to care?

maybe a touch eccentric, and not even really. an artistic temperament? no, i know what i am.

nobody's looking. nobody's watching! nobody even cares.

i knew it was useless to try to explain.