Shawn Michael Quinn: 2004

Incubate

Picture his blood

Raw as it incubates to rust

Like the delicate knife when drunk with lust

If only your shadow whispered

Like the sweat of your skin

And felt as though there were a place

For this dream to swim

Time less a friend

And has wintered your lazy road

Death a sordid void not behind

But so bitter above

And you my frantic goddess

Worshipping the spring of some elaborate life

One day to moan under a flood of power

In the midst of their enormous lie

Chained staring repulsively to the vision

You must trudge for eternity asking why

Smell, scream, tongue, and finger

Smear drool as you fall beneath

What it is you’re after

Ache and recall a 1,000 moments

That could have somehow reigned true

Urge them to think, shine, or love

But most of all, see through

I’m trying to get to the heart of the matter
But I’m distracted
By eyes imagined to be watching
I fight to turn them out but I’m powerless
I fight to ignore them but I’m unable
I write to forget but I am the reminder
These words taste of stale bread
As these thoughts burrow deeper in my head
So I personify you
Dress you in beauty
Give you the name of a woman
And douse you in her scent
Color you with her eyes
You become the fantastic creature
And I watch you dance in feminine skin
Admiring the way you choose to dive in
But you’re still that feeling I’m unable to express
You’re still that emotion, only now oppressed
Pushed up to a pedestal

By the heels of your contempt
And I’m vain enough to claim this ghost as my own
But not once have I been able to reach you
Like the fruit fly that passes
My eye, as it blends into the masses
You’re a concept in my mind
Manipulating experiential time
I’m left here documenting the chasing
Following the maps of my minds racing
You’re the emotion I can’t finger
I become beyond drained as you linger
So I swallow my tongue again
Understanding the reasons and when to say when
Knowing now to count sheep and give in

Pummeled

I reach and my fingers simultaneously spread

Touching only nothing, I reach for love

Some level of attachment, hate or rage

But nothing returns

I see it purely

What it is, what’s in me

But it makes no difference

This hollow shell creates a pretty hole

And I’m left alone

Simply

I sing and the echoes keep me company

Hollow with laughter at his mistakes

And here I am… ready… smiling

The moon smiled upon me today

And so I kissed it back

In it’s depth of black

Still there is no goodbye like this

No kiss in its sincerest-ness

My fingers touch cheek

The flesh inflamed as the cold of winter

I know it as it closes in upon me

She whispers goodbye in hello

And I’m thrown

Demolished, devastated, subdued

She, unaware

Me, unable

Winters leaves surround me

Whispering, kissing, and whispering again

“It’s time to let go”

I say, “I know”

And as if they didn’t hear

I’m pummeled again, rightfully so.

Twisted

Abandon Loss

I always wanted something more from her

Something even I couldn’t understand

Something she couldn’t give me

Something she didn’t have

I couldn’t let it go

Even though I let go of her a thousand times

I couldn’t let it go

And still to this day, I don’t know why

I knew she was a star

And she shined in a beauty all her own

That beauty was not what I normally saw as beauty

But I could see it for what it was

Like something never before described

And I was drawn to it

Fire to the fly

She burned in me

And I drowned in her

No love, no more could be lost like this

You have to abandon loss

Even when you don’t understand it

70 Years..

Paper

Her words come to me
And I fall in love with her longing, her hope
She dances like an angel on her paper
While her feet stand still before us
She hides in her hope
Hidden by the light inside
And shines like the secrets in her poetry’s lines
You lie and say you’ve never loved
As you walk through life like no other
The love of innocence, the blood of poets
That innocence those who surround you have lost
That same loss that falls and fades
And kills the innocence left, that of the longing
Love and long for love
Until if ever it’s lost
Then remember these lines
And surpass these souls
Truly unable to realize the cost

This Moment Break

I let this moment break

Like the news of her passing

And I feel numb

I attempt to fix nothing

That is not the way of things

So they say

When spirit gestures, follow

Do not interfere

As they speak of freedom

But who am I to question

To never fade is to lie

This again is not the way of things

All things burn bright

But eventually fade and die

Every cycle, ever season

Every soul, every sun

Every dream, every love

Every sight of the heavens above

To know and to have loved

To burn and to have drowned

We sink into its black secrets

Of nothingness

Without memory of pasts or futures

Dreams or hopes

Fears or faiths

This all comes down to our choices

To love or to give up

To have faith or to fear

To be human or be dead

I choose life

I choose to love

Born To Expire

In this child’s eyes

I see innocence, beauty

And know its course too

Will lead to casualty

We’re born to expire

Not to escape

We come here for a moment

Enveloped by fate

No way to remember

What came before

Or what will follow

Unsure, insecure, obscure

She smiles, laughs, plays and cries

Unknowing of the reasons why

She’ll disappear like me in time

Somehow I have to believe

It all makes some kind of sense

Even if I wasn’t meant

To understand

ⓒ 2004 Shawn Michael Quinn

Were It Not For

These first moments finally free

In more ways like the sea

While little haunts me these days

I sit embracing manifestations

Of a life I once saw that’s arrived today

Voices in our heads we’re unable to escape

Kissing the foreheads of would be mistakes

There is nothing to fear

This, the voice I hear

My angels, my demons, life’s contradictions

And of course… endless hope

Were it not for hope

Truly, I would be free

But I can embrace it

It’s me

Strings

And Often

A Silent Understanding..

Between those who have come before

They look to me
From the other side of this door

I remain strong
...As if I had the choice

They embrace me, drying my tears

The air is like a vacuum, but painless

While memories remain

I’m reminded of why we’re here

Again I imagine strength

When nothing could compare

She sits away, separate from the rest

She smells different

Her eyes, different

It begins to make sense..

And the image dissolves into waking light

Another piece of the puzzle shakes loose

And so it’s acknowledged

Again, as if there was a choice

Again, the pawn here is me

Nothing left but ambivalence to see

I remain

Pushing puzzled pieces
Into previously carved moments

Awaiting the spring
To show me my next move

And often
My feet follow me

Foxhole

My life is open, empty, beautiful

Kiss it, vomit, if you must

Here it is, adjust

Alive amongst angst

In the news, in the bars, in life

Here I am to speak it (listen up)

Become what you despise

Burn in your own demise

You, less than the shadow

Of anything you’d ever hoped to become

There’s nothing in what you hold

No heart, no soul

No love, no faith, you’re nothing

And anyway you could ever break

Me, think again, there’s nothing you could take

I am all heart, I give away the givens

I’m always chopping

But you, you swine

You couldn’t conceive of the heart I have

You have no thing, nothing

Wasted, dying, dead, ripe with decay

Take what I’ve given

Taste its worth…

Taste every bitter pill

Dying, falling down your hill

No balance, no light

No strength, no heart, no soul

Just a worthless battle that were you to win

Its loss would be incomparable

Worthy, the fame of a parable

You fool, you dying fool

How could I envy you?

This kiss I cannot give you

I will blow in the wind

My old friend

Say goodbye you sad soul

Dig that foxhole

Bury yourself, soul deep

And kiss her feet when at last you meet

But this karma comes before sleep

So until again we meet

My old friend bury yourself, your soul, 6 feet deep

J, Entry 07272004

If I had something to tell you, that you might think meant something, that might affect you in some way, that might touch you in a way you’ll always remember, in a way that you’ll pause even if only for a moment and forget who you are, were, and was going to be, would you place me on a pedestal or only see me for the beauty each of us possesses? Would you cherish that contact forever or only take what was given?

My heart has always ached for that touch, like the souls’ misty envelopes as they pass through each other on the way to express through divine dreams. Our souls dream on pillows next to Gods. He kisses their foreheads as they sleep and blows his blessings into their hearts, and then lives and dreams through them. The souls see with eyeless vision and look upon his love with the admiration of a child living only to manifest his visions and dreams. When two souls sync the same and catch a taste of frozen time and their eyes meet undescribed, God is the space between and each soul for a moment not alone is entwined again through flesh, heart, and bone with the divine. Both souls know the touch and bother not to explain but forever hold that moment in time and cherish it, the same.

Tinges Of Fear

Tinges of fear

And gentle touches of faith

What’s in here?

In this space

In this space between

Within the in between pieces of me

I stare into aging eyes

That know no more

Than every year before

Three days before three decades

Flowers die and seeds don’t always grow

Little by little, I learn

There’s nothing more to know

As water touches tin

And drumsticks hold the same rhythm

I’m here in the herein

ⓒ 2004 Shawn Michael Quinn

APC Video Contest "Blue"

The Feather

When devastation falls like the feather

You’re left destroyed seeing only its beauty

Knowing you’ll never recover

At peace and bewildered…

Animal Within

This restless energy driving me insane

Can’t purge it, cant satisfy it

Can’t escape it

Must go with it

Drive it, challenge it, embrace it

This energy in me

That craves usage

It doesn’t allow me to

Sit still, read, masturbate, ignore, comatose

I fight it and that’s what it wants

A fight

The animal within

Needs to fight, to hunt

To breathe unclean air, to run

It hunts me because I’m all it can reach

Inside these walls, inside this skin

This still air

Stale stench of wasted sweat

Air-conditioned summer heat

And cabin fever

I’ll wash it all away

Then give it what it wants

True sweat

Animal bleeding out and burning

At both ends, I’ll taste it

As it tastes its life through me

ⓒ 2004 Shawn Michael Quinn

Wasted

A tragedy

The woman wasted on her cunt
Like the mind wasted on its wants..

You’re a whore
And anyone who still holds their soul
Will tell you the same
You, soulless swine
Living only through life’s fancies
Calling it sane
Something worthy to shine your name

Worthless, waste of space
You make me pray for tidal waves
To wash your filth away

Magic and Reality

Born Into This

Ambition

We humans are so weak

We need so many things to survive

Breath, water, light, food

How many breaths we breathe daily

How much we require water

Everything dries up

Blood dries and flakes

Humor dries

Loves fade

And still we need so many things

I dream of being entwined

Wrapped around another soul the same

Sharing the same breath

So many we’ll require

This energy we pull in and take for granted

And act as if we know why

Or forget we never could

I dream of love

And knowing how many times I’ll lose it all

I change nothing

I have no ambition

Purity

Black sun mirrored the same, the sane

Reflected by choice through me

Shy and obscure, radiant yet unsure

I draw you to me, slowly, stalking

As your eyes wander my way

I am dangerous, mirrored by you

I am in love in your eyes, eternally

I worship you as you worship me

These thoughts diminish like purity

The Dream

My passions disappeared
When somehow I settled for a love I didn’t love
Believing I could have a dream I hadn’t dreamed
Believing I could be a person I never dreamed to be
Believing I could live a life I never dreamed to live
And then I forgot what and all it was I’d ever dreamed
None of it anymore made any sense to me
Then the woman who taught me to dream
And never settle for another’s dream of me
Got up and disappeared from me
And when she left all that she gave me
Seemed too have left from me
That woman was the mother that God and she gave to me
To remind me to dream, to help me to dream
This woman, this soul, this angel in blood and bones
Believed in me
But also she taught me too how to believe in me
By at times lying
Leading me to believe she had abandoned me
And I did, I learned how to on my own believe in me
In life who else will be there besides you and your dreams?
She whispers to me at night as I sleep
In the strangest of dreams
Again showing me how no truth, no matter how deep
Means anything
If not without the dream that lives inside of me
I thank her because I know she’s always loved me
No matter the dream
She loved me and still loves me, my mommy
And I miss her but I too know that it’s only time
That is the space between her and me

Miss you mama 2/13/52~5/29/02

It's Shit

In trying to change the world

I start by trying to change myself

I try to learn patience

Instead, I learn failure

I try to change my body

Instead, I learn impotence

I try to love the world

Instead I learn disgust

Some things were not meant to be changed

Some things were meant to be left alone

Sometimes I think I’m one of them

Then I realize how seldom I’ve been lucky

And then I laugh at the thought of luck

Bukowski inspires me

Keenan inspires me

Cohen inspires me

I sometimes inspire me

But most of the time

It’s shit!

Bouts

Days in waiting between bouts of faith

I struggle to maintain the composure

Of A man who knows what’s to come

I fall into these dark halls

Where the shame of memories

Appear like paintings on the wall

And it’s myself that I cannot escape

For everywhere I’ve been

There too has been my face

Staring in, and scarring these stages

Easier than it seems I doubt

The finding love within or without

And so I search for her

All the while knowing that without the inner sight

Found through the eyes of love, I’ll search forever

If daily I could just weather the storm

Sit back and ride the waves

One day, wake up myself

And kiss the soul the same

Strength and patience, gifts of faith

If only I could win the bouts

Somehow knowing

It’s in embracing the shame

Bricks

Mist

Passing through like mist in the wind

I stand still and embrace you

You pass through me, dancing

And I wet my lips

You come back around, admired

And embrace me again

So of course, I breathe you in

You refresh this age-old body

And press faith and hope into my being

I adore you

We dance for days that pass through years

But again the winds change

And I blow you away

To be free and pick up the dust

To one day stand tall to walk with me

I give you that which aches me to give

And my tears you absorb into your mist

As you wisp away before this storm comes

Nature shows you its cycles and circles

And even without conscious faith

You know we will meet again

And some day I know again

Zeroism

J. Entry 01042004

Lee is at work. I’m alone, listening to music, drinking a few beers, alive.

I remember being a child, without true freedom wanting a world of my own. When I was a kid, that world was my Star Wars toys. Instead of going to play outside all of the time, I’d sometimes sit downstairs in the basement and create worlds with my Star Wars play-sets and figures. I moved everything at will. I was God. As I got older and older and tested each of my boundaries, learning I wasn’t God, I yearned for that freedom, the freedom to be the God of my own world again. And small as that world might be, I would be God again.

Tonight I sit alone in this apartment looking around at my shelves full of music, movies, books about theology, philosophy, psychology, science, hope, love, poetry, depression, dreams, starts, etc… I know that when Lee leaves this apartment, this world will be mine, each time, small as it is. These sounds like the words of a madman, don’t they? I am mad, “mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!” (~Network)

When he’s gone, I will be the God of my own surroundings except when I go to work, but I don’t expect to be working much longer anyhow.. I will be here, listening to music, watching movies, reading books, and writing in silly little notebooks like this one. I’ll invite people into my world at will, upon choice, alienated by choice, separated and isolated upon choices of my own volition, going out into the real world when I choose to. But in here, I will be free. I will be God. What is this? Is this life? It is a life so long as I continue to choose it to be. How do we end up in places like these? Each of us choose our own cells, inside & out…

Shawn Michael Quinn