Skin Series 1: Skin

Skin

Pliable
stretched taut
and smooth demanding.
Firm
tight bonded
and calm commanding.

Can I sit in you comfortably
to see without wanting to change
accept and know you can mold.
I'm learning you take attention
how a simple shift can take all eyes upon you
and a look can invite or dispel.


I'll open soon to you baby.
Once I find the strength to shed these clothes around you.
It's a task to just be alone here.


You're on me-
yet not.
I can't find you with me.

-Matthew Koutzun

Change

Change

I reckon it's about time.

-Matthew Koutzun

Holding in Arms

Holding in Arms

Do you really care for me?
Or am I dreaming?

Shhh, or else you'll wake the both of us.

K, is this better?

Much.

Are you're eyes closed?

Yes.

Mine?

How am I to know?

True.
So, are we? Am I-
Dreaming?

Depends.

On what?

On what you want.

-Matthew Koutzun

"I wanted to contact you..."

"I wanted to contact you..."

Before I'm old and Jaded?
Then I guess you missed the boat.
I may not be old- and may not be jaded, 
but the naivety cloak has a worn hole 
5 feet wide 
and I've stepped through the looking glass
fallen
4 stories 
and several tall tales to the ground below.
The rabbit dusted me off
and took me on the journey back home
only to have his head cut off
and be replaced by the Cheshire cat
who always leads the way.

Green pill
blue pill
who is to know
or choose?
If I knew I wouldn't be here would I
but if it's all just a black screen with numbers and code
don't you think ole' Bill G would be the first to know?

But back to me.
What do you want to know?
My age?
location?
Or how far I can go?

Well, the last is easy.
From here to there.
But how I get there
is what must be taken with care.
Because there is there
and that's not here-
and here is here
and here is where I am not there
Let me stress that I'm not there
and that I'm here.
Let's just get it straight I'm here
not there
and that to get me there is
hearsay and theresay
and the hard way is usually the way
because no way with me to get there
has ever been easy.
This last verse is here-
not there-
to prove it.

-Matthew Koutzun

This poem is fairly sprawling but I like it.  
I've also changed the font to manipulate the feeling.  
I hope it works.

One Handed Books for Two Fisted Men

One Handed Books for Two Fisted Men

Read like a novel
but spoken like a poem
here's the one handed book
for two fisted men.

Taken up in private
and held stiff - pages crisp
here's the book for one hand
for the men with two fists.

Broken in sweat
and soaking just right
here's to aggression and anger
and forcing it tight.

Here's to moments of pleasure
in finding sweet pain
of knowing your own secret
and reading it again and again.

Here's to the one handed book
for two fisted men
it's read by few
but it's read again and again.

-Matthew Koutzun

Across a Mountain range I'm Moved

Across a Mountain range I'm Moved

I cry for someone else in love.
I feel fear and disappointment and am moved.

I see future glimmer and I hope.

I touch opportunity's fissure and I shiver.

I love for not need or want,
but in hoping for another.

Maybe this is turning over.

Leaves fall from the tree out side

although it's the beginning of summer,

I feel the season changing.

-Matthew Koutzun

ADULT Supervision

ADULT Supervision

I'm under house arrest again.
Locked in and out from contact.
I need my adult supervision
or I'm gonna get in contact with old sources.

Slippery slope,
I've met you,
climbed you,
now I feel like sliding back down.

It's funny because I get so serious about it all
seriously think I'm the victim and play dumb
and when I think about how I really was
I see the humour in playing the game.

Who was I fooling? Fooling myself.
Not even I, because look I've caught me.
I'm under house arrest again, needing supervision
because the phone is off the hook
and the internet is connected
and I'm searchin' for old sources in the yellow pages
and directories online.

"I'm sorry so-and-so, forgot your name once I left you.
That's good you're doing well and your kids are doing fine.
That's great you're back on track- pity that-
no, never mind, it's nothing. Me? I'm doing nothing.
Just sitting in a bath tub bathing- maybe misbehaving.
Over in an hour? Better shower."

Click, whip, and skip the messages on the phone
as I hang up and forget they're coming over.
Maybe they'll meet each other downstairs-
I've only called a few from the past;
maybe them all.
And they can all look at each other and after an hour
realize how pathetic they really are.

"Hey, boys and girls!"
I'll shout from my window as they walk away,
"I'm really not that bad- you know how good I am,"
as one flips me the finger,
"you know I know what to do with that!"
and off they are again away.

But none of that's happened
no evil happy after
only sitting and waiting for anyone of them to show up
cause I'd be grateful.
I'll take the slope I know,
it's better than the devil I don't.
And we all know the devil we're after.

Now take me on in
give me adult supervision
spy me up and down
and see past the grin.

-Matthew Koutzun

My Prayer of Absolution

My Prayer of Absolution

Our Father
who art in heaven
please forget my prayers.

I've said so many
and even though they have not come yet,
I fear for if they do.

Most are selfish
or are for others
and not what they might want anyways.

I'm afraid
that they'll come,
that I'll have to confront them:

The dirty ones I've asked of you.
Why did I have to believe in you like a lover?
Friends could have just been fine.

But no,
I believed in you like an invisible hand;
one that strokes behind the answer curtain.

So please God, forget my prayers,
even this one,
lets start fresh.

I've taken to sleeping
forgetting to ask for forgiveness
in hopes you'll forget just the same.

I've taken to dreaming
to stop me from scheming
from praying for things we don't need.

-Matthew Koutzun

We've Lost What Meaning Your Thorns Had

We've Lost What Meaning Your Thorns Had

Kateri Tekawitha,
they've lost what it means.
They take cuts for pleasure
and use crucifix dildos in vain.

They laugh as they defile
the things you knew could save us.
Insert without meaning
and penetrate without thought
they claw for answers
but still don't understand your thorn cocoon.

Kateri,
I prayed in the bathroom stalls
as I read the writing on the walls
and hoped that God could- would change me.
I didn't want to be me
and I jerked myself so I could be closer to him
so my words could be heard clearer.
I rubbed myself raw
and began to cry in the shower
as the soap used for lubrication
and to cleanse
burned as I came on the floor.

One time it was the elixir of life
and I cupped it in my hands and almost drank of it-
licked it, to see if I could become immortal.
But I stopped, not because it was my own,
not because it would be wrong,
but mostly because I feared of living forever,
and perhaps that you had heard
and that maybe afterward I would be someone else-
maybe I'd be gone forever.

"Catherine",
how did you do it?
How did your skin go pale as snow?
Did the blood leak from you?
You did sew so many thorns in your blanket.
Or did he hear you?
Did he hear you?
I want to say he heard you-
want to say you were brave
and confronted your prayers.
But now I don't know,
the water burns my back,
as I try to clean what mess I've made on the shower floor;
oh, how you changed me.

-Matthew Koutzun

One Definition of Irony

One Definition of Irony

Driving my car, I saw this mass of stench. Not a smell but the visual kind. The kind that knocks on your window and asks for change in an unruly manner with speckled teeth and and flecks of spit that hit the glass between you and the ocular monstrosity outside of your car.

But no, he was just standing there. Facing north. My car facing south. And there he was. Flute in hand. Beard down to his navel- if I could see his navel. The beard so long and grown over such a staggering amount of time the tips were still brown from youth but you could trace and even see the years of time as the gray slowly, but surely- so dominantly took over once you had reached his face.

I almost had mistaken him for an artist. The flute so shiny. Artists are bums aren't they? Living from one gig to the next? Scrounging for food? Dancing in the streets? Saying they'll climb that light pole for five bucks- please I'll do it for five bucks, as one of your friends beats him to the lamp, scurrying up, the bum screaming your friend is stealing his job.

But no- just standing. Long dirty trench coat. Something dripping from the pocket. A children's knapsack across his back. And bifocals hanging from his left ear. Just standing.

I turned to my girlfriend at the time, "Check this guy out," I made the mistake of pointing.

The man head swiveled after long motionlessness and a queer smile crinkled on his lips.

"What, what is it," Susan responded.

And as I looked at Susan, I saw the motionlessness come to her as she froze, eyes wide, off in the distance behind me.

When I turned around that was the first of the glass to smash in from the window. Bits and pieces, and shards sharp came cutting in- dashing across the dash board. The flute blunt played sweet harmonic whistle sounds of crashing notes at next blow it blew on the windshield.

Susan pawed at the locked door handle and forced herself into the corner, shifting herself as the man continued around our vehicle smashing what would be left of our windows. She had shifted at last to the middle of the vehicle and I was able to take down my arms that I had used to shield myself from the onslaught and wrap them around her.

We now sat silent. We could hear the screams of people watching from the sidelines but we coward inside the broken car.

Once I could hear the muffled rants of the bum and the aggression of maybe three guys upon him. I glanced up from Susan, first checking nothing had been done to her only to see the homeless man rip himself away from his own attackers and pick up his flute. The men advanced again but the bum used his flute now as a mock bat and swung neatly at each of the men, slowly backing up towards our vehicle. Susan glanced up for the first time and seeing the bums return winced, sobbing into my chest.

The old man had finally made it to our car, surrounded. He swung his flute back and forth, the air making the tiny whistles again through the air. The men braced themselves each time until the bum cautioned his hands forward as if asking for a moment of time. Everyone stopped again. The old man then took up his flute and started to play a song. The song was ancient and tired and Susan hearing it sobbed more. I know she must have felt it was his idea of a death march and the sickening idea it would be the last thing she ever heard.

But upon finishing he bowed, and the men launched forward, clawing for bits of clothing and string, that darted upward and over the hood, causing one of the men to bash his head, tripping into the cars door, rocking the car and Susan bracing me as I could hear her muffled cries through the leather of my jacket.

And he was gone, the men too, still chasing him probably.

Women came over to our vehicle, finally able to coax Susan from my chest with their lilting voices. They checked up for cuts and scrapes, but had discovered none. One opened her phone and dialed 9-1-1, and the others followed her casually looking back from time to time.

Susan just stared forward and I looked at the millions, or perhaps one-hundred thousands of glittering glass on the floor mats and cloth seats in the back. I was about to speak and say something about how much I estimated the damage was but then decided to stop. I looked across to Susan and her tousled hair flecks of glass peppered in the new formed knots.

I leaned over and began to pick them out, her first flinching from the touch and then relaxing in hands. She breathed, cheeks flushed, and there was something there in the car that hadn't been for sometime. I pocketed one of the pieces I picked from her only to find more that had shattered and shuffled into my pocket. This only made me smile more.

She looked over at me and smiled in a strange way that I could now precieve as, "what?".

"That was ironic," I was finally able to stutter out.

"Ironic? What are you talking about?"

"What just happened."

"That wasn't irony."

"Of course it was."

"How's that?"

"That guy. He looked like my grandfather."

"So?"

"My grandfather played the flute."

She stared at me unconvinced, so I stressed my point, "he said he'd beat me with it one day."

"Fuck."

She turned around annoyed and looked out the broken window hearing the sounds of sirens and the red and blue lights that soon danced on the glass on the ground, like a prism flashed flecks of light that dance on our car.

I took up her hand, the one she was about to bring to her face- or hair, or anything she was about to touch- or fix, and I just took it and brought it to my own face, and forced it to cup around my cheek.

We looked at each other and then Susan spoke again.

"What's ironic is that it took a-"

And the police were on us, slowly- respectfully, pulling us apart, and walking us to the ambulance. The one we sat together on the back of.

As the questioning slowly finished so did the sirens drain away. They closed the back of the doors. And off we went together, in the care car. Windows in tact.

-Matthew Koutzun

These Things We Keep at Distance or Why Should They Be Found

These Things we Keep at Distance or Why Should They Be Found

Why should I have to pay
for things that are not found
why should I have to keep these burdens
if they only weigh me down

I thought that I had left them
but these things that I have told
in others they are staying
like a bad outdated cold

They stay when they have left me
and even when I ran
but these people keep reminding me
of something

And I want to take these things I've done
and push them down out out
and take them to the places
where these things are never found

Why do I have to keep them
or are they keeping me
am I sitting and waiting for that something?

And I want to let them go but people keep on saying no
they say they have to keep them to remind me where to go

But why should I remember
when remember is all I do?
You think it's your commitment
but your commitment is to you

When these choices haunt me plenty
why do you hang around
with the snide remarks
and hurt words come out

But should I just accept them
and change into all I am to you
because the things I wish to leave
are the only things to you.

And I want to start a new life
from the things I'll leave behind
I know that it is tricky
but it's my way that I'll find.

So I'll keep them on a thin leash
behind me they shall tread
and one day when I let them go
you'll have to accept them

For these things are never gone
although I say now that they are
and we pretend and leave them
then they'll leave me.

-Matthew Koutzun

Let's do it for the Kids

Let's do it for the Kids

Will I remember
how I've been treated?
bashed?
and defeated?
Will I remember
the people?
the places?
and the distinct faces?
Will I remember
the moments of joy?
anxiety?
pride?


Will I remember?
And place in myself
these things and not forget?
And keep them always
and remember how I felt?
feel?
and empathize?
and have been destroyed?


How can I know?
I want to know
that I will
I feel it's my responsibility now
to remember
and to put into action-
and into motive
to speak with the knowing
so that others do not feel treated the way I've been treated
and for them to know-
for them not to know,
since I remember
and I can stop myself from becoming an aggressor
so they do not have to put into boxes and shelves
the feelings I feel now.

Let us remember
Let us not forget
Let us take in our lessons
Let us use our lessons
Let us use and use and use
so others may not have to
so others can learn through us
better us
evolve us
and surpass us
and take up us when we are old.

Because I remember,
do you?
do they?
They will
and be grateful
you did too.

-Matthew Koutzun

Spider in my Eye Line

Spider in my Eye Line

Driving home,
spider in my eye line.
It crawls the dash
and stops periodically out of reach.

I want to hit it-
smash it
take it-
flick it out the window I just rolled down
and trash it.

But it's there plucking about
darting into vent and out
spinning web
down from dash to floor
and has vanished.

The night has darkened everything
and I've lost him from sight
only the light from head lights flashing
front to back
front to back
give me any light to the situation.

And staring to the floor mat I look up
having crossed a lane,
but it's 1:37 in the morning
and the cars are sparse
and sparser still
now that they've sped away
to get away from my
swerving discretion.

But the spider gone
is where everything else is found
because he is on me
I can feel him on me
or perhaps he's waiting next to me.

I feel tingle
and touch
on me
and in me
and my eyes strain darkness
to find the spider.

I want him there
an exact there
rather than an everywhere,
please, not everywhere.

I look up and focus
but hairy legs consume me
and my eyes are back on the floor
the dash
the clothing he could be tucked into
next to me.

But why am I afraid-
what harm could he do-
they say there is a spider
always three feet away from us at all times-

...
fuck, why do I have to think.

-Matthew Koutzun

Welcome Ghost;

Welcome Ghost;

Welcome ghost;
friend of mine-
ectoplasm spill
and sticky inside.

Welcome spirit;
past, but not gone-
you sit by the table
and sing old songs.

Welcome banshee;
screaming woe-
predicting death
and foretelling truth.

Welcome Angel;
gather with us-
relax and smoke
halos can be heavy.

Goodbye all;
the sun is rising-
we can't have others
knowing your splendor.

It'll ruin the surprise for us all.

-Matthew Koutzun

Filling up, Departing -or- When I'm Full- I'll Start Over

Filling up, Departing
-or-
When I'm Full- I'll Start Over

Looking inward
I splinter
too many tangents to follow.

Taking one,
I take another,
feeling the others following
and there are places I don't want them to go.

I slip past them,
tangling them in sunshine thought
or a gem of time
and occupied they leave me be
so I reach deeper.

Deeper delving
passing shelving of thought
departmentalized so I could find them and polish them
and put them back.
I have the worse with the best
and I told myself I'd clean them out and start over,
but just haven't had the time.

And I'm full
and cluttered, and sitting on the ground
the glass around me
I don't seem to know the good and which the bad.
I've pulled them out
out of sight
and I just checked my lists to see if I'm gonna be alright
tallying the moments I can't redefine.

And if I could change- would change - will change- can change-
and if I could earn back how people outside would
could feel
about the things
good
bad I hide
but I can't so I'll just start back over
and take my sweet time
because if the storage room is empty,
then baby, I'm not full,
so surely this must be gratitude for
it's the easiest way I'll go.

-Matthew Koutzun