Beside you, there (sketchbook)

The constituent acts of drawing and writing function together for me as a means by which to interpret and make sense of my day to day interactions with strangers and those I love. My sketchbook images and their accompanying captions are conceived collectively as introspective, playfully quizzical anthropomorphic abstractions, mundane recollections, and multi-iterative representations of the human figure. The subjects portrayed in my drawings and attending poems are an expository of perceived incidental narratives extrapolated from the comings and goings of my everyday life. They are a meditation on the strange sanctity of carrying out such unremarkable quotidian rituals as waiting for the bus, washing one’s hair, or shovelling snow: an homage to the profundity (and absurdity) of self-talk, and a journal of allegorical projections involuntarily cast upon the inanimate material world and it’s inhabitants. Here, a diaristic consortium of visuals and words are arranged as a means to codify fragility, adoration, longing, and hopefulness under the guise of common-placed interactions and un-monumental gestures. These illustrations and captions mutually play host to a series of restless solitary platitudes, sensual jests, and apprehensive confessions — conscripting the solace of familiar motions alongside the tremulous exploits of suppressed desire.

inside the city of boxes

you and I can gather each other

independently together

we can make and hear the same sounds

of steady breaths

and press our ears to the window

and see each other 

it is in your nature, in your truest way

to be kind to cashiers

and ruthless with yourself

you make my heart a soufflé; its all puffy and ready for you

I will try to conceal my excitement and fail miserably

like a bashful cephalopod

alight with glowing chromatophores  

you let me sit atop your spires

just to watch the sun move

it is enthralling to be enmeshed in your tilt

trying to remain undazzled by your every 

step, blink, encrypted forehead pleat

and tidal sigh

is a part time job for which i have too long been owed unpaid remittances 

I will continue the job

because you remain the unwitting spectacle (to everyone's wonder)

on the bus

in line for the bank machine

and at the show

you have not

and will not know it

if it's still light out after the grocery store closes

may i borrow a trowel to excavate the perimeter of your shadow in the new cement?

you will only have to stand still for six minutes

I will scratch around quickly until your form is indelible

just tell me whether you want me to pick you up a double double or a London fog

there finger's bones of dryer lint 

will braid themselves around yours the whole night long

your tattered shelter looks so decadent, because you are it's inhabitant

may I take a nap on your veranda and watch your thoughts?

I will be so quiet

and when you tell me it's time to go

I will leave my best shadow

tucked, between the screen and the glass of the front door

I feel so fancy around you because you never spare me from your treasures

everything you find in the piñata is for you to keep, but you persist in sorting through the pile in order to ensure that I am the recipient of every salt water taffy

in return, I only have one tube of mars black for you

you fain excitement — convincingly — (even though you have seven mars blacks)

Beside you, there

click and drag if blood type is diluted coffee

its ok if you forget things

there is so much information all the time

in the storm of you wanting

you can remember to hold me

I am a box of cells who takes shape 

in your presence 

I got into your pipes and crawled around until your alarm went off

found ten bucks and fed the mice

your outta mints now, but I'll go to sev if you want anything

the last thing I would ever want is the unsolicited passage of chilled air to be let to creep upon your uncovered ankles and wrists

don't worry, I patched all the holes up in the place before I left tho