Acceptable Choices

I trod the same tracks

Back and forth across a city that knows routine

But no repetition

My bland sameness

Lost

Amongst a sea of bland sameness

Always happening in the same general way

But never ever the same

In a city of millions

I lead a life of 1s

1 store

1 work

1 way to get there

1 place to stand and wait

In a city of infinity I am making a careful study of the finite

The seasons change their clothes around me

While I stand

Nearly stagnant

On the same street corner

Pondering yesterdays

At what point will I have more yesterday than tomorrows

And will I know that day

The city can buzz around you like a hive

But it can’t give you wings

You can be the only ant

In a city of bees

And nobody will know the difference

In a city where factors have permutations

There is so much acceptable vanilla

We trod the same tracks back and forth

Across a city that knows routine but no repetition

Or repetition but no routine

Repetitive routine.

We change ourselves within our lives

We change our lies within our lives

But we rarely change our lives within this life

Our lives change us

We tan

Fade

Grow

Whither

On the backs of our own lives

Our own

Only because we cling so tightly to them

Not that there need be anything so uniquely US about them

And yet

It is merely because we say it

That it makes us so

Our lives water for ourselves

Like a tongue not pressed firmly against the roof of one's mouth

We swallow our lives whole

So that we don’t have to taste them

There is no option beyond those first decisions

They poke irreparable holes in the cloth

Forever permitting the light to finds its way through

Even if it does nothing but

Point out very specific special parts of our darkness

The clouds illuminate our sameness more than our sun ever will

And it is for this that we hate them

They cover our streets with obvious sameness

Irreparable routine

In a city of millions our worst days speak loudest

They us whom we haven’t become

And what is left to be.

-RTB

The Boy on the Train

He just stood there with his forehead pressed up against the window. Shaking and bumping up against it with the motion of the train. His tiny feet planted on the seat. Watching the walls fly by. Chunks of darkness seasoned with patches of light. Seeing nothing, seeing everything. Maybe wondering what he was missing or maybe thinking he was seeing everything. It was incredibly rote for me, but for him, it was fantastic. Comforting enough so that he did it every time he got on the train. I wondered if he'd ever stop.

-RTB

Buenos Aires, Argentina

Self Portrait by Richard T. Boehmcke

10 New Band Names

Iberian Lisp
The Sigh of Ipanema
Take Your Banana
Fancy Arachnid
Goodlooking Idiots
Whole lotta Crazy
Pocket Full of Silly
If Dogs Could Dance
A Moderate Amount of Wind
Frayed Elegance

Chased

I chased her the way little kids chase pigeons
Flapping & flailing
Giggling to the point of hysteria
Running in circles
Without any clue where I was going
Not knowing
What the heck I'd do if I actually caught one

-RTB

So Pink

Her scent haunted my nostrils
Like some sort of olfactory phantom
Neither need
Nor want
Could make it dissipate

Whenever it came by
It twisted
And curled itself around
Those memories still hidden in my brain
Somehow always managing to find them
No matter how hidden in my brain

But it wasn't like
A silken feather
Dragged lightly across my face
It was
Asubmersion
A full cranial dip in my history
My supposedly forgotten
History

And it drowned me

-RTB

Red

Tallish with angles
Red hair and freckles
Character splashed on her face
Like epidermal spreckles
Sneakers and glasses
A bag in each arm
A subway creature
Never exuded such charm
The music she heard
And the rhythm she knew
Predicted her movements
And the things that she'd do
Stoic and still
Yet not angry or stern
Her motivations I pondered
I wanted to learn
Where was she going
And where was she from
Had she known many places
Had she seen some
The motions still hidden
Her interest still dry
The odds that I'd meet her
Were anything but high
So I'd wait out the train ride
Sneaking my glances
Hoping she'd notice
Sensing my advances
Ah but it was last stop, all out
She would dare not linger
And better she didn't
For there was a ring on her finger

Santorini, Greece

Self portrait by Richard T. Boehmcke

The Dress

It wasn't so much a dress as it was an idea, a suggestion. A pairing of tissue thin fabric and hope sustaining it upon her shoulders.

It probably wasn't fair to us for her to go around like that. But it also wouldn't have been fair to us if she hadn't.

-RTB

Belts

Some people are so busy putting notches on their belts that they haven’t even taken the time to see if the belt even fits.


-RTB

Second from the Left

Those left hands, boy,
They carry weight
They carry truth
They carry facts
Fact
Singular

They carry the undeniable heft
Of possibility crushing, hope squashing
Suck
Damn
Shit

They punch holes in your feasibility
Let the air out of an opportunity
And make you feel perpetually late

The good desserts go fast.

-RTB

Submissions

Submitted for your approval...
Me
Regardless of my feelings for you
Please...
Love me
Regardless of whether or not we belong together
Please...
Love me
You are attractive
And I am close to you
And despite the absence of true intrigue
And based solely on warm affection
I must reason with you to
Please...
Love me
I'm not generally needy
I just happen to be needy of you
I would love to pay attention
To the words coming out of your mouth
But it's damn near impossible
Because our knees are touching
And that makes me feel true romance
And if this isn't true romance
Please don't tell me
Just please...
Love me
It's unfortunate that it has nothing to do with you
Even though you are quite beautiful
I could explain it to you
But I just don't have the time
I am far too busy obsessing over the idea of you
To actually seek clarity
So if you don't mind
Please...
Love me

-RTB

Hvar, Croatia

Self portrait by Richard T. Boehmcke

10 New Band Names

Sexual Seizure
Philonuts
Non Violent Explosion
Medicinal Spearmint
Poodles!
High Quality Man Funk
The Hairy Legged Vegetarian
Fine Honey and the Skinny Pizza
Bring on the Bat Heads
Winter Swords

Faux Fur

I wanted to feel her arms around me in the worst way
I couldn't get close enough to her
Or breather her in deep enough
Four seconds with her was all I needed to know
That I'd never get enough of her
Looking at her made me crave insanity
The way people feel when they flee the dark
Every blink was the great escape
I couldn't take in enough of her
Couldn't hold her close enough
Couldn't hold her at all
I continued to try to breathe her in
Because inside of me
Was the only place she'd be safe from my advances
Oh god I wanted to memorize her surface
I wanted to write Shakespeare on her torso
And whisper Whitman to her knees
I wanted to breathe her in

Sweat

Dance
I SAID DANCE!
Because I won't know you're human
Until you dance
Robots don't dance
And if you are a robot
I need to know now
Human beings sweat
They breath heavy
And they look ridiculous
So if you are a woman
If you are a human
I must insist that you dance
Or prance
Move and shake your hands
And don't stop until you sweat
And don't tell me you can't dance
Nobody tells 5 year olds they can't dance
So nobody should tell you
Dance, damn it
Wiggle and shake
And don't stop until you sweat
That's how I know
You are the girl for me

-RTB

No One

Her lips wrapped around me like deep organ music
Low & vibrating
Dark & expansive
Covered and concealed by the darkness of her love
Each note a tremor in my body
Every hold an embrace
Every embrace an eternity
My heart was violet with love
Tickled and trapped in my own giggles
Softened and startled by her hands
My words were wonderment
My thumbs could only draw question marks on her body
Her eyes
Ending all my sentences with points of exclamation
Leaving me on the edge of ecstasy
She was a deep dark darling of desire
And me
Need I even tell you I was hers

-RTB

Rahr!

Featured: Richard T. Boehmcke growling at Gillian Dodds

Photo: Gail Camacho

The River

The river can’t take you anywhere if you’re just standing on the bank ~ RTB

Silversteinesque Poem

There's a freckle on my knuckle

It's causing me to chuckle

I first came across it

While I was tightening my buckle

-RTB

The Unwitting Narcissist

The Reluctant Narcissist

I’d be lying to you if I said that the porthole into my past wasn’t dirty and smudged from the thousand or so times I’d pressed my face up against it to relive where I’ve been and watch the person I used to be. I cling tightly to anything I once was. And everything I once understood. It is an activity I have spent far too much time at. Something I’ve become far too good at. Dare I say prolific?

Seeing how I was then, with the knowledge I have now, is torture.

Every moment can give as much as it wants unto itself, but alas here I am in the future, constantly trying to suck the juice from an otherwise dried fruit.

Once I knew nothing, now I know some things. Few, to be sure, but enough to always know how little I knew the moment before now. Once I didn’t know enough to care what people thought. Now I care far too much. Once I acted on instinct, and that instinct was true. Now, well, I am getting back to that. Remembering how to be who you really are can be a challenge. Once I was fearless, and playful, and god incarnate. But somewhere along the line jaded realism sat down and put its feet up in my mind. In theory he has been evicted, but it is all I can do now to keep him from coming over to borrow a cup of sugar.

As a child I wanted the world, the big world. On long summer days I would lie on my back in the park and look up at the sky. It was the first place I got the impression that the world was endless. I would lay there until that purple vastness pushed down on me with tickled beauty. God you are so big world. Wherever will I find you?

My parents love me for sure. And they paved a smooth road for me that ran time infinitum. Run they said. Run as far and as fast as you dare. Dad said have a plan, Mom knew I’d do something bigger than planning. It makes sense that my father writes in print, capital block letters with tremendous gravitas. My mother writes in script, cursive. Elegant turns that spin their ways around lines like a white gloved ice skater, tracing the music with her hands.

I was afraid to fail, afraid to be laughed at, afraid to be made fun of. But I was anyway, back when being called gay was the worst insult in the world. I worried I was too different to be anything. Repetitive chopping fells even the thickest of trees. What tree deserves a blade to its knee? Memories of that axe.

But so what. Any excuse I over used.

In order to be a success I knew I would have to find my path. I bought machetes and chopped a hugger mugger of bamboo from the woods of preconceived notions, and hazy options. I will find my way out of this. Chop, grow back, turn. Chop, grow back, turn. Chop, grow back, turn.

They say you can never go home. They say time heals all wounds. They say everything happens for a reason. True, false, undecided. I say my wounds will never really heal, and neither will yours. I say I took my home with me the day I left it, if indeed that makes any sense. I say I am the reason, and I am happening to everything. I am happening to you.

And I need not close my port hole to set my sights on the future, but I need not stand so close to it either.

Send Me to Antarctica

I recently submitted an entry to become a blogger for a trip to Antarctica. What follows is my application.

Send me! There are several reasons why you should.

First of all, I am an excellent story teller. This is important for Antarctica since I can’t imagine there are too many things that are happening there. While most people would write something like;

Day 3. Woke up. Walked out of tent. Screamed. Ran back in and went back to bed.

I would write something like;

Day 3. Woke up in a blissful refuge of confusion and silly delight as the southern corner of the earth provides wonderment at every moment. I engaged myself with my wintery garb prior to emerging from my temporary housing to a world screaming with the cool briskness of a land untouched.

See? That’s good right? And that was just about leaving the tent. Imagine if I actually met a polar bear or found some cool frozen thing to write about. Then you would have some stuff that would really make you smile.

I would also be really eco-friendly. I would not throw trash on the streets. I would not leave the lights on in my tent when I left it. If I have a toilet, I won’t flush it too many times. Heck, I might not even shower the whole time I’m there.

But my main goal is to attract enough attention so that Antarctica can host the 2022 Winter Olympics. I believe the 2022 Winter Olympics could bring some tremendous growth and industry to the region. Without the Olympics, Antarctica will survive sure. But I want it to thrive. And that will be my goal if you pick me.

So please. Send me to Antarctica. Let me wear a silly hat and face temperatures no human being should ever have to encounter. Send me, and you won’t regret it!

10 New Band Names

Guarantee the Nonsense
Vaguely Swedish
My Name is Cafe Au Lait
Feel My Hate Now
Pete Hartman and the Puca Shell Necklace
Irrational Fear of Butter
John Too Many and the Sheet Rock Smock
Death by Dance Party
Skanky Godanky and the Campbell Nerds
Tile Store!

The Kingdom

Patience and pursuance and things will reveal themselves in time. It’s a curious balance, and a delicate dance, and a kingdom all its own.

-RTB

Bay of Islands, New Zealand

Self portrait by Richard T. Boehmcke

6 Words I Overuse

Creepy
Existential
Dooshbag
Word
Nebulous
Relative

Wenner We Leaving

The Sun was setting on my patience for work

My Days
Thought bathed in a bleeding orange
Were quickly becoming colder

My eyes were reflections of the end
My retinas singed by staring so
Intently
At my approaching fate

I was so enraptured I couldn't look away
Couldn't do anything else
I had to watch

Like a writer watching the movie he penned
I knew the ending
Knew the finale
And couldn't look away

Because it was a beautiful finale
I reveled in it
What it signified was slightly saddening
But that is not what mattered

Tomorrow's sunrise is what intrigued me
Because I hadn't seen that one
Not yet anyway

-RTB

Inverse

My 8s all look like Hs
My Hs look like 4s
My ceilings look like flooring
My windows look like doors

My laughter sounds like sadness
My sadness sounds like sleep
I always think I'm starting
When already I'm in too deep

My singing sounds like silence
My smiles look like frowns
The directions all confuse me
My ups all look like downs

My upstairs is my downstairs
My downstairs is a yard
My rocks are always squishy
My mud is always hard

I think about tomorrow
But my tomorrow is yesterday
I was born in August
But my birthday is in May

My friends are somewhat sleazy
My enemies always nice
When I want hot coffee
I always add some ice

My french toast tastes like pancackes
My pancakes taste like milk
My clothes are made of cotton
But I swear to god they're silk

Of all my families cousins
None of them are related
My street is not a private one
I am not sure why its gated

So my whole life's confusing
But to me it's crystal clear
I'm not really thirsty
But I think I'll have a beer

-RTB

Glammour Shots

Featured: Mikael Hamaoui, Andrew Woods, Richard T. Boehmcke



Photo: I don't remember

Chomp

I bite off more than I can chew and then I ask all of my friends to give me the Heimlich.

-RTB

Diamonds

I'm digging for diamonds in my very own coal mind ~ RTB

What I Remember

I remember falling off my bike the day before we left for Disney. I remember holding onto the handle bars while my knees scraped across the ground. I remember I didn’t cry. I remember that was a first.

I remember the night I hit my first and only grand slam. It was the same night O.J. took his Bronco out for a spin for the last time.

I remember how at one point in my life, all of my pants were too short.

I remember football on the front lawn. Burgers in the backyard, and herbs on the side of the

house. And I remember walking away for the last time.

I remember the car accident, and walking in the front door of my house to find out that my parents had planned a surprise party for that very same day.

I remember a million poor decisions. I remember a month of insomnia. I remember consistently getting in trouble around my birthday.

I remember every single word to every song from Aladdin.

I remember sneaking into the fridge to eat the swirl out of the promise margarine container.

I REALLY remember putting my finger on the iron, my finger in the socket, and my thumb on the scissor blade.

I remember my friend Danny. He’s still around, but by the time he found drugs in 7th grade… he was already gone.

I remember dancing around in the kitchen with an empty Tostitos bag on my head just to make my sister laugh. I remember she told my science teacher.

I remember that sunblock mom bought my sister and I that burned our skin when we put our faces in the water. I remember the worry on my mom’s face as she tried to make it stop.

I remember watching David Copperfield fly. I remember lying on my lawn for hours trying to make it happen.

I remember everything as a little better, a little brighter, a little funnier than it actually was.

10 New Band Names

Fish Pickup Lines
A Crossdressing Balloon
Quiche as a Prop
I Sweat Ouzo
Slutty Pigeon
Overtly Gay Man
Autumnal Decopage
Dissapointment at the Thrift Store
Worms in Impractical Snow Boots
Plastic Adjective Candy Store

Paper Art

Photo and Incredible Origami Skills by Richard T. Boehmcke

Complete

Some people may have it all, but nobody has it all together.

~ RTB

26

So

26 is

Twice 13

And

I’m feeling the same

Its

Just a new scene

Going from

Mid to late

It

Changes your view

Not a

Big change

Just

Slightly askew

The here and now

Has

Come and gone

And it seems as if I’m always

Moving on

From

Places I’ve known and

People I’ve met

And those times in my life

I just

Can’t forget

But time

Marches on

And People

Rarely change

We just

Become reunited

And then

Become re-estranged

So I’m

Trying to slow

My

Trip down the slope

Exchanging

Actions for

Aspirations

And

Realism for Hope

I’m

Dishing out hugs

And

Chasing affection

Because

As far as

I’m concerned

I’m just more

Interested

In affection

So from

Now until 30

I’m not

Changing

My ways

I’ll just

Keep

Plugging away

Until

I hit my next phase

-RTB

PS Arm

Photo: Leah K. White

Featured: Yazmany Arboleda, The Right Arm of Richard T. Boehmcke

Airplane

"So sometimes, I need to take Dramamine to fall asleep on planes. Well last week coming back from L.A. I wasn’t paying attention and instead of taking 2, I accidentally took 4. So I passed out almost immediately, and from what the lady next to me told me after the flight, I was snoring and kind of drooling down my neck.

When the meal service came, they couldn’t wake me up, so they just put my vegetarian meal I had requested on my tray in front of me. Almost immediately after that we hit some crazy turbulence and on one of the bumps, I bounced forward and my head fell in the “sweet potatoes”. Well not my whole head, more like the side of my face, actually it was just my ear. But I didn’t wake up!

But those meals are so damn hot because they microwave them for like 5 minutes. I’m surprised I didn’t get 3rd degree burns! So when I woke 2 hours later up my ear was covered in cold sweet potatoes, I had dried drool all down my neck, and everyone in my row was laughing at me. The lady next to me told me that everyone had been referring to me as tater face. I could have cried."

-RTB, Written for a friend's theater audition

Shade

I don't trust your hands
If I can't see your eyes
And if your words go unspoken
Than you're feeding me lies

And if the words that you're saying
Don't come from your heart
Then you don't really love me
It's just lyric art

Your bleeding heart pity
Belongs not with me
And if its pity you give me
Then its me you can't see

-RTB

Anger

Hanging on to one's anger seems to be a distinct marker of youth. As though relinquishing that would be like letting the flame the heats you from within, burn out. At some point though, one does let go, allowing for pusuits of things more significant than just clinging to what you once were.

-RTB

Hawaii Sunrise

Self Portrait by Richard T. Boehmcke

Where Art You?

She's always been within me
Deep within my heart
A stranger til she introduced herself
She said, "My name is Art"

"You've probably never noticed me
And for that I can't blame you
But now that we've become acquainted
There is so much that we must do"

But, my dear, I said to her
I cannot draw or dance
These things I made that resemble you
Were just a matter of chance

"Oh pish posh" she said to me
"Your truth is swathed in lies
Your art is not just yet a visible one
So please don't trust your eyes"

And upon my hand she placed a pen
And said, "Now go ahead and write
Draw forth those golden words
And ink them in plain sight"

My face turned red, my hair stood up
My mind turned brilliant, colorful, bright
How silly of me to doubt my muse
She had, of course, been right

And then she said as she moved away
If you ever doubt me, you'll know I have returned
Because I'll keep handing shiny pens to you
Until your lesson is learned

-RTB

If You Are Having a Bad Day...

Just misspell my name and everything gets better.


http://www.boehmke.com/


-Sent courtesy of Mary Solecki

10 New Band Names

Pepperoni Love Letter
Hot Maple Flashes
Vaguely Swedish
The Wolf Slipper
DInner with the Obscure
Crackers, Socks, & Gum
Yule Tide Couches
Angry Potato
Shut Your Face and the Hypnotists
Container of Stink

Listing

He made a list

of all that he could remember
the bleeding eccentrics
reclusive star bursts
and the radiators

he wrote their names

vertically and without numbers
like a narrow road
he wrote their names in ink

he hung it on his mantle and contemplated them
then rising slowly he removed them from their altar
and dropped them to their fate
burning fantasies

-RTB, Edited by Stereo Caro

PS 1

Featured: Richard T. Boehmcke and Leah K. White

Photo: Yazmany Arboleda

Character

What I've learned is that there is no point-of-no-return. You don't just learn a lesson and automatically function without thought at the next moment of contention. It is a constant battle that you must always keep fighting. Just because you learned your lesson once, it does not proclude you from needing to learn it again. You must fight for yourself that next time around. You must fight to show, to prove your character.

-RTB