qui tollis peccata mundi, dona eis requiem*


Bejesus we walked so far!
It was beautiful country, mind,
feet dappling through hedgerows
that led from the city, in silence,
to rest where all flesh shall come.

I remember how it started,
walled in with the others.
Lord you could dance!
How were they to comprehend
that the kink in my arm
and your off-beat jive
could lead us unguided
to narrow pathways forcing single file?

                    By a river we sat together—
amid long words and fingerprints
your skin bled dark with guilt
and for my part I saw coracles
sprout upon your breath.
We weighed down these little craft
with the chains of our sins
and tied fast the bones of our future
as payment for the ferryman.

One day perhaps, the river will dissolve to ash,
revealing our two disciples
discarded as the chance to heal,
                    there will be love
                    like a great and gentle pulse
mingling with cold stones
and memories our
downcast eyes, cheekbones to the fore.

Tethered and bound by maraging steel-
feel nothing- bar a need to unfeel.
Few words- gagged. Rubber'd tastes,
sound the same. Chewy, jaw-achingly safe.

Written nerves of attraction
make me miss you
differently expressed than I know
you excite in a comforting way

Displayed affection of others
make me miss you,
all seen never felt
but if you were here, if only you were

Craving these things that are entirely untrue
but they are when I'm with you, they are
Needing these things that aren't new
but they are when I'm with you, they are

All of it's expressions
make me miss you
pale and fleeting
till our next meeting
those touches
those words written and heard
make me miss you
and love you terribly

Love and all of it's expressions
make me miss you,
I love you terribly.

Mary,

don’t leave me.  
The things we’ve seen,
the perfectly serene
tranquil hours,
thick, sweating, hazy bliss.  
No.  
Stay with me.  
One more day of
nakedness in the park.  
One more night of you
late and deep and
infinite in the dark.  
One more breath of you.  

You *****!

I should have tossed you out
with the cigarette butts and
the empty bottles of *****.
I should have buried you
in the back yard where
no one
would ever find you.
I should have
handed you over to
those shady *******
who moved in down the block.
I should have sold you.

Oh, my love!  

These cloudy afternoons are
cloudy for us, tangled
in each other.  
Lost!  
Maybe I could live with
never seeing you again if
I could just always taste you.  
I understand you  
so perfectly.  
The lovely flower,
Delicate,
an intoxicating
fragility,
I will hold you
so delicately.

You *****!
  
I will eat you.  
I will take you down
in restrooms;
on the beach;
on the side of the road;
on the steps of the church
with the clergy staring
upon us,
possessed and hell-promised,
in the middle of
room full of people.  
I would burn the
******* house down,
Mary,
just to elicit
the tiniest bit of
glow from you.

My everything!

I plead.  
I entreat.  
I command, beg and weep and
I find a little more of you
absent each and every day.
Like you have dried up and
withered as
the direct result of
me loving you too much.  
Words and want and sentiment
do nothing
to keep you here and
so what do I do?

I ensconce you
in plastic to
preserve you.  
I roll you up carefully
expelling all the air and
secure you
with a cord.  
I make room for you in
the freezer
so that you will never change,
so that I might take you out for
a few moments
at the end
of seemingly endless days and
finger you
on the kitchen table.  
So that I might breathe you
in moments
when another heartbeat
seems too painful.  
You help me like that.  

You are looking quite
green but
that red hair, oh!  
So carefully I keep you
these days
not sharing you with
anyone, ever…,
well
almost never.  
I mean if the right girl
were to come along and
if she was of the mind
to understand,
open enough to
mentally grasp
the sort of relationship
that we have then
maybe we could
allow her just a bit
of the madness we share.
Or maybe if I had a really,
really good best friend
I might allow him a
taste of you
now and again.
Friends share until it
hurts to give,
don’t they?

All we have been through,
so many close calls like
that time in that
dank little apartment
downtown
when the authorities were
mistakenly busting down
the door next door.  
It was a terrifying experience but
I giggle a little now
at how
when things quieted back down and
darkness fell
I scooped you up and
shoved you
in the trunk of my car and
we drove and drove
and drove.  
It was summer and
hot as hell and
the next day you
started to smell a little,
reek actually and
your odor saturated the
interior of my Chevelle and so
I made sure we
traveled at speed no more than
ten miles per hour
under the posted limit,
totally paranoid with
the situation and
still as happy and rich as
I have ever been with
so much of you
bound and tied and
packaged for
no one
other than myself.  

And still,
look at you.  
Everyday diminishing,
dwindling,
evaporating into
nothing and
enough is never
enough.  
Every time I resolve myself to
quitting you,
to leaving you behind and
moving forth
I pace the floor
sleepless,
my mind traversing a
monotonous loop that
circles every reason that I should
cast you out but
religiously returns
to the need that is you.

Mary, don’t!
Don’t leave me,
Don’t.

I want nothing
but to write.
To purge my body of
the weakness,
coiling around my stomach
like
Eve's seductive tempter.
To write, before dusk takes over
and I commit
an unoriginal sin.
But the forbidden fruit
smells like bourbon, and
I'm just
so
thirsty.
If I could write–
if I could tell blank paper
of my split soul, hovering
between agony and apathy–
then I could find
what I need.
But words have lost their luster,
stories are just
selfish ***** on pages,
and this pen
is running low on ink.

****.

So I will write my last,
a suicide note
for the dying poet in me,
and pour myself
a round to serve the snake.

it's funny how stark a difference
there is before and after that day.
a literal line can be drawn.
there's evidence, so don't try to deny.
i don't know who changed more,
you or me.
i stopped saying those words
but you stopped reciting them.
i stopped reaching for your hand
but you stopped clenching so hard.
i stopped singing for you
but you stopped listening to me speak.
and maybe we changed together,
and maybe it's for the best.
but when a foundation crumbles,
is it still safe to walk?

she doesn't like to sleep anymore.
she'd rather stay up and make wishes
on the scars that she counts
than slip under a sheet.
it's something about vulnerability.
something about letting go.
if she can just keep her eyes pried
for one more second, minute, hour,
she can control it.
how long she sleeps and if she'll
dream [of him] again.
and maybe later,
once she's all alone,
she can sleep through meals
and start to hate the spots
he loved to hold
a little less.
anything, just to
hate him a little less.
she spends every spare second
checking her phone,
hoping to see if he's responded.
hours later.
still checking, and still hoping
for no real reason at all.
"is it possible,"
she asked herself,
"to hate someone and still
hang on every word?"
but maybe she wants to hang on
every word, hang on everything
he meant.
because letting it go was harder
than holding onto it.
staying awake was harder than
just shutting her eyes long
enough to let him go.
so she wastes her time counting
stars and counting scars,
until she can breathe again.

i carry your bones
the sad smooth curve of your ribs

i cleansed what was left of you under the tide

my fingertips bruise
along the imagined
arch of your mouth

i am sorry i never said
anythi
ng wort h mu
ch i’
m sor
r
y