When, at night, I'm alone with
chapped dryness on my lips
I close my eyes and just imagine
you giving me a Vaseline kiss.

Who's here
when I'm not?

Can they read this
as I write it,
does it carry across?

There's something
here
with me,
something that's
not me.

Together but not whole,
just a bifurcated hull
held together with flex tape.

We don't sink.

Is anyone here?

Lies and deceit are a heavy spritzing of perfume,
truth and honesty are a rotting carcass in the ditch.


Both are bitter and sickly-sweet to my nose,
and if my eyes are going to water either way
then what does it even ******* matter.

She uses her tongue
to write her name
on my skin,
and I can smell autumn
in the firey tapestry
of her auburn hair.

I can taste the moon on her breath,
and it reminds me of home.

Polaris is reflected on her eyes
like slumbering summer nights
spent inside
with a distant chorus of crickets
coming in through my bedroom window.

She's water in the creek
babbling beside my childhood memories
where I would play the days away.


I'm too old to feel so young.
Don't stop.