just ask any waitress
in the diner
still sane.

ask a businessman
locked behind a desk.

ask a cop in jail for theft
or custer
or van gogh

or a child in harlem
foodless and cold.

ask the grey day
evaporated by the sun

just ask.


we all want to burn,
to dance and sidestep
through are own private hells

to hang
upon
a church bell
high above a cathedral
in notre dame
laughing,
in love with the finality of fire.

the fire
is a man with shotgun
standing in a savings and loan

the fire
is a 16 year old girl
in a
short
short
dress
with oh
so
long legs

the fire cries like snow geese
warm
so warm
into this cold winter's night.

this life we love
is but a hawk on fire
flying
flaming
into the sun of our existence...

we want what we fear,
i want the sun


i am burning.

when 2 birds standing on
2 different high tension wires kiss
love is short.

you wanted me to tattoo your name on my back.
"but who would see?" I asked.
"you just don't get it, " you screamed,
"you don't ever get it."
and you smashed a glass
on the worn rug.

it was a velvet rug
with a picture of elvis
painted across it
meant to be hung on the wall
and when the wind parted the curtains
the shards sparkled like stars...

...they say the human heart
weighs 3/4 quarters of a pound
and scientists have found
in a tomb in egypt
the heart of cleopatra
shriveled like leather.
bitterness
can preserve a heart for eternity...

...but it's closing time at the bar
and outside in the cold, cold snow,
outside in the snow
my darling
one last time
i'll **** your name.

the red glow of her cigarette.
the fingers of her left hand
yellow  with nicotine
clutching dying flowers

"buy a rose for your lover," she says,
"buy one for your wife. buy 2."

"the flowers are wilted."

"maybe it's your eyes that are wilted.

she had black hair
black as the night
the violent night
and gray eyes
the shade of ***** ice

"you must love
someone,
some of the time, no?
put a rose on
your father s grave, then."

"love is like lost pennies
falling from a broken jar."

she smooths her hair with one pale,
long, fingered hand, "you re crazy."

"my mom says so."

i was born to
have adventure

I followed her up the steps.

i was born to chase the night
through the forest
of dead roses.

~
Sun drips
on leaves

not the backyard variety
but the trembling kind

the kind
that weld night-time
intermissions to
the roof of the mouth

sonnet-filled
evaporation
reveals
the timely concealment of
a very, weary
inanimate object
at the brink

just enough hip
to be woman

just enough wild
to be frontier
~

~
"Why is there only one chair in this room?"

"This once was an island." She replied.

"You favor this place then, I take it?"

"How can I not," said she. "The dawn here is quiet."

"Not on this floor, you are much mistaken! The stairs are like an avalanche."

Looking down at herself, she quickly changed the subject. "There are barcodes on each breast now."

"I see. Were you nervous?"

"Only when focusing on the morning break," She confessed. "Otherwise I was much like you--killing what keeps us alive."

"Is that so bad?"

"I wonder. Sometimes I still feel the bruises." She stated. "But I am told this is normal."

"What else did they tell you?"

"To quit worrying about not being built to scale," she stated in displeasure.

"...and?"

"For me to prepare to fall again for the apocalyptic things written in the sky," She admitted with a wicked smile.

"What's so funny?"

"I recognized your handwriting long ago," She uttered into the centrifuge.
~