First there is the prep.
The roommate.
Wearing salmon colored pants.  
He has Shaggy from ****** Doo
On his left thigh.
The alcoholic.
She has a drinking problem.
She is in denial of her drinking problem.
She hangs out with the loners.
The loners.
Unkempt, unattractive and fat in all the wrong places.
The blond looks like Tom Petty.
The one with dark hair, glasses and braces
They live next door.
Living together but segregated. 
Wild cards.
All of us.

©Gambit '13

Her man had left for California.
Left her with nothing but the dog
to fight the emptiness of her apartment.
She told me she couldn't sleep anymore,
told me she couldn't eat anymore.
She got sick,
so sick— swore that it was
tuberculosis, malaria, typhoid fever—
My experience led me to my own diagnosis;
another case of a love long lost.

I didn't have the heart to tell her.
Instead I slept with her,
despite the risk of sickness.
She was afraid it was contagious.
I laughed, told her I would
take the risk.

I stayed there two weeks, laughing.
She could eat again,
she could smile again,
she made up love late into the night.

It seemed like this
quarantine was paradise.
Till up one night there was a
knock on the door.
It seemed like her bags
were already packed.
It seemed like she was gone
within the few moments it took to see
who it was behind the door.
Told me to lock up the
apartment, leave the key under the
*** of wilted hydrangeas.
He was back from California.
It seemed like she was cured—
of her malaria, her yellow fever, her cholera—
Just like that, a clean bill of health.
A modern day
miracle.

It seemed to have been
contagious,
after all.

Don't sigh at me, Wind.
So impatient! Pushing at my clothes.
Trying to sail me down the road.
You can't force a thing any faster
than it's meant to go.
Not even you wind.
You can't hurry time!
So impatient.
You should learn something from the earth.
Grumbling, generous, gentle.
Slow to shift, only sometimes
a tremor.
Or maybe a day with water!
Crafting clay canyons through
handfuls of centuries.
Convincing rock to change, moving
the earth by gentle persuasion.

Fire.
You stay away from fire.
Fire's only good for burning.
Don't hang around him, you'll only encourage him.
All impatient-like.
He'll be up and roaring again,
Raging and burning and tearing everything apart until
he goes and burns himself up.
And then what?
Nothing.
And he knows this!
So do you.
Wind, you can't expect a forest to regrow overnight.
And that.
Well, that was a pretty big fire.
So dig down, Wind.
Find the earth and water,
rebuild your roots and grow.
Just don't go trying
to set me a'sail.

And then we broke up
so what did I do?
I read poems, hundreds of poems and each one,
even the one that was like a bird
and even the one simply about words
in each one I found you.
A beautiful new,
sad
painful you
and each time I read
(I tell you, I tried to go to bed)
a little part of me died
a little part of me
no, I don't want it to rhyme.
But my tears wasted
my poems wasted
my words and thoughts and wants wasted
I should have shown you more poetry
before we were through.

so what's going on here?
anyone determined a possible
motive or suspects yet
the guy across the street is looking like a potential candidate

the guy waters his flowers and trims his hedges for a living
he throws some sort of odd fertilizer on the ground and then he walks inside
his shirt is discolored at the bottom from sweat and potting soil, some would attest to the fact that he wears the same outfit everyday, kind of scary if you give it some thought

or maybe the transvestite that moved in a few doors down
i suppose you never know what they're up too, huh?
it's all very confusing and i need a lot of help

let's go get coffee