There was nothing plastic
About the way your smile showed
Or about the way your arms felt
But a voice in the back of my head told me so
And last weekend
I melted a carpet I thought was wool
You could have fooled me
Except now there is a hard, shiny, iron-shaped mark
Plastered into the carpet's soft mat
To be honest, I was a little disgusted
When I pulled the iron away and found
Strings of green and red clinging to it like bubblegum
And to be honest, I felt a little disgusted with myself
Not to mention you
When I left a handprint in your soft back
And strings of skin still sticking to my palm
Prove you, my little plastic boy, are just a doll
By all the tests that matter
A human illusion too easily destroyed
By an excess of warmth

I wish I could put into words exactly what I need from you.  I would tell you how I need someone to hold me, not all the time, but when I feel like I am being swept away by the currents that are life.  I would tell you that when I’m angry I just need you to wrap your arms around me until I can breathe again.  I would tell you that I need you, every second of every day.  I’m not saying that you have to be there with me.  I just need to know that you are there.  I need to know that you love me.  But, most of all I would tell you, I would shout at the top of my lungs, that I need you.  I just need you.  Everything else is inconsequential, it doesn’t matter. I just need you, always.

I had always thought that Love
Would open the floodgates,
Would make of me
A giant vial,
Tipping me over and causing me
To spill out the sweetest poison.

Love came, in his crafty, shy way,
And as he announced himself,
I prepared, filing through my thoughts,
My bank of literary currency,
Searching for the most succulent of metaphors,
The most shining of similes,
And twenty-six alliterations for
Twenty-six letters.

I sat at my island,
Pen in hand,
Pensive smile on my lips.
My heart was full of music,
And I said, like Orsino,
"If music be the food of love,
Well,
Give me more!"

I sat,
And waited.

I waited,
And nothing came.

No sounds to move my heart to dance,
No symbols to make my eyes twinkle,
No product, no design,
Nothing at all to say.

It is not that Love has made my head blank.
Rather, it is that Love has made
Me mute.
Love waltzed in,
More elegant than I ever will be,
And, approaching from behind,
Placed his solid and ice cold hand
Over my poor, unmoving mouth,
Paralyzed with a smile.

Love spun me around to face him,
Taking my arms forcefully, and said,
"Dance with me."
My mouth remained paralyzed, but
Oh, how my feet flew!
How they skated across the floor
So recently turned to ice
At the courteous request of Love.
How he spun me like a spindle,
How he pricked my finger upon its
Needle.  How he smiled and smiled,
And how I took in nothing but his eyes.

They were not an icy blue as one might imagine.
Instead, they contained a shallow blackness,
Darkness divine.
Where mortals have mere specks of color
In their eyes, flecks like those on marbles,
Love has the stars.
Love has the universe in his eyes,
And the universe has mirrors,
And the mirrors have eyes
That grasp yours,
And soon you know not
What you are witnessing.

Let faith, hope and love,
These three,
Bind whatever powers be
And soothe the heart I cannot see.
Lend his broken soul to me.

It is later than late,
the simmered down darkness
of the jukebox hour.

The hour of drunkenness
and cigarettes.
The fools hour.

In my dreams,
I still smoke, cigarette after cigarette.
It's okay, I'm dreaming.
In dreams, smoking can't **** me.

It's warm outside.
I have every window open.
There's no such thing as danger,
only the dangerous face of beauty.

I am hanging at my window
like a houseplant.
I am smoking a cigarette.
I am having a drink.

The pale, blue moon is shining.
The savage stars appear.
Every fool that passes by
smiles up at me.

I drip ashes on them.

There is music playing from somewhere.
A thready, salt-sweet tune I don't know
any of the words to.
There's a gentle breeze making
hopscotch with my hair.

This is the wet blanket air of midnight.
This is the incremental hour.
This is the plastic placemat of time
between reality and make-believe.
This is tabletop dream time.

dear old sir, poor father of mine
you've left me quite alone
all on my very own
I don't miss too much

dear father
I don't miss you

dear sister
I don't trust you

dear mother
it's not a bit real

there's a little baby bird with a hold on you

dear baby bird, sly thing you
with your man, watching clear and strong
may I take him along?

For my eyes are starlight black
With those spirits on my back
Somebody must be watchin'
As we dance these wicked tunes