He was on a pedestal
and his head fell off.
Like a heavy tomato
Splat!
It rolled around the ground
underneath the table.
Chatty chat chats
of hungry spectators,
like the company of rats.
Nibble, nibble, nibble
Not a lot of salt in the scraps
for such a head so engorged.
Swelling and swelling
Swelling 'till bleeding
The rats really like it.
Making waves with his eyes
But no one could hear him
Crickety cricket
Until someone moved their foot
and kicked him.
Bam! Flying.
One day, he will land on the ground...
But good lord, did he miss his body
that could no longer hold him
On his pigeon-toed pedestal
where he felt much important

When the dream breaks, so much has changed, as if time has been manipulated.
I look for you in photos with me for proof, but it seems that you have faded.
I must be crazy to speak and have memories of things that may have never happened, but I swore someone else was there.
I guess I'm really losing it, maybe it was just a voice in the air.

Should I go back to these places and look for four footprints in the mud, or are these photos telling me all I need to know?
Could I have been roaming around in the woods for three years by myself, conversing with a ghost?

Why do you stay arms distance away
from me,
and our dreams?

We never had any,
but I did or so it seems,

Why won't you pull me back,
I'm slipping into the dark,
I don't want to go that lonely road again,
it would just take a spark,
just to be right,
save my pride,
while I die again inside?
to save who's face?

I don't know about my own pleasure,
when I'm down on my knees,
because you're not hearing my pleas,

I am,
alone at the alter of goodbye,
yet,
again.

no knowing
so many snowflakes
reach the ground

before long
all manner of crystal
growing

sometimes flowers
bloom
to be froze
in a latter time

slow spring
seeping

I like you in the morning,
your eyelids still heavy with the innocence
Of sleep
The sunrise still soft on our skin s

I like you at noon, in the heat of day
Pronouncing German, invoking laughter.
What I would give to stand with you,
The sun warm on our faces, our hearts
In some lost and faraway place
If only to quench our Siamese wanderlust

I like you in the evening,
Your strong arms around me
Watching HGTV;
Or when you play me sweet melodies,
(that violoncello will steal my heart)

And yet,

I like you best at night
when you dream aloud-
Hands searching-
Breath quickening-
Skin touching-
Words failing-
One becoming-

You are most wonderful at your most vulnerable,
Most pure

Let’s discover the world together-
Tomorrow?

VIII**

When I was small
I dreamed of free-falling—
I would imagine my thick chocolate
Hair
Swirling around me like a parachute
And I, World Class Acrobat
Would land-standing up!-
To be greeted by
Earth-shaking applause.

Yet there were no cheers when I jumped
Headfirst
Off the unsinkable lady’s bow.
Nobody applauded my grand feat
When I came twirling up for air.
If only I had trained
On the trapeze
I might swing away
From these fatal ropes that now
Suffocate me.
If only I had learned
To escape from life-binding chains…
A miraculous act, they’d say!
See how she cheats death…

Of course, I think all this
As I sink into the
Dreamless sea.

IX**

I rust.
I, who they called ‘unsinkable’—
--once
Sleep in ghostly slumber.
In my cradle I sense
Bodies breaking down.
They cry with me about
Loss and sacrifice,
sometimes when I forget to feel.

The Grand Staircase is screaming
Every last table and chair are
Kneeling
Baby dolls are weeping-
Do they lust for eternity?

At times I yearn for my lost children
Those that lie yards
From my mast
And those generations descended
Alike
They should walk my bow
Caress my stairwell
Dance in my parlor rooms—
Shake me awake
For you are
One thousand, five hundred
And seventeen
Perished
And I am
One
Not yet dead.