I've heard that my body is a temple.

that disciples once traveled through, they used my ribs
as stairsteps and slept sound in the soft
ventricles of my heart, I've said I used to be soft
and this is mostly true, mostly lies,

you can lay a  f i e l d  o f  c o t t o n  
over  concrete  or cover  granite  in
s  i  l  k  but that does not change the
consititution of what lies underneath
and I have been cold
a bear trap constantly reset, I have been a wolf masquerading
as a girl, slick bricks of ice wrapped in wool

there has been hell in this holy city
and I have been raging through the rooms
scattering caltrops in the halls, wrapping widowers
in smoke, steaking kisses, slamming doors, wreaking
havoc where there need not have been--

Have you seen me? call the troops, have you seen me? fists clenched
temple burning. A chest full burning brambles, hot marble walls.
there is hell in the holy city.


hell.

perhaps the reason
I cannot be still is because
light so often shifts, falls
scattered through blinds
refracted in mirrors, slipping
and bursting, drifting across
wood like a great yawn
tipped and toppled over
crevasses, sliding under doors
you've seen the way it reaches
in blithe slices,

perhaps I have been snuffed
out, i have probably trimmed my
own wick, or thrown duvets across
myself, spilled into black coffee to mix
with devils, see how good I really am
but found that you only flare up before
smoldering,

i've spent more time drunk in the past
month than any of the time before my 21st
woken up to trace the rafters in his room
and count the letters of an O'Neal jersey hung
on his closet, memorized the stitches on twelve
longsleeve shirts and changed the calendar from
March to April on a drunk, half-alive hour.

this isn't me, I'm whispering into his shoulder blades.
I'm so lost, matt. I say, but he no longer answers.
he no longer has things to say, he no longer has
the right to comfort me, that's been stolen away.
I have stolen that away, I am a light but I am a thief
too forward and impatient, hearty and loyal but incredibly
disconnected,

and don't be a ***** about it he remarks, getting into his truck.
I wanted to tell him, hold me like you used to.
maybe I deserve these things he says, I hardly know

anymore.


I hardly know.

one of the few things
I remember is standing
at the corner of his garage
pleading please, stop.
while he laughed, circled
the pool table, breaking
the billiards into two pockets
close and tight, that wide
grin spread across his
face before sprinting
through his front door
hoping i'd be too drunk
to remember him spitting
*get yourself home on your own

have you ever seen the closed door and
wondered what you left behind?
seen the shadows shuffle and gingerly
brushed the doorknob--hoping to find it unlocked but
you can't pull people like books off of shelves,
once read, there is no revisitation, no speculation,
people are finite, with many chapters of their own but
often so very few in ours

but doors are not the end and neither are people,
some things that are tied are knotted with love
as clasps keep the thieves out--
if you haven't noticced, fences define the property
but never the individual,
the world is big and we are limited to
so very few things, being as small and of varying strengths--
however,

the horizon is not a line,
sometimes we see ourselves as the end
and perhaps we are with such a short reach
but that does not mean we will never see the rest
that does not mean that every door will be closed.

step 1: don't.

we all know words are alcoholic,
they can burn and they can treat,
I've gotten drunk on a moment, on a kiss
on the thin waist of a working man--

there's no use in wishing, on changing substances,
you can't domesticate a bear and tell her not to hunt
hope water will disinfect,
treat with pages out of a book, stitch cuts with sentences,
we all know words wound as much as they heal
try cauterizing with ink or
bandaging with i love you
you'll quickly learn that you are not a healer, you are a bartender,
you serve the vices, flip the switch, change the songs, pick up the drunks,

turn water in whiskey? turn whiskey into water.
help a man, hold him close, wake up and make love
clear a table, clear a mind, open a door,
leave the glass.

if at once i began
the moment i was conceived--
when my mother told me she hear a bell-
a distinct ringing to communicate
the woman i should become

the road was paved before
i had the chance to choose, was i
wounded before the war,
did i travel here on a fearful prayer?

finding myself has been a echo location
at sea, sifting slivers in sand,
i thought I was a puzzle
but that is too friendly an analogy,
i am broken in a truly remarkable way
both a fine dust and momumental landscapes
risen and

           sunk.

unring the bell it it were spoken to soon,
make me whole before they bring me to ruin,
i'd rather be shattered if it meant I could heal,
don't take me back,
take me here,
take me hear.

you'd think i'd take corners a little slower
rub rouge across my cheeks with less vigor
i've exhausted my efforts with others because
they don't know a thing

they ask questions but I'm tired of tellin'
enough people have known me and
i'm done chasin'. i've run these bones
as far as they'll go and rubbed away
the worst parts with salt and a firm word

enough people have known, enough people
have seen, I gave myself after all that mad ****
talkin', didn't feel as bad as I thought I would
with mother's shadow off in the kitchen,
kept tellin you to go slower
i still don't know
i still don't
i still
were we both there?
drove myself into a 6 minute
mile the other day runnin'
from speculations, 'cause
I feel like i gave you something
huge, some part of me i'll never
get back and i guess
that's my fault too.

you speak of places as if they were
gifts, objects as if they had souls,
regarded them defensively
when I am there without you
like their permanence only
touched you--
but I have shared rooms,
empty spaces, i have stripped
the shutters from my soul
and cut open scars to show
you where I've been, maybe
i have a lack of material things
to present in lieu of everything that
has happened, maybe my wounds
were the sacred things I shared
and I won't close them off
from you as if you don't
deserve to know, because
you showed me that
you do.