My wife, a psychiatrist, sleeps
through my reading and writing in bed,
the half-whispered lines,
manuscripts piled between us,

but in the deep part of night
when her beeper sounds
she bolts awake to return the page
of a patient afraid he'll **** himself.

She sits in her robe in the kitchen,
listening to the anguished voice
on the phone. She becomes
the vessel that contains his fear,

someone he can trust to tell
things I would tell to a poem.

today i listened to music and cried
for the first time in
a really long time
it still hurts

You have fangs as sharp as your wit.
My Delicate lips tremble at the sight of you,
But not at your aesthetic.
You broke me at seventeen.
Dried me out at twenty-five.
This false idea of you felt rather true.
Like most things, I chose to see my truth.

Tasteless sass filled with dreaded plights of mine.
Pockets full of dried receipts from a time that has died.
I tremble at the thought of you now.
Death wrapped in silk sheets.
That's the death for me.