Lady,
          lady,
                   lady,
It made no sense then
and still I'm at a lack.

Those days I'd read and fall asleep,
take the cheap warmth of the sun on my cheeks
(and literacy) for granted, then
wake to a sunburn on my back.

Aloe evenings, peeling loose skin
revealing goose-flesh, feeling foolish
again, by my garden
on my deck
off my guard
and lonely.

Heck, this is only one instance where I had chills that summer
Another was under the orange glow of a poorly funded lighthouse,
Us there - just sitting - perched
on my car, parked
              on
          a
*****

West River lay ahead and below -
Behind were the kinds of smiles and glances
people give before they know
each other and the chances
of where they both may go

So,
I took my time
not giving a ****
despite the dame's insistence
on a kiss the tourists planned -

Too many instants
spent looking, fearing leaping
peering,
              keeping
                            distance
     ­                                      sparse.
Alas, a tour de farce?
Thanks to pop-rocks when our lips touched
we chuckled at the sparks

Lip gloss
Then my loss of control
Utterly unable to console
Is it any wonder the cunning fox we saw just wandered home?

With this rhetoric I am ready to admit that
I lack(ed) certainty

Was the mist real or is't only foggy in my memory?
In hindsight I do mind causing pain
Though my brain,
it sure likes hurting me

And lo,
À l'acadie we go
...for academia!
My ego can't stand seein' ya
so the strained "Hello" is ignored -

Please impale it on the sword
of vanity and estrangement!
As I sway toward derangement
or insanity, I lurch forward
lacksidaisically

Need to learn to curb these feelings
to watch out for those of others
As the sun or lighthouse over us
this message resolutely hovers:
I hurt

I have a strange relationship with my across-the-street neighbor.
Every morning, after the coffee *** is brewing and the bed is made,
I enjoy a cigarette or two just outside the front door.
I look across the street and I see him.
Bearded, usually wearing a hoodie, sweatpants and slippers.
On a typical morning he is out before me, about half way through his cigarette.

Although I've lived across the street from him for the better part of two years, I do not know his name.
I know that he smokes Marlboro 100's, just from the way his pack, generally in his cigarette holding hand, looks.
I know he has a wife, and a what seems to be three year old daughter.
I love this man.
I love him and his wife and his daughter and his Marlboro 100's.
Every morning that I see him, it is a sign that I am awake, that this is all real.
For if I were to not wake my mind would not be so cruel as to trick me.
My mind would not be so cruel as to deceivingly use my only sense of comfort against me.

Before daylight savings so rudely interrupted my subconscious schedule, the sun would just creep above the low tree line behind the man's house as he put out his cigarette and go inside.
On some days, I imitate him shortly after, dropping my cigarette and returning inside.
On other days, days when I need all of the tobacco in my cigarette, which have been occurring more often than they used to, I follow him more slowly. I stay outside until the sun is completely out from behind the tree line. Some days, as was the case this morning, I need two cigarettes to properly prepare me for the day.
And on these days, the man returns outside, with his baby girl in his arms and his wife following behind.
They all pile into his grey Toyota pickup and are off.
Where to, I know not.
All I know is that I will see him tomorrow.
And I love him for that.