My face looks muddy today.
Patchy.
Dryness and oil coincide to create the ***** complexion I regretfully view in a spotted mirror.
My ears hurt.
I listened to a poet today who soothed them
but they are still aching.

The screaming notes coming from your actions are ripping them to shreds.
Absurdly fast, syncopated fingers gibe on a guitar, making it cry out painfully.
You ran from her.

Crashing symbols crunch my tiny, helpless inner ear bones.
You took the cat, the mahogany bedroom dresser, the silver candle sticks that you will probably pawn
and sped off in your car.

We are neither in control nor completely naive of our actions, said the poet.

Yes, yes,

Put socks in my ears with your pretty words! and achieve the serenity in myself that I cannot accomplish myself.

Oh Soft cotton *****! Fill me to the brim and let me lay comfortable beside myself where I am usually so twitchy and restless.

I sigh audibly and return to a sunny day where
I am stopped, staring at a red light preparing to
to…
to what?

I realize I do not know what song the radio is singing,
What street I am.
I whip around to see if the dog is riding shotgun.

He is not.

Why am I in the car?
How did I get here?

Was I going to the store, was I leaving town? Going to mother’s house to sob crocodile tears into lace covered throw pillows and a rough, flour-dappled apron?

I just don’t know.
I cannothearmyselfthinkanymore.My ears hurt.

Left to rot in dingy vases under layers of dust, paper roses wilt too.
So I guess it’s a good thing I
Might
Have you.
To justify my
Constantly
Conjuring
Assumptions that you will bring me real ones.
Assuming is dangerous.
So are promises.

So are open fan blades.

Running to hug you, how do our feet know exactly where to stop?
The perfect distance from the other’s toes so that when we reach out,
there are

mere inches from my lips to yours.

Driving in the rain,

Isn’t that deep?

Our human obsession with rain and cigarettes and other shallow things like love never ceases to confound me.

I pound the steering wheel 3 times.

Hard.

I think of what you said about my cheetah print steering wheel and my ****** Mary bobble head clacking away, nodding gently on my dashboard, encouraging your thoughts about me.

But maybe not.

She nods away today in the mist; she’s wet cause I’ve got the windows rolled down trying to cool my hot cheeks, pink and blushed with artificial and real rouge alike.

The dull ache in my palm from the pounding the wheel gives way to the cold finger tips and white knuckles that I give myself as I mutter harsh words to your apparition in the passenger seat.

If talking to myself makes me crazy then put me in the psych ward cause thats all I can do.

I sure can’t tell you. I can’t scream “LOOK at me. Just look.”

If I could describe my soul’s reaction to you, which I never could, it would be something like this:


A joyous, but frustrated 5 year old, her blonde pigtails bouncing in the sunshine, begs her father “play catch with me, daddy!” She tugs at the hem of his pant leg and jumps around being silly, waving her arms and shining her little girl smile around for the world involuntarily. Too young, she cannot bottle her excitement, her willingness.

“LOOK. Just look…at me.”

Soulful,

like your voice which winds and wraps itself about my heart, slowing its beat to preserve the moment we’re in.

Soulful,

like a troubled blues singer who beats out his feelings on his six string and expels his troubles through a tiny silver harmonica. he lets the audience glimpse the infinite road to his unattainable being.

Soulful,

like the feeling of music so loud it vibrates in your chest. music that shakes your very core and dares you to grasp inspiration.  

Soulful, further still,

like the beauty of humanity as we change and thus, grow upon each other like vines on a house.

Soulful,

like the strange reason we have transformed the idea of rain to be both wildly romantic and depressing.

Soulful,

like a river of my own thoughts that tumble over rocks of inhibition and doubt.

And soulful,

I dare say,

like my own pretentious soul.

I want to be lead.

I want to be told something so profound that I cry.

More than that I want to believe this thing I’m told.


I want to know what makes you cry.

I want to know what you dreamt of last night,

And more than that

I must know if your’re happy when you dream

or if you’re bleeding inside,

hoping for something you won’t tell me.



I want to know something you’re only telling your heart;

But more than that I want to be sure you can trust yourself in every word you say.


I want to write, and have readers.

I must cause impact and I must go.

Where is not clear,

But why is so sure.



Can you learn to stand when your baby steps are over

And can you run as a last resort

but be happy you first learned to walk?


I wish you would write ‘love’ on your arms, your hand, your wrist,

When you’re bored in class

Or when you feel like you’re the only one home alone on Friday,



Because I believe the repetition of love is as good as the recognition of it.

I want you to…

I want to know that you can…

Can you please learn to…

More that anything can you…


just be happy you first learned to walk.

“Everything crackles when I walk, dear,”

she said as she stood to go.

The teapot was whistling

And the TV blared loud

Because his hearing aid was turned down to ‘low.’



These splendid old bean eaters



These God loving fools

Live out their days alone.

She can barely see right

And her hands can’t much hold

The hair brush of hers

he plated with gold.



She’s hardly annoyed by the ways of this world,

She’s seen it all come and go except—

The caller ID is a plain old mystery—



What happened to telegrams?



This lovely of woman

And her lovely old man

Still live out their days as in old,

He goes to the barber and she to salon

To gussy up pretty for the drug store.



Few worries they have

But tonight without fail,

She’ll screech

“Al! What’s the Jeopardy channel?!”



“WHAT!?”

He’ll yell back as he shuffles her way

From the kitchen where

sleep closed his eyes as he waited “all day”

For that “**** coffee ***

that never made good coffee in anyway.”



Then they’ll eat stale chips

And he’ll start to snore

As she turns the TV up to its max;



Shifting thick, horn rim glasses that she’s had since high school

Untill in the blue TV lights her eyes will glow.

She can see her show is over

as the fuzzy credits roll down

She stands up and everything cracks,

Shuffle…

Shuffle…

Step.



She reaches for him

and covers his feet

with a quilt.