There have been a few

like you and there

have been many

who have tried,

but there has never

been one that 
was you.

When you are

old and fat,

and I am old

and dead,

this poem will

find its way 
toward your

blurred, 
flickering eyesight

and you will know 
of a
love that was
 replicated,
but
 never duplicated,
that was complicated,
but 
never eradicated.

No names will

be said,
 no memories

told, draped in metaphor,

simply the words,

but you will know

it was you,

and you will know

it is you

because you feel

it, already, every day,

though it sits denied

in the back of

your mind,

though it sits silent

in the shadow of

every smile,

where it waits

and waits and waits,

with a patience I could

never find,

for that day,

when, old and fat,

you chance
 upon this

and know,
 with
slight regret,

that it was 
always you.

My mother brings in the paper
every morning while my father sleeps.
They are in their late fifties now.
When he awakes she is gone.
She goes to the church.
My father never attends although
She begs him every Easter.
My mother doesn’t work any longer since
the money started coming in.
He drinks a cup of coffee and
has two pieces of toast and
goes to work in a tucked in
polo and dry cleaned slacks.

They live terribly happy lives.

My mother spends all her time
at the church now. He works from
eleven to seven before driving home.
They each have their fix.
My father complains about how much
money my mother gives to the church
but does nothing about it because
he enjoys having a consistent topic
to complain about.
My mother complains that my father
works too much but does nothing about it
because she enjoys having the money to spend.

They live terribly consistent lives.

They have worked out the kinks of life.
They have alleviated all inconsistencies
and potential threats. It is all downhill
for them moving forward.
The kids are gone.
The house is paid for.
The hair is graying.

They live terribly faded lives.

I no longer come home to visit.
It makes me sick to see them rotting there.
I love them very much.
I am happy they are happy.
I excite for their desired complacency,
But I refuse to partake in it.

If that is what is to become of me,
I will not make it there.

At the end of the day
there's always another
for her to
come home to.
Normally it's
just your luck;
he's some upper class
Ivy leaguer
with a stable income,
a degree or two,
and a large need
to get punched
in the mouth,
but there's always
another,

no matter what.

You only have her
for quick
fleeting moments:
she picked you up
from work,
maybe met you
at the bus stop,
winked as you
climb in for
the quick ride
to her place,
hardly making it
to the bedroom
before tearing each
other apart,

no matter what.

Quick flings of passion;
hand wrapped
on your neck,
hair all around.
She smiles
that *****
devil and god smile,
and you swear
that there's no one
else in this world.
But it's only
quick moments,
then it's that long lonely
cab ride home
as some Mercedes
pulls in
the driveway
behind you,

no matter what.

on some rainy mornings
as a kid
i used to sneak out
through my bedroom window
into the
pouring rain
and walk three houses down
there was a tire
swing there
and i would sit
and get drenched
just to watch the wet
slippery sunrise
come up over the river
behind our houses
it used to make me smile
to see the
colors reflect
on the water
and in the early hours
of the morning
as i swung and spun
on that tire swing
i would never know
why
i had really walked
out there
until i was much older
and much harder to please
after the neighbors
had moved
and the tire swing
had gone
i realized
with no little amount
of nostalgia
that on some rainy mornings
as a kid
i was happy
if the weather permitted

The snow stopped.
Thin veins of white lay
in the cracks of pavement,
melting.
The smoke moved out of chimneys,
drifted lazily and without direction
a few seconds before it
faded senselessly into
invisibility.
The sun will not show his face today.
Thick gray blurs the line
between sky and stone;
concrete and cloud sift
through each other noiselessly.
The flag falls stale against the pole.
Ants litter the cold ground
on two legs, stagnant,
opening doors, talking,
gesticulating without urgency.
Brown and gray paint landscape
impressionist against the
thick glass of the window;
everything blurred, everything
intangible, graceless, sluggish.
The world is a cold, dead place
from twenty stories up.

There is something in her
youthful capriciousness.
An eager vitality pushing out,
but each movement steeped
in a tender pride;
forced awake in sudden
flares of anger.

To see those brushstroke fingers,
long and carved like talons
as they paint themselves white
in clenched frustration.

To see those dark eyes;
ripping towards and
through you in
sharpened rage.

There is something in that
youthful capriciousness.
Love comes quick as hate;
anger and happiness
lined shoulder to shoulder.

To see those cautious hands,
soft and stubborn,
pulling waves across
your skin.

To see those endless eyes;
telling you everything
she never could quite
find words to say.

Being eaten alive cannot be
that terrible. It was a tempting idea,
as I thought on the vultures
that wait there upon the fence.
As I thought on the beaks
snapping at my ventricles, claws
grasping with taloned ferocity deep
into the pit of my stomach.
It cannot be so bad.
Inside the bar, I sip
on scotch and soda
I was out with a woman;
an older beaut that led me
in magnificent circles
of conversation till
I found myself drunk and
without a word to say. Slightly
later in the evening I
ran into an old flame that
I never wished had gone
out. --Yet as they do,
so did she--
This vulture was stunning
in the lamplight of the
plaza, asking me over a drink
how I came to have this woman out,
in all this time without one.
Boredom was my only answer.
Its tendency to draw me in,
with an excusable neglect to
realize the futility of such sport.
She knew, merely in the look she
gave me. She knew the ***** secret of the
skin that grasps and yearns for that almighty friction.
She knew, for indeed she played the
game well enough. Many men have found
her since me, and many more would
seek her out and find her, until I was
merely a tally on the mark. But she
knew that moment, over scotch and soda,
how bad the vultures had me, she
knew that moment, sitting there upon the fence,
that she led the charge.
She never said a word, finished her drink,
took a dance with a man I'll never know.
The woman I came with stormed home,
enraged over something I'll never know,
and the world danced around me to
a tune of which I'll never know.
Instead, I sat over another scotch and soda
and wondered how
bad it could possibly be
to be eaten alive.

I taste the bitterness
like salt on your lips—
the sadness in your sweat
a single bead that slips with care
down the crescent of your cheek.
The small of your back
is arched and tight
and I read the tension in the
subtle protrusions of your vertebrate
as I climb them with a finger.

You are full of your own miseries,
you sad  and beautiful devil.
You are full of your loves
and your hates.
Your good deeds
and the shadow cast over
them by your mistakes.
I taste them each individually.
I read them in each notch of your spine.
I learn them in every movement and touch
of our solitary dance.

I fear I will be another
for someone else
to understand one day.

the picture was pixelated
you told me
it didn't print the way you
wanted it to
wasn't fully in focus
--I guess in retrospect
it's fitting--
but I wanted you to go back
and reprint it
I was afraid you'd just
throw it away
I was afraid you'd never
frame it
afraid you'd never
place it at your bedside
afraid you would never
let it be as beautiful as
we both knew
that picture was

you didn't reprint it
it was stuck being blurred
said you didn't mind
and you still framed it
you still placed it there
by your bedside
seems ironic now
with both picture and
frame broken
tucked under
some box in a closet
that I was the one
who was afraid

She had a boyfriend
back in Miami,
she said,
and she would love
to have me,
she said,
but she just
couldn't do that,
she said,
she loved him and
she would just feel
awfully terrible about
it if she did,
she said.

I told her if she didn't
want to then it seemed
logical that she shouldn't.

Oh, but darling how
I would love to,
she said,
and I'm so drunk
it would be easy,
she said,
but I love him
I promise I do,
she said.

We were in bed
and she lay atop me
saying these things
and the devils the
both of us fought had us
up against the ropes.

I ****** her then,
and once more in the morning
before I dropped her off
at the airport to fly home
to that wonderful and
terribly ignorant boyfriend,
the one she loved so much,
quite obviously a better
man than me.

the heat has gone
with the rain
a fierce humidity
saturating every breath with salt
and hydrogen and oxygen
wet dreary hell
smothering the houses
the people inside
all tucked away
breaking bones and sweat
too much to live these days
too much
hearts don't beat like they used to
the world's gone grey
don't shine like it used to
and its maddening
once again
except now
the roads are empty
and now
the madness is
in the
corners of the
bars and
townhouse basements
where small men
whittle away at
their
shallow pride
beating their
purchased wives
to make up
for the love
its a madness
in the blood
it is a cancer of the soul
or maybe it is
the salvation
can't really tell
hard to see
or think
much of anything
anymore
everyone drowned
by everything
as the world
limps onward
toward winter

it's been a long year
and I don't think
you understand that
I'm going crazy
no matter how calm I seem
or how tough a wall I put up
I'm man enough
to admit I ****** up
but I really am going crazy
I can't even explain
everything that's
been running through
my head

you see
at some point
subconsciously
I decided to take a chance
one I never wanted
or planned on
but I didn't have much choice
the walls were cracking
and now
weeks later
I'm stuck between
my pride and some
short term feelings
I never asked for

you sat there and
cried that night
remember?
I don't know if it was
because of me or
embarrassment
but *******
I really thought
that the walls were
down
finally
at last
but it seems
we both have
a little too much pride
for our own good

doesn't really matter
much anyway
I guess
it's been a long year
one we're both eager to
be done with
just could've sworn I
saw those walls come down
yours and mine both
if only for a moment

probably just me
going crazy
again

There are times that
it gets so bad around you
that it fills you with it,
like sea-filled
lungs, like that
last breath of water
before darkness.
There are times that
it sinks in your chest
and your arms and that space
right behind your eyes,
that dull ache.
Death comes slow
amidst the wreckage;
in the chest and
the arms and the
toilet seat, gripped
white knuckles and the
stale, thick burn of acid
in the throat.

There are times that
it gets so bad around you
that it fills you with it.
Death comes slow,
persistent in its march,
and you look upward,
bleary-eyed and shook
to the bone, into its
balanced gaze
knowing, but never truly
able to understand,
how close it really is.

In the darkness it's like you never left.
Thin masses of black hue
and blend amongst cluttered objects,
blurred curves of the bed frame
rendered indifferent from
the soft length of your leg,
equal and unseen in blackness.

Drawing lines toward the ceiling,
eyes, mouth, lips,
listening to small thoughts
played out against the boundaries
of sight and imagination,
shadows the same amongst
an unknowable darkness.

In the darkness it’s like you never left.
Indentations of shapes tickle
vague reminders of light,
passing hands through it,
settling quickly from the edges
of reality back into an endless
and eager memory.

You forget how lonely it is.
You forget that you’re only any good
when it’s all bad around you.
You forget about the bitterness
and the anger
pitted in your stomach like a weight.
The drink helps best.
The ****** try.
The door swings open and shut
and it looks like it is nice and
it looks like it is fine and
you forget for a moment how lonely it is.

Then all the sudden, like a car crash
or a bullet wound, all of the sudden
you feel it, and it all comes down
and hits you in the gut.
It hits you in the gut and
it hits you in the heart
and sometimes you feel it and
it hits you in the throat.

The drink helps best.
It is cool and burns you as you try
to forget again.
The women try.
They are cool and never more beautiful
then when you try to forget again.

In the end, it is there,
all wrenched up in your gut.
The sweet, terrible, unending
emptiness of
being alive.

I'm gonna take you for a ride
on a big jet plane when we're done
with all this. With wings as
big as dinosaurs, and it's
gonna fly so fast you
won't believe it!
Pretzels? No, no no,
there will be pizza and
ice cream on this flight.
All the soda you can drink.
Oh man, we're going to have
a blast, buddy. Close your eyes.
Can't you see it? Imagine, you
and me, flying that big ol' plane.
Don't tell your mother, but I talked
to the pilot, he said he would even
let you fly it! Isn't that something, buddy?
Isn't that something. Go ahead, close your
eyes, think about pizza and ice cream, and
fast big huge jet planes, and soda, and --there you go,
nice and tight-- and how fast we're gonna fly,
and we're gonna do flips and dips it's gonna be the
best time ever. Keep 'em closed, buddy, keep 'em
closed and keep smiling, I'll be right here
the whole time, buddy, I'll be
right here waiting when you wake up.
Just know daddy loves you, so much.
Don't ever forget that.

A man can fall in love
under any circumstance.
A little attention; a soft smile,
a touch of skin like the
brushing of thighs
or the tips of fingers.

All it is might be a look
across the bar.
There she is; legs crossed,
leaning hesitantly against
the finished oak countertop.
There she is; and it is love
in her brown eyes, glancing
downward after a moment
into her gin and tonic.

A man can fall in love
under any circumstance.
It happens in the little things;
the lock of dark hair she curls
behind her ear but never
quite seems to stay there.

It happens in the little things;
the soft smile, the small touch,
making love without a word.

If you are not dead
you are far from me.
If you are not dead
you are knocking on
some other sucker’s
door. Perhaps he is
in debt and in love,
cursed in similar
afflictions. Perhaps he is
up to the eyes in hedge funds
and stock investments,
his symmetric face smiling
down his checkbook at you,
attracting you in ways
mine never could.

If you are not dead
than perhaps you
are happy.
If you are not dead
than perhaps
you are sad. I certainly
will never know.
Do wedding bells ring already?
Do the long nights of love
break bones in bitter morning?

For a long time this imagination
proved worse than any reality
could have possibly been;
I lay in fevered dreams,
praying for answers,
only hoping to find
where love had been lain to rest.
Now, it is just nice to be rid
of the whole deal.

The universe makes
a lot more sense
without you.

Unfortunately,
I have found myself
at the end of another
failed experiment.
SUBJECT 17 has yielded
no results substantial
in deviation relative to the others.
No exceeding qualities
or aspiring hopes,
only the same shallow devotions,
same tangible-driven emotion.
I have only managed to
catalyze tolerance in the
subjects toward my behavior,
with no noticeable steps
moving toward interest.

Give me one woman
who enjoys Hem like me.
One woman
who cares about literature,
or good music that provides
something deeper than the melody.
I've been looking for too long.
17 times I've given myself up for
the experiment, 17 times I've
stepped out on the limb.
However, the poet's life is not a life
of acceptance, interest, or accolade.
We are tolerated
by the subjects we surround
ourselves with,
until they grow tired
of our late nights spent
with attentions elsewhere.
Leaving us with ourselves,
until we realize that isn't
such a loathsome place
to be.

Although I know that you
are not as sad as I am
--I hesitate to call it
sadness so simply, it seems
to be more of a perspective
than an emotion--

Although I know that
you are not as eager
to embrace this sadness,
--Though some of it does
live in you, it is what attracted
me to you so fully--

Although I know that
you are striving away
from all of the nonsense
and sadness that has
welled up between us
these past years,
--That beautiful and
maddening sadness--

I hope that there are times,
you are alone,
--Sprawled across
you bed as I remember you--
or perhaps sitting in that
chair with your laptop ahead
of you, the one you used
--Oh, how many eternities
past now!-- to call me when
I was away from you.

I hope that there are times,
regardless of where you are,
that you stop and you think
and you dwell on that
ever-numbing sadness that
I see and you see, piling up
like glaciers of ice upon
your eager heart.

I hope you embrace that
sadness like an old friend,
and can listen to some of
the sad music we once
listened to, eternities past,
and perhaps find a way to
enjoy some of
our maddening sadness
yet again.

what to write about tonight
I wrote one
earlier
about the rush of
everything
about how crazy
this world can be
but that's overused
that's oversaid
I could write
about the woman
again I guess
she comes and goes
different names
different faces
but I know her when
I see her
in the eyes
of them all
you can tell
where she is
hiding
watching
waiting to bait
me in
she will always catch
me
though she's long gone
she will always catch me
I write to avoid her
I drink to forget her
I ****
just to feel her again
she will catch
me
and I will
let her

All of this is something it shouldn't be:
A scar across the stomach,
a sound heard in a silent place,
us seated here, unlucky / oblivious /
hopeful all the same that perhaps

you and I— how curious, fate!—
might be the solution
each and every one of us is
looking for,

even as another
tear pauses to rest, just ever slightly
for a moment, along the dark
skin above your jaw.

she called me a pig
--I said something
inappropriate
I'm sure--
I don't know if
it was enough
for her to stomp
off like she did
but I've always
enjoyed a little
drama
so I didn't stop
her
the bar was filled
with degenerates
of the holiest kind
cheap liquor
loose smiles
and easy times
I figured that
pigs must enjoy the mud
sometimes
if not most of the time
and I figured she
mustn't enjoy the mud
and I figured she
mustn't enjoy the
pigs
oh well
what is one to do
I hope she can
atleast enjoy the rain
because we're ten blocks
away from her
apartment
and
I have
the car keys

Thin tendrils of splintered glass.
An empty mirror reflecting
an empty sky of asphalt and
pavement and what once
was smoke but is now
only air again.

Thin fingers of shattered glass.
An empty mirror reflecting
an empty sky of sawdust and
strangeness and what once
was sorrow but is now
only me again.

Love is a frail word,
whispered out by the pressing
of the tongue against
the roof of the mouth,
falling deafly outwards
and with little consequence.
It comes rattling out slowly,
beginning there in the epiglottis,
mulling forward and pressing
against the back of the skull
like the blade on a dull knife;
never quite hard enough
to break the skin.
You hear it in the slightness
of the air, pushed through the
smallest gap between the
front teeth and the lower lip;
forming the mouth in precise
measures.
Somewhere within all of this
movement of air against the
contortions of the mouth,
there is a wonderful lie that
we have created for ourselves.

everything that
happens now
is pouring rain
banging fists on
window panes
elevated fear overcomes
excavated truths
atrophy is
a blessing
oh just to be weak
only a whimper
of jumping ship
to save yourself
with all the plans
just shot to hell

--the frying pan
is all we know
although the fire
looms below--

bones break as glass
shatters and collide
terrible secrets
drip out of pores
like sweat
and the rain still falls
weaker weaker
fists echo
noiselessly off of
transparent cages
another crack in
the glass
while the rain still falls

--from the fire
looking up
the frying pan doesn't
appear so rough--

glass is broken
bones are broken
and as the rain falls
I am weak at last
give in
that terrible weight
off of sunken shoulders
where did you go
you let me
get this bad
used to be strong
could handle
the world
can hardly stand
anymore
the glass is broken
yet freedom looms
far as ever
I would settle for peace
no chance
no chance
and the rain still falls

The house was perfect for us.
I always wanted stairs like these
because I only had
one floor growing up.
Moving in with all these nice things
and that hopeful excitement
of things to come.

After a few weeks of settling in,
finally got that dog
you talked about,
the white retriever you saw
at the shelter,
such a little pup with soft, big eyes.
He loved to climb around your bed
and sleep curled next to you
almost to the point that I was jealous,
but at first he couldn't get up
on the bed at all,
so he would whine timidly
till you grabbed him up and
buried him in your arms.

Once he knocked over
that photo of us from the wedding
off the bedside table
but the glass didn't crack.
What a treasure that frame contained!
A smile like the one you held
with white teeth in white dress.
The most valuable treasure in the world.

I remember you crying
the night you told me
you were pregnant.
I think I might've cried too,
we were so excited.
Finally starting a family,
finally living out our dreams together,
the two of us
there in that wonderful home
with two stories,
and with that wonderful dog,
with a child on the way,
and those invaluable
treasures of love and hope and family,
vaulted forever in our hearts.

you were still asleep
when I opened my eyes
light, rhythmic breathing
streaks of light showering
your sleeping face
amazing the tricks
sunlight can play in the early morning
you were beautiful there
and beautiful everywhere
and I wish I could have saved
this moment
for a day with no sunlight
or for when that inevitable axe
creeps toward my neck
let me live this moment
forever
your eyes flutter
glance at me
smile softly
and the whole world melts
you place your fingers lightly
between mine
and I shiver
with the morning sun
as it burns brighter in its
celestial bulb
in this moment
everything is ok

the women
come to **** me
softly
slowly
how are they
so beautiful?
it wouldn't
be an
unwelcome
death
and they try
try and try
but i've
been dead
for too long
to be killed
again
sharp smiles
and tongues
caressing hands
clench to fists
they are here
for blood
and they know it
for my soul
for my love
and anything else
they can grab
go ahead
take what you need
i've been
numb too
long to feel it
again

It pains me to know that
you don’t read these anymore.
It is hard for me to write
them to anyone but you,
but they feel fake,
without purpose,
when the only eyes
that will read
are the ones I don’t
care about seeing them.

These come out by the dozen,
such is my disease,
but they come and fall
to ash on the page
like small bits of cigarette,
burning off and away
unto the endlessness of night.
These poems drift
and are lost like letters,
unaddressed and
left at the post,
between the cracks
and forgotten.

how almighty we are!
this enlightened
civilization
this great
human race
I bet
if you put this great
society in a cave
without the
distractions we
call necessities
without the addictions
that **** out our souls
I bet if you put this great
species in a cave
regardless of
every advancement
I bet
we still bang rocks

how almighty we are

Here I am, drowning within
myself. Ripping my hair out
for weeks, it seems.
Torn between what is right
and what is good. Unsure what
those even mean. Yet here I am;
breaking bones under a cross
I'm not sure I wish to carry.
Breaking down to a place I'm not
sure I want to visit. Fighting a fight
I didn't mean to pick, and losing
a war I never meant to finish. Here I am
in the trenches. Here I am.
Knee deep in a love I never really knew, in a life
I never really wanted. Here I am. Treading water,
waiting for sharks to smell the blood.
Come! Here I am, I have nothing left to lose.
Come, take everything that remains.
I've been ripping my hair out for weeks,
here she comes to the door now, here she comes.
Sharks where are you? I am sinking,
hoping for an easy way out. Don't let me down.
The footsteps only get louder. Don't let me drown.
Here she comes. I am here and here she comes.
No one should have to feel this way about a woman.
The last breath chokes out of
collapsed lungs and
she smiles.

there is no good love
anymore
all these little treacheries
scabbed wounds
scar and bleed and
the love is lost
in the hemoglobin

there's no good love
anymore
the drink and the
drive leave you
****** and forgotten
on the side of the motel room
picking at the scabs again

there's no good love anymore
all these little treacheries
like needles in the arm
or bullets in the brain
the act is drawn out
and overplayed
the women are all torn up
and ******* and
thrown out
they sit in leg crossed
anger in the corners
bitter and apathetic

there is no good love
anymore
to **** is to ****
everyone's running away
from something
the act is drawn out
the treacheries are
bleeding us all dry
and then you're hung
up like the carcass
in the butcher's freezer

there's no good
love anymore
no good no good

She's beautiful
there on the corner,
as I leave the comfort
of the bar toward the winter's
cold.
She's standing,
sipping on a parliament,
--Perhaps not the best
choice in cigarette--
covered up in an army
green coat with a fox fur
edging the hood and
framing her face
in an idyllic beauty
cast in the smoky fog
of cigarette and winter breath.
We passed brief conversation
back and forth.
She smiled with a grimace
and impeccable grace,
she laughed with a wail.
Terribly drunk and miserably happy;
in a life here between cities and here
between careers.
Here between men she never cared for
but aways loved.
She's beautiful
as she says her goodbye
with a trained grace
and a measured smile.
She's beautiful
as she stomps out the parliament
and opens the door
to a cab back to her
hotel and back to
her half-loved men,
her half-loved home, and
her half smoked cigarettes.
She only wanted
a little relief.
She only wanted
an escape.
I am a terribly selfish man,
but for once I wish
I could have a part
in that escape.

Oh darling, I hope
you understand, I only slept
with you because you look
so devastatingly similar to
Ben Affleck, merely
for the fantasy of the
thing. You must understand
this sort of coincidence doesn't
come around all of the time.
I'm so terribly sorry if
I gave you any sort of false pretense.
Oh love, don't give me that look,
it's just I adored him in
Argo. You remember that one?
With all those cute business
men running around trying
to make a movie? Oh but love,
it wasn't a real movie, you see? And there was that Ben
of yours with that beard, Oh darling, you have
his jawline I am sure of it.
Oh sweetheart, it was a delightful film.
We must watch it together sometime, I
promise you won't regret it. Oh, look at the
clock, it is time to be getting on, isn't it? I shall
most defnitely give you a call in the coming days,
won't I? Perhaps we can get dinner,
wouldn't that be nice? Yes, yes, I think it would be.
Me and my Benjamin, oh love, we look so cute together,
there is no doubt, but I must be getting on, there are
so many things to do, you understand I'm sure?

An abandoned amusement park,
the ruins of a funhouse,
mirrors cloudy and thick with soot.
Stare at the various reflections:
warped and distorted
to gross effect, like entryways into
equal and opposite pasts.

Do you remember the way
the smiles used to rise up
from the glass and echo
against the translucent light?
Some distant tinny laughter
brings you into daylight:
a chirping bird, a memory,
a rusted bell shaking
against the fog.

You are the age that I was
when we met.
I have become an artifact:
vestigial, an older
version of a thing no longer
necessary, a tool of stone tied
with fraying string in a world
moving on toward bronze.

An archaeologist digs
up my bones and scratches his head.
He cannot fathom what they
were for except in relation
to you.

loveless *** is a
horrible thing

--not *** of passion
that's beautiful--
meet her
that night
play that game
and then share
in the reward
no,
that is artwork
there is love
in the art
of shared nonchalance

no, I'm talking
*** from that bad place
in your soul
from that bitterness
she thinks it's something
it's not
she wants you
and you want nothing
to do with it
but you're so
low
you're so beat
that everything
looks golden
it's a sorry thing
when love is
nowhere to be found
you make it
cheap and rough
in the backs
of cars
kitchen counters
quick relief
cause if it ain't that
it would be the noose
you **** just
to ****
just to put your ****
in anything
to feel something
thinking it must be better
than nothing

you're wrong
it's the worst
most cowardly of acts
running away
--and you know it
afterwards--
you're angry
you don't know why
lean out the
car door
or spit in the
kitchen sink
you're an ugly
*******
running
cause you
think you know better
running
cause you think you
can get away
a *******
sorry sucker you are
despicable
taking advantage of
everything you used
to cherish
just so you can try
and feel it again
it doesn't help
but you
can't help it
you're so low
you're so beat
so bruised
you can't help it

everything looks
like paradise

It was never as if you asked for it,
no, not really anyhow.
Sure, you wanted the attention,
perhaps a little love to
tide you over through the night.
Sure, sure, who doesn’t?
But not like this.
No one ever asked for this.

It is sitting next to a vulture,
you see them, you know them,
all dressed in skirts and high, high heels,
all of them in long legs,
all of them in soft smiles.
You can always find something
for them to have going good.
A nice laugh, eyes,
the way they hold their drink.
There’s always something,
a starting point to go off of.
From there it’s game over,
it’s the bottom of the ninth
and you’re striking out.
All they need to do is wait, circling,
sitting there, smiling with sharp teeth.

It is something simply not to
fall in love with every woman
you meet.

Often, we take care of the
death ourselves.
These women needn’t
get their hands *****.
Maimed and tortured
in the backs of bars,
bedrooms, telephone booths.
Beautiful little vultures,
do you see how they circle overhead?
winking, blowing kisses.

it was never as if you asked for it,
all of it part of a plan, an organized death;
carrion for the scavengers.
You think you have it good,
you smile along with it all.
Gripped deep into that flesh,
breaking bones, ventricles,
talons sinking into clutched skin.
And we just keep on smiling;
clueless, eager.

When the knife is in your
hands, I won't blame you.
When it kisses my throat
as you used to,
I won't blame you.
You with the kind brown eyes,
You with the silk strung hair,
You with the soft smile and
the burning fire in your chest,
I won't blame you.
Instead I will remember;
the touch that faded, but never
truly stopped burning.
The nights that ended, but never
truly left us.
The love that was extinguished, but never
truly burnt away.
There are embers even now,
smoldering in your hand around my neck,
I feel it. But the thin line between love and hate
is one I pushed you across long ago, and that
passion burns anger in your eyes, where once was love.
You gave me everything you had,
and I gave you not enough,
so when that blade comes to take
the rest,
I won't blame you.

It's not something you notice.
Years pass,
maybe you don't keep
in touch
as much as you would like.
He's the reason you're writing
and you can't even shoot him a phone call,
what kind of **** is that?
Then you see him;
maybe leaving a movie theater
or in passing at a restaurant.
His hair is long-- mangy--
eyes low and wandering,
you shake his hand,
brief hug.
He's been drinking.
You can smell it as good
and strong as
you can see it.
He smiles briefly,
spares a few words;
an old joke that
doesn't seem
funny anymore.
And that's it.
It's scary.
There goes your hero,
****** it's scary.
Everyone's old now,
and all of the hope
of the future
has replaced itself
with the tangible
harshness
of memory.
You look back
just to make sure
it's real.
Thank god
he's not standing there
anymore.

you wake up
one morning
just like
all the days before
and realize that
this bed is
the one you
will live in
the rest of your days
and realize that
this bed is
the one you
will die in
the day after that

You can’t trust a pretty woman.
Those eyes, ethereal, glittering
in focus towards your direction.
You can’t trust a pretty woman.
Caught between the burning touch of
skin on skin and the soft taste of lust
in the nape of her neck. Her hand
is in your hair, perhaps finding its
way down your back. She’s smiling
through clutched lips, perhaps nibbling
on yours. You need her for a minute
there; all pride, all dignity, cast astray
for her fix. She understands this.
She capitalizes on your momentary
weakness, slipping the knife
slowly between two of you ribs.
You feel it miles away.
You feel it, pain careening
from far off, clenching
your teeth and muscles.
You can’t trust a pretty woman.
You pull away, look
into those eyes.
Nothing.
Nothing but that smile,
and the sweet taste of lust,
dead on your tongue.

When the war fell, it fell with no warning.
Machine gun fire cut through the schoolyards
and the shopping malls, the graveyards
filling up like the churches.

When the bombs fell, they burnt out the buildings
and the shells of old homes stood like jagged
testaments toward human fallibility.
Centuries of labor reduced to dust.

When the silence fell, it was full and complete
like a thick fog atop the cityscape.
The world, a museum of history,
burnt and scarred, forever in its silent fury.

When the war fell, it fell with no warning.
I took you in my arms and locked the window,
turning into you while the night fell around us,
waiting out the end of existence.

When the world awoke, like a sigh,
we were there, breathing it in.
The smoke and the dust and the ash
bursting in our lungs, sweet scented survival.

I had been in recluse for a time.
First due to sickness of the body,
then the inevitable sickness of spirit that tends to follow.
I wanted to see no one.
I was happy to be alone
in silent isolation.
For days I lay, refusing call
from friend and foe alike,
the latter mostly being the women.
They were the ones who
pulled at me the most,
but the sickness was strong
and I remained apart from them.
When it was over I found
the friends gone and
the women gone and
the loneliness dragged in me
where it been freeing before.

What is one to do?

I walked to the park
and saw a man and his dog,
running with clutched
frisbee in mouth.
I saw a young couple
walking hand in hand
in that sacred paradise of two.
I saw pigeons peck at
scattered seed and
trees looming in dark shade
over various occupants of
the shadow,
and the sun above peering,
like me,
through wide-eyed gaze
at the all of it.
I had not known how cruelly
I had missed it,
and atop that,
I had not known how cruelly
I had not been missed.

How curious that life continues.

The days blur perilously close
to each other now.
The alcohol does not help;
helps other things.
Blunt force trauma has
swelled and colored
the gulf of skin beneath my eye,
hindering sight.
Disgust awaits the mirror;
a child shading in the
contusions of my face
with the wrong colors;
purples, sickly yellow.
Knowing how it should,
but doesn’t, look.

Faces of friends seem
to slip further away,
this memory failing
as cells burn and pop
atop the frying pan of chemicals
that I have become.
The drugs do not help;
help other things.
A tile floor, a dimming light.

Naked, she is a stranger,
and I am overflown
with nausea, apathy;
some thick welling of revulsion
pitted in the gut that I pray
is only toward her
This hatred does not help;
only any good for the writing,
ironic, unsure if there will
be a writer much longer,
anyway.

the world spins
towards eternity
while you spin on stage
beautiful
pulsing with the lights and
the music
I lay in the crowd
making faces at shadows
hoping someone would notice
eyes like magnets
pulled in your direction
dancing
laughing
the world spins and spins
but seems still
while we make eye contact
I can't look away
I am riveted to your
eyes
magnets pulled to coin
but only for
moments before
you glance away and
lean close into
a luckier man
than me

the world never
stops spinning
no matter how
beautiful the
still life may be

the past is a pitiful thing
it can consume you
if you let it
it can tear you open
and bear those
terrible secrets
you buried
to the world

the past is a pitiful thing
it can let loose
the animal
that hides
deep under
the skin
clawing
at the insides
of your mind

the past is a pitiful thing
a cross on your back
that breaks you down
vertebrae by vertebrae
ball and chain
dragging you under
holding you
until you cannot breathe
anymore

the past is a pitiful thing
because you are there
and you will never
be in my
future
again

the past is a pitiful thing
eating me alive
bleeding me out
from underneath

the past
is a
pitiful
thing
I am consumed
piece by piece
as I add
another link
to the chain
another weight
to the cross
I slowly fall
under

sick to
your stomach
early morning
outside some
bagel shop
watching the sun
rise over
the houses
and she never called
you were out late again
and it
only gets worse
and worse
these women
they want your soul
want your heart
they stop for
nothing
how do you resist?
every ounce of dignity
filtered away
through the drinks
and the tongue and the
teeth and the temptation
how do you resist?
until next thing you know
you're sick
outside some bagel
shop
hoping no one sees
waiting for her to
call
because those other women
they come for your soul
they come for your heart
but they won't find it
they won't find it
it's a thousand
miles
to the north
and you want to
hear her voice
just one more time
but she still
won't call

for awhile
the women would
tell me I didn't
smile the same anymore
they would say I was unhappy
they'd ask me what was wrong
day in and day out
they'd ask
baby what's wrong?
why don't you laugh
anymore?
why don't you play
anymore?
it was consistent
and drove me crazy
I'm fine
I told them
I'm fine
but they kept asking
sweetie what's the matter?
don't you enjoy me anymore?
aren't you glad to see me?
for weeks this went on
and eventually
I began to believe them
is there something wrong?
am I secretly depressed?
I started trying to laugh
and smile
even when it wasn't necessary
and it worked
the women stopped
asking me how I was
stopped seeing if I was ok
and eventually stopped
seeing me
at all and
now there really is
something wrong