Not even Seagram's whiskey
can tame tonight's cold starlight


and I'm ok with that.

Reminds me of your blue eyes
that summer night we met.

Right now, there is a narwhal
bathed in the same moonlight
that drifts like a gypsy
into my room.

I am sure Bukowski had nights like this:
not enough liqueur,
too many thoughts.

I just pray we keep the moon in the sky,
away from our mouths, our teeth.

Safe in my watery church,
I quietly watch warm water-drops
gather on every bit of my thin, scarred flesh.

My eyes become moons, the demi-globes
of water on my skin become moons,
my heartbeats become moons, the moon
becomes an even nearer moon  
and I pale in all that sacred bright.

that I sit in showers
because water understands.

No questions. No judgment.

It just holds me.

I confess:
I left your yellow-brick road
and followed a forest deer trail instead.

I belong to the unknown.

I awoke to a piano
lullaby ringing in my ears
and moon lyrics
whitening my lips,

goosebumps illuminate my pale skin.

The stars talk
to me: they blink
Morse-code.  I drag
my knuckles along the blue
wall, force my skin away.

I want to see bright bone,
like fresh moon in the dark.

It’s all come down to this:

prongs and damp curves
and lots of serration.
My bite and your bite
and we all
bite down.

My heartbeat pulses
like the north star
in my lower lip: I am, I am, I am.

My hair is humid; it curls like
smoke.

I toss Petoskey stones back
to Lake Michigan
where they’ll be safe from
souvenir shops,

at least until they
land on shore again.

I suppose dreams are like that,

washing up again and again
on our eyes shoreline.