The skies were that pretty kind of gray,
cloudy saturated with the smell of rain.
It was one of those days where you felt
six feet deep in bills you couldn't pay
and promises you couldn't keep.
Thoughts of Robert Frost because
I still have miles to go before I sleep.

please do not be afraid i will not hurt you i
think my hands are made of splinters anyway i
think my hands are made of splinters anyway

I do not fear men, I fear the intentions of them.

the punch line of this poem
is sweeter than the
smell of old jeans, grimy
under the cuff. it was a disingenuous summer
on our backs. earth worms
belly up in the sun.
writhing. pleading. drowning.
sand rubbing the wrong way on the calloused
cracked heels of summer.
neck slummed against
steering wheels.
burnt cheeks from leather.
tough.
I can’t remember, though.
fed on my memory more than on my body.
the clouds less appetizing than
cotton mouth: violently quiet

I plaster memories over faces,
Distant places in the present,
I dominate the room with the constant regrets,
Of yesterday 1978,
I pull the liquid thoughts,
Of what I can & cannot do,
Overlap it weighing,
Out the good & the good,
Don't tell me who I am,
You've got no right to be dating,
I'm your mother you'll do as I say,
Paper rain; origami,
Mailing needs to go to the vet today,
Today,
I'll have to dig her up out of her grave,
Today,
Tomorrow,
Yesterday,
Here & now,
I plaster faces over memories,
Room full of strangers could be enemies,
Get out of my house,
Get the hell away from me,
Daughter, brother, uncle,
Who are you,
It's hard being 20 when you're 93...

Tonight I sat by the corner of my room,
Dreaming of nuclear pasta and
Bottles of ultraviolet water.
I was alone, and it was bleak.
Everything around me was lost
In the sadness of everything else
Swallowing everything else.
I sat and wondered about each moment that passed
And how each moment slipped away until the next came afresh, unbound.
But I remembered the one that came before the one next, and that too was bleak.
Bleak, cold, filth, like a grotto filled with rats and dead fish.
The floor creaked as I shivered sitting there,
Life it seemed was given and not had.
I lit candle, for it seemed macabre
And I need that,
It was homage, an appeal.
The shadows about me had flickered as if alive,
A life given.
I remember wishing, wanting to be something.
For the few precious moments that passed it seemed believable.
Betwixt my cold finders and burning wax,
I could feel and light sprung briefly.
The joy was maddening, almost manic.
I had whispered ferverently that I had won,
Ever briefly,
But the voices had come back,
And those moments had passed,
I blew out the candle and wept.

They all talk of being born with skin of glass. I live with flesh of stones; no mortar holding together my pieces. One harsh touch to crumbling down into a pile of debris like houses after disaster. Houses that home the bodies of the forgotten. Houses of the people I used to love in a time when  love was something I was capable of doing. A time when blood ran through the veins that are now tangled grape vines. When the boulder in my chest once held the names of people whose lips I've once kissed. I am no longer able to hold people without them being a part of me. Whose heart was made into solid rock and built me. I am made of everyone I have broken. I remember you visited me last year, laying flowers at my feet. Crying, begging me to hold you. Begging me to take the pain away. You traced the lines of my composure, you rested your head against my solid chest. The chest that doesn't contain the resonation of a beating heart. I wanted to tell you I am sorry. I'm sorry for keeping them from you, I'm sorry that their names are etched into me. I'm sorry for being the only reminder of the ones whose absence you feared. I still remember the day the carved each death date into my side, It didn't hurt. Nothing hurts other than seeing your tears that shower onto the flowers that bring beauty to the darkness I am made of. Maybe I'll become numb someday... maybe it'll be the day they carve your death date into my surface; maybe death will look a little more beautiful.