each letter rolled
'round my
tongue, wet
with let's
say ess and
ess indeed
('tween you
and me)
shy one
letter, YES
eeeeGADS
whoop-eeee
(d)eee
easy like
me
say pretty
pleeeese
ex
lover
ex
con
ex
marks
the
spot
yes please
***
(***!)

I can't I can't I simply
cannot live with this
emptiness (and why
didn't anyone tell me
how empty it would
be?) hell, I didn't expect
a box of chocolates (melted
stuck to the mailbox) or
even a limp dozen roses
or a farewell cordially
written by the hand
that knows well how to
cordially say goodbye
but I did expect something
and never mind why-
I expected maybe for
the sky to change color
or for each and every leaf
on each and every tree
to turn around in mourning
in deference to some wild
thing that not even nature
can explain, me and my
heart torn away like bark,
undressed of love and left
with only my nakedness
I thought I would feel it
in the air, come sweeping
down and defining each
of my breaths, each one
a death to me when really
I deserve no less than
a two mile snake of black
that runs through every red
light and leaves nothing
but road rage in it's wake
(hear me snicker between
the walls, ceiling, and floor
of my new and fabulous tree)
There is no special ceremony
no cake to cut, no carrying
this great loss over a threshold
like a bride, like a widow
all in one day, this death
like so many others that
folks just want to turn their
heads away, this death
like so many others, an
embarrassing display

What I wanted
For a home,
This artifice
Bone for
Bone
Thankful
When the creak
Of winter breaks
It's hold and
Thin green
Stems
Hide the broken
Parts
Home

She has a heart that beats like the constant rolling of the waves
That kicks against her mother’s chest as to always assure her
“I am here, Mom”
Her mother hears,
while stretching out her swollen legs in the bath.

She has bones as fragile as a rose stem
Her eyes drooping like petals
She plucks her mother’s breast
With her sleepy mouth as to always assure her
“I need you, Mom”

She touches the buds
of her blossoming fingers to her mother’s heart,
stumbles with her pudgy little legs,
teeters, slips, crashes down to the floor
And still manages to avoid the cracks in the
Pavement,
on her mother’s aching back
As if to assure her
“I love you, Mom”

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
They told her
As she dug her fingernails deep into her skin
Like her flesh was made out of playdoh
In the uncautious hands of a toddler.
Her life balances dangerously on her tongue,
steadied only by a love she will not swallow
For she has been told
“Too much sugar will rot your teeth.”

when she was eight years old
she
asked her mother
have you seen the girl with
lashes like butterflies against sharp cheekbone branches?
a dandelion sprouting from sludge covered gutters and streets
streets, where you feel that bitter bland nothingness in your stomach

it feels buttery to stare at her:
see how snow outstretches arms and twirls tippy toes, envies her grace
see how balloon sized raindrops pop, target the freckles on her arm
see how her forehead crinkles when she concentrates, nothing more than a beacon
proclaiming she trickles with stars

when she was eight years old
her parent's violent protests slipped bruises under her skin like pennies in a coin slot
but they could not contain the celestial girl tucked under her ribcage.

she would still look at her like she was the breakfast sun on a saturday
whistling by the creak, catching glimpses of dresses from behind the legs of trees.
see how this is special love, sweet as strawberry fields under soft sun
they would never feel on their forked, sour tongues

tis your fate
lick it off a plate
proffered to you
under the table
and between
your knees
(love comes in at
at the eye and
quickly
heads south
you see)
you there, you
with the mouth
pretty please
open wide
and guide a fella
straight inside
(love saves the
day, not yours but
someone's)
anyway