-
crack another thermometer open
on the broken bathroom sink,
pour yourself into me like mercury
and pan the bed of my stomach
for multitudes of gold flecks
like however many myriads
of sickly pill bottles in your
dresser drawer of socks.
-
see all
the shredded speckled petals
i ripped up before i'd let
the deer get to them;
i'm colorblind,
and i can't tell
the sun's reflection from plastic,
or tulips from the broken
pottery outside my front door.
-
and far least from another beer,
and another fifth of whatever
could be fit under your shirt
-
and never a chair pulled up to speak,
from standing like a soapbox
more suited to cleaning
than to preaching.
-
pour yourself into me like mercury,
because it's so much easier
when my veins weigh me down
to distraction, than being able
to think of hydrangeas again.
-

porque usted nunca entendió
lo que quise decir cuando dije:
siempre estás en mis sueños;
como verano y limonada,
quemaste mi piel y eras
agrio en labios secos;
finalmente yo corto la pulsera
que me diste, y la corazon
de la musica se está desvaneciendo.

es marzo,
y le hice una promesa a mi mismo;
llovió la última vez que lloré por ti
y nevó cuando me olvidó;

ya no estás en mis sueños nunca mas.

because young men are never good to their bodies.

i can see where we stood,
slanted tin sheets on the second story,
commercial street lit up with excitement
brought about only by the prospect
of another friday night.
the moon wasn't out then,
but if you laid back just right,
the metal and the cold and the stars
made it better than the moon,
and that's what i would call it
if anyone ever asked.

(now) i can see where we stand,
like marble giants skipping disci,
or stones by the lakeside,
where august on the shore
can't throw enough
to change the season,
and as much as i'd like to blame the kid,
it's not his fault summer isn't here yet.

and there's some weird comfort
in being around you;
maybe it's the crazy talking,
or whatever was in that bottle,
or maybe it's because you smoke
the same cigarettes as i do,
or because you ditch money
faster than the interest rates.

*******, it's empathy.

you've been sad like i've been sad,
and that's what it boils down to.

sometimes it seems as though the cars
passing my street won't drive quickly enough,
and that the strands of christmas lights
aren't strong enough to support my weight.
                   
so for now i'll settle for forgetting to look both ways,
and perhaps later, i will invest in some sturdier rope,
all the better to scale my own cliffs of despair,
and face off with the spanish swordsman
reclining on the tip of my tongue,
matching rapier in (left)hand.

if victory finds its way to me, i'll continue to confound
in meeting the brute within, he who pounds boulders,
whose heart is like tourmaline in a granite casing,
and who claws at pristine arms in convulsion.

if i am once again triumphant, i shall travel further,
and face the shards of wit cutting through my irises,
except i am not as the dread pirate, the man in black,
i am vulnerable, i have no resistance, i am broken down
as easily as i am built up, and it is truly a gamble.

if, by some miraculous stroke of good fortune, i continue further,
i shall be disappointed, for at the end of the trials lies tribulation,
no flower princess for me, no blindfolded beauty,
only that **** noose of christmas lights again,
suspended from a macabre and rickety structure
seemingly crafted from the same material as the road to hell,
destination identical.