"What's wrong with you?" he asked through a chuckle, and then it hit me. I knew exactly what was wrong with me. I was passionate about things, and never about people. I had loved people, but always platonically, or platonic and gilded with a crush or wrapped in lust that I always brushed off with innuendos and flippancy. I had never loved another person the way I loved twisting my brain around a calculus problem or constructing a flame chart. I had thought of people in a romantic sense more than I had evaluated people for science bowl, but lust and love had never consumed me as the issue of organizing practice and evaluation and cuts within the handspan of a month. I always fell in love with things, and never with people, and that's why already, not even 16 yet, I've reconciled myself to die alone.

High on the I-40
Been up since six no *** and
Fighting

****** in trucker motels, facing west.
cabbies lit, white plate gifts
for the barefoot women  
the wet haired

siamese, their black soles
From room to room

I could be a deity
I could be a ghost
and stay

to watch the sky  
to relish the exit music
I wouldn’t be jealous  

I am the traveling type –
an ambassador, a fog

the ledge of an open mouth, snug
fingers under doors

there is one for whom I was made

and another by name by
line by go on, goodnight

I could take all the showers
and still be alright -  

I would take all of them, and still be alright.

Here dead we lie
Because we did not choose
To live and shame the land
From which we sprung.

Life, to be sure,
Is nothing much to lose,
But young men think it is,
And we were young.

i have stretch marks
and dry skin
and when i cry, mascara turns my face dark
half the time i want to take an iron to my stomach
or a scissors to my thighs
but i am not a butcher
and the one time i burned myself,
it wasn't what i needed.
i just want disposable cameras
and cotton candy pink hair
and sidewalk cracks to walk along
after holding a piece of glass
filled with a natural herb.
vertebrae of small mammals
bless this house
i'm rooted to these sheets
i can't get out.

i began collecting my hair in April
it sits on the tops of pillows
weaves itself onto scalps of my loves
sets itself on bathroom floors and
swirls onto the walls of showers
wraps itself around your tender parts
and leaves me pounds lighter.
i find it on this very page
soft and breakable and shines in lamplight
that is harsh
like how you pulled the strands
because i asked you to.
i shed so much because i secretly wish to vanish
and my vanity  has not taken over
and my vapor sits still behind my gums
even when i am left alone
taking bristles to my head
to relax because
i have no one to play with me
and no one to look into
when the sky is a combination of both day and night.

It's 7AM
     where you are
and where you are
         I am not.

So time
does not matter
because its passing brings you
no closer to me
                         (nor me to you)

All that matters is that
I am   here
and
you are       there
and I am
missing you
                           (again).

Hello
this is a short message
written this Sunday morning
on March the first

the rain keeps coming from the west
non-stop for two days
risk of flooding
government says.

I miss you - had another dream
driving in sunshine.
It's the sun I miss
mostly - and then of course
there is your friendship
to treasure and to hold.

I hope you're having fun
on your quad.
They say four wheels
are better than two
I'm not so sure
how could you
have Zen and the art of
quad biking -
impossible?

I see you have given in
to peer pressure or whatever
and made your modest entry
in the ******* book
I had a quick look.
It looks
OK.

Now I suppose Twitter
and MySpace
where you can compose
even wittier
sayings.

You're a true master
of Wisdom
with a capital W
But it is not that
you struggle to say something
wise
it comes spontaneously
best when blurted out
immediate response
like:
"they throw babies in dumpsters
in your country too, Janet?"

She'd never forgotten it
as it
was such a strange and powerful thing to say

by the way
I googled your name
and you have loads of coverage
mostly under AHEC and Best.

This is just a few short lines
to say you are on my mind
and in my heart
as always
yours
me.