a week ago wednesday
and here we are, here i am,
begging and bruised and
bursting at every touch;
the gentle threat of promises
that are not uttered
but seep in, somehow,
through the sensitive skin of my thighs
and into my bloodstream,
begging to be realized
and i dream of giants and gems on your pillow;
my mouth is consistently
failing me, and the promises hide behind
my teeth as you pry them open
with your tongue--
i melt the confessions into your
bed sheets and close my eyes
to dream

my passion is broken;
i spend my days and nights
knitting, organizing,
drinking, waiting

writing poetry hasn't ever felt hard
so maybe it's the zoloft, maybe
it's the dull repetition of days
the humdrum chaos of getting older

i want to be kissed, hard
and deep and long,
by someone with strong hands
and unwavering concentration

i am happy and quite sad
and quietly fulfilling my duties.
i'm typing this at my desk
and it feels wrong and bad

my therapist told me the antidote to burnout
is variety rather than rest--
so let the various archbishops of my life be told
that i am so ******* tired

there is a man here, he is broken,
but in his eyes there is passion,
and in between my thighs there is fear,
and i'm absolutely frozen

so tonight i'll drink,
and knit, and write e-mails,
cross my fingers and pray,
that something magical happens

the fan on the lowest setting
still disturbs the decade of dust
enveloping the books that formed
my adolescence;
the disorganized organisms and
******* that have dissolved
in these sheets and these short days
haunt my dreams;

how do i sleep,
knowing that the past future present
perpetuate the block universe of
betrayal and boredom and
baby cries, my mother's eyes,
the abdication of adulthood
and absolution in the absence
of harrowing hope.

i broke my own heart
three states over and now
working and waiting for the
answer to be revealed;
my teenage self says that
sadness is my truest form,
but my soul knows there is more

it’s sticky on the porch tonight,
crickets, cries, clouds of nothing;
the hum of ac units and boredom
and the ache of my thighs,
shallow drags of tar as I wait
for the man who loves me
to really love me.

sometimes our home feels hollow,
but maybe it’s just my heart
wishing for more than the repetition,
the waiting, the dull pulse of waking
moments in the heat of the end
of everything;
but maybe I just need
for the man who loves me
to really love me

pencil shavings and falling snow,
records on the phonograph
playing songs from a lifetime ago

my body, my heart, is sore
and the melancholy mutations
of my future force me to burrow

deep, deep into the familiarity of
razors and a phone that no longer
rings, because there's no one to call

the promise of heaven;
a notion I have ignored
until right now--
I'd give my entire life over
to an unknown god
in the hope of a sisterly reunion
eternally in the sky--

the first forces my hand
to these keys, to these cadences,
to the heartbreaking repetition
of melancholy moments--
the comfort I find in you is
intoxicating, illuminating,
my heartstrings are at your will as
the scenes of my life,
carved into old wood from the junction
by the grace of your hands;
precious in execution, precarious in practice,
persecuting my every thought and action;
yet my intention is pure in form: