Victor,
          Vanquished
                              both perished,
                                                     in due course.

I

We sit on a tailgate pointed toward
the hills, where life ripples down the slopes
gathers in pools of the creek and begins again
to climb up the peaks and tree trunks on the
other side. It colors the breaths we take
green.
Children run here, learn their legs, as stalks
graze their shoulders and block their
view. They get dizzy as rows rush by.
We rein in our bovine friends here, watch
them jump and kick, see them call in
spring

II

We walk between rows of highly stacked cement and exhale smog that drifts
upwards to
join the cloud of soot.
We walk among so many abrasive shoulders. We get
hung up on abrasive personalities.
A gray wave in a black sea we’re vapidly
drifting. Legs move quickly to stay afloat.
swimming. Swimming always. Swimming further.

III

We sit for pictures with clogged eyes and stuffed chests
We coo at portraits of masks and dummies
We write books for laughs and money and friends
We read a little to find the romance and sorrow
and lay cold on the slab while our own pages turn.

IV

We pass out of porcelain faces with their tightly
drawn eyes that cast gazes over shoulders, homes
of last night’s kisses. We pass out of the electrical
current of youth
numbed and still alive
with eyes that look like stained glass windows of the
Church of Holy Suffering.


V

We wait for Sunday night to turn the dial to the Blues. We keep throwing something for an animal to pick up and return.  We string beads and sell them for redemption.

VI

We think of our friends. They’re draped in a future,
warmed with hot blood rushing through their veins,
slamming fists to tables, pronouncing their minds.
ripping off dresses, sharing their madness.
tossing paint to canvas, showing their hearts.
asking questions to startle, proving their love.

VII

We think of our parents.
dead and gone, dead to us, dead by self-proclamation -
Is their blood cold and still in their withered veins?
Have they their fill of slamming fists and ripped dresses and tossed paint and startling questions?

VIII

We are sad.

I say my grace behind gritted teeth and furled brow.
The anger in me; pent-up somehow.
To vow my soul since child's belief.
Forced upon me like broccoli and beets.
Taught to believe and not to suspect; that what they tell me are lies about death.

The air is smooth and warm,
the breeze wraps around you
and seems to fill you with a rare kind of contentedness;
specks of infinity freckle the navy sky
and the streetlights glow against the buildings,
like something you've seen in paintings;
her hand is small and a little sweaty against yours
but you wouldn't let go,
not even to grab something out of the nearer pants pocket;
the town is empty, asleep, quiet,
and the noise of your feet on the pavement is almost offensive
but it fills the silence between you,
that lies in the small gap between your arms;
she's so close,
you missed her
and you know she missed you
but you pretend not to notice the way she keeps turning to look at you,
and you suppress the smile that surfaces each time you catch her eye
until you find yourselves in the alley,
away from the lights
and while pressed up against that wall,
pulling her closer and tasting every sweet thing she's said
and every laugh she's chased your jokes with
you pretend to understand
the complex perfection
of the simplicity and beauty
that is a summer night.

Kindred spirit, the privilege is mine, it's just that I,
I never finish because there is nothing going on, nothing to go on.

All right, all right, all right,
you're right,
I don't write as much as I used to,
but in all fairness (to myself)
I feel a bit more loose.

Never mean to,
but I guess I argue
a lot in order to hide
how much I really don't care;
Celina said it's not okay
but
that at least I know
it's insulting.


I only want to be in my body
when your feathery fingers graze my spine.
That tone an angel loaned
to you can ripple through
the void, make a soft,
translucent puddle out of reality,
can you see me
on the other side?

Don't say I'm angry,
it's just that
no one has ever really tried
to impress me, so I'm scared
I guess.

Remember you are here,
don't be weird about the types of things
sentimentality will bring,
will string along to the
forefront of an open sore;
no one pours the sink a whiskey
drink until the girls are crying out above the stars,
better yet, stirring them from afar
for their own faults, for being
fickle with love
and their own hearts.

You know I don't sleep much,
You know I don't dream of such
pretty things but I could imagine
how you, in a different life,
were gifted eternal wings.

Those that brought you to me.

I would weep

if I wasn't made of stone.