I taught him English words,
taught him "gamble" and "****."
I taught him "lullaby," and he taught me
his favorite French pick-up line:
something about thieves.

My clumsy tongue and chapped lips,
my Southern twang
made him laugh.

We went to a show together
-  a punk band with a ****** name –
and he left early,
left me with a wink.
I fought for my life in that concrete room,
gasping for air,
swinging arms wildly.
The next morning he kissed all my bruises.

His gap-toothed smile is a poem I wish I had written.

There is a stranger sleeping on your floor
but you wanted an artist.
Beautiful things aren't easy.

I am tamed, comfortable.
You are wild.  Smoke slips over my nose
when I think of you.  
Alcoholic sweat, fingers down my throat
and I am North,
northbound.
Ivy League meets the Yellow Rose.

I am here
I am staying here
I am the same I am unchanging
I am a ******* perpetual
motion machine please strand me
on a desert island I will survive
by eating sand
I am here
I am staying here
with my back to the sun my skin will burn
I will curse the recessive traits
of my father

I will regress into the days of caves and
I will paint my face
on the walls and
I will paint my face
on the stones so
thousands of years from now French boys
can find them and wonder
am I the missing link
I am the weakest link you can find me
if you try
your fingernails can scrape the rock but
the earth will cry
and tell you I was never born but
if you scatter the bones
of your fathers all will be forgiven:
for God so loved the world he gave his
only forgotten son
and I sometimes
see his face on the walls
and

oh god I am here I
am staying here
I am the same I am unchanging.

It’s gotten too heavy, child.
Much too much
for your weakened knees,
your delicate wrists.

You’ll never be a dancer
or a poet.  A singer, a lover,
a sister, or the President:
Baby Boomer lies. Baby,
we're going nowhere

and it’s heavy.
Heavy like your breathing,
heavy and full
like your blue moon eyes.

Hand over hand, day climbed into night -
our noses bloodied -
our eyes bright with the glare
of neon signs.

Empty laughter escapes from the lips
of a woman, like little
drips
from a gutter.
Gutter hands, gutter voices.  Is this
our Renaissance,
sealed with a kiss?

On and on the world turns,
and in her hand a cigarette burns.

Breathing in humidity and
a thousand evaporations:
alcohol and enmity
and sensual sidelong glances.

“I had the taste of blood and chocolate in my mouth, the one as hateful as the other.”

I am reduced to:  
Ten fingers.
Twenty-eight white teeth.
Two firm arms and two strong legs and

three
parallel
lines.

Holding a prayer between our teeth,
we
      slid
             down.
Knees scraped, sand in our shoes.
Across the phone line, other voices.

The sound of traffic;
my hips, my shoulders
become highways.