Please don't look at me the way you do,
with those crystal blue eyes burning right through me.
Don't ask me about people I used to love
whenever we get drunk.

Please don't touch me when you lean close
with perfect hands that I don't think have ever harmed anything.
Don't express such tenderness to me
while thinking you were critical of yourself.

Please don't talk to me the way that you do
reminding me of the dreams that I left a long time ago.
Don't ever kiss me softly
and ask what it is that happened to me.

Please don't think that I might be the right man
for you, because I can't live up to that.
Don't let me start hoping
that meeting you wasn't an accident.

Please stop being the person I've not been looking for
and happened to stumble into.
Don't let me fall in love with you.

So here's the real question.....can I get drunk enough to have sixty pounds of Dutch courage to think I've got the ***** to start submitting the crap I write to these six badass UK Journals that supposedly want "New and Fluid"? Yeah, I can do that. I can be the drunk, no-*****-left-to-give American with a chip on my shoulder and a drawl when I have one too many shots. Especially since that's exactly what I am anyway.

Limoges
the driver said
you can get out
and stretch
your legs
for awhile

so we got off
the coach
and walked
about the place

Miriam beside me
her red hair
in a mess
her tight fitting
blouse about
to explode

you hear
about these places
then you're there
and it all seems
so ordinary
like you have
waited to see
something
and it just seems
so flat
she said

I don't get excited
about anything
I take it
as it comes
sights
views
music
*****
girls
I said

am I
just a girl?
nothing special?
she asked

there's only
one you
only one
red head
with your
lovely eyes
and smile
I said

O yes
of course
what are you
after?

beer and burger
I said

and me
what about me?

you can have
a beer and burger
too

no I meant
what do you
think of me?
you were all
over me last night
in the coach
with the lights low
and that Mozart music
on the radio
flowing out  

I recalled
I had been
and not only
because of her
and the Mozart
and her lovely eyes
and her perfume

but all together
all that and me
and her and life
and her softness

we can
have it here
she said
pointing to a bar

ok
I said

so we entered
the bar
and ordered
beer and burger
and she sat there
opposite
her tight blouse
still waiting
to explode

and a radio played  
some French music
and Miriam smiled
and I wanted
to kiss her

but I didn't
I just sat
and waited
for the beer and burger
and watched
and enjoyed her.

~

Winter’d wind doth cradle
O’ the daylight glow
Found to bend of spilling fragrance
Filtered o’er the earth below

Why the birth of seasons green
Claim yon saplings cast a’ ground
Brought o’er lonely sacrifice
O’ the whistling autumn’d sound

Splintering amidst the bands
Needles o’er the pines they seed
Following lo’ destined path
Of this earthen soil to feed

Days of time, o’er shortened length
Fell defeat O’ final stand
Feel the grasp on captured breeze
*Deeply held in autumn’s hand

I ain't lookin for anybody to save me
won't even accept the twirling garbage
that some women have tried to spoon
feed me after they figured out
I loved them in spite of the nasty ****
they confided in me.
You bet "I'll be your back door man"
and I'll actually possibly maybe wake
up the next morning without feeling any
kinda disgust towards you or myself since
I think I've thrown that unwanted baby
of puratinistic sticky ***** out the
window like I should've thrown out
my backwards medieval wanting for
a fairy tale called true love.
Yeah and life rolls on like a highway into
the pearly reflectors in the road
beckoning on into the dire consequences
of knowing that you want to love somebody
but understanding that all you will ever be
to that woman you've wanted to be with
for a year since you met her on accident
and that one day she found a yellow tweety bird
which had tried to **** itself on a glass building
we both worked in and you in your shyness refused
to pick up and put into a tree till she was gone;
is one weird ex-army ******* unless you
get you **** together and explain to her that
you don't want to be without her anymore.