To sleep, my mind impounded,
My heartbeats, bass, lowly-sounded,
Each beat, a note upon mine ticking meter.

An unfamiliar feminine voice, not hers, poses,
Questioning noises, issued from a blackened figure.

This human-shaped metronome,
A singular inquisitor,
In rhythm, but not in rhyme,
Gravely announces repeatedly,
T'is your time, t'is your time,

Each pronouncement,
Spoken n'spiked distinctly:

"Your prose now ended,
last-gentled sweetly."

Wondering still, is it just sleep or truly death,
This forlorn eve, to go, to meet and greet,
Without having said my finale prayer.

Unprepared, thus with unaccustomed flair,
"Unfair" doth me protest, a newly-minted naysayer,
My book incomplete, black-brother frere!

If death indeed you be, my fellow cloaked-rider,
Then make me a one-last-time composer.

Let me whisper once more inside her,
A last poem of the greatest brevity,
But of the greatest import, laden heavy!

Good bye, my love, goodbye....

This closing writ, my finest ever...

spring’s breath hums on your face
sits upon a fencepost, hawk-like and stoic

its infant rays nuzzle, organized and coded
its beauty, slightly bothersome
to the man who mistook god’s warmth as permanent

all planets in space operate between two foci
and ted hughes wrote “crow” as a bedtime story
for the lovers he abandoned  

what I’m trying to say is this:
spring will leave earth
like a two-faced lover
but never forget the monday you shared with her
as she breathed winter’s hangover
down your holy throat

for that is something memorable

the shock
of bodies—
a sound
rippled in
cheetah lightening
to wings of blasted
flowers taught
red
yellow
lavender sky—

butterfly wound
festering pollened
breeze to
where your
mouth
is opened
breath
tongue
and twisted cord—

opaque bee
twirling with
opaque stamen
lit
in a wall of
rushing
waterfall—a
perfect contrast
of forgiveness

spark the flask—the vitality
of natured *****
and

tears (they fall again)

releasing the bloodied heron from
sleep—

yesterday,

I drew a lead around you
and harnessed your heart
like a dog and (for the first time)
you

were on your own,
schmaltzy from

daddy’s liquor.

this

blindfolded euphoria
creeping in channel 99’s

static—how

I’d drink you whole
until my toes swelled up

rough and one-rooted

12/7/2017

The month was over
heart in my hands
pulsing, bleeding

crawling down and off my
fingers
ruby, garnet

all over
the muddy riverbank.
the summer night's air-

still, holding.
it was unknown,
so were you

remembering the
look you gave me
as i walked away

you thought i didn't see
days turned into weeks
soon enough

like always, of course
and again
i watched you walk away

forever and ever.
you did not look back like I did.
I did not expect you to.

December I sit on the top of the slide, looking at
playground monkey bars

I laughed when
you hopped on
looking at the brook we

flung cigarettes at.
I wonder why no one has killed me yet in life

With something as simple
as- placed firmly in
my liver- a knife.

the biting air freezing
the tips and tops
of my fingers

the lights of the cars
pass over my head in lines, through metal slats

thinking of you:
a brick to my face,
to my brain, please.

so I can start over,
comatose, new and
unknown to the world.

In three weeks
New Years
will come

you will laugh with your friends miles away
i, sick sad abandoned

will frown deeply
at the television
and make myself empty promises

that
others will
break for me eventually.

Before I lit a match,
I turned on your light.

Before I bought a book,
I took you into my arms.

Before I had her printed
on my skin,

I knew she was you.*

It was night. There was
nothing in the sky—not

even black. The world
was a pale gray, and the

bats—the color of smoke.
Then you came—a woman

from space, dusk
with yellow armor. The

moon resting on ocean. Your
halo, a burning wreath of

gold. You, finally. You who
I’d been waiting for—the girl

who sneezed the black, the one
who said, “goodnight.” You,

my moon and stars.

Only the strongest dark lines
cut the vision of your
profile. Your visage—a blazing ball
of gas—atoms emitting light in
every version day.

Smell of lilacs bloom
to no end—a nebulous glow of
purple, perfect, and unperturbed—your
poem of lilies with caution tape
snug in my backpack—
your pollen hundreds of miles
away—a firebrick orange
sung again and again. A cotton
blow unlike anything colorful
—a white puff of dandruff before
the rain—a bouquet for
your spring stitched
stem by stem.

Slightly, brightly
Amarillo heavens, whispered
Lather,
Lavender clouds, and your
Butterfly belly button
Soapy on the car hood. I
Cast my brain's map wide
And narrow.
I can't make time--one thousand
Years feels like one day; one heart--
A desert of sand while wind
Pushes in violet patterns.
those
Spots on your eyes
Never so warm--cinnamon.
And you know how I'd stir
Your coffee.