I fight with god and whoever
Keeps spitting truths at me like peanut shells
**** the doctors
And **** the first time my dad decided to drink
And especially **** the last time I decided to drink.

He did this to himself and I love him
And I’ll pay for his mistakes
But my pockets are empty

I eat **** sandwiches with stoicism
I praise the autocracy of the medical field
That told me dad is dying
And I should too.

Miracles don’t happen to people like me
And families like ours
In towns like this.

I’m dying with you
Stage 4
I’m dying with you.

I’ve got nothing to lose
Until I found I had more.

**** your age and **** my youth
**** Medicaid
And **** the truth.

My Notre Dame is burning
Let the bells ring
Of ancient fools.

My dad looks me in the eyes
And asks me how long he has to live
Is it terminal?

The Jim Beam speaks back to me
Of fathers come and go
And I lie.

I lie with my lips glued to my teeth
And nostrils flared
And with mimicked repose.

My spire collapses
And I book flights to Paris
So I don’t have to answer questions.

How can I take care of you
When Notre Dame is burning?

Daddy, someone has to put it out and I’m sorry.

Pressing the weeds that you pulled
In an ancient book like it were a bouquet
Presented with gusto and pride
As bright as the pest itself.
A cool bed and a cool temperament
Leaves me listless.
For once I’d like to eat and feel full.
I eat with my eyes the appetizer of your figure
And the breadth of your chest
But I never reach yours.
I am hungry and wanting
Beyond *** and repair
Beyond curt courtship
And cold companions.
And at some point I’m tempted to pull the rope,
Unsure if it will drop the curtain or the floor
And not knowing if you will want an encore
And filled with trepidation.
Why do we whisper?
It makes me want to cry.
A little louder now, love
Tell me what you want
If you want anything at all.

Eyes of blue
And skin of laurel
Serene indifference
Meaningless quarrel

Body still
But panic sober
A lifetime of stuck
And a lonesome October

A 911 call
And a lack of composure
An empty syringe
And a long for some closure

An absent friend
Giving a cold shoulder
An absent friend.
Wake up now, Laura

Calloused hands that give and take
Both to your detriment
That write and hold
Empty promises
I can’t tell whether
You’re grazing my cheek
Or wringing my neck.

Every moment a growing distance
Whether it be the speed of the plane
Or your apathy.
Your silence still makes the sound
Of a belt being unfurled from your waist
and I cower with trepidation.  
Treat me the way you mean to -
Be as cruel as you intend
Clearly and with no distractions.
**** me and then never talk to me
Until you’re hungry,
Because I can decipher by now
The language of your disinterest.
Stop trying to dress it up -
In “how are you” and
Dispassionate kisses
As shallow as 2% milk.
I’m tired of finding reasons
For you to grip me a little tighter
And say my name more often
And hold me in the dark
And look my way in a crowded room.
I wish you would do anything,
like you really meant it,
whether or not it would hurt.

In Budapest I’d take a lover,
We’d meet outside a ruin bar,
And I’d notice as we stumbled
On the cobblestones
He walked beside me and not ahead.
And we’d **** on cotton sheets
On a twin-sized mattress
In a hostel full of friends
I haven’t met yet
While the city pulses outside
In an unruly procession.
He spoke into my wild hair
That until we must leave Budapest,
We would be wed.
I asked him what would become of us
The next day.
A smile plays on his lips, bemused
With the taut delicacy of stringing a harp,
He tells me, “we will part.”
And I’ve never known a kinder partner
Or a gentler fate
That feels like the dissolution of sea foam
Rather than the crashing of a wave
Threatening to drown you.
He would tell me he loved me
And it was easier to believe from
Someone I’ve known an hour
Than someone I’ve known a year.  
We didn’t leave bed the next day until
Late afternoon.  
We kissed simply and quietly
And yet it drowned out the whispers of the Danube
We clung to each other’s sides
The way a cobweb sticks to the sleeve of a sweater
Sure, soft, and smothered.
The next day I had a bus to catch
And tired eyes.
We checked out quietly and held hands
Until I had to go right
And he had to go left
And we did so with one last caress and kiss
And that was that
And it was the greatest love I had ever known
And I wonder if it were because of him
Or because the future wasn’t around
To complicate it
And that I didn’t know the difference
Between loving with abandon
Or without it.

i saw a homeless man
fidget with a twist tie
the way i fidget with my rings
crossing bourbon street
alive with the fare-thee-well
of sober times.
with weak conviction,
i admit the stars crossed one of us
and cut the other a break.
we are both drunk,
we are both merry.
we are embroiled in the microcosm
New Orleans has to offer
one day a year, guilt-free.
he jingles his cup for coins
and i show my **** for beads
and i will be bedecked in glitter
and jewels,
and he will sleep on the stoop.
but we both find our shoes drenched
in the mysterious gray waters
that plague that street tonight.
with the guise of my beads
i feel like a queen
but it would make no difference
if i were a homeless man
fidgeting with a twist tie
on bourbon street,
jingling my cup for coins
and sleeping on the stoop.

he bets 7 to 1 odds
you'll lose your roll
forfeit your money
or forfeit your soul

a crooked smile
you haven't seen in a while
you want to trust
but you know will beguile

a crossed promise and a bit lip
a shrouded truth and honest fib
he means nothing he says
- but everything he did.

my grandmother was born
a squalling baby
in the sun of the Ukraine,
her mother too young
and a father too violent.
she led her through the wheat fields
whose long tresses tangled
in her pale ankles
to a pond behind the farm
where she tried to drown her.
a passerby intervened
and raised my grandmother
with his wife up the hill
on their own.

she spent her life
not cursing the hands
that sought to destroy
when they ought to have held
but thanking the hands
that pulled her
from the freezing water
on a crisp morning
in the fields of the Ukraine
lungs still full of breath
and eyes full of trust

Every crumb, a cake
Each flower, a bouquet
I hoarded tiny treasures
And tucked them safe away
And though I knew you’d go
I’d always hoped you’d stay
I had interpreted your vice
As a tender, warm embrace.

Red rover, red rover
heart of gold
and bed of clover.
chip in the pocket
and twenty months sober.
times moving fast
and I wish it were slower.
an old open wound
that longs for some closure.
a day in the sun
and a night in exposure.
twenty-five years
yet it's already over.

We are expired prime
with nothing left but ribs,
a derelict butchery.
I gave myself 30 more seconds
to count every line in your hands
before I left
but it would never be enough time
for you have so many wrinkles
from pinky promises
and crossed fingers.
I will remember
your slumbering corpse
as nothing but idyllic
and ignore the temperament
the early morning would imbue you with,
cross and out of sorts.
You will become a year to me.
I will remember the landmarks
but no longer the husk of your laugh
or the salt of your sweat
or the look in your eye
while you roil in the midst
of hysterical laughter.
You would never
come down from your pedestal
to find me.  
I studied this man
as though he were art
and not history,
blissfully unaware
the course was pre-requisite
to heartache.

You are nothing
but cheap thrills
and a midnight laugh.
A half cigarette
and nothing new.

You make no promises
but a thousand excuses.

You can name all 50 states
and their capitols,
but you never learned how to love.

The water of your knowledge
is above a sieve of apathy
and I don't know if any
of the bits left are
worth anything at all.  

You are not who you say you are
but you are who I know you are,
and I am what I am
and that is an afterthought
after thoughts
not worth having.

Your sleeping breath sounded
Like the whistling
Of a crisp and frigid wind
And it’s howls between
The narrow and somber buildings
In a slumbering winter city
Whose chatter is smothered
Beneath a gentle and bitter
January snow.

The glass fogs cold from a muddy brew
Matching the sweat on your brow like morning dew

Falling into love and falling into routine
A waterlogged man seeking a mountain’s dream

Termites gnaw at the wood in my head
The chores, the anger, the existential dread.

A penny for your thoughts, a dime if you know me
A quarter for investment, a dollar for apathy.

We tried to meet
on a cosmic plane
and that is why I loved you.
Because we believed in
magic and conspiracies
yet you had the audacity
to believe soulmates,
were disingenuous
and phantoms were real.

A soul on fire
A-light,
A-glow.
Where fate tempts me
I dare not go.

A hand so warm,
Gentle,
Alive.
Tender embraces
welcome brisk goodbyes.

A skip in step,
flutter
in chest
I dare not hope
When I know best.

I have found a reason to
Spite the freckles on his back
Like china speckled with mud
And I despise the way his
Eyes bore into me
Like an earthworm in loam
digging.
There’s nothing to find here.
His small mouth has a poignant humidity as
It makes its best attempt to consume me
Leaving slug-like trails in its wake
of devour
across my brittle shell.
I sling an arm across my eyes lazily
So I don’t have to see his hunger
But still smell his desperation
he pounds into me like
his sour *** will prove to me something.
His fingernails dig into my shoulders
And he’s trying to pull me inside of himself.
I cannot occupy you.
It is the only way he thinks
He can make me his
But I belong to nobody.
I endure encounters like
I endure watching clouds roll by
Softly on my back with no utterance.
You cannot rule me with your passion
Your wanting kisses and timid bites
Leave your mouth bitter
And alone.

you are the ripple of a stream
you are a passing-by dream
you are the hum in my throat,
you are an after-**** smoke
you are the sweat in my bed
you are the noise in my head
you are the letters i write
you are the receding night
you are the smell of cologne
you are a king been dethroned.

somebody told me this kind of love
was alright.
it's just not the kind you make.
why burn cities down
when you can warm your hearth?
the winds of adventure gust
in the sails of a sinking ship
and do i pray for god to stop
or for a life raft
or do i drown either way?

blocks of wood that ought to be
bird houses
and cards that ought to be
games
and hands that ought to write
and a heart that ought to love
and a brain that ought to work.
suffocated by half-baked ideas
and canceled plans
and smothered by
dreamless sleep and unfinished projects.
defunct and derelict
the artists grip
slips off the chisel
and nothing looks like the blueprint.
i spent prestige like coins
on a half moment's respite
and a half moment turned to an hour
and an hour turned to two years
cowering;
i am cowering in my own shadow
of what i thought i was
though i know not it's shape.
i don't deserve to be capitalized.
fluidity longs to take shape
but slouches in the mold
a failed and brittle thing.
my neck is bolted on as
i cannot look forward or back.
my respite is over
yet my palms are empty
and my fingers are idle still.
i can only manage to wave.
adieu, my friends,
adieu.

The precipice of tense-held breaths
gives way to heated sighs and heaving chests
And long before dawn does break
the evening lingers, long in wait
A compass leads us, waterlogged
through obscure forest and cold damp fog
The needle spins with absurd grace
to each wobbling step and choice of fate
Every direction is pointed wrong
When you know the rhythm, heard the song.
And why use it on paths trodden well?
Seeking baubles and jewels and bridal veils.
Walking in circles, for hours it seems
over crushed velvet and heated dreams
The determination of a scholar, wild
Wasted on the ambitions of willful child
The crystal ball need not be
a window to the future foreseen
For one can simply turn around
to see the future, all lain out.

I quiver behind
a benzo escutcheon.
Sick of a delicate nature
and riddled with
gentle constitution.
I laugh at the cat that scatters
'til I see it's me.
I numb loud doubts
to soft murmurs
and partake in the marketing scheme
of the terminally unhappy
in grimy hollers of the ******.
Our awareness for sale
seeking happy days at happy hours.
Brown glass cuts my lip
and teeth
as I suckle like a newborn babe
at a maternal **** so I grow
big and strong and brave.
I hope it makes you as uncomfortable
as it makes me.
I chew my pen like a cigarette filter
and wonder which of my emotions
I will exploit for art today.
There are so many words for fear,
and how can I show you something
when I don't know anything
at all.

When the soft Knoxville summer
Slips it’s way over the Smokies
Ghosts through Gatlinburg
And passes Pigeon Forge
We opened all the windows
And made love in the mist.
I jumped into a gorge
Naked and full of expectation
Washing the sweat that
Only conquering mountains
Can conjure.
I erupted from the water
New and fresh and clean.
While sullen hazel eyes
Watched water drops
Trace down my *******
A siren drying in the sun
On the rocks.
The trees were dying
White and blanched
In Everest emerald green
While the mountains cast shadows.
My love for you much the same
As the quick moving summer.
A lifetime turns into a blink.
Your body pulsates on a rock
Next to the wild Obed
And you are just as untamed.
You had a past you never mentioned
But always remembered
And a father who forgot you.
I collect stones from the riverside
And dream of you being happy.
I lay in a bed of purple honeysuckles
On a mountain bald
And share a bottle of bourbon
With a man hiking
the Appalachian trail.
He tells me he is
Almost famous
And I laugh at the word “almost.”
He plays the trumpet
And moves souls
With every utterance of his lungs.
He continues on the trail
And I never see him again.
We get late night ice cream
And my cotton shirt sticks to me
In overwhelming humidity
And suffocating heat
But I am laughing
And hanging out the car window
Through winding roads
and wild thorns
And summer has ended
And so have we.

Apollo always forces Diana to rest,
and she only shines with his permission.
Mistakes look brighter in the daylight
and in the rearview mirror.
The grass is wet as I dissipate into the night.
Guarded by the goddess
and discretion.
I sleepily drive back home,
because I'm no longer welcome
in yours.
Being a stranger
is all I wanted, after all.

The bar light shines
on a woman trying to be beautiful
with the rehearsed demure
of silent film.

It creates a wreath
the color of movie popcorn
and grandma's kitchen paint.

Only one thing burns
as much as the bourbon
As an indifferent patron
spins a ring
on their finger.

A raucous group of old friends
play their favorite song
for the whole bar to hear
of their happiness.
It moves me for but a second.

But I slink against the wall
for safety and comfort.
I am out of place
with no passport
in this foreign land.

My face doesn't match
the way I painted it
and I am a cheap joke.

I grasp at whatever straws
the universe drops before me
and they always come up
the short one.

I think I would rather
you try to hurt me
then to forget me.

I'd rather you stab me in the back
than turn yours.
Perhaps masochism
is the greatest love of all.

trying to find the answer,
to the universe,
when it is not a question.

trying to find peace,
solace and purpose,
but finding distraction.

trying to love
the self-loathing
and bold narcissists

trying to find god
in the fine powder
of a street chemist.

trying to find comfort
in hard people,
but finding indifference.

trying to find words
out of turned backs
and stoic silence.

trying to find the way back
when I never
even departed.

trying to find courage
and finding only,
the faint-hearted.

trying to tell the truth
when someone only asked
for a dare.

trying to find a god,
who may or may not
even be there.

And although most days
I find myself deep
in sorrow and mourning,

I would not barter one second,
trade one moment,
for anything.

The vindication of violation,
is etched in our ecstasy.
The insatiable invitation
Looks on longingly,
to be accepted with no exceptions.

Twilight tinctures transforms
to mild midnight musk
by anatomical alchemy warm
In the dark discord of dusk
Our communion is calculated.

Only hedonistic heat
can melt the polite pretense,
Our dialogue is discrete
Left in static suspense.
I dissolve into your delirium.

The intimate impalement
gives way to grotesque gratification
To cure the ancient ailment.
We ignore the implications
Of this meeting meaning more.

As I ride to robust rhythm
My ****** is chaotic
Our communion is christened
in a cry exhausted and ******.
The vulnerability is voided.

Sanguine sighs give way to
Languor in sated lust.
Sweat drops like dew
Upon my breathing bust.
The distance develops once more.

Susceptible to supple pleasures
and carnal desires.
I should be home writing and yet
I try to find my pen and paper in the night.
Ending up in the back of a van,
while hands dig around for kratom
and mouths dig around for justification.
There are so many balloons in here,
I thought it was a party.

A man tilts his head back salivating
and yet I feel unworthy of his presence.
Why did I want to be kissed?
I remember the grabbing,
pulling, biting, panting,
but never did his lips graze mine.
And yet in the ruddy afterglow,
I thought he loved my words too.

A girl spells out her dreams in ink,
her hand moving like it means to catch something
on the tension of water
and I wonder if she ever will.

I find myself sober,
and yet envy the drunk.
We each believe the other,
is not living life.
What evidence do I have,
that I am  not wrong?

Every day is Halloween,
when you recognize the costumes.

Why did my pen and paper lead me here?

I went home and collapsed in dreamless slumber.
I awoke to mascara running and lipstick stains,
a reminder that my job is to be a comedian
for the universe's cosmic giggle.
I reach inside myself for the divine,
but find tacks and taciturn excuses.

I slept for an hour but wept for a day.

Is coping the new
celebration?

The rain drops drizzling
On the aluminum awning
Reminds me of the way your hands
Would gracefully tease piano keys
And make the most beautiful sound.
A man so kind he makes heartbreak
Taste like honey and settle the same way
On your tongue,
A sweetness savored,
from a sour savior.
I sort stale feelings like recyclables,
But can’t bring myself to throw anything away.
The way your floor is littered with pens and pennies,
Makes me think of how when you arrive home,
You empty the day and your pockets onto the ground
In a most imperfect fashion
When you are alone.
A crack in the mask
And a chasm in façade.
I deserve you,
Whether that is as a consequence
Or reward,
I will never know
For so bittersweet it has been to know you.

The executioner showed no pity,
With an axe as sharp as tongue
And he guards his blade,
And the choices he made,
While maidens prefer to be hung.

He condemns the dark witches,
With a stroke swift and sure.
For he has no time,
To forgive the crime,
Of the enchanting scarlet ******.

And of all the guilty harlots,
One did catch his eye,
As she was brought to the block,
He thought of his ****,
Despite her end being nigh

As she lay her neck bare before him,
He had let down his guard,
And though he felt it was love
He put on his gloves,
And swung the axe twice as hard.

My arms were crossed,
And the stars were crossed,
So I was cross
That you crossed me
And I crossed the line.

Flowers withered
At your august speech
And at August’s heat.  

Your love is bed sores.
The clothes I’ve worn
Still adorn the hardwood floor.
And on soft, sad nights
In the dark I was sworn
to selfish secrecy.

YOUR NAME IS IN MY HANDWRITING
I have made the image of you,
I took it and made it mine own.
Your essence filtered through my view
Your old scent, but not your cologne.
I never liked the way you wrote.
Heavy heathen handwriting
Hedonist mind through spoken quote,
That will leave the body writhing
And render the soul in shivers,
Out of fear or love I don’t know
My lip continues to quiver.
And then you strike the final blow.
I find myself brought to my knees,
Though my posture is of prayer,
The cross is barren and empty,
And I find you no longer there.

a century for every
year I pretended
we were supposed
to be strangers.
Were I to tear
off my clothing
to bandage you
I'd be left naked
and cold
but sometimes
I feel that is
how you want me.


Running from
and running to
are the same thing,
you know.
And now as we embrace
we have the monsters
coming to consume us whole
at our backs
but in your eyes
at least we go down
together.

I was tired, and looking
for a restful place
for my head
and you thought
I'd sleep forever.

My eyes are open now
and the alarm clock is ringing
and the birds are chirping
and it is dawn,
and I dare not wake you up
as I leave.

I wanted
to maybe hold hands
but it's hard to do
when you're drowning
and trying to keep
your head above water.
Your current is pulling me down
and another riptide
will surely **** me.

Maybe one day,
I'll see you ashore.

Two strangers
desperately throwing coins
in a fountain
from empty wallets
to wish the other
peace and solace
as I check the schedule
for a train that never comes
after a morning of
trying to go back to sleep
to savor a few moments
of a dream I had
about a person I met
who had a smile that
made me think of
clean sheets
and the smell of
butterscotch
and bourbon
and I hear a whistle
down the tracks
at the station
and I can't help
but think of
that one time
I made plans
that fell through
and I had to
mechanically
change out of
a cocktail dress
that I left on the floor
with the other laundry
I can't stand to look at
but can't stand to do
and that I sat at
the bottom of
the shower
but could not
be angry
with anyone
but myself
And I frantically
check the schedule again
and I don't know which train
is not coming
but I know it is mine
and I do not feel late
nor early for it
and a vendor
calls out to me his wares
and a child pulls her father's hand
and a *** jingles coins
in a styrofoam cup
and two lovers depart
on two separate trains
and a man chases one
he missed
and I beg for mercy
that too, never shows,
and I meet two strangers
and throw my last
quarter into the fountain
and I ask that
God saves us all.

Is this gossip or sweet nothings?
Our we sharing love or pleasantries?
A nickel for my aching soul,
a dime for who I pretend to be.

In armor so long stands the knight
there is no person underneath.
The looking glass and photographs
are who I pretend to be.

Tell me
How long has it been
Since we last danced?
It was before your smile became obliged
And your laugh had the scratches on it
Of a beloved record
That was played too many times.
And it was before your caress
Turned to a machine
Stamping labels
As the conveyor belt turns.
And it was when little nothings
Were wholly felt
And not some incantation
Invoking response.
And it was when we held hands
To stay together
Instead of to avoid
Falling apart.
How long has it been?

How dare you sing songs
When you don’t understand them?
And how dare you have dreams
That you never think of
And thoughts that you never plan for
And plans that you never dream about?
Where the mask ends and the skin begins
I’m not quite sure.
But have you ever felt as passionate
About anything
Or anyone,
As you do about your ******?
Have you ever put forth as much effort
Into your aspirations
As your ******?
Or is that all
There is
To you?

I built us a home
Inside a globe
And it was small
And confined
But it was ours.
Until one day you broke it
And put sunset eyes on the sea
And headed towards the horizon.
I cut my hands trying to pick up the pieces
But ended up sweeping them away
As they crumbled to dust.
So I set out the other direction
And dedicated myself to topography
Not cartography
Because there are people who own maps
And people who use them,
And I vowed to be surveyor,
And never a historian,
And I vowed to never share a map
With another lover again.

Tired modern gypsy
Hopped up on junk
And street-side bebop
That only he hears
Tells me he’ll read my palm
For a buck oh’ six
Including tax, of course.
He holds my fortune for a price.
He can see clearly
If he drinks his malt potion,
And rubs his magic ball
Behind the dumpster.
He grinds ashen hands together
And it makes the sound
Of a snake hiding
In the grass.
My hands are wet and sweating
From fear or nerves
For who am I to judge
The prophet come.
I show him my hand,
He examines it between his own.
His are covered in dirt,
And stories.
Mine are as clean and pale
As a newborn
Quietly sleeping.
His eyes are rolling
As he drags
Haggard thumb with
Cracked yellow nail
Down the lines of my hand
Muttering in tongues
Or slang
I can’t really tell.
And I reach the pinnacle of fear
That suspends time itself.
“I got bad news, missus,”
He says
And gently closes my hand
With the reaffirming squeeze
Of a mother that wasn’t mine.
“The world ain’t nothing but a giggle,
And it’s all laughing at you.”
He looks out to the sky
And with a loud guffaw
At god himself on the horizon
He slaps me on the back.
“Don’t worry, baby, don’t worry.
We all stuck here.
Even the ones walking.
We all stuck here.”
And this time I looked up at the sky too
And I laughed at god and the madman
Though I knew not which was above me
And which had just held my hand.

The words have been at the tip of my tongue
For as long as I can remember.
I saw the first sound in autumnal eyes
In the first crisp days of December.
I was a fool to search for forever
Without first stopping to consider
maybe love is meant to last a moment,
Not a day, or week, or a winter.
Nor must it be plagued by incessant need
Nor be sealed by a kiss or a ring
Nor be the sweetness the poets promised
Nor give reason for the birds to sing.

I remember
Smoking a joint
On an abandoned road
At the end of August
Reading the map wrong
And getting lost with you.
The car never worked right
After taking the wrong road.
“I thought this was a freeway.”

I remember
Leaning back
For my first
Divine and mystical tour
And passing you the wand
That would take you there.

I remember
Shaking inside
When you first put
Your hand on my leg
Because it told me
Something was going on.

I remember reaching our destination
And never stopping.

I remember
The first time you used your key
To come home to me.

I remember
Conspiring
And perspiring
On summer evenings.

I remember
Dancing with you
At one in the morning
At a run-down club
And wondering in awe
Our natural rhythm
That was better than the music
And how glad I was
That you were mine.

I remember
The first time
I looked in your
Denim eyes
And my mind quietly whispered
“That’s my best friend.”

I  remember
When I was leaving
With tears in my eyes
Was the first time
You told me you loved me.

And I wonder if I was the only one there.

Walks by when it is raining
And I don’t say a word to them.
And a ghost left his laundry
Where it shouldn’t be again.
The world wants to be my lover
When I only wanted a friend.
And everybody wants to be real
But they can only manage to pretend.

When they ask me why I loved you,
I tell them I do not know.
How could I possibly tell them
Through word or thought or prose
The way your thumb grazed
The stitches of a leather steering wheel
The way it would graze over my breast
When we woke on foggy Saturday mornings.

What words would give merit
To the way I felt
When our eyes locked across a room.
Full of people we know very well
And people I don’t know at all.

It was in the moments
Your eyes opened for the first time each day
To a new beginning
And old problems.

It was the way you ran
Your hand through your hair
When you were angry
That I was angry
That you were angry.

It was the way you’d come
Strutting up the walk way
In the evening
Where I could barely see the silhouette
Of the man who would break my heart
A thousand times.

It was the way you put your shoes on
When you left me.
It was the way you buttoned your shirt
Before she would button it down.

I can’t tell them why I loved you.
They would never understand.

The air in the room is so palpable
I can sink my teeth in it
And roll it over my tongue
Like a cherry candy
Looking at the real world
Through yellow cellophane
That gives it just enough
of an unreal gloss to make me wonder.
And I realize I’m only older
When I’m not falling in love
Or having my heart broken
Because it feels the same after
5
10
20
23 years
And I wonder if I found the key
To eternal youth if not life
And if it’s any different
Then putting together a puzzle
And breaking it apart
Time after time for eternity.
I’ll live forever if I stay with you.
I feel each second on the spectrum
Of a wavelength
I feel us dip apart and pull right back
Closer and closer
As we feel each others’ frequency
Grow higher in pitch
My blood is turning to static
As we brush shoulders on the electron cloud
Only together in an instant, snapshot
Forever apart in the fluidity of time.
And I wonder if you’re making me better
Or if I found a new way to get sick.
You taste like lavender and ashes
And borrowed time
Subtle implications
And of the place I was yesteryear
And the places you’ll be when I’m gone.
And you’re fragrant with the scent
Of your old and future lovers.
And when your calloused finger
Taps my hip bone
Like the strum of an old bass
It is perfectly in tune
With the hum of my throat
And it’s vibration
Sad and sweet
and the most pleasant complication
I've ever encountered.

Though all babies are welcomed
As cherubs and innocent things
All are born of circumstance
Starving soldiers or spoiled kings.
Some children sip from silver spoons
And others taste spoons of lead.
Some mothers pinch round, chubby cheeks
Others cannot keep them fed.
I know my child’s only fault
Is that he was born to me.
Destined never to witness Rome,
Due to my own poverty.
I tell my son what mothers do,
That he can do all he dreams,
But late at night, I bury tears
For someone told that to me.
I look into his eyes like mine,
And wish I’d set my lover free
So he had found a finer half
And loved someone more than me.
I too was born from circumstance,
I too was careful to dream
But still I dream for my son,
Most of all, that he is more than me.

On the drive to my mother's house
I noticed the streets were alive.
The rural dead was lit up
with sedans and vans on a drive
I thought it strange on this road
when usually, I saw not a soul.
Many mothers just like mine,
must stay in the rural gold.
And I thought myself not quite wrong,
But not quite right, when I saw the cause
They turned to the cemetery on the left
While I myself drove on.  
Many years later, I used my signal,
to tell those behind me of my woe
as I made a left on mother's day
with no where else to go.
I felt the pity of the drivers,
as they drove on past me.
I looked in the rearview one last time,
Full of wisdom, but full of envy.

I swim through tremendous oceans,
through waters of worry and crisis shoals
paranoia forms a tidal wave,
that threatens to swallow me whole.
The currents are strong against me
to swim, I try my best
and soon I am tired and lost,
and ****** into the depths.
I see anger's buoy beckon,
but I know that is no better.
I can cling to it for long,
but I cannot cling forever
My arms would soon tire
and away, I'd soon be swept
Once more gasping and fighting
Against the gravity of the depths
Lost at sea, is the sailor
who did not follow the sun.
And if he looks down in shame,
He will not see the stars point on.
When rescue ships are far and few
and supplies are back on beach
I sigh and think of shorelines,
that I know are out of reach.
I want to float on my back,
and let the waves take me home,
The search party stopped looking,
For too long I've been gone.
But it takes a strong swimmer
to make it back to shore,
when one is this far out,
and I cannot swim anymore.
As the waves roll beneath,
and try to pull me under
while the gale whips salt
to tear me asunder
The pull grows stronger
and the water surrounds me
and what I long for most,
is that I did not fear drowning.