try to cheat the crying again
wake up every day after day
with a stained pillow
I've been sentenced
to life  in this prison
of sunrises on the porch alone
sunsets with ten bottles
serenading me
the paper on the refrigerator
yellowed stained
that says
where she was leaving me forever
still that ring
glistens in the window
and one dead stem
still in the vase
on the mantle
remains beside that wilted
brown brittle rose
the door has never been closed
ten years now
and the sun I don't see
ever shine
don't
need to water the garden
my tears flood them
as the wildest weeds grow
tangled around
my dreams
in them