The dead ask nothing

Nothing offers no answer.
Life makes demands.
She reminds me of someone.
I once was deeply in love.
The glass is empty,
yet she keeps sipping the straw.

The surgeon’s serrated saw,
severed crown of his skull,
to allow brain swelling.
The detachment is frozen,
in purgatory, in Paris, California,
in as much as I can gather.

I keep making
the same mistakes, over and
over. Eternity is preposterous.
She has same prominent forehead, same
brown silken hair, same slender fingers
as my ex, same buttoned-up betrayal.

“Man-up! You ******* *******,”
she said, he said, their
ceaseless quarreling
makes me hide.
Stomach knots, breathing hurts.
The allure of her stink.

My sister insists
it will be okay.
The glass is half.
Mom can’t remember.
Everything fits neatly.
She burrows in the booth.

This one needs money,
that one needs parts,
liver, lung, cerebrum, heart.
Her hands cup the glass.
She gazes beyond.
Everything is a lie