The way the clock ticks
Smooth away
Spirits dry
  Slightly tender ears
Become another breath

A breath a sigh a mess to deal with
A test of zeal
& a box of papers
  strewn left
& right
  torn & strung about to conceal
  the floor
the door
the walls
& the ceiling

naked peach & sweating
standing still like a post, but turning around slowly internally
putting on graces & smiling, sniffing the glass
before frowning & commenting on the values of waiting,
or diving right into the chasm of debt,
    he looks handsome
& brutish
  like a man best used for feeding
  himself, feeding someone else
  mere feed
    he was food
  a cow in a pasture
devouring to continue the feeding
for some dollars each day increasing

‘no worries mate’
a gesture to continue moving
there’s less to do
ensuing deadlines
wave beside the days arrive
sequentially,
enduring through them dutifully

    like you must

red stars of sparks string off his limbs
& burn holes in the papers
brown cigarette burns widen & envelop
the papers that are small, the bigger
ones catch alight & fall to the
floor & it spreads
to the door
the walls
& the ceiling

now naked & blue & burning
the red & yellow flame rises high
a candle stands spinning
screaming & fighting & running from foe
who will eat him,
or **** him
he sleeps shivering under stars burning brighter than his own
& the papers are gone

  so few left to feed the fire
    he collapses
in a heap of soot & ash

he lies naked & black & steaming

panting & huffing like a kid on a balloon
on hands & knees observes the wreck
& sighs to clean the mess before
he becomes accustomed
or bored
  he swings a broom around
  and a dust pan handily collects the
soot & the wreck doesn’t seem so bad

it still stands & he stays there

in a darken pit, a hole of charred plaster
& carpet,

  it seems OK so he stays there

all along the street the candles are snuffed out

they still stand so they stay there

in a row
toe to toe
all together
in compartments
of a box
of matches