This is the kind of cold that makes your
teeth feel like they have skin.
This is a twenty lined story about
your beggar arms and your open hands.
This is about finding warmth in whiskey
when you’re not much of a drinker.
You can’t even hold your water let alone
your drink—or your tongue, or your heart.
One glass too much and you’re vomiting
sonnets into the phone, into the gutter.
***** something into me.
I don’t care if it’s last night’s Chinese
or last year’s tears.
The world isn’t in your books and maps.
And it isn’t out there.
It’s here.
It’s here.
Take my gloves for the cold.
They’re yours, okay?
Our hands have always been the same size