She takes what isn't hers like a burglar.  
Her spouse wed his lover.  
She shut her eyes and once more she lost him to that witch.  
She views him as all-powerful.  
Finally! She wears his ring.  
Now it’s time to hold her tongue and demonstrate to the world that she belongs to Master Shingh.  
What goes around comes back around; karma is a trickster.  
Now it’s casual intimacy with Tess the slutty switch.  
He smiles; she chuckles.  
He slows down; she accelerates.  
He sneezes, she responds with “bless you.”  
She embarked on her new life without hesitation.  
To her, the man is all-powerful.  
She reverses the ground he treads.  
“Yes, master; no, master”—somehow, she manages to love, respect, and obey.  
She takes things like a thief.

I have lost her love.
I look for her in words—
the words that fill pages
of my stolen diary.

She has a few good days.
She fell in love.
His honey words
made her forget her fear.

He left.
And so did she.

I have lost her love.
I see glimpses of it
when I cook pasta.
In dance, in sweat—
I see it in my eyes.

She seems so far away.
I have lost her love.

I love all good poems,
and how they make me
feel whole but deboned,
de~parted,
sometimes cleansed
sometimes *****,
sometimes ashamed,
occasionally fried,
occasionally enlived,
often all of these,
simultaneously

I love how mine please you,
breaking the knots of anonymity,
unleashing the little white package
strings of connection, and, when yours,
make me guffaw, or even  a better, person-age,
when we weep deep in our  recesses where the
just-beneath-the-surface emotes, are pricked and
brought to the surface, for the first time, or the last of time,
exposed, curated, healed, leaving but a tiny sore, that lingers
on the body's surfaces,where all things.are etched that
are needy for a reminding of the when,
and here, right there, is the where,

but your loving of likes somehow
dissatisfying, like a kiss, perfunctory, skullduggery
or dis genuine, a hit and a move on,which is why,
I treasure your comments, long or short,
insightful or delightful, critical or critique(e),
just a tender heart of appreciation, a snuggle
from the sea, throned out of Jonah's whale...
rounded bellicose belly

but they render me
alive,
when they split and spit me, to you,
you, to each, defined in pieces, gratitude
nuggets, each, treasured, each hugged, each letter,
a custom bespoke of  connectivity and

who needs friends, when your words
embrace me so deep repeat and touch me
in places where my heart must follow on & on.
now many poems you commission with every exposition.
even the dimplest thanks is a vibrato of pleasuring sounds, that
you, you, you, took that particular moment of time to
express the heartfelt, destroys the invidious
that does quiet creepily slides inside us,  
saying I am your comforter false,
but is not!

use your words, that,
they to the children teach; let us too
embrace this honorific so terrific, and touch each other with
comments, a sharing, and the sol shines on
'*we two too, for all to seer and see

I’ll close my eyes
But I know it won’t
Change anything.
You’ll still walk
Out the door.

Maybe I’ll drown
Myself in the pool
But I know it won’t
Change anything.
You wouldn’t want
To save me.

I could try
Starving myself
But I know it won’t
Change anything.
You’ll chew up
My pride and
Spit out the rest.

I could run away
But I know it won’t
Change anything.
We both know
I’ll come crawling back.

What do you
Want from me?
Don’t answer that.
I already know.
You want nothing.
You want silence.

I could jump
From the gallows
But I know it won’t
Change anything.
You wouldn’t wear black.
You wouldn’t come to
My funeral.

I know you
Don’t want me dead.
But you don’t want me
And my heart is
Having trouble
Telling the difference.

I can hear the
Door creak open.
I can feel the cavity
Where you should be.
I close my eyes
But I know it won’t
Change anything.