pale light through ***** blinds
ash dancing on smoky shadow
the familiar confirmation
of body into body
the memory of our sinews
clammy hands entwine
as speed climbs and stability fails

caution is gone in the wind
but an overhanging doubt
lingers in the doorway
the wilted smiles
stiff embrace
chapped kiss so cold

remember not to dwell.
lose yourself in sense
soft skin and cologne
toothpaste and cigarettes
remember not to dwell.
warmth of laughter
rush of dark hair
green eyes like sea storms
remember not to dwell.
remember not to dwell.

Fingers scratch against steel strings
A melody floats
Fleeting, yet constant
A truth lying underneath the floorboards
Replace the slat
And roll on
Wheels spinning on a smog laced highway
The dust shining
In glaring headlights
Standing still,
Beautiful, just for a moment,
Then disturbed,
Trampled beneath thundering hooves
Of cattle terrified by
Flashing lies and half-truths
Running blindly, noisily
Toward the melody.

I softly read aloud to you, but
My mind wasn't thinking in words:
They passed from my lips and
Dissolved just above your ear.

My mind wasn't thinking in words---
I was thinking in terms of you,
The silk of your hair, your knee grazing mine,
The fleeting kiss of our fingertips.

I was thinking in terms of you.
You were a poem all in yourself;
Soft euphony and delicate intricacies,
A playful melody in your verse.

You were a poem all in yourself,
So I was thinking in terms of you,
Instead of in the whispered words
That I read aloud to you.

Your words---love , deserve, forever---
Cling to my skin
Like clothes sopping wet,
******* futilely at my neck,
Impossible to shelter from
The torrential nature
Of your need

Your need,
Like the clamoring cries of an infant,
Screechy, demanding,
Hanging helplessly on my arms,
You pine for affection
From this absentee mother figure;
Futility resurfaces.

I feel the weight of you,
Pressing on my chest:
The crushing force of responsibility,
Of dedication, of obligation eternal.
I have written nothing
Since your frigid winter crept into my home
And ravaged my bed, my body, my dreams.
You created my hollow life.

You carved your name
Into my tender wrists
With teeth honed to knives
And fingernails like acid;
You seared it with a kiss,
Poured your toxin in my veins,
Planted rue in my garden.
Ruined.
Never before have I wished more
For death's swift embrace
Than when I hear
My name in your mouth.

promises are never meant for keeping.
empty words flung around,
luring innocents into a sense
of familiar false security.
i promised i wouldn't,
but i did.
i promised i would,
but i didn't.
all still empty words
swirling down a dingy bathtub drain,
dirt collecting 'round the rim.

promises are never meant for keeping.
i feel the needleprick if my own shortcomings,
sharper than a surgeon's scalpel
carved my breast in two;
the autopsy recites the cause---
"overdose, heart failure, aneurism."
"cancer, blood loss, asphyxiation."
but i died log ago,
in the velvet arms of mother dear
as she murdered her
whispered bedtime melodies
that alighted my fondest memories;
when she told me life is hard
and magic can be sold.

promises are never meant for keeping;
they wither over time
like wilted flowers in the windowsill,
years if drought apparent
in their sad, shriveled cores.
i was promised much
and promised more in return,
but we're left all with only
aching temples
and half-empty beers.

Nights like this
Are the nights that will **** me.

Nights when translucent ghosts
Drape their long arms

Around my waist and take me
Waltzing across you bedroom ceiling;

Nights when sad songs pour
Out of the cracked walls

And fill my heart
With their bittersweet nostalgia;

Nights when my body freezes
In its despairing loneliness,

Cold stone wrapped in stiff sheets
And sopping pillows.

Nights like this,
I lie awake, aware of

The tangible emptiness,
The stale smell of grief.

Nights like this,
I **** myself the way I killed you,

I break the way you did:
Delicately, like the slivered backs

Of infant birds
Left the nest too soon;

Like thunder collapsing,
Shaking cupboards and windows

In time with our trembling shoulders.
You told me, you told me

"I can't just forget this like you can."
But I don't forget.

Like a soldier cut open
By the knife she obliged herself,

I bleed.
I hold my insides

Inside, cram you back
Deep into my chest,

Wrap memories around my spine
A spiral  staircase of sorrow and

Sweet intentions, where no one will see
The trail of blood

Save for me.

I,
I do not escape this.

I cannot cast aside
Ashen remains, box up burning coals.

I can only carry them with me,
A red thread around my finger

Burning your name in my skin.
I carry my sorrow like a crow on my shoulder;

It pecks on my neck sharp reminders
And gorges on my acute isolation.

You say I forget,
But nights like this,

I remember everything
And regret nothing,

Even on nights like this
When all of me screams

But nothing hurts.