he had
been a
pretty
thing.

i got my
own to
keep and
he’s got
his own.

we ain’t
got no love
to make.

when can
we learn to
live without

touching?

he had
been a
pretty
thing.

we crawled
in the back
seat of my
car and i
pulled mine
out first.

i came
on his
*** and
was proud
for it.

i know he
won’t need
me again.

i got my
own to
keep and
he’s got
his;

we gather it
together
under a
dying
sun.

when you
thought i was
sleeping,

i was pulling
the breath
out of your
lungs.

scaling your
throat, deep
into your core.

the rope strains
and breaks
between your
teeth.

you feel it
and remember
the way god
feels in your
stomach,

the fear of hell,
and of waiting
rooms,

the thought that
someone out there
had, at least once,
thought of
you.

this poem is
for the dreams
you’ll never
realize.

this poem is
for the words
i want to shove
through your ear
and into your
heart.

this is for one
night, a thousand
miles away
from here,

when you
say good night
to a man you
can never love,
force your head
down on your pillow
and remember
that you had been
loved at least
once.

you are
the only
science
i’ll ever
know,

the only
pieces i want
to add and
subtract.

connecting
the arms,
the head,
the ****,
the heart,

and breathing
what life i
have left
into you.

i hope you
remember
how that
feels.

i had a *****
when you left
which subsided
in the fifteen
minutes it took
to realize you
weren't coming
back.

when i couldn't
write a poem
about you,
i realized what
you'd done.

"you son of a
*****," i yelled
as i walked into
the bedroom,
where we'd once
made something
of love.

knowing you'd
never hear it.

knowing that,
of everything i
had given away,
you had taken
the few words
i had kept for
myself.

read the following
under a false
pretense:

i am the bird,
you are the plane
that swallows
and hurls me
back to the earth
again,

to discover
myself one
more time.

i have your
memory,
your smile,
and your
silence.

and i intend
on being selfish
with what i
earned.

it is
nothing.
the parking
lots and the
schools are
empty today
and tomorrow.
we decided we
didn't care
about it,
at some
point. we will
all wait here.
it is
winter
and it feels
like spring
before the chill
of god's wrath
sneaks up on
you. whenever
the weather
suddenly changed,
my mother swore
up and down that
the world was
going to end.
i wanted
nothing to do
with it. but this
is where it's
come: the empty
spaces in our
conversations
when we run
out of ways to
tell people that
we love them,
when their eyes
lose the thing that
made your stomach
turn, when they get
bored with you and
throw you away.
it is
nothing. the day
is someone's or
no one's at all.
i, myself, will
wait out
another
cold
night.

what is death? a
middle-aged man
in a volvo, collecting
payments and
favors?

i met him once on
his road trip from
new york to
california. i imagined
death streaking across
america, the way the
ground shakes and
swallows its people.

i didn't ask him anything.
i was afraid of his answers
but he keeps files on every
living being and sorts through
them when he gets bored,
picking people off like flies.
i figured he had heard
about the likes of me
before.

is death the object of a
mid-life crisis for a god
who got a little too
close to the sun and
got his feelings hurt?

maybe that is the
answer after
all.

he left me at a truck stop
off the interstate
in anniston, alabama.

i didn't catch his name,
but i think we'll be
introduced again
real soon.

broken as it was,
we had tried to
fix it. you said i
was your first like
it disappointed you
to admit such a thing.
would this be worth
it? my heart sighed
no.

but the body,
entangled in yours
as it was,
kept fighting its
own battles, waging
its own wars with
destiny and with
your eyes and your
legs.

you told me not to
speak to you, as if
i was the only one
doing the hurting.
but would you mind
keeping me, once
again,in my own
dreams for awhile?

the heart says stop.
the body says go.
turn on, turn
off.

as we dissolve
into the ages,
i will only have
these things
to remember:
your messy hair,
your easiness,
your voice,
your embrace.

when i drove
through the
last exit, i saw
a plane speeding
through the
cosmos.

i think
we are all
crossing some
distance.