I see you blinking
in the summer sun.
I take you drinking
in the gutter slum.

You sit there
and you read your poems
and you stare where,
you stare where you should just go!

No Morse code! No Morse code!

Gotta find three of these-
three of these that fit...an angel couldn't laugh-
I would laugh! I would laugh!
No Morse code!

I figure the fragments are all black;
I figure the fragments are all

stagnant and all black!

No Morse code! No Morse code!
Ex facto!

I see you blinking
in the summer sun.
I take you drinking
in the gutter slum.

You stare where...
and you stare where...

"Not like that!
Like this."

She turned over her shoulder to face me, snatched her hair, soft and strawberry blonde out of my hands and giggled as she tried to show me the French braid.

She saw my blank expression and buried her face in my neck and giggled some more.
"This isn't going to work."

She gave up on the braid and kissed me anyways,
She tasted like sweet tea,
mixed with somethin' southern and strong.

She said "thanks love".

Her porch was lit up like it was the hearth of her home
and we had stopped slapping at the mosquitoes hours ago.

with my head in her lap, I was getting the grass burs out of her skirt when my fingers crept up her thigh and picked at something polyester, it smelt like lavender.

She put her hand on top of mine and kissed me again. I watched the dimples form on her cheeks as she whispered "daddy'll be up soon."

Laying by the river, when everything is silver, and silent, just for a moment before
the sun rises, we held our breathes

and then the love birds wept
and rattled their cages.

My memory fades as she got up to go but she said something like

you're still dizzy from that southern sting
or
you're still dizzy from that southern swing

and that she was hungry
and that we were hollow.

and I just laughed anyways; I could never get her father's truck to start but my heart was always in the right place, she knew it.

*She had a way with words,
she had a way with wasted...

she had heaven on her ankles with her jeans rolled up, and I just wanted to linger there.
My first prayer, my first gray hair.

Little one,
try not to be

so broken.

Save a shuddering
breath or two,

you've already spoken.

Little one,
emotions,
energy

is spent,

vent,
vent now little one,

cry on my collarbone.

Nerves and naves
may fail you

but I will never leave you alone.


I need red.

Give me purple,

fuchsia, and maroon.

All of the colors that sear your insides;
carnivals come too soon.

Little one,
let it out,

just
save me some.

My name is not Matthew,
I'm not Thomas but take a little bit of me.

My name is not Andrew,
I'm not Peter, but give a little back please.

My name is not Bartholomew,
I'm not Jude; Philip always insisted but he was rude.

My name is not James
and I could care less 'cause I heard Matthias was a mouse.

Andrew couldn't give a **** though he didn't mean to curse.

John told me that Simon said Peter was sorry.

You keep walking out
to see who's going to chase you.

But honey fairness is and fairness was.
That's right,

fairness is
and fairness

was.

I'll be straightforward with you,
I speak in riddles and rhymes,
have you got the time?

I don't have
any flowery words for you,
the **** if I know,
fair chances,
careful glances
in my direction,
could you fall in love or in line?

I won't chase you.

It wouldn't be fun.

I won't chase you,

but it would be fun

to watch you

run run run run run!