some people stop feeling as though they've just flicked off the switch as they move on to a different room.
but i will live with every light lit.
**** the electricity bill.

and **** the dark.

and so yes i did go back to where
we'd once balanced
on stools  

from the chill night into the buzz
where memory
waitfully pooled

but no right here was
"Brendan"
pouring the gin oh so slick                      

sizing me up across the bar
said that he'd make me something quick
(and slipped some ginger

in the glass)
asked me to taste for
"a surprise"

but all that the bottom
of the glass cupped
was the reflection of your ice              

in the bottom of my glass, still there
that reflection, oh yes
your ice.

oh no i didn't want to talk
i clearly wasn't there
for him

said he'd just read something Chris Kraus
said he'd just watched something Goldin                                    
then he leaned over

took my glass, and lit
the tealight
swift and sly

but all i saw deep in the flame
was the reflection of your ice

so when he turned his back i fled  
out of the dream into my night.

an idea laid on white
stretches once taut and breathless
brief rule-bound plaything

god is dead. and i'm not looking
for enlightenment. it's winter

and i test the world through fingerless
gloves: i touch, therefore i am.

so read the universe mapped out
on the back of my hand. your number

inked. and in this palm - the story.
let's trace the lines. the lies. and lie

here where it's written. past future
present here. this. this is all there is.

my jaw aches.

it comes out only at night
a gripping, torn dragging
                            and slowly splintering teeth
        my dentist tells me I've been at it again
        awareness month announced through a 3 ply mask.

it comes out at night only.
when my hand has swum down your riverbed spine
        I count each smooth stone
        try to forget the explosions beneath
        seam mining, undermining everything we create?

        at night my jaw aches.

by day I smile too much
collecting girls' numbers like sea-tossed glass
       once all dangerous cutting edges, now pocketable
       forgettable -
                    I don’t want to run.

        and so our monster under the bed
(the scans show this)
        burns its fires through your head

while mine growls through troubled teeth

       and I ache.

when time is a slowly emptied sigh
and winter grips tight to autumn's last leaf
then I'll hold my breath as I wonder why
the wind shakes the tree when it falls beneath

~            and she watched from the kitchen stool as he tore the heart from the artichoke while the onions stroked their invisible wet fingertips down his cheeks             ~