The duvet is disheveled—
hanging onto the mattress,
half draping the ebony stained
floor. Admiral Blue walls are illuminated
by two brass pendant lights
that have sprouted from the ceiling
and are growing off of
the bitter ends of
the anchor rode.

My attention is pulled down
by the locket
weighing from my neck
as the silver braid bites
with chill and I stay on the bed
and focus on that brightwork
laying on my chest and
I keep trying to ignore
the far corner of the room
by the vanity because
I keep trying to ignore
your blubber-skinned suitcase
painted in barnacles, sitting on the floor,
mouth wide open, like it is just there waiting
to swallow you whole and
spit you back out at the next harbor—
I swear, I think it is trying
to rename you Jonah.

Tonight, like every other night before
that you have stepped from my deck
to throw yourself into the sea,
I will find myself,
after the moon has risen,
after the tide has shifted,
and after the town has fallen asleep,
wandering aimlessly down the hand paved
roads that weave along the port to sit
with *your life, your love, and your lady.

I woke up in the afternoon
Missed myself the morning train
It's the second one that I've missed
Since I tried to get going around 6am

I can't keep my eyes from tearing
My hands from doing their not-so-cool shakes
I reach into my pockets for something
That just feels a little bit like yesterday

I can hear the whistle blowing
From outside my apartment door
I believe for the first time
Maybe I should drive to work

We missed each other's calls from last night
I counted the minutes that passed,
I drank myself a thirty-three year old brandy
I stole from my parent's liquor cabinet.

The 10:00am buzz to get me right
Started for, is it Saturday?
I don't drink but to remember
I drink to remember the pain.

A .44 at close range
My heart skips with great excite,
The bullet-proof vest I wear when I'm shot
May barely not save my life.

I've grown tired off waiting for the beach
I swim with sharks blacked out in the dark
Playing dares with Sarah Marie.
Until the wild Pacific digs its first row of teeth into me.

I have an illustrious dream,
     want to be Leonard
          Cohen's gypsy wife,
he's kissing my lips on
    Boogie Street,
impetuously we dance
    to the end of love
       'til closing time
       midst his secret life,
he serenades me with
     I'm your man
         when we take Manhattan,
bewildered by his poetic beauty there
     waiting for the miracle to happen,
a sip of wine, a cigarette
         in love we disappear,
   here it is, you got me singing
        be that dog in heat,
I'll take this waltz and
   another please, cause
             everybody knows
     I hunger for your touch,
  his famous blue raincoat
         and the dew on my thigh
goes a thousand kisses deep
   in the cave at the tip of the lily
  with its very own breath of brandy,
slipping into the masterpiece
             where Lenny is eternal

that night, I saw bodies in the motel bathtub
beckoning like a 50's Cadillac
back seat beats and Father's  
bottle of snatched brandy up
to bring back our youth

and stay
for one last whisper in a last-innocent ear
the diner lights buzzing like
a lifetime of loss to mistakes
that can be little more or
less than broken glass lies