I'm sitting in the corner
of a cold, empty house.
My eyes glazed over,
I haven't slept.
Memories of Thanksgiving
flash upon the spoon
flipped over before me;
the plaid shirt
I was wearing,
the crummy salad I ate.
I see the look
in your eyes,
you were holding
back tears.
I couldn't contain mine.
Suddenly, flashbacks
of white powder
caked like snow upon
the jail cell bars.
I'm sitting in the corner
of a cold, empty house.
My eyes glazed over,
I haven't slept.

Write the good,
as well as the bad,
on the same page.
Both are equally
important
to the story.

Eve: When will I arrive?
God: You were already at your destination the moment I took you from his side
Eve: That word taken, is there a lesson?
God: Yes, sometimes things must be created, taken, then presented for you to get the blessing
Eve: How will I know he loves me?
God: He will honor his Mother & put no man above me
Eve: If he begins to question, how will he know?
God: His faith will plant the seed & your love will make it grow
Eve: I'm afraid to make mistakes, what if my actions are forbidden?
God: He will love you with my love, it holds the greatest forgiveness
Eve: What if he has loved before me and that love is still in his heart?
God: Nothing can happen without my will playing a major part
Eve: So to have loved before me, he would have needed your permission?
God: Yes, he can receive nothing except what is given to him from me, it is written
Eve: Then why confuse him, what if they pretended to be me?
God: He will see good qualities in them all but none will resemble me
Eve: How can I reflect your image, when you are perfect and always right?
God: You cannot mirror me exact but your efforts will reflect my light
Eve: I have these flaws & things about myself that I don't get
God: I will provide comfort & clarity in your gift
Eve: What is my gift & will it help him know it's me?
God: He may not know at first, but he will surely notice me; he will hear my name in every word, in every book of your poetry
Eve: When he reads those words, will he know they are for him?
God: He will trust the way they make him feel, you are well established friends
Eve: Have I loved him before? This feels like another chance at life
God: You have loved each other many lifetimes but in this one you will be his wife
Eve: If we have lived & loved before why is this any different?
God: He is finally in search of what was always missing
Eve: Am I the puzzle's missing piece?
God: No my dear you are the puzzle, the missing piece is me
Eve: If a man is to lead how will I influence his direction?
God: You will be his greatest helper & the object of his affection
Eve: What does that mean in correlation to you?
God: When he is ready for a wife he will put me first in all he is called to do, that includes honoring you
Eve: What about school, work & finding himself?
God: Until he searches his heart &  loves me he will have trouble discovering anyone else
Eve: So what you're saying Lord is be steadfast in you, pray without ceasing & be confident in the truth? Focus less on being chosen & more on what I was sent to do? For part of my purpose is to be a great help, to a man who puts you first & has learned himself?
God: This time with you has been well spent my child my instructions I see you have received, the morning has come and gone so from now on I will refer to you as Eve.

We are all humans,
eating sweets from the
palms of our enemies

we are greedy, lustful,
animals. Swallowing air by
the gallon because it's free

our lungs turn black as
coal, black as a starless
night sky

in the garden of discontent,
before Eve tainted the taste
of apples

before Adam bit through the rubbery red skin, down to
the white flesh

taking hope into his mouth
and spitting it straight
back out

If the Sacred Fire of Vesta went out, it meant one of two things:
             meant
1. Rome was in danger;
                                                  meant
2. A Vestal ******, a guardian of the flame, was having ***.  
Chastity                                      and                                       fire
are two attributes that are directly correlated.  If one is lost,
the other will follow.  Trust me.  This is fact:
                                                                ­                 only ****** women
                                                                ­                   can be celebrated.

The ****** Mary,
                                the ****** goddesses,
                                                      ­                 the way **** was seen as a crime
                                                           ­        against the father, not the daughter:
                            women
                     ­         must
                            remain
                ­              pure.  

Do not eat the pomegranate seeds,
do not touch the fruit of knowledge.  A
                                                   ­                    statue of a young boy
                                                             ­              holding an apple
                                               does not hold
                                        the same connotation
as a woman holding an apple.  Offering it to a man who
could have refused.  Getting blamed for the fall from Eden.  

                           A woman
with a snake draped around her body is not Eve,
is Lilith, but it’s close enough.  They are both to blame for
all the evils of the world, so what does it really matter anyway?  Women
are more susceptible to wavering in their faith in God,
to worshipping the devil, to practicing witchcraft—

            The flames are out.  Rome is not safe.  A “******” is buried
            alive for her sin.  Lilith is slaughtering women in childbirth.  
            Babies  are  dying.   A  man  is  celebrated  for  his  multiple
            lovers.   ****  shaming  in  79  AD.    The  beds   in   Pompeii
            brothels are made of stone.   St.  Cecilia  is  face  down in the
            dirt.   Women on the same level as slaves,  if not lower.  The
                                     goddess Vesta as a housewife.

Let your craving make you my Eros,
And let it make me your indulging Aphrodite,
In the mountains of the paradise, let sensuality electrify.

Let me submerge into your spell,
And let your toxic fingers trail through my swells,
And in the dawn, let all my secrets tell.

Let me bathe in your sunshine
Let your temptation hang on my lips when I smile.
And in the morning, let the flush on my cheeks stay a while.

Let me braid my body into your touch,
Let your addiction curl me and get me undone
And in those thirsty afternoons, let the sheets cover our blush.

Let me long for your touch,
And let your aroma infatuate my pores
And in those lavish nights, let my frail body render to yours.

Let your gaze rip through my skin,
And in my fantasies you will be my Olympus king
Let me be a shameless prisoner of your lips.

Let your gentle taste ignite my hips
And make my blood shiver when we move to the pulse of your kiss
And in the moonlight, let me bathe in your sins.

Let your insatiable desire make you my Adam,
And let it make me your poisonous Eve,
Let’s stay in the Gardens of Eden, in an eternity intertwined.

**AM

Thursday night is game night but Hasbro
has never had this one right. Operation is not
a game for ages four and up–maybe four,
multiplied by four, add four, and up.
Surgical mask on, Cavity Sam prepped,
and tweezers waiting to the right of the operating table:

I like to start with the Adam's apple–
carve away any trace of my origins
and they will never figure out who I am
because, like my mother used to say to me,
who is Eve without a blameless man.

Then I move on to the butterflies in the stomach
flittering and fluttering for a home that feels far more familiar
but they cannot be caught, only drowned.

Naturally, the broken heart follows
but the problem with pulling that out is
the never-ending-silence,
white-noise-science, black-hole-giant,
You know, the absence that predates writer's block–

writer's cramp, sliding a pencil up your wrist like it's the
(best kept) secret IV of an author.
Is that the price of filling up your bread basket,
going  to bed full on recognition and reward
and maybe even a Pulitzer Prize?
Be careful not to trip up on your own ego
or you just might end up with a wrenched ankle
and water on the knee.

I still have to deal with the wishbone,
the split-in-two-gravestone,
the only-one-of-us-is-leaving-here-happy zone.

And finally, I have the spare ribs
but I just might leave those there
because we see what happened when God
bothered to remove those the last time.

When Adam ate the forbidden fruit what did it taste like?  
All the good things life has to offer?
All the bad?
Did it taste like sunbeams?
Like a childs rithmic gigles?
Like The sick, upside-down, im-going-to-***-myself rolicoster feeling?
Like tight hugs?
Did it taste as good as fields of flowers feel?
Like rain?
Like farness?
Like the saltyness of sweat-or tears?
Like silence?
Like long open nights?
Like unanswered texts?
Like lunches alone?
Like the sting of liquor?  
Like raisors
Or did it taste like blood?