I keep saying I carried
Us alone for a year,
In the face of
Abhorrence - derision and rage,
In truth some of each with
Much good reason,

I keep saying,
As you did,
That my love is not enough,
Keep saying that now
It's your time to shine and that Indeed now you must,

And yet even as you
Reach out in a way
I am supposed to honour,
Your tone is dipped
In censure and rebuke,
Accusation and deep ire,

What you seem not
To understand is you
Are in fact,
For all your vaunted effort,
Merely nailing our coffin lid,
Firmly,

Shut.

a frosting-filled slice
eaten one day is a treat -
fluffy, sweet, luxurious.

eaten every day -
nails encrusted with frosting,
cloying, drained, decayed.

Tight in my grip
I feel your nails slip
Digging deep
Digging hard
She says to me
He left me a card

Long and lithe fingers,
comfort moulded into cones,
is where art kisses geometry
and meets one of its own.

Her hands are to touch
manicured and glazed,
you feel home and lost
a Pharaoh now, and next a waif

The nails, you find and wonder
filed for a student and trimmed.
Not a wisp of colour
bare as a bone, naked and skinned.

Snug in a life song,
a pallbearer of untold griefs,
they are a stark sight
of colourless coral reefs.  

On but a blue moon,
they’re a savoury rare,
when hungry eyes feast
on the riotous fair.

Why, one day, I ask thee?
She would smile and wouldn’t tell.
‘Never felt like’,
is her No Comment.

Scorched skin and broken nails
This love makes me so **** frail.
Inked-on stars and shaking fingers
My heart thrives on these lurches and twinges.

shirtless screaming through
the heartland and I used
to smoke cigarettes
too.

she never wanted
to stay: the youth
she had
left demanded it.
now, I'll wager
she's somewhere
in an apartment with
some dandy that
wears sweater vests
to Thanksgiving dinner.

maybe she thinks
about me and my little
twisted heart every
now and again:
like when she's away
from the sweater vest
on the toilet
behind a locked door,
"be right out, babe!"
or toting groceries
through a parking lot
to her car,
or signaling a
left turn before
changing her mind
and deciding to
go straight instead.

and
maybe I need to
stop thinking
about her
especially after
three years
incommunicado

but what can I say?
I've never slept on
a bed of nails
I couldn't
dream on.