something fit.  something aligned under the breastbone
ribs pattered out and gave space for breath
that didn't taste of anything.  

something clicked.  tortured poet keeping a journal
walks the south route instead
and sees the spiritual spin on life through the stained glass windows
of a shack church in need of extensive renovation.
she is inspired and her need bottoms out for the day--

praise is good.
good.
great.    
don't bother me when i'm sharpening my pencils.
i'm preparing for divine intervention
and the clarity i know i'm owed

something hit. my words, hey, i'm black and blue
and they? they're cut through and through
with flecks of tracts lent from life and beyond.

reading my old poetry is like sampling
blood's flavour on the tongue
the uncomfortable metallic taste
of something in the wrong place
at the wrong time

sitting underneath her knee was a lent book of entymology
something about butterflies being caught and pinned
preserved in stasis for the sake of beautiful things
cold crisp leaf wings smoked behind the glass
of a cyanide bottomed killing jar
and in that half read book all she could glean
amongst the bones of writing so lean
was the feeling that you could lie flat and cold
and be a redolent beauty despite the lack of life-

days earlier
the talking therapy had been all right.
hey, there's a ton of treatment these days
medication and conversation and there's no need
to burrow yourself away.
so they talked about feelings
as if they were quietly observing the to and fro
independent little embryos growing opinions of their own-
the indignant insistence that these things,
these emotions have names, signs, triggers
and they begin and they end and curve again-
rising up from the flat of a typeset page.

Hell is
being with you in my
sleep
But waking up
all alone
With windows open
and wine bottles shattered
on the floor
Hell is
standing in the shadows watching
you adore another woman
Kissing her and holding her
Hell is
being all alone without the soul I adored

                          S.M.R.