The shirtless poet,
he writes on the fourth floor.
Corner of Bedlam and Squalor.
He’s running two experiments:
Ingesting only whiskey and
texting only ex-girlfriends.
He keeps a journal.
The title is
The Dishonest and the Deceased.
He’s seven days and forty-one pages in.
He’s sent 63 images of both himself and
empty bottles.
Three different women have shared his bed,
and each subsequent morning departed
with a similar sentiment: this never happened.
He’s drank ten liters, placed the empty bottles
on top of the cabinets. Proof. Yeah, I’ve been drinking.
I guess you can tell, he said. I’ve got friends.
Just haven’t seen them in a while.
He said he’s getting closer to the center.
Of what? Woman No. 2 asked.
Of myself.
I wouldn’t do that. Whatever you do.
It’ll help my.
Don’t do that.
My art.
This isn’t art.
I am art.
You’re drunk.
I can remember the first time.
I’m starting to.
What does.
Nothing.
You’re leaving.
No. Well.
The first time. Your grandma’s shed. 2007, 2008.
I’ve got work in.
I remember the smells.
The morning, she said.
The dew, the grass, the sweet wind.
Please.
Your husband’s no ******* poet.
I.
Let me remind you how poets love.

The air conditioner hiccuped.
A taxi door slammed outside.
A helicopter dipped past Squalor.
Through the window a beam of light.

But this never happened.
This never happened, he said.

I remember you like the first time
Every time
You’re the chill of wet lips
In a first kiss
The click of my favorite food
Against my taste buds
As I first realize
What a favorite is
You’re that moment of elation
When I first pulled it off
You’re a first ******
When everything is possible
And a last ******
When everything is precious
And scarce
And impossibly wonderful
You’re that crack in my perception
That moment
Where I stop
And realize
The world doesn’t spin quite so fast
Time gives me a thumbs up
While the trees snicker
But the universe just raises an eyebrow
And says
Now you see how beautiful I am?

You filled me up then pulled away:
left me empty inside.
Now I'm on a beach somewhere
just lying here
for someone to find.
Maybe the tide will come
and sweep me out to sea.
Sure beats a life in a jar  
on a shelf
as someone's memory.
No, I think
I'd rather sink
to the ocean floor
than to live an empty life
up here on the shore.

To write food in the stomach
Of every hungry child.

To spell war as peace,
Metaphorize flowers into the barrel

Of every gun on Earth.
The poet has responsibilities

Beyond those of mothers,
Of kings and presidents.

I refuse to give up hope;  
This could be a poem world.

Come on, write your worst piece
Of literature.

Even misprints may give other
Meanings to a word,

Write me a green sky, blue dirt,
Trees the colour of air.

Sometimes the best poets
Have the least to say,

So keep writing, write until your
Fingers fall asleep.

Write until you havent slept
For weeks in search of that word,

That one right word,
Then rest on a notebook pillow

And dream the world right.
Write the world right.

There is no such thing as
Wasted poetry.

That night haunts me like I might as well have committed a ******. Your tongue tastes like a longing for cigarettes and those last four shots of "just having fun" but I'm not supposed to know that. You proceed to tell me I'm a dream come true right before she calls you because she had a nightmare. How ironic it is that she runs to you for comfort when you're the one creating lies as you speak through the phone at 6am with me lying by your side. I wake up from only an hour of sleep and find myself in your bed and whisper "it's not real" as you roll over and pull me closer as if I'm yours. I'll go about my day with a hangover in the place of my dignity and occasionally the memories come up with the alcohol. I'm starting to think it was actually the thoughts that made me feel so sick.

I wake up every morning with a throbbing skull and I tell everyone it's hereditary but I know it's just you in the back of my head telling me you don't love me anymore. I guess when my heart of glass shattered you picked up the pieces and have carried them around with you ever since because you seem to be the only person with a match to the missing parts, and after giving you the only section that's still whole you have the nerve to tell me about her. "She means nothing" and I believe you but that doesn't matter when I'm the one who trusted in you when everyone else called you a fake.

She's probably never even noticed your eyes.