We used to sit in your parent's basement
with your two dogs on their little beds
in the corner by the old desktop computer,
wooden hand-me-down grandmother cabinetry,
lace doilies underneath all the candles
on the coffee table. I made you turn out the lights.
We would sit there and pretend
that we could find something better to do
than kiss between commercials
or talk about all the things we used
to dream about in high school, how I
got mine and how yours were like
the back bumper of a car that got left
out in the rain too long-- a little rusty.

Your kissing was a little rusty,
but I let it go because you didn't make fun
of me ordering a double grilled cheese
on our first date. You also didn't judge
when I got drips on my dress
from my ice cream cone. I can still
remember the way you'd yell at me
for stopping too far out at intersections,
laughing how I was gonna get us killed
one day, but I think
you just really loved to hear me sing
over you. I think you really loved

me, and here I was playing teeter
totter on curbs in little jean shorts
with a guy who gave me a slice
of leftover pizza. Here I was, burning
down your own ambitions because
they didn't seem as glittery as my own,
because you didn't quite match all the sketches,
all the plans I had on my map. Because
if we were to draw straws I always thought
you would come up a little short.
I think you really loved me and I left you
like a penny in between that couch
we used to sit on.

For me, you are Sunday. Today is Sunday,
and tomorrow will be Sunday. Because I am stuck
in gingham yellow sheets, small white saucers
with matching ceramic cups, cigarette ashes
like a crop circle around them as I sip homemade
coffee. The ***** brown liquid sloshing
in the back of my throat, scorching my insides
as I swallow something not nearly as
painful as looking up for an answer to the crossword
and realizing you are not in fact actually there, and your hand
is not on my thigh, tracing the outline of my knee
with your thumb. I am stuck

like a kid on the monkey bars. Deciphering
between reaching my hand out to grab
the next rung or just allowing myself
to fall into the wood chips, welcome
that scraped skin and soil in the worry lines
of my palms. Because calling you,
reaching out to that line, could end with me
face up on my bed staring at the blades of my fan
trying to pinpoint just one to follow around and around
again. Or I could get your voicemail. Or you could
see my number and decide to hang up. How close
were we really anyway?

Or you could answer and we could talk through
how bad the weather is, how we've been doing,
and then get to the poignant silence, that hum
in the background that coils through the wires
into my ear, down the canal, and sinks into my heart
until the pressure becomes too much. Until
I tell you that its Sunday. That I need the 1994
Tony Award winning musical for 3 across, and hopefully,
you'll give me the right answer.

I took Billy Collins to lunch with me today.
He kept me company, Horoscopes of the Dead
and new versions of Dante’s hellish sandwich.
My pasta was dry, but I ate it
between stanzas and between pages.
You walked in, backpack and all, at the top
of the stairs. I choked on some graded cheese,
because of the way you looked in your khakis.
I hate the taste of cucumbers but I would have

kissed you anyway. Even though,
I sometimes laugh a little too loud in the mornings
you still make sanctuaries out of my sheets,
covering us in a layer of polka dots,
craving each other’s skin, listening
the lullaby the ruffles of the duvet make.

And even though I sometimes know
that wanting you has its clumsy consequences,
I still lose my breath when you walk up
to the lunch line, or when you grab my face
with both hands, or when you say my name
backwards between sighs. Maybe Billy understands,

and maybe I can just stay a poet. Maybe,
you would look good on me. I’d love
to try you on. But I lost my breath
when you walked in this afternoon.

Welcome to the house of addictions: please, leave your assumptions at the door. . .

             I emptied my pockets
I sorted the change
                My conscience receding
Mentality, deranged

                A straw in my nose
And a blade in my hand
                The velvet of breathing,
Crushed on command

                A line of white rabbit
Appears on my desk
                Clean, and well sorted,
Yet I am a mess

                If a substance is stronger
Than myself, alone,
                Perhaps I should ***** it
Addictively prone

                For, the path of assumptions
Undoubtedly leads
                To the house of addictions
In which you’ll find me. . .