Pour tout l’amour que je t'ai donné,
Pour tout moi patience,
Pour tout l’honnêteté,
T’ai m’a rien donné.
Rien.

The sound of stripping boughs stirs in a dream,
Leaves plucked and prepared for tapering steam.
Thy senses awaken, ravenous beasts,
Satiated by boiling, liquid feasts.
Darling china cups, looking sugar spun,
Perched, gathering dust, till the tea is done.
And the table must be clear for the drink,
Aside from the vases with rosebuds of pink,
Awaiting the whistle, too long to bear,
Silent, aside from the creak in my chair.
The kettle calls, I move, roused by the din,
And out, the nectar comes, hotter than sin.
Slowly it steeps, so graceful and tender,
Bitter and rich, it fills me with splendor.

“Don’t you want a life with someone you love?”
“Don’t you want a ring on that finger?”
“Do you want to die alone?!”
I can’t get married,
You see.
Married life,
Just isn’t for me,
I can’t have a white wedding,
With a pretty dress
And roses galore,
I can’t have a little suburban house with a swing,
In the backyard,
And a yellow lab wagging his tail by the front door,
I can’t get married…
Because I already am.
I am married,
Sealed and sewn,
To my love
My forever soulmate,
Who has me,
Mind, body, and soul,
Until the end of time.
I cannot give you my hand,
For my whole being belongs to her.
She owns me,
Like the sun owns the earth,
And it’s her tender,
Unrelenting,
Nourishment of love,
That sustains me when I must travel,
And we are apart.
Every day I wake to her beauty,
And every night I drift off peacefully in her embrace.
If I am ever forced to exist away from her,
I’ll die,
Just as slowly as everyone else,
But far more miserably,
At the base of an altar to her,
Surrounded by canvases marked with her image,
I’ll die,
Like a dry succulent,
Slowly wrinkling and withering,
Without the liquid life from the sky,
I’ll die,
Of heartache and loneliness,
If I’m ever forced to be away from
Texas.

Tap, tap, tap,
Go the keys,
Tap, tap, tap,
Furiously nailing the letters to the page,
Like nails to wood,
One at a time.
Tap, tap, tap,
Words about heartbreak and love,
His eyes and her eyes,
The way his coat smells,
The way flowers grow,
The way music touches your soul.
Tap, tap, tap,
Spinning sugar-sweet rhymes about “womanly” things,
While my womanly thoughts lie burning in the deep,
Dark,
Cavities of my chest.
Tap, tap, tap,
Deep down,
Beneath a waterfall of Earl Grey,
Beneath the flutter of a feminine heart,
My womanly words crackle like a fire suppressed.
Tap, tap, tap
I can hear them rumble like thunder,
So close to being spoke,
Being written,
Being typed,
Tap, tap, tap,
Tap, tap, tap,
The fire and the thunder stay in my chest,
Rolling and seething,
Tap, tap, tap,
I continue to write,
Tap, tap, tap,
Someone else’s words.

Tick, tock,
Thump, thump,
As the minutes go by,
The heartbeats seem to grow more strained.
Up at night,
Pacing,
Moving,
Weary from the constant movement,
Never resting,
I sit,
A temporary reprieve,
And then up again.
Walking,
Waiting,
Listening,
Terrified,
That at any point,
I could stop and wait to hear what I always hear,
And it will be silent.
Hushed is the house,
Creaking in slumber,
Like a great breath in the foundation,
And all else is silent to my broken ears,
Save the ringing when I strain to hear,
The inhale,
Exhale,
Of my loves ones.
I go to each door and stand,
As still as can be,
Watching for the rise of the chest,
A stirring hand,
A fluttering eyelid,
To remind me-
They are here,
They breathe,
Their hearts beat.
Every night,
I cannot rest,
Haunting the hallways,
Peering around doors,
And I wait,
Impatiently,
For dawn,
For the time when life is clear,
And the nightmare of death can be put to rest,
And only when the sun rises
And my beloved speak
And laugh
And move,
Can my restless limbs,
And shallow breath,
Be put to rest,
With the moon.

I used to be beautiful,
Glossy,
And warm with the glow of untouched purity.
Propped up on my stand, for all to see,
To admire,
To desire,
But not to play.
I can’t remember feeling before feeling the touch
Of your hands,
Rough and warm.
Beauty be ******,
I relished the newness of your grasp on my curves,
That first rush
As your fingertips glided down my polished body.
It wasn’t long before you found my strings,
And joy turned to fear-
Furiously yet gently,
You loosened my taut wires,
And a motion of sound filled my once blissfully hollow form,
And what came from me but an alien, lyrical cry,
Flying from my strings as your fingers danced across them,
And to my horror,
You smiled,
As you watched my misery unfold.
This sound,
Unheard before now,
Rang out my fears and my naked desires for all to hear,
I couldn’t stop you,
And my soul could not be stifled,
As you forced out of me a bitter song,
A tearful melody,
Of hopes unfulfilled
And a vital *****,
Stolen and unreturned.
One hand round my neck,
The other pulling most painfully at my delicate strings,
You played me.
You monster,
You kidnapper,
You mad musician-
Take me home,
Put me on a stand,
In my case,
Hide me away,
Let me go.
Release me from my tiring song,
In any way you must.
Master,
End it,
Before there’s nothing left,
Before I’m dust.
I already lament the death of my beauty,
My once unblemished wood,
Now splintered,
Dull,
Warped by your unforgiving grasp.
And still my strings you play,
Relentlessly,
And with cruel dispassion.
Ravageur,
Finish my song,
And don’t play me again.
If you must,
Destroy me,
So I can’t sing anymore,
Feel anymore,
Destroy me,
Obliterate me,
Shatter me,
Break me,
Against your counter,
Your headboard,
The wall,
Until I’m scattered across your floor,
Oh, **** me,
Player,
Anything to be silent again.

Hat pulled low over my face, I pull the lever of the pump,
getting back in my car,
hands placed on the steering wheel as if I'm going to drive away while the gas is going,
I just sit.
Alone.
Trying to clear my mind before the day.
That's when I see them.
A pixie-like little girl in denim and cotton,
tennis shoes untied and scuffed,
long hair trailing unkempt,
summer hair,
barely brushed,
she skips beside a man who is undoubtedly her father,
a serious-looking man dressed for a day of adventure,
the same nose as the sprite hopping along beside him.
At once,
I spiral into an invisible shoe box of photos...
then it's me with my hair down and my shoes untied and a big smile on my face as I accompany my father in the most mundane tasks.
Everything is an adventure with daddy,
everything is a game,
a brand-new experience ******* in shiny ribbons,
even if it's just going to the gas station.
They reappear from the store,
and the little girl excitedly pulls a bottle of chocolate milk from the plastic bag.
The colorful snacks look silly in the father's large, rough hands,
but he opens each package carefully,
handing her napkins,
and in her unrelenting grin,
anyone can see that she owns him heart and soul.
I shift uncomfortably in my mental shoe box,
and I see myself again,
overalls and a small bag of donuts,
licking the glaze from my fingers,
my father reaching over with a towel to wipe my face clean of chocolate glaze.
He chastises me, but he's smiling,
and he pops a donut into his mouth, too,
two best friends on a summer adventure,
nothing can stop our fun.
The father starts their rickety old suburban, and the little girl bounces excitedly in her seat, eager for their next stop. The mode of transportation could be a rusted row boat in the middle of a swamp,
but to her,
it's all a part of a beautiful memory that she'll never let go of.
And one day,
when her daddy is gone,
she'll drive up to the gas station in her own car
and sit in the driver's seat to take a breath,
and she'll see herself, fifteen years younger, prancing happily along her father's steady gait,
and she'll fall backwards into an unexpected
invisible
shoebox.

The days drag out,
Unbroken by sleepless nights,
And a bone-deep,
Brain-deep,
Gut-deep
Weariness.
Restless,
Uncomfortable,
But too tired
And too spent
To give to where I am and what I’m doing.
After the sun goes down,
I pace, despite the fatigue,
And let my imagination run in the dark,
To satiate that squirm beneath my skin,
Even if only briefly.
I gently place the needle on the record,
And strip down to a slip,
The sound of vinyl humming over my bare skin,
In a caress as intimate as the satin I wear,
And there it is-
Apparent,
Immobilizing,
And I know-
I have to satisfy it.
At first, just a sway,
Side to side,
Left to right,
Rocking front and back,
One foot,
Then another,
And spinning,
I’m swinging,
Rolling,
Working muscles that hadn’t moved
In what felt like years.
From my bare toes,
To my stiff neck,
To my tingling fingers,
I unravel that itch,
And dance.
Leaping
Twisting
Grinning from ear to ear,
I move like it’s the first time anyone has ever moved,
And I shake off the whole day,
The whole week,
Every worry,
Every word that weighs on me,
I dance,
Until my shoulders feel no burden,
And the ache is thrown from me,
In the shake, rattle, and roll of dance.
My feet don’t stop until the soles blister,
And my arms don’t still until the sockets are weak,
Until my fatigue is true,
And not the creeping,
Crawling
Drain on my bones,
On my soul,
On my everything.
Until the tired makes me smile with gratifying exhaustion,
And my sheets are a reprieve
And not a ritual,
And my body can rest,
Now that the itch is gone.

In the middle of summer,
at the end of a long day,
the kruk chased a white mouse up a tree.
The mouse chose the tallest tree in the grove,
but the kruk had flown far greater heights.
Finally,
upon reaching the highest limb,
the kruk devoured the mouse
and rested
after its large meal.
As it sat,
the kruk,
for the first time,
noticed the rays of the sun,
and followed them with its eyes
to their origin.
The sun,
nestled in its hazy, pillowy throne,
shone with less enthusiasm as the day wore on,
and now,
it only gave the earth red and orange lights,
as if the Indian paints covered every inch of the ground.
The kruk marveled at the way the sun could decide what the people did and did not see.
The sun held so much power,
and so much generosity,
for it gave life to the plants
and joy to the animals
when it did not receive any in return.
The kruk took so much pleasure in the light
that it returned to the high branch every morning and every evening to greet the sun,
and although it did not speak,
the sun seemed to shine brighter
when the kruk sang for it.
The visits became longer,
even as the seasons changed
and the days became shorter.
The kruk basked in the warmth that the sun provided,
and lamented when it sank below the horizon
to be replaced with the deep blue illumination of the moon and her many children.
Though the moon was beautiful,
she did not hold the same beauty for the kruk that the sun did.
The kruk soon realized that it was in love with the sun.
Of all the birds in the trees, the kruk was the smartest,
and knew that this love was a difficult one,
but determined that it would join its lover regardless.
After filling up its belly with seeds and cool river water,
and resting well through the night,
the kruk took flight at the break of dawn.
Its love propelled it upwards,
and even as the air thinned,
and its wings weakened,
it flew on.
The sun grew more stunning the closer the kruk flew,
And its glossy black feathers,
Shimmering blue and purple,
Began to singe with the heat.
The creatures on the ground below protested when the kruk began to caw in pain,
But nothing could be done for the bird.
Finally, in a black, frantic streak,
The kruk descended,
Falling through the leaves like a stone in a pond.
It was days before the kruk returned to the high perch on the tree to greet the sun.
The sun continued to shine,
Rising in the morning,
And returning to the earth at night.
No rays were spared in mourning for the disappearance of the dear kruk.
When the kruk once again fluttered upon the well-worn bough,
The animals whispered,
“The sun is too far,
The sun is too hot,
And the kruk is much too weak.”
On the high branch, the kruk hung its head at their words,
And sorrowfully shuffled further down the branch
Into the shade of the tree,
Away from the bright, hot reminder
Of the sun’s unattainable touch.
At dawn the next morning, the kruk raised a matte black beak to the sky and let out a miserable caw.
There would be no union between the two,
Nothing to warm the kruk through the night.
The kruk extended its wings in surrender to despair, and took flight,
Driving its body into the sky until the air became unbreathable
And the clouds offered no protection.
The kruk ignored the burn rippling beneath its feathers and cried out to the sun,
A wild, grief-stricken call to be accepted by its deadly embrace,
And below,
The animals could see for a brief moment,
A shadow falling over the sun.
The animals gasped and looked away,
But for a few moments,
The sun’s shine was replaced with a melancholic glow.
A dark hole of blackness was cast,
Only a small ring of light twinkling around the edges of the sudden shroud,
And the wildlife shuddered in the unexpected coolness.
After its last cry,
The kruk never returned.
The animals do not speak of that day,
But once every century,
The earth remembers,
Covered in a darkness so complete,
That one can only think of a lost, forlorn disciple,
Flying into an unknown fire
And imploring it to love.

The world used to be so quiet
Way back before there were so many people,
The far past,
And when I had a young body,
And my ears didn’t work,
The recent past,
It was so quiet.
But I can’t hide under covers and behind drawn curtains for the rest of my life.
I want to be in the outside,
I want miles to explore,
For things to be far,
So they have to be worth it,
To get them.
And for there to be enough silence
That when a single thing happens,
I can hear it from far away.
I’m tired of running away from the noise all the time,
Being chased into corners,
Locking the doors behind me quickly,
Earplugs,
Earbuds,
Sunglasses after sundown,
Anything to create a barrier.
I’m not a person who likes walls,
But they’ve been my friends and family,
For twenty-one years now.
If it weren’t for the people,
I would embrace a world without walls,
Without buffers and veils and masks,
But the people are loud,
So loud,
That even when I feel a small,
Pebble-sized
Sense of peace,
I must tuck it away,
It’s not to be enjoyed,
Because it’ll be shattered by the people
And their voices
And their cars
And their phones
And their computers
And their people toys
And their people games
And even in the quietest corner
Of the most isolated, abandoned building,
I can still hear
The people noise.

Walking outside, I feel the cold before it really hits me.
The loneliness of the campus after night class amplifies the bone-deep chill sweeping between cement buildings.
It’s nights like these that are the worst for my memories of you.
This liminal season, the bridge between fall and winter, is ruled by you.
The rough texture of your wool coat
brushing against my soft cardigans and billowing scarves,
the opaque black of your irises apathetically gazing down
into my upturned, wide-open ones,
liquid chocolate and trusting.
These are the things that plague the colder nights,
particularly when I’m on my own.
The evening drizzle descends and ****** my skin, as if trying to drive the memories deeper.
**** you.
I try to shake off the droplets, but they cling to my clothing, unwilling to let go.
Part of me pretends that when I arrive at my car
and turn on the heat
and the steady thrum of the engine drowns out the silence of solitude,
that the memories this weather brings will fade away.
But I know that's not true.
I want you.
Even now.
With the knowledge that behind your charming, lopsided smile,
you're a disorganized monster,
I should be able to tamp down the recollections,
like weak, sizzling embers.
Instead, they flood into me as the rain grows colder,
and I grow more numb.
Images of you,
unruly, wind-blown locks,
just begging for my caress.
You scent clings to you, a heady mixture of old books,
paint,
sawdust,
and tobacco.
From your lips, your cigarette dangles as if it belongs there,
taking a drag with all the nonchalance of a person slowly killing themselves,
and enjoying it.
In this particular memory,
I stand beside you,
as opposite from you as one can be.
The scent of the jasmine oil I bathe in floats on the wind, wafting off of my soft, pink scarf,
and my white coat conceals every inch of my body, from neck to knee.
But you,
your coat wide open,
gaping in the wind,
reveals the taught, black t-shirt  underneath,
narrowing into long, lean legs,
that I can't forget,
can't forget what they look like crossed,
stretched out in front of you as you lean back in your chair.
I'll never forget that image.
And, unfortunately,
I'll also never forget the sound of you
saying that I'm not enough.
Your tone suggests that I'll never be enough.
And it's not a rejection of my affection.
Just a fact.
I'm not enough.
When you're near,
I can have what I want from you.
But it's a passive action,
and no matter what I take from you,
it always feels as though I'm the only one giving.
And of course
that I'm not enough.
Reaching my car, I fish for my keys,
the familiar fluttering of my chest reminding me that I'm not safe,
a woman lingering alone in a parking lot,
but soon, I'm in the comfort and safety of my car.
The intimate and achy feeling of being somewhere I know,
but still feeling unwelcome,
wrong.
I sigh,
my breath coming out in a cloud of vapor in the cold, stale air of the car.
Even here, visions of you appear out of the corner of my eye,
vibrating with the hum of the radio,
and yet another memory crawls up my throat.
You,
breathless,
reaching for me,
because you've succumbed to the ferocity pumping in your veins
and clawing your fingers,
digging into my hips and my hair,
with complete disregard for the ornate pins holding it up.
The windows are frosted with our breath,
and from the speakers croons an indie singer,
singing something about her self-worth,
because "what good is she
if she can't speak her mind?"
At the time,
my only concern was how to steal your words and your breath,
straight from your lips,
but now,
I think back,
as I peer through the downfall on my muddled windshield,
and wonder...
what good am I?
If I'm not enough for him,
what good am I?
If I'm not enough for anyone,
what good am I?

On dusty streets leading from market to to the edges of a resort,
elderly men with three teeth beckon you.
The commercialized exoticism sweeps you up
and you hand over pesos
in exchange for a piece of parchment with hand-scrawled symbols...

There is no Mayan alphabet.
They'll tell you that they're writing your name,
you'll take it home and display it on a shelf next to framed pictures
of you and the family in Chichen Itza,
but nothing about it is real.
We never grow up and learn not to believe,
we just learn piece by piece what's real and what's not.
Children learn about the tooth fairy,
and mermaids,
teenagers learn about soulmates,
young people learn about their dreams,
but even as adults,
there are things we still believe in.

There is no Mayan alphabet,
and yet grown, educated people
pull coins from their pocket in an attempt to connect with a culture that seems too fantastic to be a part of reality.

There is no Mayan alphabet,
but people still believe.
They believe in utopias
and countries without debt.
They believe in world peace and infinite resources,
they'll write checks to conmen
and work for checks from them, too.
They believe in honest politicians
and perfectly healthy food.
They put stock in organic remedies
and all their trust in online articles,
and every time they think they've learned the way of the world,
they'll turn around,
and learn something new.
Adults may not believe in fairy tales,
but they will believe in the Mayan alphabet.

Shadows move with my feet on the cobblestone
from the sunlight dancing on the picado banners
that stretch between buildings
And offer some reprieve
From the Texas sun.

The mouth-watering scent of pan dulce
Draws children to the glass fronts of the old bakery,
And they flit between sweet breads
And figurines of brilliant colors
Crowding stands run by elderly craftsmen and women with big smiles-

San Antonio,
There’s something in your streets.
Something binds me to your old, leaning buildings,
And the murals that decorate them,
San Antonio,

My first memories of reading
Reside on 600 Soledad Street
between the shelves of the Big Enchilada,
And dapple down through the glossy, colorful limbs
of its Chihuly spine.

You exist in the border between coastal plains and the hill country,
Mesquite trees and palm trees living side by side
Just as the German and Spanish settlements do,
The missions becoming as much a part of the land
As the Guadelupe.

With tequila on my tongue,
And boots on my feet,
I’m prepared to bask in the warmth absorbed by sandy loam
And breathe in the smell of elotas on a Sunday afternoon
To the sound of San Fernando’s bells,

Oh, San Antonio…
I’ve never wished for a better dwelling,
Even one with cooler summers
And smoother streets,
Oh, San Antonio…

I’d be a fool to leave you,
To call another home,
And I’ve never found myself foolish before,
So my dearest, sweetest, most proud San Antonio,
I am here to stay.

We lament,
systematically,
our woes,
our naked ring fingers,
and our cold mattresses,
we indulge in our vices
justifying the gluttony
with broken hearts.
My comrades and I
we bond over the futility of love,
the battle that is romance,
and in coming together,
we make one another strong,
condemning the ignorant male swill for their lust,
their objectifying ways,
their Godless, scheming hearts
that leave no room for us,
and we bemoan
vigorously,
the fault that keeps a man from binding himself to a woman
indefinitely.
But the truth is...
I love it.
I smile inwardly as I spin lies that keep me in my cups without question,
and at home in peace without argument.
I nod in affirmation as my acquiantances curse the carnal seed that brought man forth,
but the truth is,
I love it.
Primal nature
is far more satisfying to me
than the boring, blustering outsides
of a man with no personality.
The tedious conversation required by polite society,
and the obligation to know him,
no matter how Nothing he may be...
The truth is,
I would rather create an adventure,
something to truly stimulate my senses,
something to rouse the animal in me,
as opposed to tranquilizing my *****.
The truth is,
when a man releases me from his embrace,
a rush of endorphins thrusts me into the streets,
and I fly through the night like Margarita on her broomstick,
wild and unfettered,
pink-cheeked and laughing,
naked and free...
the truth is,
there's a thrill,
in taking a man,
giving him what he thinks he wants,
taking what you need,
and ending with the drop of a guillotine,
and the blade never dulls,
the game never loses its charm,
and the truth is,
I never tire of it.

The texture of the glass is rough with blemishes,
convex with swells of adipose tissue
and spotted with stray hairs.
The occasional splotchy flush
on the sallow complexion
is just enough to suggest life
but not in the right locations
to suggest beauty.
The glass sneers.
The glass snarls.
It takes handfuls of its dull, lanky hair
and yanks,
as if with one tug, the entire image could come to a screeching halt
like the break line on a train.
It's a hideous image,
but it doesn't frighten like a vision of a monster.
Instead,
it insights a painful tug in the chest cavity,
an ache,
a slow, throbbing pang
that lengthens with every glance.
Nothing feels quite as horrible
as the realization
that even if the glass breaks,
comes to the floor
and splinters,
shatters...
Its duplicate will still exist.
In me.

In the dark of my room,
I lightly tap the pads of my fingers
against the smooth keys
of my typewriter,
Hoping that the gentle reminder
Will awaken my subconscious,
And the words will come.
The gentle trails of incense smoke
Drift drunkenly around me,
Like a haze of memories wrung out
And overused.
I sigh,
Accepting that I may require refueling,
Recharging,
Replenishing of the nourishment
On which my work sustains itself.
I stall,
Grasp for any last resource,
And when I find nothing,
I sigh,
Finally conceding.
I need it to write,
And I need to write to live,
And though writing makes it hard to stand the noise of human contact,
The ugly distraction of romance,
The sweaty, *****, selfish people,
That I have to smile at and touch.
I suppose I have no choice
But to face the war zone that is humanity
And collect.
I rise from my little desk,
Gather my coat,
And prepare,
Begrudgingly,
To go out and experience.
In the outside,
I must laugh with others,
Hold a man or two,
Taste and feel and drop into every pool,
A pebble of disturbance,
And let the ripples unfurl new strings of words,
Lines and lines of poetry,
Bundles of stories,
Baskets of characters
Floating in on waves,
A long awaited reward
For an unpleasant,
Detestable
Deed.
Forging love,
Flowery romance,
For the sake of pulling and picking what I need
To color the pages of my work.
Back at my desk,
Weary from company,
My hands revive to complete my purpose,
The reason for my distress,
The thing that moves me,
But makes me want to be still,
What a suffocating paradox it is,
The unfortunate requirement of my condition.

Late fifties, early sixties,
Maybe somewhere in between,
I died.
Can’t explain how it happened,
I don’t think it was a big deal,
It certainly didn’t feel like it.
Besides, if it was a tragedy, shouldn’t I remember it?
It doesn’t matter anyhow,
It’s all over. The point is that I lived,
And now I can’t remember enough to sustain myself on memories.
I’m left with that itch you can’t scratch until you put your finger on that word,
That face you forgot,
The name of that restaurant,
Figure out what it is you’re hungry for,
Bring that specific thought to the front of your mind and picture it,
Feel it,
Recall what you need to…
Instead I’m left with half-thoughts,
Words and figures I can’t finish
Because it was long ago,
Looking with a different set of eyes.
Here I am now,
Out of place,
Uncomfortable in my own skin,
People noticing that I’m not quite right,
I don’t quite fit into the landscape,
And there’s nowhere for me to be.
Because it’s not a where,
It’s a when,
And you can’t take a plane to a when.
You can’t drive your car or bike or even take the bus
To 1958,
Because wherever you go,
It’s still going to be a place in Now.
Everything Now is a bitter reminder that I’m a foreigner,
An intruder on a new place that deserves new souls that love new things.
Even the good things are a slap in the face,
A kick to the shin,
A bright light in my old eyes,
That bring my attention to the calendar,
The clock,
The dress on the streets,
The technology in the hands of every man, woman, and child with two thumbs and a pocket to stow it away.
I want late nights listening to those smooth notes pouring off the stage like mist on a cool morning,
Everyone on the dancefloor losing themselves in it,
Instead of losing themselves in brightly lit screens in their laps,
Fingers shaking with anticipation for the next tap and scroll.
Where’s the addiction to long drives and the yearning for a simple joy?
It’s disappeared into an addiction to little black boxes and all the noises they make and information they stole from books and brains and the tongues of real, live people that died with less attendees to their funerals than attendees to the opening of the new Apple store.
No one listens to the old folks,
Too busy resenting the things they left behind for us,
Even though they couldn’t control it either.
Good things that last take more effort to destroy
Than the flimsy new things take to create,
But we destroy them anyway,
Instead of honoring the way they earned their place in our world.
Artists with the ability to remember and record are distracted by politics and ugly things,
And forget their responsibility.
Fifty years from now,
We won’t have anything beautiful to offer our children and their’s.
Is it too late for me?
Am I destined for misery?
I’m an old thing, too, does that mean I’m fated for a dusty closet or decaying garbage bin?
I couldn’t have been made alone.
I couldn’t have been left on my own in this new place,
There has to be someone else,
Maybe even more than one someone,
Because anything less is too cruel.
And if there is,
Where do we go?
Can we make a new place out of Then?
Or is it too late?
Is it impossible…
Impossible to make a where out of a when?

I’m relieved that you’re not here.
Though I’ve never seen you here before,
I sort of expect you to be,
Because the memory of you follows me wherever I go.
Slipping noiselessly through the door
Into the din of the bar,
With a perpetual cloud of smoke clinging to you,
Highlighting your phantom affect.
I don’t think I could handle it,
Seeing you here.
Visions of you already plague me
Without seeing you
In person,
Sitting before me
Balancing on the back two legs of your chair,
Heavy leather boots crossed at the ankles,
Rocking on your long, lean, jean-clad legs.
I don’t think I could handle it,
Hearing you order your Jameson,
Double,
Neat.
One hand in the pocket of your long black coat that grazes the floor when you sit,
The other wrapped around your glass,
Jameson,
Double,
Neat.
And although the smell suffocates me,
Sometimes I sit out on the smoker’s deck and breathe in the smell of burning tobacco,
And if I’m particularly desperate to feel your presence without succumbing to the need to call,
I order it.
Jameson.
Double.
Neat.
But see,
I can’t actually call you and ask you to come,
Because you will.
And if you ghost through the threshold with your paint-stained hands casually shoved in your pockets,
And give me that gut-wrenching,
Heart-stopping grin,
I’ll die.
Because death is the only way to avoid my incessant need to be near you.
Even now,
Knowing that your insides are just as coal-black as your eyes,
I yearn for the feel of your broad shoulders flexing and rolling beneath my fingertips, my hands running over the expanse of your chest,
Seeking entrance beneath your shirt
As if I can feel the tattoos that lie beneath.
The neck,
The jaw,
The parted lips,
Everything I’ve kissed and caressed a thousand times,
I know I would do the same a thousand more,
If I got the chance.
So thank God that you’re not here.
Because if I caught one glimpse of your irresistible, impossibly soft, dark locks
Falling over your severe, furrowed brow,
Mussed by the wind
And from your fingers running through it over and over,
To the envy of my own,
I would burst at the seams,
God,
It’s a good thing you’re not here.

My grace,
My love,
My soulmate.
She drapes her majesty in mountains, oceans, rivers, plains, canyons, swamps, rivers, and rocky shores, big cities and small towns, deserts that bleed into forests, and anything and everything that the world could offer.
She extends her arms so far, you couldn’t reach the fingertips of one hand to another,
Not in a single day,
Not without ignoring her beauty.
I love her from her masterpiece sunsets
Down to her rusted shack tin roofs,
From her lush green fields,
To her sizzling sands,
I love you,
Texas,
My Texas,
From the freezing floods of January,
To the hot, dry death of July,
And I’ll never let her go,
Even in death,
I’ll be buried in the sandy loam,
Under the sticker burs,
And wild flowers,
And let my love nestle me in her embrace,
Long after I’m a pile of chalky, white bones and ancient cowboy boots,
I’ll lover her until the ocean cuts away her shores,
And the wind wears down her hills,
And the parasites drill holes in her ground,
And build streets on her fields,
I’ll love you,
Texas,
Until the end.

I miss you,
West Texas,
You more than most.
I miss people
And things
But I’ve never missed more,
Than I’ve missed you.
One day, I’ll return to you,
And we’ll be together until I die,
My dear West Texas.
Some say your deserts are unbearably hot,
And I say,
It’s easier to make shade
Than a fire.
Picturesque cacti,
Blooming in the spring,
Sunsets that put oil paintings to shame,
And wild mustangs escaping man’s unyielding possession,
Just like me.
I can see them running along the dusty banks
Of a wide river in canyon carved by the Great Artist Himself,
West Texas,
I want to drive a rusty old truck through hot afternoons till frigid nights,
Miles and miles of sweet loneliness,
Until it’s just you and I,
And I can watch your brilliant display of stars move
Across the endless horizon.
Desert owls,
A serpent’s rattling warning,
Creatures that crave solitude,
As I do,
Emerge in the night,
Like the neon lights of lonely bars in the middle of nowhere,
Sweet prickly pear in perfect harmony with Jose Cuervo in my glass,
A tribute to my lonely West Texas,
Singing me a tune of cicada chirps and desert winds,
And the jingle of spurs on concrete floors,
As the men,
As old and covered in sand as the bar itself,
Make their way in from isolated jobs miles away,
To listen to Tejano,
And sip on that cactus nectar,
Distilled by the Great Bartender
For a night like this,
In my West Texas,
Perfectly lonely,
Perfectly perfect.
I just want it to be me and you
And your hot red sand,
I want to see those yellow blossoms bursting from the deceptively spiny hands of desert life,
I want to hang a dusty, wide brimmed hat above dusty leather boots when I come home,
I want the sky to explode with color,
As a reward for enduring a long day of the heat,
And when the rare jewels from heaven fall, and nourish your cracked ground,
And peace is sworn between all animals,
Predators and prey,
For that moment,
So that all may celebrate the loving dew sent by our Great Caretaker,
I want to dance on your planes,
Twirl in the rain,
And let the drops fall between my lips like the crevices of your canyons,
Brought to life when you are,
Slumber when you do,
Live each day as you live,
My sweet West Texas.

No matter which window I look out of,
the world is still on fire.
Upstairs,
Downstairs,
gleaming with the orange-gold of
indiscriminate destruction.
When I was young,
I thought the framed oil paintings were real,
and enjoyed the pleasant, static serenity-
but one day,
I noticed a shadow glance across the edges of the curtains,
and when I parted them,
the glass was aflame.
Every bay,
every aperture,
glowing hot and chaotic,
apathetic to my plight.
I scoured the halls,
reached high on the basement walls,
searched the attic,
but every window framed the same vision-
a fatal inferno.
It wasn't until I caught fire myself that I realized-
the world is not on fire.
My house is.