4 A.M.- it’s much too early
It’s no surprise I’m feeling surly.
It’s cold outside and lacking light.
It feels like the middle of the night!
(When you’ve been out late and had a few
Mondays are no friend to you.)
Villainous clock that chirps and chimes
I’ll hit your snooze button one more time.
Its cold, and someone stole the covers
I reach for them as for a lover.
Alas, my larcenous spouse has taken them
I guess I’m in for a brewed awakening.

I erased your voice-mail today--
     the only remaining evidence
     that we ever loved each other.

     Notes I could part with--
       penmanship doesn't encapsulate you.

       E-mails jettison into cyberspace
         without fanfare.

         Pictures were trashed
             before you left the parking lot.

Flames of rage
         consume indiscriminately.
     Like a bruise,
         black will fade to blue
     until it looks worse than it feels.



       Strangely,
       the voice-mail gave me pause.



Your voice exited that ear-piece
     like a sucker-punch to a glass jaw.

             It took me twenty minutes to punch 7
                 and put the defibrillating pads to my amnesia.


Whoever coined the phrase
     easy as the push of a button
never used one to erase the only
                 "I love you"
      that ever sounded genuine.

You can identify your own flaws by scrutinizing strangers.

I watched a woman
     from across a platform
at the subway station:

Straight, dishwater-blonde hair
glimmering in the subterranean fluorescence;
         striking posture—
     a dancer's figure—
and a thrifty ensemble that bespoke good taste
in spite of budgetary constrictions.

She pulled a circular compact from her purse
the way people in films exhume a pack of cigarettes.
   Then, in deliberate fashion,
she removed a pill and swallowed it.

             Birth control is like receiving a governor's pardon
         in the process of planning a crime.
             I resent her having that kind of indemnity.

I pass judgment on assumptions of character,
       high on the blissful soapbox of bigotry.


As that pill crested the ridges of her teeth
and met the soft tissue of her tongue, then esophagus,
my mind conjured a phantasmagoria of lewd images
on the surrounding subway walls--


         more a reflection of my character
              than hers.

72 hours in
I'm giving serious thought to
drinking the Listerine.

The ***** is it's citrus flavored.

I can't even rinse with that toxic concoction, let alone swallow it,

but I'm running out of options.

I finished my other MacGyvers--
the Nyquil was first to go,
followed by a Dimetapp chaser
  (the cherry,
     not a refreshing grape-flavored one)
and a shot of Wal-fed
that induced indigestion.

My kingdom for a belt of whiskey--
maybe a snifter of ***.

You know you're bottoming out
when you wax nostalgic
for drunken days
when soiling yourself was justifiable
due to your general state of disarray.

I'm the **** that adheres to the bottom of the barrel—
******* in the shower with my shoes on,
pants removed as a cautionary measure.

Not that life can get worse;
nothing trumps waking up miserable,
sore,
   jobless,
     alone,
       queasy,
         woozy and
           drooling uncontrollably

and lacking ***** to blame it on.