afternoon sun falls through
the cracks in the walls,
falls along the floor where
aimess specks of dust laze
in the heat and I lie
across my bed sweat
covering my sheets and
every so often I’ll drag
my old and weary body over
the floorboards and sip
from my water dispenser
and worry worry so much
about the day it finally
dries up but deep down
I know that I will
probably have already
crawled into the darkest
recesses of my bed’s underside
long before and that gives
me a little comfort,
sitting here on my mat
in the heat, dust settling
on my hair as I wonder what
I could possibly do next.

Why a writer writes I will never know.

Though rich of me to even group my pitiful
expression with that of 'writing', whatever
I have thrown down on pages over the years
must have had some purpose, some reason for
existing, but having stopped writing for some
time the reasons for my words have disappeared
and I sit trying to throw my head at a piece
of paper and everything that comes out ends
up right in the waste basket.

Where it belongs.

But nonetheless it seems unnatural to give up,
to think rather than do, as anyone who has the
urge to write must do so because there are just
some thoughts that are better off not left
inside, some thoughts that look better written
down, thoughts that one feels have to be read.

Whatever they are.

Though perhaps not knowing why is the drive, the
push, the emptiness or the fullness of your soul
that begs to be dribbled down your chin into a
bubbly little mess of verse, prettied up with
similes and metaphors and stupid run-on sentences,
perhaps it is a 'somebody' that a writer writes
for, a lover or a friend or simply just a stranger.

Who it is probably doesn't matter.

Why a writer writes I will never know but thankfully
I will never be a writer or at the very least think
of myself as one so any of my baseless assumptions
will just meander on this ugly page until it catches
the eye of somebody, because I have a somebody,
a somebody who I have written for, but I do not write simply
for her because writing is a selfish act and writing
'for' somebody rather than 'to' them feels insipid
and contrary.

Whichever way you look at it.

Most of all an unwriter does not write so
much as spew, hence the occasional bouts
of 'wisdom' that pepper my confusion may alter
one's perspective about how truly awful a writer
I am, because I do not write to learn, I do not
write to express, and I most certainly do not
write because I can, I write to write and I
write just so somebody can read.

Whenever it is that she does.

I
An orange overcast this
evening splayed pink
hues stripes and
saccharine beads. The

twilight caricatures live golden years.

Restless becoming in the garden of
her drunken sons their flowers
soaked in brass, seams
bursting in uncontrollable
laughter we pause. To
admire the briefness

of that era exploding
its petals peppering
spraying saliently we spill
indoors churning across tabletops.
My arms hang dead by my sides.

Her eyes gaping sway
swiftly biting deeply the dottedfaces
lurch. Streets fall unconditional
amidst tears we comb lips
sharply distinctly

her stubborn *** stumbling
handles loosening she holds
my hand my arms hang
dead we pause.       

II
Children babble sunlight across
lawns; I hear sirens traffic icecream nips
our tongues twinge on windless
pipes gust our hair flying smiling
at laughter  from the
playground behind us.

Placid smiles stain enamoured
halls; for glimpses
we mumble necks crooked
sheets flap  draped over bars
her eyes waver glisten
shiver. A warm breeze
dries my hair.

III
Wallowing I oscillate utmost trep-
-idation entangling grappling but
hushed beneath foliage eyes
downturned soil clings when her

fingers impress deeper through
to where rivers end.
Glowing dawn I turn further
lighter almost her hair caught

between the floors;
gently feverish we see turgid
lines the tinniest cracks we pray
on tranquil mornings.

Window panes blemished it was
spring only darker from
deafened rivers throbbing;
under lucid eyes I fold
and heralds blare. We consume
the silence sounding from still lakes.

You glanced at me several times, and I at you a few times more – it was one of those awkward moments, where we both knew the other was looking yet continued to window shop with no intention to buy. We both pretended to look busy, and maybe you really were, but I wasn’t. All I did was look at you when you looked away, and pretend to write in my book. All I wrote were these words (if they’re anything at all). I would ask for you to read them but then I would break the current of this charming game we’re playing. And in two minutes I’ll leave and forget you entirely, but for this note. It was still a pleasure to meet you.

what are these words

but the right to write to
be joyous

to be expedient

to crook our arms
beneath the weight of others

to rest where rest is intimate
(like the rest of us of Love of Spring
of fully knowing)

what it means to be joyous is to know
it is as time is to season yearly

it is to know her almost there
if she, fully knowing,
were almost here

it is to be dear
and daring to endure

it is about
mostly and entirely
to forget Almost and
remember Now

it is to not write and not make sound

it is just a parenthesis of How

these are but sagas for lovers and haters in love
who love to hate but are in hate with love

these poems

of couples who exist to exist
and to redefine Is

these are but stories for the sons of bleary eyed fathers
who tread the same threads across dilated garters

and heroic stoics be proud!
these are but fables of folly
and of transparent whim

of hunters’ beguilement
of huntresses’ ****

of mechanical males who practise old tricks

these are but tales of maidens and heads
of neverending aims nevertheless transfixed

these are but poems
of Envy and Trust

poems that unbe the unfair
for the sake of unlove

and while mechanical feelers probe seas of flesh dealers
and reels of film cast doubts of Enough

these are still
but poems of Trust

I

meteor showers are not
very cleansing nor are
shooting stars much of
a threat

they pass over arms
raised and waving with
a hundred cries of
‘not yet’

by the time they
have passed the universe
might expand enough to
engulf Regret

and our arms will touch
our sides as we realise
the chances we may
have missed

and by then stars may
not exist and Never may
have already paid
its debt

and we’re left wondering
why we were left behind
and not chosen as hunks of
rock flew by

and though Ever After
has been stitched on
our minds dimensional
thread by thread

(and has with it what the
past cannot forget without
a vast sense of swoon)

Ever After will never
become Forever if it
speaks too late
or arrives too soon

II

if you were to ask Where when it would be
he would most definitely reply with ‘not now’

and if you were to ask Why exactly how
he would probably reply: ‘without me’

but if you were to question What with how it was
he would redirect you straight back to Why

so the last one to ask is the ever glum Was
(for he knows many things, most of all regret)

and Was also knows all you’ve done
and all you’ve done wrong he won’t let you forget

III

I’m about to begin work
on Forever but I don’t
know how long it will take

by the time I’m done
with Now who knows When
it will be

maybe by then North will
be South but true North
will be down somewhere
else

and clocks won’t have
numbers they’ll just
have words like ‘never’
and ‘too late’

it might take
a very long time

so it would be nice
to have someone here
just for having someone
here’s sake

it wouldn’t make Time
any less steady nor
pass it any quicker
or slower

but when the little hand
gets to ‘too late’ or
where ‘too late’ should
have been

I hope to have felt
and seen
everything

I remember when
I first read Bukowski
I thought he was a
joke

his poems weren’t even
poems
they were just a bunch
of lines
and sentences
strung about like flimsy
washing telling
mundane stories
about insipid things

who was he to venerate Cummings

(as if he had any of Edward’s
profundity)

and who was he to write
poems about poets not
writing poems

or his simple lines propping
up grossly defective and out of
date words

like jeroboams

or how he’d drink
(four-fifths a gallon of wine)
then write more derivative
lines

who was he to live so long
and write so much

drivel
and
claptrap

to other poets’ literary
athleticism
our darling Chuck was a
pedestrian

he was born a pensioner
but never received a
pension

his poems flow
like a river
to
no
where

and after reading them
the first time
I withdrew
my poetic concern

but then I read them again
and then
again

and I
realised

I was in his poem’s
stories

and that foolish girl I knew
that dense and brainless
denizen of triteville
was the heroine of
his ‘splashing’

and his love for classical
his love for wine
and even his love
for Edward
matched even mine

but most of all
and here
my rhetoric ends

the moment I sighed oh yes
when I read his poem
yes
you guessed it
‘oh, yes’

if not for his whimsical
words
or his misaligned wit
love him for his
grasp of regret
and the sheer sentiment
he can emit