i am the elephant
on the couch that
nobody wants to confront
i am the lipstick stain
on an unwashed shot glass that
reminds you of your first love
i am the smell of cigarettes and singed hair and bleach and ***** vomits
on an indigo floor tile that
you don't want to clean up-
you like the smell too much
i am the sting of poison
on your tongue that
drifts down your leather studded throat
i am the spiderweb scars
on your skin-drawn with such a delicacy to detail-that
makes you crawl back to me
i am the echoes in the caves
on your broken record mind that
you love with a burning desire to hate
i am la fin
on your favorite movie that
you want to live inside
i am the nightmare
on the left side of your bed that
you seek for companionship in
i am the bad ideas
or the good ideas
i am the everything
or the nothing
i am the end
or the beginning
i am the hope
or the violence
i am the last love
or the first
i am the possibilities
or the infeasibilities
i am the predicament
or the solution
or just you
and you,
you want all of it
or none of it
what a dilemma.

its a blister bandaid sock combination
its the yesterday tomorrow combination
its the dried up and fresh lawn
its the untied knot and TV combination
its remembering the rainbow trout and forgetting every birthday you were ever told
its the roads that never touched but ran parallel through three cities
they shared the same median for many miles
we walked in the middle of it
our legs tired into the earth
rocks rust rush
we saw the moving forward and looking back combination
the coffee and 7 pm combination
    call dad
    figure out situation
    mint new keys
    pack clothes in the wicker basket
now that I know I'm leaving I savor every day like a coughdrop
it's not too cold and it's not too warm
the song that played was 666 so I turned my phone upside down
traded it for a pen
humbled me with a piece
the one that has a map yet knows no future combination