23 December 2013

You are carbon.
You will leave nothing more than a smear of carbon crumbs.

Time has always moved at exactly the same pace
and you have always been fading
- neither of which you have ever understood.

Your knight is not coming.
Your night is not leaving.

No one is thinking of you
from far away.  No one ever has.

You are selfish.
You sit in judgment of everyone and everything
despite thinking yourself generous and kind.

The thing you have been secretly hoping for all your life -
the thought of which plunges your heart into your stomach
with nervous excitement and anticipation of validation -
is not real.

Nothing written was ever meant for you
and had you lived in France in the 19th century
everything would be exactly the same.

You are not exceptional.
Your personal struggles and failures and triumphs
are meaningless.

Your life experience generally resembles
that of those around you, despite your resistance
to this circumstance.

Move forward, look back
wait - imagine the future you will not see
the mark you will not leave
the tragedy and ecstasy that will not unfold
before your unblinking eyes
as you shuffle and sway and shake
along the gray and disappointing edges
which you have never understood.

19 August 2013

I have always been two.

The grimy beast, heaving in a damp cave for decades
scratching words into the walls with bloody shards
by firelight
imparting no wisdom
leaving splinters.

Reverence
on a crowded dance floor
purple pulsating lights
fixing
everyone staring and telling themselves
"That's the one who will save me."

And every night that rough madness
kicking and coughing
soothes itself grunting
while pawing its own head
and smoothing out the sequins.

21 June 2013

I was related to the city by blood
but you were only related by marriage
and after the revolution
they wouldn't let you in anymore
so we came here
to this starless hunk of flyway
with its crusts of bread and unholy water
where no thrush would ever fold her wings
no matter the weather
or how tired she must be.
I wouldn't have minded
except there was never anything to read
and I blame myself
for watching your smoke rings in the night
believing they were telling me oh
when it's obvious now
they were always saying
Surrender Dorothy.

Seven Lovers

You only told me your first name.  You never asked me mine.

I kept hanging around outside your door, even after you locked it and told me to go away.  I know it was ridiculous but at some point, I became invested and from there I just had to ride the thing out.

I really can't count you since the only attention you ever paid me was to make fun of me with your friends.  But, fuck the rules.  You're in.

My sense of loyalty is sometimes misguided.  Even worse, I have this thing about not flinching while enduring pain.  That explains those years.

When you warned me that you were a monster and at the next full moon you'd kill me, I thought you were speaking metaphorically.  Lesson learned.

You asked me to dance.  I lived off that for weeks.  Until the next time I saw you.  With her.

I was having such a hard time coming up with the right words.  I filled up a notebook with all the wrong ones and mailed it to you.  I got my arm stuck in the mailbox at the post office trying to retrieve it.  The police were called and later, the fire department.  A photographer from the local newspaper showed up.  I had to appear in court and pay a fine for tampering with U.S. mail.  The photographer showed up there too.  I never heard from you again.

4 May 2013

Someone asked me what I was thinking.
Just then it was
that time you
were looking at a coffee table book
on stars and telling
me about the pictures.
I wanted to see
but was too shy to ask
which you must have known
when you said, "Come here"
in that way
you have of saying what you want
plain - as if disappointment does not exist.
Before I could think too much
I moved a little toward
you on the couch
you on the stars
and in one breath
     snatched from the aether and held
you had your arms around me
holding the book open
propped in my lap
so we could look together
and lying back against you was
suddenly the easiest thing in the world
the easiest thing in the stars.
But when someone asked me what I was thinking
all I could manage was
"This coffee makes my hands shake."