101015

do you understand that you shut me down
do you understand that

your words should be rain not arrows or

you are like a heavy darkness
a dot of ink spreading
under the skin or

do you understand that i don't even have words

reminder

i don't want to forget

the precise angle of your shoulders

or the tight curve of your smile

but it has been a while

and the skin forgets its goosebumps

the heart forgets its joys

there is a deepening void, and i cry

I remember! I remember!

pleasing aches and little plummeting delights!

of course! the pain of that jagged edge of satin petals fluttering out of sight!

on a sunny day --

I remember (because i'm terrified

to recall only that i've forgot, 

to know only 

that i loved you once and then i loved you not

as undeniably

as dreadfully

as a dead thing rots).

062813

my love is not a lemon
- can’t press it till it flows
my love is not a violet
my love is not a rose

my heart is not a chocolate drop
that melts on curling tongues
you may have a voice
- doesn't mean that i'm unsung.

thinking and doing (a poem from the bathroom)

thinkers must be do-ers
just like eaters must be poo-ers. 
a morsel in the gut
ought be inclined towards the butt.

whatever thought on which you chew, 
let it digest and follow through
into the loo, its destination
without which fate is constipation.

your mind would be a bloated spot
if all there were were thoughts and thoughts
dried and clumping up to be
of a retentive sphincter freed. 

and so i will repeat once more
(in case you missed it once before),
just as an eater surely poos,
if you think much, also do and do!

my dear, love is -

- well, how can i explain? you will feel
it, when you do, like
the sight of spring
opening,
empty,
and filled,
like breaths you do not remember,
like dreams you do not recall;
you will feel it like a reaching and a never arriving,
you will feel it like a birth and a forever dying.

011313

is it the gray month

is it the winter rain in the cavern of her
breasts cracking
stone where it falls that makes her break and
say

i'm old
and i'm alone oh

if only if only

i could take the coldness from her
i'd lay it like a shroud over the sky and lick
her ragged forehead till it was smooth as milk.

wish

I cannot smile with the other children;
I have no pearl-bright teeth.
I cannot sing along with them;
My heart does not agree.

Let me be with the shadow forms
who dance on naked feet.
Let me be myself, and glad,
on the dark periphery.