What if
There is no easy
Clean cut
Love
Only a clumsy
Reopening
Of scars
Accompanied
By a careful
Excision
Of those healing
Keloids
Gone awry
Maybe
A restitching
Of the self
Into a neater
More presentable
Demarcation
Of old injury
And in time
If you are lucky
You can bare
Your soul and skin
Again
Without the shame
Of scaring
Men
-me
In early morning
Stillness
A train whistle
Split and traveled
Fast
Bending trees
And raking grass
The shockwave
Slammed
Straight into me
Shaking
Picture frames
And aging meat
From well placed
Hooks
Inside my brain
-me
The springtime sounds
Of sawing wood
I never hear in winter
Redemption rides
Warm temperatures
To fix what freezing splintered
-me
I love to run my lips
Along my freshly lacquered nails
Their sturdy smoothness soothes me
And I do it quite incessantly
As if to reassure myself
That comfort always lives
Only a hand gesture away
But nearly simultaneously
I feel the urge to flinch
To part my lips and teeth and jaw
And bite down hard
To leave behind a dented scar
Along one perfect surface
Erasing all symmetric sureness
Playing with my own desire
To allow and to deny
And so sometimes I bite
And when I do I always know
Which nail my lips will seek out first
-me
And then
There was
A canyon
When I had
Only dreamt
Of seas
-me
Shattered
Glass bottles glisten
On a freshly
Lined lot
And I
Find myself wishing
I am somewhere
I’m not
-me
Today I sat
With resistance
A hive of bees
Behind the walls
Of my chest
And frenzied
Making their way
In all directions
Burrowing inside
The drywall
Of my thighs
Roaming random
Down to my
Dead end toes
Bumping on bone
And turning
Churning over
Each other
Through my middle
Frantic flitting
Up my throat
Wildly swirling
Inside my mouth
Alighting on
The lightly sealed
Line of my lips
Crawling and testing
I could feel them
Trying and tickling
With antennae against
The soft corners
Of my mouth
Exploring
For weakness
And tempting me
To open up
And let them out
-me
A bundle of “No”
Swaddled warm in my arms, still
Always free to leave
-me (and she)
Sitting silent
Makes me hungry
As I stare
At hope awhile
But the blank page
Beyond hoping
Calls my innards
To defile
Because I’d rather
Spill than eat
Your shit
It’s filled me rank
For way too long
I chewed and gagged
And choked it down
But it’s been
Deadly to belong
So I choose
Evacuation
Either by heaving
Or entrails
I’ll stay starving
In my stillness
Before I gorge
Your crap
Again
-me
When we used to walk
Our neighborhood
At night
You’d point out those towers
Blinking red antennae
And tell me
To meet you there
Should the world collapse
Well it did
And you didn’t
And now
Somehow I end up
At those towers weekly
Alone
And the sign I pass
As I drive away
“Rent a Dream”
Speaks more truth
Than you ever did
-me
