To go a year without breathing

Until it seemed there was nothing good

I couldn’t have told you why

I wouldn’t have stopped you if I could

And your candles fell to shadow

An umbrage that forgot about your light

I didn’t tell you in time

I’m sorry it seems I never really tried

You said I seemed endless,

But I don’t think you saw clearly

Whatever we were meant to teach each other.

Even a happy thought would escape

If you pressed its neck and spoke to it crudely.

That seemed sometimes like what you did to me,

You did me in but I still felt,

I still wanted to see you once in a while,

To get high in your living room

And watch you roll a flawless spliff.

if i told you that i love you now,

i wouldn’t shed a tear

you think the time has come

to start to let go,

that the end will soon be near

if we'd stayed longer

we’d have more time to love, i know

but i love you so much now, that

i'm sure i will continue to do so

if i told you again that i love you

the world would spin anew, for

when i tell you that i love you

i rotate 'round my axis:

you

she moves she, she moves her

body to the beat

the swing of the bass and her

hip right in place

her arm launching through time and 

space

she is:

humming strings on liquid wings,

all of history's summers and springs

cat's purr flutter, insects fly like butter, 

like butterflies fly and slide and 

glide by the seaside, by

seashells and bombshells and

demoiselles, raising hell but wishing

well

she moves she, she moves

in a cadence, a partnerless contradance, 

une solo romance,

avec les étoiles elle brûle et danse :

une immense ésperance

et  elle s'incline, se 

replie en ligne 

comme une violoncelle qui tombe

dans son etui 

dear mister gee

i think you owe me an apology

about ten years ago you took something

very important to me

i could not think of what it was

i could not feel

i dared not pause

i searched through my collections of rocks and stamps

i stayed up every night by the light of my

searching lamp

i always thought so highly of you

your son was in my first grade class

and second too

he was a funny gap toothed boy

and

like your pretty wife

he was a decoy

Mister G, I promise you,

as long as I live I will not forget.

Every scar,

every deformity,

every grotesque, phantomic bump on my body

aches with your residual touch.

My heart knows treachery;

My body knows invasions;

My innocence knows murder;

My tongue holds stories of injustice and

slaughter and

I will remember.

I will always remember.

a lipstick mark

left by a girl’s gaudy unwanted red kiss

a cheap pack of eyeshadow

stolen impulsively from the shady corner

of an unnamed french pharmacy

the stubborn remnants of glitter

that refuse to wash off a cheek

stuck to weakly glued false eyelashes

(leftover from last night’s concert)

beauty

in the cheapest ways

refuses

to be extinguished

i am not a novelty!

i am a being of flesh

and blood and fire

just like you,

boy

you glassy-eyed

ivy league applicant

with nothing of your own but pride

and an honors society membership;

a taupe paper proclaiming

your identity as someone inherently, superficially superior to me

i thought i loved you, boy,

a miracle in my dreary existence;

its temporary center;

my temporary solace.

i see you from up here, boy

and for once i have the upper hand!

i am performing my routine

as a high-functioning trapeze artist,

poised and excellent as you

watch my spectacle from below,

amazed in all your

refined

mediocrity.

and for all your

corrective, fashionable eyewear

you are blind to see

that my world

now revolves around 

me.