A Year Without You

The sound of your breath
Amongst a world that is otherwise quiet
Against walls that otherwise
Have nothing to overhear

I remember when, miles from here, I
Imagined the sound
And envisioned your left arm
Draped drowsily around me

I remember so vividly
How savage silence can be
My own breath, erratic against the static
My ever-racing mind, combative
Refusing to yield to the tumbling minutes
Refusing to accept a world without you in it

I used to wonder if it would ever get easier
To fall asleep without you
If the stillness of the night
Would ever cease to frighten me

And when my answer came

I had little hope that remained
Only that eventually I would fall to a darkness
With no escape
Catch the perfect wave at its break
And enter a dream in which I would never wake.

Ache

Ache
Vodka-induced
Plus the absence of you

The bottle hits back
As a matter of fact
Well past noon
But still too soon to rise
To face a new day

I pull the shades and hide beneath the blankets
In the bedroom we don't share
So many times
I have imagined you here
But dreams are cruelest at their break

And a thirst just as great
Creeps in
You are only alive in fantasies
And even then
You are scolding me for my self pity

You aren't the kind to cower beneath sheets
Or hide from the day
But let me cope the way I need
Let me pick these scabs
I need to bleed
To see it running down my knees

It's the only way I am able to recognize reality--
Blood stains and vomit
You're goddamn right I'm running from it

And I know that makes me weak
I've heard your self-righteous speech
You've always been so much stronger than me

But I have given up on sobriety and ever finding sanity
That cold, quiet place drives me crazy

Longing

It is a hunger pang
One I can never satisfy
With your saturated fats
Your half-hearted apologies
They fill me up with fallacies
Like a jelly donut

You are a sugar high
That drops me from the edge of the sky
You leave me more alone
Than I have ever been before

These cravings
Carve me like a jack-o-lantern
Leave me hollow
With an artificial grin
Leave me searching for something
For which I can truly sink my teeth in

But there is so substance in you
No nutritional value
You are my most unnecessary indulgence
The temptation of which
Has unmatched expectations

Your nectar protected by an endless buzz of bees
For even a single drop of your honey
I feel the sharpest of stings
And it aches at the very core of my being--
This endless, irrepressible longing.

Creaking of walls and the clatter of these keys
My fingers are tiny worker bees
I am the queen of misery

I forgot about nights like these
The kind that knock and lock your knees
Remind you how lonely, lonely can be
On that long drive home from happiness
Rolling tires and tears
Changing minds, grinding gears

I think I've given too much to you
Outsourced my emotion
So you're the puppeteer
And I am here, hands on keys
Creaking walls, buckled knees

Wishing desperately
I could work without strings.

Unobtrusive love

Unobtrusive love

Beats within me now, and

He should no longer feel disturbed by it

The beat is soft and quiet

Like a child's cry

Like a whispered goodbye

From where he sleeps so peacefully

He won't know I am awake

With this ache in my bones

I miss him, now inconspicuously

So ambiguously that no one can tell

Since they all say to abandon this hope

That flickers like a low-burning flame

That ties everything to his name

That burns assumably, in vain

I let it burn just the same

Freedom Now

I have freedom now
to do as I please
and I do
and I do
and I do
but I am not pleased

I think of you
I pause on memories
that swirl in my head
and confuse my retrospect
like dreams

But it was more like a nightmare
to be loved that hard
so I left
or you left
doesn't matter which
or who was right
only that we were wrong

I spent a long time in
sober
solemn
silence
and then I cried
tried to make it work
but it wouldn't
it couldn't for reasons
that are seasons
and have since changed
and so have we
so much so
that the two people who
love each other in those photographs
don't exist beyond paper
or outside my head

I have freedom now
to do as I please
and I do
and I do
and I do
but I am not pleased
because I have freedom now
but not you

Traffic

I am driving on fumes

in bumper to bumper

and early evening gloom

I do not know how much

longer I can last

I am way past E

passed three stations

without stopping

I have always been a bit

of a risk taker

I keep the radio low

and my thoughts turned up

Left foot on the dash

heart on the floor

I say out loud:

'I can't do this anymore'

I cannot remember a lot

of last night

the last few months

have collided

in a high-speed pile-up

and it is all one big mess

of twisted metal and emotion

I cannot decipher

moment from moment anymore

my identity

is lying in the street

covered by a sheet

and I do not recognize

my eyes in my rear view

I wade in a pool of self pity

live a small world

in a big city

I break fast and hard

love fast and hard

live fast and hard

I wonder if my life

will always have

this much traffic

The Art of Letting You Go

I placed you by the window
Hoping the wind would blow you out
And that your scent would just dispense
So there would be less to dream about

I let you circle in the sink
Willed you down the rabbit hole
Perhaps if I could end it quickly
Your absence would take no toll

But the wind would not pick up
And you just circled till I was dizzy
Your sent lingered like a shadow
Your absence cut me with great frenzy

I danced with you in dreams
That kept me up all night
Months passed and seasons too
Even summer could not shake my plight

So I put you down on paper
And the load upon my back
Lightened only slightly
Still, I liked the thought of that

So I cried out to my mother
Till I'd dispensed every angry tear
And the rumble once inside me
Was now in my mother's ear

So I put on my running shoes
Ran till you had all but disappeared
And I left you standing on the sidewalk
Miles and miles from here

And every piece that loitered
Became fuel to toss in the fire
And that night I set you ablaze
Left me empty, but so inspired

Still, dreams cannot be tamed
And a time or two we've waltzed once more
But you and the music are gone by morning
I don't live in dreams anymore.

Slaughter

It is all around me
Fragmented and smelly
I am just bone
Standing at dusk alone and
Feeling a caustic chill against me

The rest of me, in pieces
Scattered all about
Sliced like trout from a hook
Ripped like your favorite page from your favorite book
Who the hell are you to destroy my masterpiece?

What have you done?
I try to speak but you have taken my tongue
Blood is not the worst part
It is watching my heart flop like a fish
Standing witness to its agony
And knowing the tide is out for good

From where I stood
Your shadow was a mile long
I stood from dusk till dawn
Watching you fade
The curtain of darkness cascaded over this wicked mess
I begged for your trail to fade too
So it would be impossible to follow you

I stood till my bones gathered dust
Till it was all just rotting mush and there was nothing left to save
I stood till your trail was gone and a road was paved
But I still could not find my way

You are a machete
Blade is clean
Heartbeat steady

I am alone in my demise
A pile of lonely bones
Still waiting for the tide to rise.

White-speckled and fanatical
He flies
From the stucco walls
To the porch light I left on for you

It is a fancy he cannot fight
He loves for reason etched inside him eons back
And his beloved
Will kill him without mercy

He flies with passion
His wings, always clipped

Aimless it seems
But knowing nothing more
He circles each night the same

Closing the drapes now
The cruelest of epiphanies
Creeps up on me:

You are a porch light.