Secret.

I have a secret. It's a big one. I wish I could tell somebody, but I never can.

I can just spend the rest of my life trying not to act on it, I guess. Acting on it would be both the beginning and the end.

It would be the beginning of me, but the end of everything else.

The word "temptation" never really applied to me before, not since I grew up and became respectable.

Well, it does now.

And the thing is, I might act on it anyway. I really want to.
I mean to say, I REALLY want to.

Shhhhh. Secret.

Adolescent

"Follow me into the bathroom" she said slipping
off her clothes, "you can listen to me in the
shower." sound effects to what you can't have.

"Yesterday I believed in God," he spoke -
unexpected as he had always been mute,
"But today I believe I am god."

She was always dying for a savior -
washing her lovers' feet in hopes they
might really be Jesus, she a martyr.

She showers alone in the bathroom these
days, though she often invites high school
boys up to fill the void of being desired.

Meanwhile, he's preparing for his
crucifixtion, a ridiculous idea, he's already
34, thinks they've miscounted his age.

Now she lives lonely in a loft downtown,
snorting cocaine and licking tabs of LSD
looking for enlightenment (the hallucinations

keep her company at any rate) he hates
her now, lives with women who lock the
bathroom door, asking, "Mom, how could you?"

John

. . . and when I remember the blue of your eyes,
The me that I was then still drowns, (the good kind),
In the blue, the incredible blueness
Of your soul’s windows,
Where you looked out at me, and the clearness of the blueness
Made me believe every word you ever said.
Oh, your eyes, your beautiful eyes. . . .
The clear, clean blue, the kind of blue that is almost clear, but blue, but clear, but mostly blue,
Like the still, clear, blue sea,
When you are in a glass-bottomed boat and look down,
and you can see through the clearness of the blueness to the bottom of the sea
where beautiful shells and starfish and tropical fish and the occasional eel are,
seeming an inch from your hand,
but really a mile away. . . .
And when you reach eagerly for something lovely, to help you remember the day,
The only thing that comes up to meet your fingertips
Sends an electric shock all through your system
And you remember, all right.

Your eyes were like that.

I loved to look at them, and see the beautiful things behind them.

One day I looked more closely.
And what I finally saw, through the clearness, and the blueness,
Hiding there among all the lovely things,
Gave me the courage to leave.
I turned once,
And you looked out at me, and didn’t blink, and didn’t smile,
And didn’t say goodbye
When I turned away
Forever. . .
. . . and when the me that I am now remembers the particular blue of your eyes,
I still drown, but not the good kind.
I can only feel the electricity that burned me when I reached for something lovely.
I wish it would burn the memory away,
But each time it only brands it deeper in my heart.

Mornings, Explained (for Chris)

"Some / sleep is not worth sleeping, some nights / mere neglect of light, lingering" - Bin Ramke (After Artemidorus on Dreams: Oneicriticos)

Those nights with you,
my day too early.
How easy would
it have been to
say no? Go home
and lay in the
pattern of headlights
on my ceiling?
as if those nights had
a purpose,
some meaning other
than lying                                                (Such a common talent
here covered in satin                                    why do we bother
and red light                                                to practice it?)
like some
nocturnal exhibit
at the zoo.

It would have been
easy except
I love the way
you make me
feel beautiful
I could bask                                                      for days
in the way you
don't try to know
anything about
me - are content
in this rhythm
of youagainstme.
Our habits
comfortable
and predictable
as if this were
enough, this
skin-on-skin.
The sound of my
breath on your neck,
your hand on my
side. I rarely
slept those nights
anyway, never

mind the shuddering
of our bodies
the way you
would grab
the back of
my head and
I would start
to cry, my hands
gripping your
shoulders, my
mouth on your skin
to muffle myself
begging you to stop.
I would not have
you hear, you
see. Why risk
letting you think
you've possessed me,
won.
After all, this is war dear.

Mornings my victory.
Those hurried
moments
as I
left before the sun
became like the night,
lingering.

Dan

You scum.
You gave me wine, and when I woke up the next morning,
My memory of the night was gone.
You ass.
Two weeks later, as we danced,
I pulled away from you for just a moment
Looked at your smiling face an inch from mine, and recoiled,
As it all came rushing back.
That’s why I made that little mewling sound, before I broke your nose, and cried,
And ran away from you forever.

Bruce

When you finally did die,
I felt a twinge, but only a twinge,
And only a small twinge.
What did people expect?
The pain I felt when you ran off to the Grand Canyon
With Carol
Far outweighed any control
I might have had
Over that same heart.
You did ask me first, and I said yes, and then no.
Even then I was packing my things,
Easing away from you,
Leaving a little less of me behind with every visit,
Fading out of your life, even as your life was fading away.
If I had known then, would I have stayed?
No.
I always tried to leave before the inevitable trip to the Canyon.

Fear of Sleep

They took me from my bed and threw me in a van. No one else was there except the cops and me. They didn't tell what it was about and in fact they didn't have mouths, they hardly had faces.

We rode for a long time and I really had to pee. They hadn't blindfolded me so not only could I see where we were going but I got a good look at the inside of the van. Stuffed in a crease of one of the rear quarter-panels was a red, plastic beer cup. I shuffled over to the cup on my knees, my ankles shackled and my arms cuffed behind my back. Kneeling before the cup, I motioned to the cops around me that, hey, fellas, one of you are going to have to help me here and take my Johnson out so I can, you know, fill this cup.

The faceless, dumb cops just kept looking ahead at the road. They looked like mannequins composed of black holes.

We stopped at an IHOP and some Mexican busboy helped me take care of business in a bathroom thick with the scent of urinal cakes.

When I left the bathroom, I saw the cops sitting at a table, staring at their food. After all, they had no mouths.