Of a Cherished Collaboration

Waking Moment — maggie                                                             Rest. I'll carry on through our next to last mile.                      Smile.                   I'll sort through the tunes to find one I know,                            as though             collaboration knows what magic to weave.                                  The dream will never leave       behind any shadows of these roads our words conceive.                 Sleep, my love, sleep. I know the way to take             to still be here beside you when you awake.                         Smile as though the dream will never leave.

This May Hurt

I couldn’t get all worked up to to try’n miss                      this                   near enough to turn around to've heard you say,                            "May             I stay a night more?” If I'd've let such dirt                                  hurt       me near that bad, I might’ve kept your shirt.                 I didn’t even save you your place in bed             nor take note when the one to follow said,                         “This may hurt.”

Don’t Do That Again

When the money stops and you don't do lap dances over where he'd sat, do that naked out in full moonlight, then that again will sell you out to passing men. "I believed your body free when you said it was for me. Don't do that again." [posted for Sara as of date written]

In So Far

Think: engross. Daydreams of sin? In blood overdose. Want I should go? So extra close. Escape options are? Far from over. First word of an avatar. Same breath. Not gradable. As designed. I found all three stones you left behind. Insofar. [posted for Sara as of date written]

You’re the Soft

and you knowing — maggie                                                             Sleep on as I slip quietly from our loft.                      You’re the soft                   belly of morn, the fun in each waking chore.                            I reach for             a cigarette, only hold it lit. Dream scraps spark                                  in the dark       kitchen. Outside down the street dogs bark.                 Then when first light starts to sketch distinct lines             I slip back into our attic bed’s confines.                         You’re the soft I reach for in the dark.

Moonlight Soul Shopper

Midnight moonlight sliced through window boards into the river tavern like a hot moist tease. Does casual choice bring its own rewards or does chance make up its own penalties? Straight in she burst as though everything they'd ever sinned, violent as wildfire, as loose turned open as a hard winter wind losing any and all controls, like men grasping at their beers for any pleasure within range, like women wrapped at their poles. She asked "Who here wants what you're wanting most to exchange? I've come here shopping for souls." For each customer a uniquely crafted flirt, for each piece of soul a close fitting bait. Tonight only pleasure, no one gets hurt, nothing to hold back, no need to wait. Her shopping filled the shot glass to every risqué toast, her trade in kind proving you ever only sacrifice most what you most already lack. Each ran up the tab no thought to what might get owed when the glitter had faded black, lining up rounds on the house years on down the road on the odd chance she'd be back. Left last sat a stranger only passing through — "No thanks," he resisted, "my soul's all I'm not. My heart's already stolen by every love I knew. I lost my family wealth, my real name I forgot. My head's gone lost the instant this crazy journey commenced. Forgive me but no, my soul's all I've left going up against what's left of who I am. Neither magic nor science nor darkest art will get to me, sweet ma'am. I'll not shop my soul, it's the only part for which I give a damn." "Your name I will put on every man's tongue. The most precious riches'll be yours to own. Your heart, your love will go back to young. Your mind'll be the greatest minds've known. Don't decide between, you're not forced to choose one or the other, take them all, what's to lose that you wouldn't want to?" Her lips were the wheel, her eyes the dice, her body the devil's due doubled down as the stranger named his price, "The cost of my soul is you." As darkness turned away flew our buyer's kiss, as darkness turned back lay our seller's loss, at morning's first light came a lover to miss and a silence with no song to make it across. The hole left in moonsetting fog where she'd taken off felt so real, he could feel her word calling back soft, soft as away his own word passed. And when the music driven through forgotten dreaming stopped in the shadow he now cast was when he knew his soul was not the first she'd shopped nor was it to've been her last.

Way It All Ends

Late one night I was reading a book     alone with myself in my bed     when my daddy came peeking his head through my door     saying Let's us go playing instead     He ran a bubble bath helped me out of my clothes     fussed Don't be so camera shy     My mom and my sisters were out somewhere else     at the time I didn't know yet why     I'm supposed to learn things out the hardest way     that's what nature's choice intends     That's as much of it as I remember for now     and I forget the way it all ends     We moved around too much to pin down a house     a year at most in any one school     never learned what might make anything keep very long     what could carry was what fit our rule     I got caught in trouble once maybe twice     for various petty crimes     and also for trying to burn our place down     almost did so too many times     One can't always grow up innocent     take the one hand the other extends     That's as much of it as I remember for now     and I forget the way it all ends     By the age of fourteen I gave up pretending     so moved my ass out to the street     I confess there were days I even quit that     but I'll never admit I was beat     You learn how little it takes to get by     when you find yourself happy with less     A girl hasn't truly hit the floor hard     as long as she still can undress     That and some whiskey are all the girl needs     to get her a room full of friends     That's as much of it as I remember for now     and I forget the way it all ends     That's not what I told my doctors when asked     for some background dirt good for their files     There's really no reason to be how I am     since my childhood was sunshiny smiles     I don't know why I got put in there anyway     I never did nobody harm     and who cares if some skinny bitch puking her crack's     got some blood oozing out of each arm     I was that close to missing this song's next verse     and still might, we'll find that depends     That's as much of it as I remember for now     and I forget the way it all ends     The roomie they gave me was worse than insane     I never knew what to expect     Call it whatever you think it should be     except love (which would be most correct)     I won't go around filling the holes she left open     Maggie can do so herself     I'm just happy for what she left in my care     though she meant it for somebody else     I'm not really one with a right to complain but     love sure doesn't earn what life spends     That's as much of it as I remember for now     and I forget the way it all ends     She said from the start she was fixing to leave     every morning — I'm fixing to leave here, kid —     but then always made up excuses against     so I wasn't there when she did     though I know the way she expects to be found     I'd prefer that she find me here first     so that's why I came back and that's what I'm doing     Feel free to assume worse than worst     That's her, wasn't it? saying I might come with her     in the way her last note always bends     That's as much of it as I remember for now     and I forget the way it all ends

Monstrosity’s Form

How hideously gruesome! What a monstrous form    has by some stroke of ill fate been imposed    on me! What horrid shapes I'm forced to bear!    Atrocious! So incorrigibly mean!    Maliciously inflicting needless strain    and hurt, then laughing at the flood of tears,    then laughing even more when there's no point    as if that were the reason I got sent    a beast to such a bloody empty hole.    But what's not spit out must be swallowed whole,    as I do without thinking, true to form,    the body's burdens rushing its descent    to sewers where most easily disposed    race wasted dreams, designed to disappoint    expected appetites. The flesh I bare    sports scars across the borders of frontiers    insanity's inscribed on foul demeanor    absent want or purpose to restrain.    Vile changeling from an outlaw mutant strain!    the enemy to souls conceived as holy    innocence, the spoil of noble mien!    No image is too sacred to deform,    no art immune to agony and tears    nor pleasure free of rotting ruin's scent.    So be it, it's the curse I chose to bear    as though that were the word the gods supposed    in making up my world, to prove a point.    You've choked it off. You've faded to a point    your very own. As though it's such a strain    to stay too close. Say why. Because I posed    so rash a threat? Because I punched a hole    where futile panic goes? Because I bare    my dreams like feral breasts? Because I mean    you unremitting loss? Because I'm sent    as ugly useless garbage? Is my form    anathema? the acid in your tears?    I've been there. I have cried those very tears.    As if you care. Why bother? What's the point    your prejudice attempting to reform?    To you love's but a monster to restrain,    unworthy of intentional consent,    too soon discarded as though predisposed    to represent the worst a kiss might mean:    an ugly fear, a stench, a wound, a hole.    Like, total torture you can barely bear.    Yeah right, you're like you've been mauled by a bear.    Almost you make me move myself to tears    decaying in your "Villains" pigeonhole    marked "future zero" and "will disappoint."    No footnotes needed, I know what you mean:    my bent shape doesn't suit your uniform,    like words that don't go in the places posed    as indicated, like the doctors train    your guarded systems to misrepresent.    Your doctors, they're at fault for your descent.    Look closer at the ID tags they bear    and think — is it expecting too much strain    for you to recognize they're puppeteers?    They make you think your scars are self-imposed,    that I'm the beast who lured you to this hole    to make you mine. Permit me to inform    you of the truth: look back at them and point.    Believe me, they will know the ones you mean.    Be rid of me? They're aiming to demean    the world to which your heart gives sure assent,    to bend your spirit to its breaking point    and leave your head undone, alone and bare.    Your monsters are the ones who would transform    you into what they're seeking to constrain,    not dangerous, not strange, not real, not whole.    So raise your hand, they're taking volunteers    to be the way they'd have it: decomposed.    While I'm in exile, found out and exposed.    They call you cured, and you think what they mean    is that you're cured of me. Spare me your tears.    Get lucky, and your cure will keep me sent    so far off you'll start thinking I'm a hole    that caused a scare at some forgotten point    you can't remember why nor care to strain    to feel again. And I'll be just the barest    whisper of the void inside the form.        (This whole discourse was posed in tortured tiers        that air her form. The point is that she'd mean        consent: it bears the mark of her own strain.)

Enough Then

Blue sun blinding my waking eye turning me away from the kiss I have been warned to avoid, I had longed to wake to hold. Take me back home, please. I have been too long out across. I won't want to change my mind. Some loves want leaving behind. Black snow stinging my open face turning me back from the door I have been threatened against, I had longed to open since. Take me back home, please. I have been too long off here.       [posted for Sara as of date written]

Hers

First breath of a thin silver-skinned wind casting our winter moon shadow through its wane, rain fortunate enough to be on good terms with the one sun still following orders as if not yet ready, not yet done. And so whose stone is that which you now hold, which stone of three that works to keep uncontrolled her wind, her rain, her sun? [posted for Sara as of date written]

Hurt

It hurts. I don't need you to tell me. I know the word for it. I know my word for it. I regret learning it from you. I regret repeating it out loud. I regret coming back to it. It is my fault. I made it my word. Now I hurt. I don't need you to tell me. It will hurt even worse. It will hurt even worse. It will hurt worse than childbirth. It will hurt worse than growing old. It will hurt worse than death after death after death. I know the word for it. It will hurt worse than that. It won't stop hurting. It can't stop hurting. It will hurt and hurt and hurt and it will hurt you and it will hurt him and it will hurt me even worse. It is my fault. I made it my word. Now I hurt.

Won’t Be Long

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀I hurt. I can't help but show it. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀He knows it. ⠀⠀⠀⠀He's so sad. I tell him don't be. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀It won't be ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀that tragic. It won't be wrong, ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀won't belong ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀to what we've had. Be strong, ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀I tell him, don't think of it as going dead, not ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀when we've still so much future ahead, yet ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀he knows it won't be long. [posted for Sara as of date written]

Keratoplasty

How nice! They'll take my eyes            to help some stranger see as bad        as my squint's had to make out.                Nothing else I've got's considered good            enough to pass along. And by the time        they realize their mistake, I'll be long gone,                out of even second sight. They'll see            what I've known all along, how I'll look        no better than the worst you'll let me be.                                                                    [posted for Sara as of date written]

Straight up ahead

Straight up ahead, look for me. You can't possibly miss. I'll stand where you know I'd be. [posted for Sara as of date written]

As Composed

As composed as I will remember myself to have been, my glass eyes staring straight up past their light far into the timeless reaching skies, who will know the fury of my flight? As composed as I will expect my face to have been, my stiff lips frozen on their final vow, their warm outlasting a breathless moon's eclipse, who will feel my vision's frenzied form? As composed as I will cast my will to have been, my dying touch relaxing its hold on their white sheets to spill ink behind me, a poem as such, who will break the spell my word completes? [posted for Sara as of date written]