Thursday, April 22, 2004



Floor

I go to shuffle the cards
but instead drop them
to the floor,
the goddamned floor,
gravity beats me again
when my chips
stacked too high
or too low
for even a sneak thief
to steal and cash in
because a drink costs more
than a dime
or any number of
copper-toned Lincolns.

There are so many
poems I wanted
to write about
that special heartache
from so many years ago,
but there are no words
to say
when you arrive in
the middle of the night
with a suit case
full of CDs and
two change of clothes.
He tossed a fast
fist, you say,
you drop your cigarette
to the floor,
the goddamned floor,
and curl on the couch,
sink into the deepest cushion,
every mark and bruise
resembling something like
brutal brush strokes
in the 40 watt light,
I get some sheets
a pillow, a blanket still folded
from when I moved in.

Every poem I would have
written would have
been dedicated
to who and what
used to be here
and only know
I can talk about,
more things
about what might have
been if
the world were less perfect
in the way it absorbs
our conceits and feeds
us to the birds
who'll take us ,
piece by piece,
to the the highest peaks
where we will be scattered
under feather
over the limitless valleys
and ocean hiways,
springing anew
in life that never ends
like the last page of
the story
I thought I was the author of.

I sleep on the floor
as the refrigerator motor
hums in the dark,
your breathing
is lost to the gears
and the clean sheets,
there's nothing to say
in any event,
every sheet of paper is blank,
like the sleep
of criminals
who dream of
clean white halls
without windows or doors,
no one to speak to,
not one voice.

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