The Viewing

She matched in black

Her pony slicked back

As I watched her clear her plate

Her tongue swollen to muffled sounds

My fingertips rubbed at my tragus

Yet still nothing but nonsensical noises

She appeared so alive

The sight bittersweet

My heart warmed but sank into my stomach

Was it God or that Devil,

Knee deep in Bordeaux

Who swims the circumference of a hock?

If God were a good man

My faith would not be uncertain.

Perhaps her strength was too lacking to live

But upon a bed she lay,

As do I when I close my eyes,

Her audience draped in all black

As was she

As she cleared that plate

In a state that seemed so tangible

That I reach for her hands

Clad in gold rings

Left to me in her remembrance

Push

I slouch in my chair when I'm with my friends.

And use words like “shit” and “fuck”.

She hates it when I curse around her,

And I apologize for it in her presence;

For my habitual potty mouth.

Sometimes it just slips out.

The way "I miss you" accidentally escapes my lips,

Down my arms and into my finger tips,

Then pounces on the word ‘Send’

Even though I saw her hours before.

The way I mistakingly add beautiful

To the end of every good morning.

Every good night.

I am predictable.

Predictable as the sun will rise and set.

Predictable as her fear of diving in.

She says she once dove into the shallow end.

It took her over two years to hit the bottom.

She wants to learn to swim again

But she won't let me teach her.

Cool, chlorinated water on just my toes

Can't satisfy my craving.

August sun beating down, 

My blood is beginning to boil,

And I'm inching into the deep end,

Trying to pull her with me.

She's fighting me. Crying.

Panic painted on her face.

Either I pull her in and she drowns,

Or I watch her bask in sunlight from afar.

Her fear stares me blankly in the eyes,

And for once, I am unpredictable.

A Love Poem

Your solitude a juggernaut,

Here you are.

There we were

Destroying all we are

The benevolent failing in their only work,

Your heart became ever so corrupted

The molten core I aimed to be

Became the dirt beneath your feet

Crammed in the map lines of the sole of your shoe

Seen only when you entered home

Searching for warmth and comfort

I left you on a Friday and regretted it on Saturday

I refused to turn back, to look 

At your plaid flannel and tapered khakis

To see your cheeks without a smile

Without those dimples, 

Rather covered in the tread marks of tears

I refused to let you see my swollen, remorseful eyes

Filled with dejected rage, two burn holes of bogies in a blanket

Yet here we are a year later, our tongues still stuck to frozen flagpoles

I’m only acquainted with your shadow

But for the words your mother shares with me

And the moments your mother shares with me

The time your mother shares with me

Your mother like a nicotine patch when I need that cigarette

To taste smoke on my breath

You on my breath

What is left of you that lingers on my breath

My very last breath

The one I used to tell you that I was leaving on that Friday.

Dennis

“Play it again.

This is just what I need,”

She orders him.

Tap, tap, tapping feet.

Each pluck of the guitar

Strings like tweezers

Picking out each 

Sore word the other man bore 

Into her that evening.

She did not see

The look in his eyes

While his fingers

Played notes he 

Had memorized.

Well learnt from hours

Of practice for this

Moment when he would

Remove the wounds of

Another man once more.