Five Poems

MY THROAT IS FULL

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And there are days when I can’t even speak. You see my throat is a second heart. You see my throat is full of cotton balls. My bloody cotton balls on the bathroom floor. My dim heart as a mess of paint. My heart is alive and you say I’M SO TIRED ALL THE TIME. You say I’M SO SORRY THAT MY EYES ARE MADE MOSTLY OF SLEEP. And when all the red veins are tiny lines I follow into bed you whisper I CAN’T GO FOR TOO MUCH LONGER and even when I want you to wait for me you can’t. You say I’LL MEET YOU AT HOME LATER or I’M EATING AT MY MOTHER’S TONIGHT so I’m alone again, dreaming of mosaic brickwork, of the storefront we’ll never finish.

TELEVISION IN THE BATHROOM

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And sometimes the storefront is nothing. The cold glass keeps me dry but the it’s made of rain water, too. I try not to think of my wet pants, I try not to smell the liquor-stink of hydraulic fluid under my fingernails. Sometimes we’re playing Jenga instead of Tetris. I try to walk away but I still hear you say I DON’T LIKE TO TAKE ALL THE PIECES APART ALL AT ONCE. There’s a television in the living room. I wish there was a television in the bathroom so I could drown and stay away simultaneously. You see my perfectly bent sheets of steel. You see the rough black paint. Everything here is meant to keep me from slipping away, to keep the rust lonely. Even dry clothes don’t keep me warm, even clean sheets are dirty if you look at them.

THE WINDOWS ARE STILL

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On the weekends I am a lump of pillows. On the weekends my clothing is made entirely of flannel. You say YOU ARE A WHOLE NEW THING WHEN YOU WALK OUTSIDE. You say THE THINGS YOU OWN ARE BECOMING PIECES OF YOUR HEART and when I fall into a couch made of worry you believe that I am going to be okay for a few days. At the storefront the windows are still shining. You say WE COULD BUILD AN OFFICE IN THE BACK and the dog is drooling a bit, the dog is drooling a bit and doing everything I would do if I didn’t have to finish building you out of colorful bricks.

A GOOD WEEKEND

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And sometimes there’s nothing at all to do and most times actually there’s so much to do and I sit at home on our huge fucking expensive couch in my pajamas and spend the whole weekend thinking about the two beers in the refrigerator that I will never drink and I wear a wife beater that’s yellowed in the arm pits and I imagine myself as a fatass beer-gutted wife beater and I know I could never hurt you so I decide to never marry you and I know you’ll understand when we take a good weekend alone and I don’t spend any time at all on my knees while the sky becomes the thoughts you see when you close your eyes at night thinking I WILL ALWAYS BE ALL ALONE LIKE COOKING WINE.

YOU SEXY FUCKING VAMPIRE

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We try to climb the walls where I would propose to you on the roof. I would make you a ring of poems. I already tried this. I keep my poems a secret. I fill the window of the storefront with drafts of my poems. I wrap you in a sentence I keep rewriting. I think you’re sexiest in the shower. I am lying. Come here and trust me like you used to. I think you’re sexiest when you’re wearing a small pair of underwear in the morning and your hair is just a bit wrong. I try not to think my way into the walls. I try not to climb but you see the hydraulic lifts hold 6500 pounds. I try to weigh the anchors I drag with you. I try not to ignore the echoes in the warehouse. The walls are cold and made of dough. The walls are falling down and I’m sinking into them. You know what I mean. If this poem was really a great poem you’d say something like I AM GOING TO FUCK YOU LIKE THE NEIGHBORS FIGHT. If this poem was an erotic novel your hair would be deep red, your blood would be deep red also, your blood would be rose petals, you vampire, you sexy fucking vampire.