If You Please

Bile

I’m quite enamored by
Your imagined love,
authored by me;
it fits so perfectly.
Just in case I die today
it’s there in the casket
waiting
A secret between me and me
Because in the dark
all the whispers crawl
like spiders in my mouth
softly as if the intrusion
were nothing but alien 
A light choke
But I’m no sleeping beauty
I need no prince,
no savior
Just a ghost
The faded visage of a love
That’s buried deep inside,
A mediated affection for myself
that can bypass every tremor
of disgust. 

World Mystery

I hold the ribbons
almost like keys as they
swirl in my hand 
if I could unlock the code,
see the ripples like the sea-
but the thread is shiny like plastic
and I imagine seagulls choking on it. 

Act II

The vanishing act is quite
the old hat for a man of your
qualifications. I’d say you’re slipping
but I’m sure you have a better rebuttal
than I could hope for, an answer those
questions I never cared about. Amusing how
when the twisting words and philosophical
phrases fade all that’s left is a made-up
boy in a colorful cape. You have an eye
for the beautiful, but you don’t have the heart
to keep it. I’m sorry for you, how your glassware
hands turn to shards and make a dangerous
mess. It’s regretful your mouth can only speak
kind words to half-strangers and those you want
to win and fails to strengthen those which were
already yours. I’m sorry you’re careless and I’m sorry
I care. But then again, let’s get real. I’m mostly sorry
for me, because I got lost in the magic that was
never really magic and when the stage lights
gleamed in my eyes I could only feel the hurt
of a show I wasn’t in on, a secret world
that was only in my head. 

The Magician

Quite the puppermaster
you have with you there
It seems the sergeant
is now the soldier.
With my bonds cut, you
threaded new rope 
only to realize it was
not your hands tugging the strings. 
Even at your worst
Before her lean hands gripped
your pale, eager face, back when
I learned to hate myself
and danced to unclear
rhythms in which I was
never quite right,
Even then, I still
found a place for you. 
But I took your bones
out of my closet, washed
them with years of dust
and set them in a box,
miles and miles away to one of 
those places only vultures creep to. 

I do not imagine
your love with my love
your skin on my skin
but that your
neck is my neck,
heart for heart, lung for lung
Just so I don’t have to breathe again. 

Happiness in glimpses
if often stumbled upon
“Better once than never”
but I disagree. Because a
happiness in a glimpse
that fades to ugliness
can be a twisted joy
that suffocates. 
The “You’re beautiful”
that fades to
“You could lose weight”
The compliments that now
reign in laughing criticism
or “cute quirks” that now
face the brutal accusation
of “you’re changed and
it disgusts me” Welcoming
arms to “Leave now” 
Iloveyous then petered
to a waiting silence. 
No, I could have done
without the glimpse,
Because it left a
seductive bitterness 

Old Dogs Die Young

Making the motions of
a flower that was pressed.
Never quite enough sunlight
but was done with growing
long ago. Just put on a wall
looked on with occasion
mostly by old ladies that
are thinking about the time
in their life when they almost
made it.

What it is, isn’t Quite

Her tombstone kisses
were grave indeed 
As she pleaded
to Sophocles
Make one more
tribute to those who die purposefully
with valor and honor, a sung decree

Oh aching love with bashful eyes
How quick to die. How quick to die.
“take my breath away” she chanted
It was all she could say
“take my breath away”

Rise above it, a thousand trees
shadowing eroded stone
All those chapped lips
Recalling the loss
but avoiding the empty rooms
In case it can follow.  

His eyes are in his mouth
And though he can
recognize the tones of his
own, the shallow openness of
cast jealousy and manipulation,
every touch to his mouth
Will be seen as a threat to
blind him.

And he will die,
probably undernourished
on a carpeted floor
where he will dream of
pine needles and a sweet,
simple hum.