untitled no 5

Are you aloof because
you don't or can not care?
And do you fear that sharing
means diminishing your share?
I assure you that my bite
is so much sweeter than my bark
so if ever you should shun the light
and cling to shadows in the dark
you mustn't be disturbed
to find me near.

I would calm the anxious currents
where your truant pillow sails
and count your breaths
until the very dawn itself exhales
the midnight's final, tragi-comic sigh.

No, I don't expect to pass
for one that meets
the measure of your dreams
but, is the place beside you taken?
Even after you awaken?
Or is the room where you reside
not near as lonely as it seems?

Land's end

It feels like Christmas eve
on Easter Island,
The presents pile around the tree.
Packages, like fancy pastries
afrost with shiny wrappings, beckon.
But none of them addressed to me.

It would be easier by far
to get through these days unscathed
If I didn't have to see them here,
picturing the pleasures they contain,
while cursing the secret names
of those for whom they wait.

Unlike the loves before
in which I've been,
I see quite clearly
the coordinates where myself ends
and you begins.
The very latitude and longitudes
themselves rail against
the thought of intersection.
It matters not how I may try
to cross from here to there,
and forge a single Us from out of two,
The status quo is doggedly determined
to remain: there is a Me
and then, there is a You.

Without a map or invitation
I cannot hope to comprehend
the outs and ins.
But it's like Christmas eve
on Easter Island
and I must pay
for my own sins.

wrong again

I was wrong when getting up today.
I'll still be wrong laid in my bunk,
or grave, later tonight.
I'm on the wrong side so consistently
wouldn't know how to behave
if I were right.

I never liked to have your
breakfast for my supper.
I never care to make
decisions after lunch.
I think I know what I'll be
getting for my birthday.
I say that now,
It's little comfort,
just a hunch.

I'm quite convinced
there's no convincing,
been this way
my whole life through.
And nothing anyone can do
will make amends

I'm going to end up
as the bad guy here
once the final credits roll.
No, not an anti-hero
or a tragic figure
or a 'crying on the inside' clown.
Just an ordinary villain
who shoots the leading lady down.

I never meant for it to be this way.
My handicap deserves honorable mentions.
The path to this, my home, sweet hell,
is paved with all the best intentions.

I didn't want to be your last resort,
aspired to grander station in your court.
But greater I shall never be;
It isn't in the cards for me.
And, if I'm not mistaken,
I'm wrong in everything I do:
wrong below and wrong above
for looking through these eyes of love.
Damned from left and
from the right, if ever you
should vanish from my sight.

neverland

What will you do
With this piece of information?
Where will you go
when the moon falls down?
What will you do with
this wisp of urban myth?
Some folks fly while
others drown.

What will you find
at the bottom of the ocean?
What will you see from the top of the hill?
What is in store for
the one with empty pockets,
empty heart, empty eyes
empty once, empty still.

If the final consolation prize
is all you are seeking
Remember that the earth
shall be inherited by the meek.
But what will the remnants be worth
when discarding the infant
with the afterbirth?

I've loved you all along and
I love you still.
I make no excuses and
I never will.

What will you do with this
piece of information?
What's getting through
on the wire 'tween me and you?
Dead letters and hopes stillborn.
One-sided desires to adorn
my humble canopy.
A Neverland which never was
and never is to be.
Though it's so easy to imagine
a life there, the fantasy
is quietly erasing me,
gradually.

unceremoniously

Throw me a bone
Romeo's cover has been suddenly blown
Just when he was gaining
on the great unknown.
Unceremoniously.
But it always seems to go round that way.
At least it tends to sound that way.
Here, where the deer and the antelope play.
Long ago
Was it me or you practicing
'Turn To Stone'?
For endless hours sitting all alone,
Unceremoniously.
It's a pity that I never thought to pray
For the deer and the antelope
In Mother Nature's transcendental way.

Home, home on the range.
Wonder why normal feels so ghastly strange?
Wonder what Romeo would have had to say
If not for Shakespeare standing in his way?
Unceremoniously.
Throw me a bone.
When you are gone
I'm gonna turn to stone.
I think I'm headed for that great unknown.
Sure as Poseidon sits atop his fishy throne.
Beneath the briny sea
Unceremoniously.
I'd sing his praises night and day
Where the squid and the jellyfish are said to play.
I ask the questions in a million ways
But the answers always coming out the same.
Home, home on the range

don't call me

Don't call me oozing doom

from your musky little room,

floating in a languid sea
of mucous and anxiety;

with persuasion's barrel

leveled squarely at your brow

don't call me like you done before,

don't call me that way now.

When sirens are wailing 
of low pressure systems staring down 
your hastily assembled
bag of supplies
and you're feeling like less than a
speck of dust in some
handsome stranger's eyes,
maybe then you will know why
you should not call.

After each and every venue

has been brazenly detoured,

till correspondents and old stand bys

have indelicately demurred

and every solitary safety hatch
has been otherwise secured.

Don't call me,

Don't call me,

Don't call me.

Forget my address
And my face
Forget the path that leads you
to this place.
Erase it from your memory
Forget it all
and please don't call.
The consequence is far too dear
and too predictable, I fear.

Don't mistake me for a tympani
next time you take a beating.
I know you've heard this all before
But for my sake it bears repeating.
Not in a while,
not even now and then
no, not if you are bleeding.

Just simply do not call,
don't call to me again.

O, please, by now

you must know how
this roundely will end.

Don't call me or
so help me...
You must take this to your heart
as a warning
Or as a threat
But this one thing you must remember
This one thing do not forget
Don't call me or, so help me,
I will come.
After all is said and
all is done,
don't call me,
if you call me
I will always come.

construction

Like the wolf in a fable I've been
grasping at straws.
You built your brick castle
on a long lost 'because'.
And so now who's afraid
and, well, who wouldn't be?

The wind is still blowing
but best save your breath.
All that huffing and puffery
scares the children to death.
And so now who's afraid,
and, well, who wouldn't be?
If it weren't for you,
if it wasn't for me.

So how does it go now
and howdyado?
Will I ever know now,
if ever you knew
that the way to the end
is the way it begins.
and if you'll believe, love hides
multitudinous sins:

That one of omission,
the one about pride.
I envy the one who
keeps nothing inside
and who follows their passion,
who leads with their heart
in irrational fashion,
forsaking all art.

So vacate that fortress
of thatch, twig or stone
but you better be ready
to go it alone.
For the sheeps in the meadow
the cows in the corn
and so it has been since
the day you were born.
But where do you go now
and howdyado?
If it weren't for me,
if it wasn't for you.