I wore black every day
just in case.
the train was fifteen minutes
late and I was
one month
and counting.
“the accident”
the kind that takes whole
neighborhoods
hostage and
leaves the dismayed
picking through the remains
to find their charred family albums
while their babies are off
staring at ash clouds
that block the sun
holding an empty leash
and at such a
young age
finally understanding
accidents, permanence,
their environment’s
severity and no exits.
you always remind them
there are no exits.
“grief”
last words
hang in the air
like a drunk ellipsis
that doesn’t know how to
let go.
you’re famished: learn to
feed yourself first
eat the savage sadness
you drive with;
your third overdrawn
valediction between you and someone
you never really knew.
swallow your pride,
swallow your words,
eat his fucking heart out.
watch it all nest,
watch it nuzzle in your silk,
flutter in your lining,
incubate and bake
into a thousand tiny worms
squeezing from the casing,
a thousand black balloon
butterflies
are bursting from your lips
and gliding through ice
gusts of wind.
watch them hover,
watch them expand, watch them
land on the cheeks
of all the boys you kissed
hello.
watch them
*pop*
into a thousand
uninvited phrases.
no
run down and cake their
faces like mud tears,
turn to stone,
stay pressed there.
watch them carefully
from your handmade stage.
you can feel the prickle,
their hair stand on end
from here.
watch your men,
girl.
they are starting to talk,
shiver,
watch you with
a closing distance .
“a thousand salutations”
you’ve been coming home
mint chapstick and
tobacco pieces stuck to your lips from
those poorly rolled cigarettes.
extra bus fare.
bottom shelf whiskey and
natural laughter
spilling from your breath.
I keep finding
little post-it notes
shoved into your pockets
pasted with someone else’s playlists;
some other guy’s suggestions
on how to lift your spirits
when the depression gnaws your
spindles
like a cancer and
you’re too tired to
undress yourself.
I’m still here
following you under the covers,
taking keys from your hand,
leaving fresh water on the
nightstand.
gnawing your earlobes
with some panic and
whispering at your hair
you’re manic, dear
pinning you down with some
well timed stanzas.
“the boyfriend”
you gave me a bouquet of
weeds once as I was drinking
my third cup of coffee.
you had picked them from
our backyard when I wasn’t
looking.
you were smiling with teeth;
big, and I loved
you.
following that the day was not as
pristine or worthy of
photographic memory,
but I don’t
always choose what stays,
what goes, what lingers
in between the building of
new thoughts, the removal
of the old, the magic it
all makes.
I had changed into a sundress
and walked down the stairs
slowly because I had bent over
in a way that tore something
inside of me:
a nerve or muscle.
I mustered up enough breath
to say it feels like I pinched a nerve
and am having trouble breathing.
what should I do?
you had to be somewhere
soon, I knew.
you looked up the staircase
on your way out
the front door and
simply said: I don’t believe you.
someone else drove me to
the doctor and that doctor
confirmed I strained my back,
prescribed me Flexeril
for the pain and wrote me
a note explaining to my internship
why I wouldn’t be in that day.
I laid in bed, waiting for the
drugs to subside.
you came home
and attempted to justify
why you always felt
deceived by me.
I lay numb,
relieved
of feeling anything as you recited
everything I’d ever done
that bothered you.
you weren’t sorry,
it’s Thursday, and I feel
nothing for you
now.
“Thursday”
“And you’re still addicted to way back when instead of
coming back to life.”
—Buddy Wakefield
there once was Boulder
and the flatirons draped in
summer sun.
I always had popsicles and
chapstick on hand,
a wet coral lipgloss,
tantrums and suggestive tones
that my brother would make it through,
funerals and weddings and cherry-
stacked Shirley Temples;
a lot of murmurs
from a painful
you declaring your love for me
in the middle of the night in
the middle of my hometown
while I was drunk on my former losses
and no cocktail to hold.
then there was despondent me
taking it all in
with a wilted corsage in my hair
that I wanted to wear the next day
but couldn’t wait
so bought it three days early and
never mind the water
my date called and
without twenty four hours notice,
stood me up.
you stood in.
we attended the wedding the next day;
on the anniversary of our trip across country.
I wore a peach vintage dress and tied a
ribbon in my hair instead of
the dehydrated orchid.
you brought me a headband and a bracelet to match,
said some dulcified things about my progress
and recovery, apologies about my brother
and you hoped my mom would be ok,
a little postcard that said “Ghent”
to remind where I came from
and a note on the back to remind me
where I’ve been.
to your credit,
I never said it,
(mostly self seeking back then)
we had it.
I never appreciated much
until I moved here and was
left in a townhouse on the
edge of Lehigh
and these days,
I appreciate just a little bit of sun
through the mirror of clouds that frowns back
and the retreat of all the workers and corners
to their shelters somewhere barely safe,
a brief meditation on my mattress,
enough money for dinner and
if I’m lucky, a nap
in the middle of the day where I lay
letting the thoughts of us
running to the west and unlocking fingers
to each discover it
in our own way
wash over me
to the sound of
forgive the sudden bird chirps
mostly silent days.
and we had it
so I know it happens.
“liberation”
as if I am even hurting anything;
some embittered tremulous
thing shaking her fist at the
moon and praying for a tidal
wave.
you notice the notch in my veins
before you even notice
the rain.
“flood”
Dear xxx,
I hope you’re happy
soon.
“How to free yourself”
- Big picture: I don’t belong anywhere.
- Small picture: Buy bed.
January 5, 2014 and we
have arrived in
North Philadelphia.
“hypothymia”
daturamoon.com 