warm-ups, & i have been you

a myopic lens
so fair you see
sad you see

marvel the
mystery
whispery
wistfully

some things
are for what happens
when you just type
for the sake of typing

stringing words
along the lines of a page
just to see something
left behind
when you leave

just to leave these little
lines of me
a history

her story







& the shot
glitters in the ruby
concave
of an open chest
the filigree sparkle
like a flash
of life or little
tiny pieces of a life
tiny drops of days
that spread
out a long red
pool beneath
all the holes
in leftover heart
or what once was
heart but is heart
no longer







i have been you.

i have sat
with the loose ends
of my expectations
dangled in my hands

while all they were
tied to
drifted away,
the smoke
of nothing

& my very soul echoed
by the purple sobs
of twilight
down the wall behind

me & the moonface
as blank
as white
as my own.

i have been you.

i have buried
loose ends
in busy little
businesses.

i have tried
to tie them
footnoted in
music notes

superimposed the ghosts
of their open knots
on every rushing image
i would flash before my mind
or eye
or mind's eye
hunting just one to help
me remember how to forget

i have pulled
reflections
from my black book
like poems

& kissed them
as memories.
each a different feature.

so many he's as
brown eyes, warm voice,

strong hands,
deep laugh,
an inquisitive eyebrow,
those lovely shoulders,
that dark hair

that could never be
strung together well,
or long, enough to
fill the longing.

each one dropped
like pebbles
into darkwell depth
to bring the
reflection of my loss
up to me
until it overflowed
& was lost

i have been you.

i have had
cups of days emptied
& their contents replaced
with the deafening
white noise
of strawsucking
nothing
nothing
nothing,

i have been you.

i have been the cage
for a starving animal
that eats itself
behind the bars.

i have been you,

& i am not you,
anymore.