I have no fear of shotgun-toting
orangutans. And why should I?
They’re just monkeys with
weapons they don’t understand
how to handle.

And all the while
you think I can handle myself
But I can’t
I’m just a victim of
your imagination.

my eyes alone
my eyes are alone
i see through them
as does no one
else
i see through them
and am solitary
yet a person
like everyone else
but i don’t know
what everyone else
sees because i
can only see through
my eyes alone
you know me?
how could you
know anyone else?
you didn’t exist
until i saw you
through my eyes
alone.

Toyota makes a fine,
Fine automobile
But
I have never
been more terrified
of potholes.

i offend
you offend
we both offend,

and it just keeps going
with every word we say
with every move we make;

hurting and digging,
long after we have forgotten
the reason why this all started

but just wishing
that we can be apart
so that this can all stop;

so the night progresses
seemingly interminably,
until we unite in bed.

it goes rmmrmmm
and it goes bmmbmmm
calling unwanted attention
to my self-disclosing mid-section
despite my attempts to
hush and shush and
my muttered “shut-up stupid stomach!”s

Lackadaisically we
found ourselves submerged
within the folds of our
own self-indulgent malaise.

All confidence aside, we
faltered all too willingly
into a sultry – if sordid –
Non-movement.

It’s the worst thing we
could do to ourselves,
but damn it,
sometimes,
it feels so good.

When last I checked
I’d heard you’d died
when last I checked
you’d lost your way
when last I checked
You had escalated your
situation, and it’s
up to you to
redefine what ‘died’
really means
between now
and when next I check

or not
you’re on the one hand or the other
hand in hand and foot in shoe (if it fits
then don’t take it off to the races
are from mars and women are from
that land out yonder where
your bristle breaks
where your beard bristles
and where your blabbery
is better tolerated

I wonder
what my cold fingers feel
like
scraping on your skin
like
ice?
like a strange and
unwelcome touch from
a specter?

Am I a ghost?
yes?
Can I be your ghost
at least?

And so I sit
remissly weathering
another evening
after spending the day
so carefully on
nothing in particular

stumbling over words stuck on a single
letter reminiscing over second grade
when i learned to read aloud and not sound
so much a fool as my classmates something
i chose to hold over their heads apparently
to this day now disgusted at my inability
in a new tongue to complete a single sentence
without a pause to think what this word could
possibly be and how it might should fit into
said phrase knowing you’re laughing
as i would if you were reading this and
knowing those second graders would laugh
too at me but i have to stand with grad students
who are mature enough to hold in their laughter
but bad enough poker players to keep me
from seeing it all over their faces

It’s raining.

four-thousand dollars worth
of expensive electronic equipment
to be moved from one building to
another with a car that
doesn’t have the best weather-
stripping in the world
and it’s raining.