What's left in the world
For the woman in the burning house
Except pain and sorrow?

She meanders through life,
Picking things up
Here and there
Where
Here is darkness,
There is nothing,
And tomorrow never comes,
And each new thing
Is something to hold
For just awhile.

She must watch
The house burn down,
While still inside.

First the drapes.

She clutches onto the past,
In the falling ashes and huffing heat,
And can't let go,
Even as her skin peels away.

Black tears stream down her face,
And the inner workings of her own soul
Become even more confusing to her.

The walls crackle,
The windows shiver and burst,
And the world rushes in upon her.

On the braided rug in the living room she kneels,
Holding her things underneath her *******,
Praying that everyone will see
And that no one will see.

Her life,
Ruined.

Her family,
Gone,
Long ago.

Her hope,
The match that lit the trashcan.

And now, flames all around her,
Her black tears a residue,
And the world watching,
She knows nothing.

She has nothing.

but
Pain and sorrow.

After falling
Off the wagon,
I ****** blood.

And woke up worse
Than hemorrhage
Suffering from a pain
I couldn't
Explain.

Pain troubling
Me thru the day
Knowing there were
Things I couldn't fix
Or understand.

Waiting for nightfall,
The shroud of darkness
And
Foggy light,
Knowing understanding
Would never come,
But searching for its source
In the sky.

While soldiers died,
Under a Syrian night.

I'm sorry, I'm such a sorry man,
regrettably, I thought of our old love,
remembering nights of amorous hugging,
bending you over, spreading your legs,
entering your body, finding a place
to reside, though not deep inside,
not where the creature of love casts
his gaze at me, from his light
with a shadowed eye, seeing through you and I,
to the future cast in the die, I fall
hard you said, quietly, so quiet and
hushed, without weight.

When you talked about your dreams, they always escaped
your mouth in a mote of smoke,
into the spackled ceiling it snaked,
wisping, serpentine, through all the fiberglass,
into the atmosphere, into the solar system,
not yet burned away, into the stars,
where all of you resides, all your dreams.

Back on earth, my eyes fixed on your escaping self,
I imagined no happy endings, no good way
to say a sad goodbye, a burning lullaby.

No way,  even naked,
in the bed we shared, did we share a single shred of truth.

Curled up in my arms, naked bodies sweating from the *******,
not just not knowing each other anymore, not just not listening, but so close to the singularity when we were *******,
so close to zero gain,
that when you said we may be having a baby,
I didn't know enough about you to say yes,
only knew enough about *******,
to say no to yes.

I'm sorry I turned out to be such a sorry *** man.

He drinks, he forgets
Where he is and why he is there.

He begins to lose himself in his darkness,
Begins to erupt from within.

He stops caring,
Or begins to care too much.

He wishes himself born again
in the purifying sunlight of dappled spring mornings, because he wishes to start over again.

He starts to do things harder than ever,
He gives himself over to the mercury of the moment,
He bathes in his own sin,
Finds the wash of it freezingly refreshing
And repulsive all at once.

He stops talking,
Starts wishing to enjoy the ornateness of youth.

Feels he's old at 25,
Starts to change his mind.

Forgets everything he's learned over a quarter century
And goes back to rudderless childhood,
Even worse in adulthood.

This is not a bar
for the optional. This
is not a place for the unknown.
This is a place amongst the fire
and iron. This is the home
of tumbling mongerers
and life-dulled addicts;
of the hope-filled dull
and drone of life.

I have taken the drink of spasm with you,
and tasted the wine of dehydrated breath
and loss.

I, in my hopelessness,
was hopeful
and angry.

We were.

And i've drowned it all, with the racists
and nubients, rednecks,
how I love you *******.

Take my calming down
as love.
Take my Wilding out
as truth,
and hear the scream of my useless crush.

We will sober,
we will long to ****,
we will long to understand,
we will long too long.

This is not a bar
for the optional. This
is not a place for the unknown.
This is a place amongst the fire
and iron. This is the home
of tumbling mongerers
and life-dulled addicts;
of the hope-filled dull
and drone of life.

I have taken the drink of spasm with you,
and tasted the wine of dehydrated breath
and loss.

I, in my hopelessness,
was hopeful
and angry.

We were.

And i've drowned it all, with the racists
and nubients, rednecks,
how I love you *******.

Take my calming down
as love.
Take my Wilding out
as truth,
and hear the scream of my useless crush.

No better woman
than her with ferocious eyes,
And a glow of life.