you're a shark and I'm swimming
your kisses make me peak
I'll paint your world red

irish luck... word salad...
something in between...
an hour minded;
irish luck is... a potato famine;
clap... the irish are waiting for applause
and a drowning man's paddle!
they're irish by the way...
they're hardly designating continental shifts:
with the icelandic harbingers of hope...
reduced to a clover:
i said luck... didn't i? clover four wings
and keep the rest asking.

I am aware, I need to let go
That all we once were
Has flown out the window.

I know it has been long enough
How can you look so happy
And I look so rough

It is easy to see, just not accept..
Tears swell my eyes
I draw my breath

Your smile reflects my rotting insides
I try avoiding your gaze
As you walk on by

I can pretend to be just fine
Not putting myself out
To be left to dry

To the moon and back?
Forever and a day..
How can we be friends..
When you threw it all away?

for Franz Wright, late*

~

the hand
I don’t wash
has never
been touched.

is the last
woman
on earth
pregnant?

the children are burning
yet

my son
is not enough
to fill
your nose.

I saw god
he was crawling
away
from a clean
diaper.  it would be my only regret

to miss
the encore
of death.

Take a Carney ride
at high noon,
or at midnight sky
under the moon.

The moonlight says
that night is a good deal
And the night said: the moon knows
that we are here to pack a wallop.

But the stars ignore the moon's stolen light,
knowing that they will all turn too soon turn to dust.

The stars spend
wonderfully wistful hours
wondering if the only reason that time exists
is so everything doesn't happen at once.

Then, all at once, they are able to leave well enough alone.