POEMS
YOU ARE A FOUR LETTER WORD No one will ever convince me that houses are not alive. Your house always looked like it was smiling. Your bedroom would often try to kill me. I will tell them your name. No. I won't tell them your name. It doesn't matter now anyway, or you matter too much. I am still taking your phone calls and wondering why. I tell my friends that I don't think of you. I really want to mean it. You have a dog and a wife with a kid and two cars and a garden. You call me to tell me you love me when everyone's sleeping. You are a four-letter word and you're not to be trusted. I still want you, or I still want to win. I wish we'd never met. YOU’D BETTER WATCH WHAT YOU ARE SAYING THE THINGS THAT YOU ARE SAYING ARE CHANGING YOUR LIFE. THE THINGS THAT YOU ARE SAYING ARE BIRTHING THINGS AND RAISING THINGS AND KILLING THINGS DEAD. THEY MAKE LARGE THINGS OUT OF SMALL THINGS, DANGER OUT OF THE UNKNOWN, MOVEMENT OUT OF DORMANT, RESTING POTENTIAL. THIS IS HOW YOU BUILD YOUR HOUSE AND THIS IS HOW THE HOUSE FORMS, THRIVING OR STRUGGLING. ACCORDING TO LANGUAGE. LOVERS AND OTHER PROBLEMS It was almost summer. I saw you and I thought you were the perfect medicine. I thought you’d help me live. We nearly killed each other trying. Or, we nearly killed ourselves trying. Of course it didn’t work. When you are this mad about a thing, it has to leave you. You have to be shown how much you need yourself, instead. There were good things, too, you always say. Things we miss each time that we review this. You, after our tenth misunderstanding wordlessly ironing my trousers. Me so caught up with thoughts of you I could never really eat. After the fight in Santa Monica we fell asleep blind drunk, holding hands like baby dolls. But were those good things? They were badly done, but they felt just right. The last time I came to you, I was hoping for something new. I boarded a plane and I prayed for the most. You were not there. Then I was not there. We have always been mirrors of each other’s best and most horrible work. I can’t come back from the things that were felt, but I love you. Someone else will love you more. IT’S LIKE THAT Friend, you have misunderstood me and likely I have misunderstood you. There is too much smoke here from long ago that we carried with us. Our air is old here. Hot. Wet-thick with dust. We could have been clearer with one another if there had been trust. But staying was harder. (We weren't taught to stay.) So go we must.
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