Touching Distance

The night is only as deep
as it takes me to reach down and find you
and the dark is only as wide
as the distance between our bodies

The night is only as long
as the time taken for heartbeats to echo
and it is only ever as cold
as the moments that you are not here.

People talk about loss and sorrow
as if they were vast and unknowable seas
but sorrow springs from tiny sources
and loss from a second apart.

They say time and distance are relative
but I don’t believe it is so
for time without you is absolute
and touching distance the furthest I’ll go.

Your arrogance

I love to see you strut and preen
and walk
and cast that haughty eye on those
you merely suffer to stand
near you.
I love the way your words
just stroke the surface
and keep the boiling inner self
from completely spilling over.
but most of all
I love your arrogance.

I love the way you make yourself
available
only on enquiry
and even then I’m not certain you’ll
deem me good enough
I love you calm and certain brand
of self-superiority
that timeless, firm, unyielding
arrogance

You’re cocksure and impertinent
and think only of your
own needs
and you what’s right and your’re
not afraid to say so
and the rule of what goes round comes round
does not apply to you, sir
All must bend to your magnificent
arrogance.

And I love the way you wear your
arrogance.

The Killer

If you fear the hurricane
the hurricane will find you.
If you fear the bonds of fate
the bonds of fate will bind you.
If you fear the future’s dark
then such darkness will blind you.
The killers slips in through
the unlocked door.

If you hate the hand of god
the hand of god will doom you.
If you hate the grinding mill
then it will consume you
If you you hate flowers of love
then don’t do what its blooms do
The killer climbs the staircase
by the hall.

If the road seems hard and long
then hard and long it will be.
If the knife seems bright and keen
then your heart will cry “kill me”
If your task is cruel and harsh
then no one will show mercy
The killer creeps across your
bedroom floor.

If you wake up from the dream
you still may not survive it
If you vow to mend you ways
you somehow must contrive it.
If hope in you still lingers on
it will not stay alive, it
will perish as the killer
drives his knife.

Adventures of a Saran Girl

I watch you watch me
I play, you play.
I take your money.
I win.

You sigh and squirt your stuff
I sweat and count the bills
Your wife walks in on you.
I win.

Yes I have dreams and aspirations
Yes I went to college and got paper.
No, I do not have three welfare children to support
$40 for three minutes.
I win.

You thank me for my effort
You go to work tomorrow
I sleep in to midday.
I win.

The City of Bitches

Hell is the city of bitches
the valley of the shrill, bleak, droning crones.
The pit of the never quite skinny enough
and the smile that hides the sharpened nail.

Woe is the highway of the insecure
doomed to their self imagined flaws
and their desperate defiant pleas for self-affirmation
I am random, I am crazy, please love me for who I am.

Keen is the gallery of ravens
who pick at the uncertain flesh
I love you, I dream with you – I understand you
now get naked and do just what I say.

Dull is the blur of the cutters
and warm is the blood which they waste
waste at the feet of the world which they think
doesn’t care for or deserve them enough.

Hell is the city of bitches
and hell is a place in the mind.

O My God

I was twice down and bound
dark highways to the water
a broken headed God
for a roadside sign.
Multifarious attractions
deep and unrelenting
weave their finger in the crooked signs
of an empire in decline…

They sent for Doctor Death
but he wasn’t making house calls -
all they had of him
was a rusted hook and knife.
By the waters of the lake
they drained her blood and vitals
like a red plume in sunset,
the blood stained every drop.

Men are in denial
to prove they are not racist.
Women ignorant of law
demand unsteady hands.
The driver is asleep, or drunk
or deliberately swerving
all across the road,
the children
cannot sleep tonight.

The Downbringer

Once in a while
a good day, a compliment
a little tiny victory -

that’s the upbuilder.

Then comes
the dark cloud, the turnaround
the fruit of overconfidence,

that’s the downbringer.

Everytime your feet start
hitting a stride, or get into a
serious groove, you find

the downbringer.

Laughing at the pratfalls
like you life and your hopes
are a single camera set up sitcom -

that’s the downbringer.

Downbringer, dark cloud
hovering over
my shoulder.