AND TO LOVE

AND TO LOVE

danced all night you did
first meeting and me
not yet
on the agenda

I suppose I must feel glad
you contrived to shut
every other option out

don’t know what it would feel
like right now
never to have been conceived
never have to come
into existence

never to have encountered
the day the dancing stopped
ground to a halt
    eventually dead in
its tracks
   and me and my siblings
left wondering
if this is what time
and children do
    to passion, and to love

MCCALL

MCCALL

you told me
about your beloved dog

whose name,
unforgivably,
I have forgotten

I am on my way
to forgetting everything
every day
the jigsaw puzzle
loses another piece

and the picture on the box
must have been replaced
because I would
swear by
all that is holy
I have
no knowledge of this one;
would attest
in a supreme court not
to have seen it before

not to have
seen you before, remembering
good times, the odd
great time
before it all went to Hell
turned cataclysmic

falling further from grace
than fallen angels
ever did

no pride, I guess it was,
that threw our
little world into
terminal
       tail spin

the worst kind of pride, pride raging sad shadow
born of childhood pain
beyond our
undetstanding at the time

that time of which
you told me, your your legs
striding through
the veldt,  dog whose
name
   I have forgotten chasing
you, loyal
to a fault behind you

and me
    not in this scene, here
just  whisper

waiting for the moment of
our meeting and
the thought
(for which I do
so apologize
   that here you are
   here we are

neither of us from this moment on
ever going to be alone
   

DARKER TURN

DARKER TURN

when I die
condense all
I was
and now am

into a love poen
single, short, to the point

thing of night and dream
and moment when
all our darkness
all that
we are
    of  darkness
thrives, comes alive

knows
the bliss
    of a star

when I die
turn me into
a love poem

short
and to the point
         nothing special
of diamond, golden

   thing in the heavens
like Romeo’s heart
                      speaking plainly

not
    (as Juliet did envision)
beautifully scattered

and then
    if I am read

(if you
are the one to read)

put
    what did, what was

into some
forever parenthesis

just to say, remind me,
that I am
           thing of absence,
thing of
the darkness now

this
    small, petty life that
writes

being so
preoccupied with what it says
                                           what said

took a
      sweeter, darker turn