feared
free-falling
into the abyss
so fell
for you
your crazy kindness
kind craziness
suited me
to a T
to my own
bad crazy exposed me
so gently
teasing out
the turmoil, straightening
and smoothing
draining the dross, filling up
as replacement with
the dangerous
incredible
LOCK
love is that
gleaming apple
too high
up
the tree
it is
the death bed of the intellectual
fatal aporia
kills
their categories
it is the puzzle
with too many pieces
for the box
infinite choice
the blurb on
the sleeve
pity barely any fit together let alone
interlock
and you told yourself
it would be all too easy
are we not
so perfectly designed for this?
BUT THEN
poets marrying poets
do not do well
let me labour
the obvious: on
the one hand
Ted
on the other
Sylvia
and on the other
I leave that to those
scrutinizing their
letters
delving into
their lives
this whole enterprise
a dubious affair looking
for dubious affairs
something
about love and poetry
in this configuration
such a curious mismatch
amusing in a sense
but then there is death
SOMEONE ELSE
“My only regret in life is that
I was not born someone else”.
Woody Allen
you looked through that
special drawer
for mementos, treasures,
precious relics of time past
you you found were
poems, love poems
written
for someone else
told
their own story
self-
explanatory
no comment necessary
or required
it is always; there
is always
someone else
it iz in the nature of desire
who we are
you don”t need
a doctoral thesus on
Jacwues Lacan
to figure it out
but it just might help
things
might help
and everybody ultimately
knows that ws all
want, wish
we were someome else
want to pour our hearts out
to somone who might love
us, want us
or at least listen
but they have no time
for you
and your pain and
all ypur somebody else troubles
becausw
in the hearts they know
what you are
is
less, is negative
is not what
they thought
too young you were
to figure out the disappointment
on all those faces
first breath
you took
meant for somebody else
BATHE
want to bathe
in you
feel your
ripples
your undertow
and the power
of your crashing waves
THIS THING
this thing, suffering,
never
thought about it really
when we were
together
before the fracture,
time of complete loss
yes that short time
of beauty
I do not remember
much about it now
why, how
it could not be sustained
thinking about the drive home
immediately after our
marriage
no reason to think
of suffering
suffering there lying
in wait somewhere
outside us
or, already primed, set
to destroy,
lodged within
CLASSIC
want to see
the water
cascading
down you
in my
scruffy little
shower find
you
gone full
Botticelli
Venus
newly born
and our love,
which you proclaim Platonic
shadow-shown
on the wall of
my mouldy bathroom
though would rather that it
were enacted
comically, tragically
in the cosy comfort
of our cave
HOW
how can I possibly
still love you
still
want you
still imagine you
with me
right now
now
now
now!
so close, both of
us, the two of us,
would agree we feel embedded
wrapped up in each
other’s arms:
the ultimate package
but
this
is
not real, is pure
supposition, ghost conjecture
me here
alone in these words, with
this poem
you,
as ever,
so far away
HERE
if you were here
I would
devote myself to
your pleasure,
shamelessly, spectacularly
so
bring you into my sphere
softly, slowly
inch by inch
measure
by measure
until you cannot, would
not ever desire
to leave
come down to Earth from
where we
soared together
poems 2 die for