not ill us

Not quite a cuttlefish,
but we can spoon
though I'd need a fork
to get you out of your shell
and a smoke afterwards.

Conflict Resolution

I bought a bowtie for my dog, but there hasn't been any formal occasions lately so it's become sort of an inside joke. I mention it casually over breakfast and he drags his ass across the carpet. He pees all over my sweat pants and I say, "Looks like we're going to the opera".

On Sundays we go to the non-denominational place of worship next to the Wa Wa and hash out our differences by barking at cars through a sound-proof cashier station. Afterward, when we are hoarse and moist with the residue of our anger we get Otter Pops and every time, as I watch him pawing at the wrapper I have a little sad, "Pour it all over me. I was meant to be blue." he seems to say.

In Deference

On windy days L sits by the window
with a book in her lap, waiting
for a chill to rustle through its pages
like a cat through the reeds. In this way
her stories reveal themselves in sudden
jagged fragments, acquaintances vanish,
love flickers and flames,
landscapes melt into conversation
into monologue into description;
paragraphs fissure mid-sentence,
mood writhing, dissected on an uneven plane.
The world balances with its spine sinking
into the fault line of her pale legs,
pleats of her skirt carrying
its motion into the afternoon
while slender pearly arms pillar her head.
Her eyes close to make room for the sun.
The roar of the freeway douses the crackling
of crisp pages as death goes unnoticed; confined
to an instant, smoky tendrils encircle the infinite
and its already crystallized moments, drawing them to
constellation. All far from seamless, unseen, crestfallen,
she wants to know if love lasts; who she will see again;
if her journey was an arc or an ark.

Suicide Pact

It's so hard to find someone

you love and trust

enough to die with,

but still empty

enough to want to die.