Pecan Pie With Melted Butter, Two Forks
You
were like a found cigarette butt
with a little bit left
for me to smoke
that I pulled from the Waffle House ashtray
So brief and so good to me
Distractions
The dog is licking himself again
As the kitten plucks the strings of my guitar.
A steady, distracting accompaniment
To the syncopated clicking of my keyboard.
Lick, pluck, click, clack, lick, pluck.
Bones
When I dropped out of the University
She told me on the drive
Back to my home in Greenville,
“I am always here for you”
And here I am, four years later,
And I can’t do a damn thing right,
And she has cancer in her bones
Message Send Failure
Shivering in the cold,
I send messages to the world
While you, curled tight into a ball,
Lie in slumber, oblivious to the fact
That I am
Shivering in the cold,
Sending messages to the world.
Memorial Day
Your cousin cradled your head
and yelled feverishly for someone
to phone an ambulance.
I knew in that moment,
no matter how much I cared,
no matter how many nights I would spend waiting for your return,
no matter how many trinkets you would wear
on your wrist
or around your neck
or adorning your head,
I would never be able to save you
from the things we feared the most.
And when I held you that night,
your skin ice-cold and my heart racing until the morning’s light,
I prayed to Jesus Christ,
my indifferent childhood savior.
Violence
Window-panes spattered with dust specks
and nicotine stains- broken up by finger prints
over chipped glass made by nervous, shaking hands
doing work for cautious, weary eyes
that received violent, street-lit images
of neighbors feuding
over half-empty cartons of milk
and half-empty bottles of King Cobra malt liquor
in the yard.
There, where an aging witch sells her singing daughter to the streets.
I’d Smoke Them All Again
King-sized Famous American Cigarettes
wrapped in foil.
Rolled by machines and
delivered to my favorite corner store.
Twenty at a time,
time and time again.
Thrown to the floor,
over-sized sweaters, vanity belts, and black leggings.
Chapped lips on skin
covered in goose-bumps.
Like the seasons come and go,
we come and go again.
I won’t always have my health.
Plastic Bag
Your mother handed to me
in a large plastic bag
the shoes you were wearing when I met you,
my favorite shirt you had taken for the drive home,
and that same old pair of blue jeans that you never washed.
I had to wait two whole days to see you
in waiting rooms,
in my car to smoke a cigarette,
in the cafeteria when I went on food runs for your family,
and by that window above the bay where they carted you in.
I recall the first thing you said,
black and blue and doped up in your gown.
“Sorry about your shirt.”
Fix
“This is happening, this is real! “she screamed as if the whole neighborhood was a part of the argument.
I had the urge to laugh at the irony that she was allowed to follow her heart if it meant mine were to be broken, but my stomach instantly laughed right back at me as it began to sink and burn. For months the ache had been growing with every missed phone call and my every half-assed excuse, so it made sense that the building tension would release itself in a disastrous climax. The aftermath left me shivering like a junkie three weeks without a fix.
I don’t know how well I can speak for the rest of humanity these days, but I do know that in the realm of failed romances, it can be tempting for one to look back and wonder where things went wrong. It is not enough for me to count my losses and move on; I have to do the tedious work of historians and dig up facts muddied by memory. I have no choice but to trace the roots of this disaster back to the very moment we first met. That first high I achieved when she saw right through me and my intentions would be the catalyst for this particular reaction, which burned bright and hot until it finally fizzled out, was to blame.
If our brains can pre-disposed to addiction, is the same true of our hearts?
Pressure
The pitcher shook and hissed
as if to say,
“I’m almost there!”
My worn hands, eager and accustomed
to the intensity,
the anticipation,
and the pay off,
twirled the nozzle shut.
I wiped my hands clean,
And carried on with my life.
