Perhaps

We lie in perhaps, hum-
hushed in dank corners
of fir lights and twinkled
haze, toenails crowned
with dandelion bands.

Brows beaten and drunk --
a given gesture gives way. Knees
on shins and knuckles tossed,
a fingered slip in twisted
touch. A still life

slain but breathing, broken
smarts, an absent thing.
Dishes spilling molded jam,
a carbon stench below
the shift. And when it must

it disappears, a column
crumbled to its toes. An empire
wracked with empty feet, its chairs
cracked with vacant falls. A dizzy dive
in liquid land, a stumbled leak

back into straight -- linear loops
to drop a grasp, a lone perhaps.

Bummed Despite

I have no idea what I’m doing. Acting because people are watching (not really watching), greatest influence being the last page read and some meaningless glance into upward skinny branches of college in January. Face red and serious and concerned about the phony (PHONY!) bullshit of too drunk to play and playing for any other reason than that’s what the girls wanna do.

Toaster Oven

Today I saw a color without a name,
spread eagle across bayside breezes
and visible from top to bottom

I saw it while sweeping up and away
the jagged bits of glimmering pebbles,
infinitesimal casualty of another night above

Of a day before that, in the mud and pointed
branches of campus mystagogues and sideways pathways,
Of making camp in the firehouse lighthouse of our twenties.

Of today, tonight - homemade salsa and two dollar
fifty-cent wine, and Woody Allen, and "Mamie's Blues,"
and "Whatcha Gonna Do About It?"

Of rain on the deck at half past midnight, Billie Holiday
and Ginsberg's "America" - halfway there
and with good wine.

And more free counter space.

The First of More

Bare jarrings of cocoa flesh
and bulky glasses
and blaring white diamonds,
all against fluorescent offerings
of yet another adolescent experiment,
the result of which is blissfully
thankfully
and eternally
unlearnable.