pawned

now's ok for a chat
not a sit down

when your motivation
is laid out
on a glass coffee table
plain as day
in front of me

how in fuck
am i supposed to
pretend you
are really present

pretend you're not
actually in
the market
for some adolescent
alibi

with the sweat in your clothes
and the grease in the air
he's out somewhere
and in drunk repose
you'll commit to
a night
but only for the
illusion of being
his equal

we be like them little bitches on the chessboard

not i

there's a hole in the bucket

i can pour my heart
into anything, watch it
spill out the bottom

those hours could be spent in bed

woke up wide
around three
this Tuesday morning

its sick
to notice i am
not thinking
like someone
working in a
collection
agency
already

i pondered
joining facebook
after all the
shit i've
talked

hilarious

and posting my
employer?
it was the cardinal
rule that drove
my pulling out
before

speaking of which
the fucking
birth control
has still not been
dealt with
so i'm starting
to think
vasectomy
and/or suicide

woah there
big drama:
its like butchie's
uncle said
'the bitch wadn't worth
more than a pinky...'

true enough
but that makes me feel like
a nail clipping
or a flake of broken skin
from her callus

with so much
wasted beauty
and hours of
paradise on earth
spent in office parks,
kitchens and
space stations,
this is no land
for young men
which explains
why so many
of them take
it as hard as
they can
on the old

sometimes
i wish i had
given them a rougher
go of it

girls
my peers
or the boomers
either

'cause fuck it all

a host of problems

the thing about surrounding yourself
with the people you most admire,
i'm tired of being in love with everyone
and never growing close enough
and i'm tired of being disgusted by the rest

i hate that i can't connect fast enough,
deep enough to satisfy
whatever childish expectations
i am driven by

and i hate that i want to talk
about it
fuck it
not only is love a bad word
my people have borders
and we can talk about illnesses
and menstruation and
botched affairs

but i am squeezing a pillow
trying to wrestle myself back to sleep
in the early morning
desperately remembering the sight of
your long proud torso in a tight
gray shirt, almost masculine its
so carved and V-shaped as
yr poised on a barstool

i hear shared laughter and
i see shoulder blades sliding under your skin
in some self-erasing fantasy
i still silently call love when i'm telling myself
what not to do.

she stomped the Tara

this chick got fired today
her numbers were way down
and she was missing time
more frequently because
of morning sickness
in the afternoons

apparently she saw it coming
even though half these idiots
would get fired for
texting or surfing their handhelds
at the greasiest fast food job

we had hung out with her
a few times outside of
the legal department
of the collection agency
but she was always trying a little too hard
bringing up herb and happy hour
every week
even though we rarely bit

i am watching all these folks
ponder how long they will be here
and most of them, especially the old-timers,
are congratulatory when they hear i am
quitting

they are wondering how many years
they'll keep doing this
and they know that unless something
falls in their lap
or they get fired
they will stay

i hope, for their sake, they all get fired

a toast to the children,
they are the future

his beard says he's virile as a drug-fueled race horse...

i would heal you if i could
i will come rushing over to listen
anytime
and i am going to keep it
tamped down

if its human instinct to make
vows and pledges
to the sacred
i choose to deify
those i can taste and touch

without your flavor
i might burn
but i might just stay at peace
at arm's length
learning how to speak while
waiting for moments that never come and
snapping out only the
substantive comments
like catching a fly with poised chopsticks