Rumination of a Meltdown

She's left me to the unyielding summer,

evaporating into a stranger's past.

I'm huddled in a corner with this molten hot swelter,

swaddled in layers and chilled to the bone.

Thinking and sweating and shivering sickly,

I wish I could quiet my thoughts to a roar.

She's left me to the unyielding summer,

to wander and wonder and simmer and fade.

Juxtaposed Dreams in Watercolor

Mary couldn't look more heartbreaking as I ponder her through the prism of our time together.

Dressed down in soft pastels and a razor wit, her nod drew blood, a word hemorrhaging hubris; she unsheathed both with aplomb, often.

I thirsted for such nods and words from Mary, whether as benefactor or victim (she could make the latter seem like the former, laughing).

The blade is warm against my throat now as I remember the good times, crimson reflecting off silver pressing inward.

"Coffee's for closers only." Indeed. Wise words from Mamet.

"Third prize is: you're fired."

And so it goes. One of last season's second prize steak knives delivers this year's consolation eternal.

Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. But closing counts in every facet of life.

And so it goes.

Mary appears less heartbreaking to me now that I no longer have one to fracture in her honor.

The sea goes red on the linoleum as Glengarry plays to no one in rooms unoccupied. And the horizon drains from view as I sail onward, my head in the bowl and wrist in the tub. A Royal Flush. Indeed. King me.

The Sun Gone Bad

The sun gone bad is lurking in the distance,

a jack-o-lantern framed against the cellar of the sky.

I continue staring aimlessly long after it gives in to the horizon,

the night swallowing its seed to blue and then to black.

I'm swallowing too, the bile of countless compromises;

it's all my strength just to wrestle my weakness weary to its knees.

Then I rise, along with the consequences

before I sit, the present tense stealing my senses.

Tripping the light fantastic to an armchair and a remote,

a cold compress pressed against my wanting soaked into levity,

and a bracing, burning chaser of equilibrium or just denial.

The proselytizing on the tube washes over me as I surrender to its siren song.

The Norfolk Ballet '84 (Broken)

Squatting in the ambiance of stripper perfumed smoke haze,

shot glass run-off, PBR and cellulite unbounded.

***

Journey, Styx and Benatar careen off restroom mirrors,

evaporating into stalls where sickly souls go praying.

***

Echoes of my emptiness tear at my gut this Tuesday,

distilling into drunken numbing Huey Lewis hatred.

***

"Owner of a Lonely Heart" now soundtrack to my musings,

as "Lovely Lisa" takes the pole to creepy stage announcements.

***

I'm lost on Granby/Little Creek as Tuesday ticks to Wednesday,

then stagger out into the dark of early morning summer.

***

I hail a cab back down into my Pier 12 home and office,

tripping down the passageways toward berthing slumber solace.

***

Crawl into my bunk in back and pass out until morning;

rinse, repeat and hope to God this Groundhog's Day stops playing.

***

Some twenty six long years gone by since stumbling into stasis;

still, Pavlov's Dog lives in my ear when certain songs sing to it.

***

Those wretched tunes I just can't stand, they take me back to Clancy's,

when optimism for my fate had not yet died exhausted.

***

I sit here now and contemplate my mindset in those shitholes,

and wonder why - just why the hell - I look on those days fondly.

***

It could just be the booze, or that I was finally free of Everett,

or fantasies of hearts of gold wrapped up in 80's muzak.

***

In the end I think it's probably something a bit more basic:

it was a time when the future held a promise now since broken;

it was a time that I myself was not yet - not quite - broken.

Quite broken -

and facing the wrong direction looking to become whole again.

Burnt Brown

On a bender of thought stumbling sidelong this evening

with tipsy discharges of imaginary sweetness

licking my illusions clean,

flashing back into blackened white still frames hung on breeze blown clotheslines

when we were neighborhood children at play.

One last nightcap of wondrous mind fucks gone walking

as I drink in this drunk of resplendent endorphins

braced for moonlight's burnt brown masquerade.

One last whisper of weakness that is my calling, my vocation

as I breathe in this bracing narcotic reaction

of life's burnt brown belief smoking cold.

This weekend, snakes melt into childhood driveway cement as I perspire into my past,

until fountains of fire and pinwheels of blinding luminescence fill my eyes swimming ...

... of joyful dancing, sparklers in hand;

trailing streams of light like a flaming bubble wand across our front lawn floating.

... of celebrating my independence from life's suffocation

at least until the morning as the holiday fades,

when evergreen hopes in the moment are revealed as everyday burnt brown once again.