Oddities exhumed, or Dr. Snave plays at the poem

1

    glancing lost (imagine my an

-xiety) in the rows and columns

     of plastic; man made and made man (in

thinking that I had misunderstood)

     nape hair standing static attention a

voiding gazes of all save the

     clock (or perhaps hadn’t capacity

to understand) alienation

     and real amazement (the scent of your

touch and wanton glimmer of your hair)

     writhing anticipation (the

     meaning of life) oozed your envelop

-ing (nothing is all) presence and

     melted into myself i

2

a poem about sex

with the head at the helm

of an excruciating ecstasy

where my knees dissolve into

the roiling pit of my stomach

i’ve got your meaning right here

and the world is liquid warmth

should your tongue again stray

so near to my ear i’ll tell any

lie you so long to hear

horses trample through the static

and your thigh makes me forget

that i smelled the coffee burning hours ago

3

wake up my love

it’s nine o’clock

and time to face

the blunted blue gray

of another dull day

the telephone knows

that i cannot say

what i’m thinking

for that would be

a breach of trust

or decorum

smokes are on the desk

some eggs are in the fridge

no     it’s not much

but i do the best i can

i do what i can

4

a barefreckled shoulder

speaks volumes on the thin line

between why and because

by reason of all imagination

inamorata

the cadence of your dreams

sings no dirge for my wanting

and my plea no apostrophe

who understands syntax

when all propriety is contained

in the warm wrinkle of

your lips

a wisp of hair

bisects your left ear

and thanking all whowhatwhenwherehow

i revel in being

5

it’s going to take some getting used to,

sleeping with someone after doing it

alone for so long    hands ungainly and

unfailingly out of place, i have to relearn

nestling, the spooning into knee nooks

curvature of the spine

                                 (no, not scoleosis)

sleepwarmth…remembering that the bedclothes

are finite in space, spaceless i gravitate

towards the center and what was a face

(only a moment ago) is now a back (a

muffled grumble and it’s cold again

i must rethink the aroma of you

impinging my senses and imbibing

the taste in my bosom    at four in the

morning as i peek over the pillow through

red rimmed sleep puffy eyes at the

peculiar little frown of contentment

i know that you could live without me

so near and yet lifetimes removed from

my thoughts, i celebrate every goddamned

holiday there is (and some that aren’t)

and sincerely thank whoever for all whatever

i have to get used to sleeping unalone

while clinging to familiar sensations

for this will not always be, and getting

used to that sinking empty feeling of

not you is going to be a sonofabitch.

6

Today being your birthday

I decided to rekindle my love for you

a token of something I cannot recall

a gesture, a touch, a lifetime

I looked beneath the bed, to see if it might

be hidden there beside the shoes, empty boxes

and magazines with trifold pages that

somehow always seem to get stuck together

Instead I found dustballs and lonely socks

mementos of times long forgotten still

I looked in the closets among the garments

hung loosely and haphazardly like affection

in the dark spaces where nothing could possibly survive,

behind and beneath the stove, in the dank sludge under the refrigerator

I even went so far as to look in the toilet

to see if the incessant gasping gurgling might be

that which, having once been, I sought

I flushed away, remembering what we had

grown another year lonelier and unwiser

In the face of all reason some ember defiantly glowers

discernable even through the cataract of living

though I cannot seem to locate it now

Spent and bewildered I’ve come to the conclusion

that the telephone is utterly useless