When I wanted to write a poem for you
I felt cold, as if the distance in your eyes
Had followed me home, riding my
Red ribbon coat tails like a stowaway.
So then I thought of that old Yiddish bard
We both like, who combines politics and art
Just right, and sing the way we’d like to live.
I remember mutual absorption and obsessions,
And not being able to tell the difference between
Curing the disease and making it worse.
I remember cursing to pull attention away from
The silent violence. I remember blacking out after
Having run out of ways to justify our actions,
And then being fondly reminiscent of our sleep.
I remember attempting to run back into the arms
Of a memory that never was, and a place we thought
Was true, but was really just a different kind of mirage.
Even before I met you I had begun painting myself
Black with tar, I also remember taking notes and
Making photocopies of events as they happened,
Putting it all into the cedar chest in my childhood bedroom.
That memorabilia now resembles a lover I haven’t seen
For years, who’s become fat and bald, and sold his soul,
As I always knew, but never believed he would.
Then a time came when I realized that even if I had
Gotten pregnant the only reason I would of kept the
Baby is because I hate throwing anything away.
Even after I met you I was kissing pillows and white walls
While reclining into a living room couch alone with the
Television twinkling like my own personal star.
The bitterness accumulated like age, and I cannot
Understand why I let it, but I just know there’s a reason.
I remember the hat from the moon once being enough
To melt the miles, even though by now I’ve forgotten
How to howl. Now I dance a melancholy jig, while the
Music slows down, the distance grows farther,
And the temperature keeps dropping. Your
Puddle eyes are freezing like ponds, which from, in the
Next Spring thaw a different colored fish will emerge.