Should have found a job by now; should have slept in the night;
should have boiled old coffee before noon.

love is a soggy tea stain on a grocery receipt

a folksome, gruesome opera
of gauze and malcontent.

I tap at the alphabet while a single deer
taps at the dirt beyond the brush
on the far side of the tree line.

You are strange, my mother said, dwelling on the past.

Long after midnight, we’re talking about our first time

how does an afternoon turn
on its axis?

Okay, picture this: We’re in an elevator. The elevator shuts down. It doesn’t matter where we’re going, only that we’re alone.

Any still figure at mid-late evening, when the long shadows make even crumbs appear arranged like furniture.

Empty vessels
make the most sound, I think,
as you rip the fairy lights off the handrail.

Every so often, they add a tattoo
in honor of some long-forgotten love.

the man is stayed bent over the canvas
of my sofa. the man is me the man is him
self and I bring down the whip…

Try not to see your own predicament in every fucking thing.

Part of being a good sad person
is always painting the shadows
in the right direction and knowing
what sorrow to art with.

you quit wearing pants
loaf around your yard
in hole-nipped panties

He has stories that I am not in
anymore. It’s healed this way.