fiction 

                                           astral summer

i. wet visions

skidding around town on my heels
while visions of you reel and
rip
    me         
        open - -

I’m etching your visage
on the back of napkins,
in the margins of my waitress’ pad
hazy & weeping while I polish martini glasses

absent         minded
absent     of mind
lost
in the well of my heart - -

cursed to wander
cursed to wonder why
as the palm fronds quiver and glisten

in the setting sun ;           wet visions

remember the time we kissed,

under the balcony at midnight - -
ankle deep in the rose bushes?
somewhere somebody flushed with shame
somewhere somebody blushed with longing

how can I live
if it never happened again?
what life could be
if it happened forever
if it happened forever . . .

I got lost in the infinite depths of your crystal eyes
clear blue, crystallized -pink and creased,

weepy and melancholic.
mannish, you extend a plaster hand - -

I blanch, turn away
kick a stray Tecate can
the beard-shadow on your jaw golden,
glinting in the late afternoon sun.

ii. she lays down in the shadows

guess I’ll go walking through the roses again
get lost in the pinks and corals, twilight maiden
snap a .jpeg for her roommate,

who’s dancing the night away in garments of gold.

the full moon bathes her clean, bathes her, cold - -

watch the hours slide through your fingers like sand;
maybe you’ve held a dream of me in your hand...
or thought of me in some idle turn,
turned me over in your palm and yearned.

maybe you’ve thought of me in some idle turn,
turned me over in your palm and yearned ...

I’d give it all
I’d give it all away
anything
I’d give you everything
anything

feel the powdery lavender petals on your cheek
hold this precious life, close - -
she quivers, weak
she lays down in the shadows

 

I’d give it all

I’d give it all away

anything

I’d give you everything

anything

iii. what’ll it be, Valentine

will it be hell and high water
or a slack tide that lasts forever
slipping a folded sutra into your palm
smacking on a handful of rose cherries

idle . . .                          and on a pedestal.


just keeping looking at me like that…

you’re a star to me….
you’re a star to me.

iv. like a bad habit / ghost

it’s a small town after a while
but you hide me in your pocket like a bad habit

stroking the rim of of your glass

dim lit under the tiki thatch

making me ask - - making me ask

roses scattered on the dash

​

& I'm laying limp, in blissful rapture

moving wanly through the crowd

gazing languidly at the clouds

staring at nothing

staring at nothing

​

picking me up for the show

guess I'l never know

guess I'll never know
 

it’s a small town after a while,
and you haunt me like a bad habit

just hanging around
seeing everything,
seeing everybody,
polite in the corner - -
baby you can watch me

you can watch me walk away
I don’t love you anymore.

saw you passing in the night again.

you & me we just can't win

the apparition of a memory.
the place we shared
a mythic space,
a glass cabal
where you stroked the walls,
showed me a world beyond- -

saw you passing in the night again
through the haze in an east side parlor-
alone, like a ghost-
while my new man takes all my cash for beer
and drinks it on the porch

just hanging around
seeing everything,
seeing everybody,
polite in the corner - -
baby you can watch me

you can watch me walk away
I don’t love you anymore.
I don’t love you anymore.

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