Verse: Identity (name)

Are you
still using
the name that I
reluctantly gave you?

The name that
you took from me?

Or did you
excise it
from your personal effects
as the surgeons would excise
cancerous tissue
from your lymph nodes?

Either way
I'm wondering if
you would consider
returning it to me
through the mail
or a mutual acquaintance

After all
it was mine
before you met me
and I'm certain it isn't
much good to you now

And any way
it's immaterial
I'd know you
by any name
just as you know me
by mine.

Verse: The Poets

The poets
will not help you
unravel your
mysteries

They will not
absolve you
of your guilt

Like magpies
they will thieve
your grief
rifle through
your practice
your assignations
looking for clues

They will sit
at your table
uninvited, seducing words
from your lips
like solicitous
children seeking favor

And what they leave behind
they will not vet
for accuracy
they are only interested
in the truth

Verse: Beware

After spring
summer is indelible
and autumn is like a cemetery
only winter covets nothing
beware of my love

The stars do not speak any language
the streets have all
exchanged their names
the night passes
without adventure
beware of my love

Tomorrow is not forthcoming
the trees are all
bejeweled with rain
and your shadow
contends it does not know you
beware of my love

It's in the market
after breakfast
and those uninspired picture shows
and all the things
they are not saying
beware of my love

All things have
their consequences
even if you do nothing
choose or it's decided for you
beware of my love

Nothing has been compromised
certainly not the flesh
which is your altar
you pray or you are preyed upon
beware of my love

I spent a long time
seeking you
at night when only
the moon would befriend me
this will be my epitaph
beware of my love

Verse: 3:30 p.m.

On Chebucto
the traffic slows
like everybody
got the doldrums

the hands on the clock
seem to reverse
their course
reluctant to let
the day slip
from their grasp

The cats slumber
with paws outstretched
like drunkards trying
to hold onto the earth
after a bacchanal

And I
wait for you
like the buds
of an oak tree
wait for spring to
favor their blushing cheeks
with a kiss

Like a prisoner
waits for
a stay of execution

Verse: Unresolved

Are we lovers
if we are tethered
to clandestine rendezvous

Are we sacred
if we go bar to bar
looking to drink in
cool epiphanies

Are we profane
if we exhaust our
names in idle
conversations

Are we lost
if we root ourselves
in the things that
others seek only to elude

Are we scavengers
if we adopt
the identities
that they discard

or are we refugees
when we take leave
of each other
of these lives

Verse: Before

Before the encounter
Before I am suspended
in the things I cannot say

Before the birth
and the face
on which you inscribe
a jagged kiss

Before the ceasefire
and tomorrow
and this little death
of defilement

Before the climax
and before I inhabit
this ever-mounting flame

I stand before you
waiting in a world
where I am bound
to nothing
and no one
at all

Verse: untitled for November 23, 2009

(NB: And I approached the muses, waiting for a poem. And they insisted I do this one. I resisted and resisted, but they persisted. So I gave in. I think, in my struggle not to do it, I harmed it. I dare say it will not speak to me any more...)

They are not your lovers
who do not know your name
they would ransack the thousand
countless tendernesses
of the wondrous night
just to have you tamed

They are not your lovers
who have not seen your eyes
for they would destroy
a thousand benign gods just
to blaspheme your thighs

They are not your lovers
who do not know your skin
and they would harvest your
selfless heart before you let them in

They are not your lovers
who have not earned your trust
they would inveigle you with
their spiteful tongues and
compromise you with their lust

They who are not your lovers
they are fugitives from
an old war and they are
fluent in a language that
we dare not speak any more

Verse: Conditions

(NB: No rhymes!)

There are some truths
that you should know
by now

Night is not
a new day

Summer is not
a century

And time?
It feeds us
to ourselves

But these conditions
are temporary
only love is persistent

It fills my lungs
with immutable words
with popular songs

And joy
insatiable
indomitable
joy

Verse: Caution

(NB: The writer acknowledges there is a finality in the ending. He doesn't know how many times he's thought, 'well, that's the last one' over the past two years. So the odds are good there might be one more. One never knows. Only the muses, and they aren't saying...)

There is winter
in this verse
it settled in
like dust

And I can't tell
the words I should
crucify from the ones
I can trust

There is winter
in this verse
and its teeth are
sharp as frost

It is not one
to play favorites
it does not care
what I have lost

There is winter
in this verse
and it will not
be ignored

It is howling
like a feral child
outside of
your darkened door

There is winter
in this verse
and it accumulates
like snow

it was a long
time coming and
it is reluctant
to go

There is winter
in this verse
and its intent
is dark and cold

And now I am
purged of it
with no stories left
to be told...

Verse: Through the looking glass

I passed through the looking glass
and awoke in your dream

A thousand jealous lovers
stood along a stream

And when you sailed by them
they began to scream

And the tears that flowed
in your wake
turned the water into cream

I passed through the looking glass
and you did not know my name

You called out for the magistrates
swift as death they came

They heard your accusations
and invested me with shame

And saddled me with outrageous desires
no prison could ever tame

I passed through the looking glass
and I lost my hands

I could not pull myself up
my arms were rubber bands

My legs were enrobed in chocolate
and angels flew through my glands

And all my sentences when I spoke
began with ampersands

I passed through the looking glass
and fell into your embrace

I could not tell what time it was
every clock had your face

Someone approached me from behind
and said I would be replaced

He ran his hands over my chest
and my heartbeat was erased

I passed through the looking glass
and found myself alone

I could not read the newspapers
I could not pick up the phone

Everyone had signs for heads
and their breath reeked of cologne

And when they grew tired of me
they chained me to my clone

I passed through the looking glass
and found myself in bed

Everyone had gathered to mourn me
as if I were already dead

I tried talking to them but
no one heard what I said

And then you came into the room
and cried out, 'off with his head'