--I’M HARD TO LOVE

The Back of My Throat

Today I am

desperate

for love again,

a toyless toddler,

a junkyard dog

gnawing on its chains.

This sidecar rain wants

no part of me.

The old eagle shivers

in its elevator nest.

The trees sob and moan,

their limbs tight

with arthritis.

I could try talking

to myself,

raise a rifle to the moon,

or stitch up this

seeping wound.

All I need to know

in moments like these

is an answer:

That last kiss—

did you mean to leave

a grenade in the

back of my throat,

or were you just playing

Charades again?

And What About You?

And what about you?

Are the carrion fumes

a little too thick,

a little too sharp and pungent

for your liking?

Hasn’t Tuesday felt like

the fattest day ever?

Was there a crossbow

aimed at the lash-less space

between your eyebrows

when you practiced smiling

in the mirror?

Did that raven spend

the entire night

pecking a hole

through your skull,

and did it have specks

of fool’s gold in its black eye?

No?  Oh, good.

It’s just me then.

I’m glad everything’s

sunny side up there.

But be careful with

that stir stick.

People have been

known to get

those suckers stuck

in their throat.

Some have even died.

I Am Holding You In The Rain

Today a jar of wasps

crawling through the head again,

all that blue confusion and fear

time-stamped your face.

Still I see the young

woman you once were,

everything around you buoyant,

possible and accessible,

a field overrun with poppies,

the moon hanging untouched,

both Kennedys still alive and vying.

The nurses are more worried

than you because they’ve

been here before,

restraints at the ready,

clipboard for a weapon,

sighing like a pair of

exasperated willow trees.

Sis and the others

have stopped coming,

can’t take it,

the vacant shell of you,

the brook of chaos

gurgling behind your eyes.

But you may call me

by any name.

It’s okay. Your mind

has disowned you,

but mother I will not.

Even if you don’t know it,

I am always here,

holding you in the rain.