Never living in thunder,
under tie-dyed clouds
the petrichor here reminds me
to draw hearts on CVS receipts
instead of obsessing
over sleep, dream after dream.
The whirling serpent,
the sunset before I know it,
life's lime in my eyes,
which makes me cry
as I pick a fight
with my mother's ghost
in a Mexican restaurant.
Don't you get it, I scream,
she wants nothing from me –
no questions, no exclamation points,
no piers of passion in poems like this one.
Undressing the pressure of leaving,
even the leaves befall me,
wishing to bless and hush,
I am a dead devil,
bowing down to the madness that makes me.
I send books but I don't sign them,
and I may do that forever
just to remind the universe
that I love her,
expecting nothing in return,
and that is okay.
As the Tuesday rain delays,
I crack the window just to hear
the cadence of the drops diminish,
and I move on to work and music,
other muses, some magnificent, some not so much,
but from October to October
I will hope upon hope
that we meet again in the middle.