mistaken identity

Your paintings never tell the rooftop view.

Never show the sweat from our beers
cooling the evening humidity
against separate palms.

Never reflect bottle necks
forgotten by the fluidity of
innocence.

Never replicate
death gasps or
compartmentalize
the childless mother
the motherless child
in the dark sluttish corners
of the mind.

How they were
hung out to dry in cobbed webs,
mentioned, discussed, then
forgotten for the night
by the repetition of a
mutual catching of breathe
by one, then the other.


an accidental brush of fingertips against the wrist
as silver ringed fingers met silver bracelet tips
to say;

Look, we are the same.

Our likeness, that which
drew us together,
disintegrates with
each question
each false answer
each moment of retreat
into sluttish corners,
soiled bed sheets.

But as you did, I do -
recycle the pain -
never allow in moments
before we met,
when we were left
by another -
when hearts suddenly
contracted upon themselves
and only released upon
the turning of stones,
which never amounted to
anything but
a new contraction
against a heart
no longer strong
enough to fight.

Here is the sound of silver bracelets saying;

Look, we are the same.

I am tired of the questions,
the times when we are together
and more alone then ever.

I am ready to relinquish our mistakes.

I want yours.
I want to give you mine.
I want to release what we have made into ours.

I want to be face to face and
find a new rooftop and good beer.
I want to say;

Look, we are the same.

and move on in a different way.