No relief here

I walk ahead of her

Anger burning in my chest and my heart

The pressure of it pushing outward from within

Seeping through every space

Through the gaps in my ribs

Through the easy heat of my flesh

Muscle is no barrier to its persuasion

Blood and organs heed to it, powerless

And let it pass

Then it meets skin and here it stops.

The delicate sheath, pale and soft,

Grows warm with the force of what is held within

My mouth opens to take a breath

Cold, crisp air rushes in and touches the storm beneath

With angry excitement the brewing devil exalts

‘A way out!’

And with the ignorant urgency of stupid mistakes

It rushes to its exit

With a bitter taste

The anger shapes its own escape

Wrapping my willing tongue around the sharp edges of malicious rhetoric

Released, my words are flung back through the air

Through the meters that separate me from her

The malice has no problem finding its target

Meets no resistance in her ears, her eyes

Reaching her heart with too much ease

With regret my body realizes, too late

This is no release

The malice has escaped but the anger stays

There is no relief here

Only a new pain

A stone in my stomach

Guilt an unhappy new companion to the anger

And a wounded sister unwilling and unable to help

The exorcism of anger turning the meters of distance into miles

Insurmountable and hopeless

And all my fault

Give me the man

She waits

And in waiting she feels the tug of anticipation

A duel between happy excitement and gentle torment

That exists only with the assurance that it will be put at ease

Sleeping only to encourage tomorrow

Working only to pass the time

Breathing only to breathe the same air

Take away the anticipation by taking away the man

And the memory of the man

Take away the feel of his fingers on your lips and eyes

Take away time to before him and the nights are for rekindling the day

Necessary and indulged

Breathing is an unmeasured given

The shadow of tortured feeling is removed from everything

Neutrality resumes

Duller for it

Less appealing

Give me the man any day

Give me the torture

Give me the happy pain to feel the edges of the mundane

My senses and my nerves tingling and aware with the torment of love and lust and men

What of the nights

My mother told me to stay away from men who take drugs

And to stay away from drugs

But what of the men who love me but love themselves more

And what of the drink that makes me forget them

And what of the nights

And what of the nights

And what of the men who are young and the drugs that are fun

And what of the nights

Footfall

Left and right foot land

One after the other

In sync

Walk when will resists desire

And the feet will falter

And you will fall

Out of sync and out of will

On your knees and embarrassed

Have patience

Take a breath and dust off the legs of your trousers

And wait

When will and desire walk together

So your feet shall fall

One after the other

In Sync

He saw her

He saw her and she was the only one he’d ever seen

She wasn't as pretty or as thin as he was

But she was the prettiest and the thinnest

And the only one he’d ever seen