5406 Lexington

please don’t answer
please don’t answer
please don’t answer

(voicemail)

success

We got there at 4 a.m.
Lying in bed I said,
“Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.”

We never sat on the beach
We never went to the Boardwalk
We never took photos
We never looked around, all at once, and fell in love with the time

“Come on now.
You’re just stoned,”
You said. Then you paused to give it some thought.
“We’re just four really self-absorbed people,”

We did drink like fish
We did two grams of coke until all the powder ran dry (poof gone)
We did accuse one another of stealing majority of the coke
We did meet new friends and old friends met us there

Gladly we jumped into the car to come home
And you said, “Santa Cruz kicked my ass.”
Then I corrected, “I think you kicked Santa Cruz’s ass.”

We all never gave one another a chance

Looking back,
I had been walking out since I walked in.
You hadn’t.
I had, I said.

It took you a long time
But you arrived.
I waited, like a dog by the window (to be walked),
For months.

Now

It seems that there is nothing left but dust.
And it will settle.
Eventually.

It’s not

in the way you hang
It’s in

the way you let go

Red Light, Green Light

Merging
Onto the freeway
Breaking, even though he knows it will change
Trusting now
Not breaking
Because
It will change

These are the conversations

We have
Over
Scotch
And
Whisky
At the Dresden
While the little Jazz players
Pack up

Rots in the fridge. Not in a gross horror-film-you-can-see-its-eyes way.  But in a soft, cold, and lonely, pink way. It’s become a laughable regimen. She takes salmon out, defrosts it—with healthy, good intentions—then all plans recede into nothingness and the Salmon ends up in the fridge—rotting. Vicious cycle. She thinks that it has something to do with her Russian friends. They carry so many *superstitions.

She’s turned into a sour-sap, goody-good with bed times, rules, and boxes. Three things she’s grown to be no good at. It’s 12 o’clock and nothing has turned into a *pumpkin. Her life is a fucking perpetual pumpkin.

Date night. Cancelled. For good reason, but cancelled. She’s no good at any of this. No good at all.

You can’t wrap up presents that don’t have perfect corners. Shit looks amateur.

Wine induced clarification:

*Superstitions: She’s afraid of Russians’ highly contagious superstitions.

*Pumpkin: The word pumpkin is quite alarming. Pump-Kin. Come on.

He stuck his hands in my armpits.

I said, get those out of there.  He said, this is love. I said, no GET OUT OF THERE.  He used my face-wash, mask, and towel. Not my toothpaste. He used his own toothpaste. Then when I was putting on my clothes, he stuck his hands in my armpits—again. I said, GET those out of there. He said, baby, this is love.

Ok, I sighed.