I've got this frozen virus in my blood,
like my words are the warmest I could ever touch.
I'll limp west with the sun
and sleep the days under wide-eyed illusion.
But that beacon has seen me sleeping,
knows the ruse; the rouge, the spill that pools
to pull at my shoes and leave me to stand,
forever free, forever dead.
Please stay alive.
I can't beg again
with a back that's bad as your eyes
and ears--oh my.
Please stay alive.
I can't ask again
with a tongue that's worse than my pride
Oh Angels, keep the windows open
wide as English bathtubs
running through miss Annie's head
(the one she cradled in CO).
I know I shouldn't talk so low
of high life when I've got no
frame of reference; all the ones I found
were broken with pictures torn out
and strewn asunder
under summers laced with tracer fire,
copper pieces, and fishing wire.
(Rolled in the covers
over tumblers filled with vacation.
Empty, it reeks of self-deprecation.)