Man on a Corner, with iPod

I've been waiting here since the afternoon,
There's no more denial that I can consume,
my stomach is too full of empty already.
She would've telephoned if she was coming.

My earphones in,  Nina Simone
sings "You'll Never Walk Alone"
and I hope she's singing to me.

I wrote all my love letters in the dark.
I don't think that any found their mark.
I dream of love with a perfect fit
& not having "Hopelessly" as prefix.

My earphones in, The Cure
describes Love as a force majeure
a tragedy we all still carry

Music hath charms this beast was told
but this yearning heart shit's getting old.

I don't wait on that corner anymore
there's nothing good to wait there for.
My heart is empty, but my head is clear.
My body clock says it's time is for leaving here.

My earphones in, Linda Thompson sings,
how one clear moment can change everything,
change everything

Self-Defense for Empaths

Your heart made you a target for the Hungry
Narcissist. You've been to this ill picnic before:
they know just how to serve you those words
you've always wanted to hear; they'll whisper
you're special, just like you always dreamed

you could be. They're good at that. You aren't
even paying attention to the pedestal building
slowly under your feet. You don't realize how
far from your friends and family you've been
removed. This is classic predator behavior:

separate you from the herd, chain you down
until you require their praise just to breathe
right. Now they bait the stick with everything
they once gave you freely. Now they expect
you do the trick on demand. I made you, 

I can break you They tell you this. Didn't
you know how wrong, and helpless you are,
if not for them? Or this:, wouldn't you want
one more chance? You would, You owe them.
And this is where you lose the battle before

it's even started: Once they get you to engage,
they have won. You will never be listened to;
they're too busy adjusting gas-lamps, changing
the argument out from under you, twisting up
your words; anything but let what you say be.

But you have power here: to win, shift weight
from their words to yours. Like verbal Aikido,
you use their force against them, letting it fall
behind you, uselessly-- just like them. Unless
they are violent, you have stolen your power

back. And if they are violent, you do whatever
you need to protect you and yours. But mostly,
Narcissists are like parasites, and denying them,
you will starve them out of your head and heart.
You are equal of their pedestal, on your own level.

Things That Rhyme with "Alone"

A shell to the ear produces no sound;
oceans found dried up long ago. Blue
sky that is just someone else's opinion,
not true for everybody. Songs speaking

directly to you: capital L love in one
small hand; the word "no" in the other,
loss all over your face. A dozen phone
phone calls made to voicemail, thick

with nothing. Bird cries from outside
describe the dimensions of the room
where you reside isolated, can't escape
can't hide. Doors that weigh too much

to open from the inside. When you cook,
there're always leftovers, always, because
you still can't help but cook for someone
else that isn't there, hasn't been, or never

will. Sleep as escape. Romantic films
as stings to the face. The way you ache.
How someone's absence has so much
weight. How you wait, the way you wait.

Daring Self-Love, I Risked Learning to Cook

When I first suspected this might be the case I stopped,

hardly able to taste the word I'd prayed for all my life.

I imagine floating, whole and golden, in mid-air, sound

surrounded by what contented angels sound like, sighing.

Music becomes food through a series of simple magicks

Having exchanged smudged forests for individual trees

that exist, I started to see possibilities I had missed,

(so obvious, this): just start with premium ingredients;

know how to allow them become their own eloquence.

Cooking is like Comedy, like la vie; timing is everything.

There is power in small details that gets lost in the dreary 

catch-basins of generalities: it is all the same, does it matter?,

hide everything under garnish... all these words want to do

is weigh-down, and take all the fun out of cooking for one.

I am not the magic, but I can know how heat conducts.

Try to learn the real names of the people who bring the food,

their families and their farms; savor the names of vegetables;

how flavors are layered; the best sources for everything;

and how the turning of the year sets different dinner tables;

how that simple, nutritious meal is my first act of self-love

How to Be Alone for the Rest of Your Life

First you must believe you have
telescope eyes that can smell
the future. Next, you populate
that time- not-yet with absences.
Name each one and give them
faces of people who have left

you already. Build this city,
this lonely city, from skin cells,
old love letters never returned,
and the memory of phone calls
you will not get to answer again.
Stir the wind up with this dust;

stir up all the dust that is dust,
that is what ashes become. Yes-
lay there in your sad bed, imagine
every bad thing, possible or not,
that is going to happen to you.
That you most certainly deserve.

At this point you have cursed
yourself enough. Bone links
and blood links; subconscious
making consciousness; bricks,
mortar, but not in that order.
A lonely city falling upwards.

You have presented yourself
with the key to this ruin inside;
you are sitting in a graveyard
of things that have yet to die.
as if a small, cold room could
be trusted to tell your future.

Mother's Day 2016

19 years of pain, both fresh,
and wounds that linger on
way past when they stopped
being scar-tissue. I miss you
Mother. Some years are better
than others. This year isn't
one of the good ones. You

would tell me we should
pull ourselves upright, show
up to work; let that be structure
when your heart bones break,
your legs are tired of years,
and photos holding nothing
but symbols and keepsakes

for loss. I wish she had lived
to see me rise up from crisis,
finally alive, human, present.
She died knowing I was adrift
and she could no longer help.
She tried to give me apologies
from her deathbed. I refused

to let her feel she hadn't done
her job. What mistakes were
mine, were mine; I absolved
her as an adopted child should
(were they as lucky as I was),
"Mother, you were always just
like a mother to me, every way

that mattered." I don't believe
in Ouija Boards; I don't feel
we should assume the dead
yearn to do anything else but
rest and move on to whatever
is next. Mom, I'm ok. Missing
you just reminds me I'm alive.