True Story
Because I ruffle
more easily than the turtle,
I’m spending today’s sunshine
indoors,
picking my teeth
with the leftover shards
of yesterday’s poem,
flossing out
any subtext I
might have missed
when that
naked guy waded
over to hear my
verse-in-progress and sent
thought’s rumbling
boxcar right
over the side
and into the
river.
(The heavy-eyed reptile didn’t
so much as blink,
neither
at his unsubtle
arousal
nor at my muttered
reading. I
don’t blame him;
the poem wasn’t
half yet done.)
left for dead
folded up into a puddle of
blue-stained nightmare
she woke from the bottom
of the bathtub, shivering.
strange because
the tap was turned
all the way to the right,
streaming showerhead rain over
her best dress and dreams
hitherto undisclosed;
maybe it was the nakedness
that caused the goosebumps.
naked
….
….
….
….
….
….
….
….
….
albatross’d shadows
wing their way across
the spongy caverns of my
heartbeat, their darkness
keening into the cup
of my palm and slowing
my hand, swallowing
piecemeal my
spirit until
there is nothing
left of me but
fear.
