there is only trespass that matters (as if you can,
could step
hold
of one moment, untangle it from the rest, as if you could ever remember
where you had drawn the line, as if you
could ever distinguish yourself from this
and that, from this
for
that, to chisel out yourself of this
from everything in
between
in between you and I
lies
a handful of grenades held by tin cans and bleeding
gums. Here could never have been
there
but we longed the distance between us
like a twine around glass stems, gentle gentle but for the pull (or was that when you had said
“tension holds my knees apart for you”
there drinking
drinking from the wire seat and
the craw bloody in circumflection, body raw on the insides
and something
in the firmament, something in the way
your lips stretched and warped in your smile (all a smile is really a rubbing,
an ache across bones, look at it, nothing there but fat being pulled over a grill.
the matters,
the weeping matters,
the matter of the task at hand,
the matter of your hands in mine,
“is something the matter?”
And I could not
shake
myself right out from under myself,
I could not put myself
aside
for a moment (for a moment
or two you can leave
yourself behind, you can be
behind if you liked, you can be yourself,
and not this, you can be that,
I promise you,
sign on the dotted line.
how much would you pay for this (do you know how much I paid for this?
the ring’s gone down the drain and I want to make a fight about it, say wonderful things like
you stupid forgetful bitch, you couldn’t wait to forget this could you? But instead
I wonder where I am
going when I look in the mirror and see myself
leaving.
I wonder where I run to in the light
of day and come back terrified in my bed (i had shot up and said fuck to make it go away
knowing
that it doesn’t just go away like that
it never goes away
like that’s just for show, that’s just rattling
the cage a bit, to introduce something new to it,
like a martini: stirring out of bed her hand on my shoulder
“what? What is it?”
nothing
nothing (but old fears dying hard of growing old and dying. I can see it,
this is how it will be: the night sky and it all shuts down, not goes out, but
shuts
down,
age old having traveled
millions of years now knowing that
they’re dead so far away
you can’t help but be terrified of the inevitability:
the stars have gone away and
you’re so far away getting further
and there’s not a thing you can do
with your hands,
there’s absolutely no
touching about it.
there’s no distinction from when
and what. Only a trespass
that comes before the hands, these hands,
none
from this or that. Gold metal, even my name is in question.