Cured Bored

 When the corpse revived at the funeral,

The outraged mourners killed it; and the soul

Of the revenant passed into the body

Of the poet because it had more to say.

–Allan Grossman

The walls

Talk to me about time

You’ve seen plenty

clocks hammered to your side

Lingering as others sleep

Flat-backed guardian

How many faces

have you forgotten?

How many times

have you stared back

Into glazed over eyes?

Objects move in and out

But does it ever really change?

This place that is meant to

What wisdoms are trapped

Between Your coats?

How many mistakes

have you witnessed?

Taking a vow of silence

like some stoic saint

like you have more soul

than me

Settling in

A girlfriend is a hide-out, a guaranteed 

front row at the hanging, complete

with pocket tissues. A girlfriend is a 

bridge, but a bridge is a prostitute, a body

in the arch of a doorway, an arced

voyage, the noplace outlaw pass through

on the way to someplace else.

You left your holster on the floor when

you walked out, or was it your belt, your

coiled pant-legs, a rattlesnake around

the question of when we will talk again.

–Sarah Messer

Leaver

I’m a leaver of things.

Leaving keys at parties

And shoes with lovers.

Leaving memories in the basement

And promises in my other pants.

Taking your name, placing it into

A box and leaving it somewhere

I can forget about for a couple hours.

Leaving my credit cards in bars,

my friends at doctors offices

and most feelings unsaid.

Peeling away each piece of life and

Leaving them to drift like rubbish

In the open ocean. And Leaving the

Lights on, just in case one of the

Things I left decides to return.