AT 3:32

at 3:32 a.m. a freight train whistle runs
up valley walls into my bedroom

mixing well with images of lust, blame
and heartbreak jamming my head;

a throat-clutching moment.

if I smoked cigarettes it would be
a good time to chain smoke

so the wispy tar cloud could lift me
off my blue sheets, carry me

closer to exquisite memories,

closer to where a boastful locomotive
soul is born onto this world,

the bull iron thing always pulling out
on time, guided by someone who knows

how to navigate every tricky, twisted
track without getting lost.




STEPS OF THE SCAFFOLD

The fires of love, part of a scheme, a raging tentacle at times
that closes in on the fleshy throat. It’s so difficult to learn
from the scar, to sit in the confessional chair and beg for help.

It appears we of human need are born to play with matches,
to drink heat, to lay at the gold altar of lust, ignoring nails
in the floorboards, waving off answers hurled our way,
directly and with good intent.

Silly at times, unwarranted, yet we remain possessed with hope;
we cast off the cost of scorching temptation, tick-tinted desire;
we seek to be touched in a way that ignores crackling thunder;
we want to be cuddled, drooled over, fused with cherry blossoms,

a safe place where we aren’t face-slapped, where the stringy soul
isn’t hung out to dry, where our bravely galloping dreams
don’t slide too damn close to the steps of the scaffold.