Dim the lights.
Cue the music; soft and adagio.
Pull the curtains.
A young girl dances onto the stage,
twirls her arms up over her head and glides through the air,
she reaches the center of the stage,
looks out and falls to the floor, arms sprawled out,
as if the floor grew arms to catch her.
The music never gets to grow or soar through the air;
the violins screech to a halt and the echo of notes still linger in the air,
only intensifying the still and the silence.
The spotlight, lying bleekly on her body,
cuts out and the stage is dark and ominous.
Pull the curtains.

In soft shadows of lust, love blooms and then its peddles wither and fall to the vagrant earth, turn to dust and blow away.

Drip
drip.
Where the ceiling leaks.
Drip
drip.

And here I am, sitting cross-legged on the hardwood floor of the highest room in this very old house; my mind.

Racing thoughts, my wild imaginations run full speed; full circle.

Everything I seek; forbidden
everything I have; destroyed
nothing left to do but
lie under the sky
that doesn’t answer me
and feel small
and alone.

I saw the day break
yonder, and I
saught for shade
or maybe shadow cast
under an Oak
somewhere,
to hear life break through
the beaks
of pretty birds
nearby.
I gave way and proceeded
to drift,
dreaming fervently,
far and long,
distant and wide;
through the cedars,
the forest greens, to the
snow-capped mountains,
and along the floorboards
of the home
of my long
lost
love.

Yellow tree bird,
perched and parched
do you hear the breath of wind;
the arm of a lover?

Oh! My yellow tree bird,
what do you see from way up there?
Past all the heads and simple penny hands
reaching up for the arm of a lover… 

We have lost even this twilight.
No one saw us this evening hand in hand
while the blue night dropped on the world.

I have seen from my window
the fiesta of sunset in the distant mountain tops.

Sometimes a piece of sun
burned like a coin in my hand.

I remembered you with my soul clenched
in that sadness of mine that you know.

Where were you then?
Who else was there?
Saying what?
Why will the whole of love come on me suddenly
when I am sad and feel you are far away?

The book fell that always closed at twilight
and my blue sweater rolled like a hurt dog at my feet.

Always, always you recede through the evenings
toward the twilight erasing statues.

Pablo Neruda

In the gentle moonlight, she dances
along the walls and through my memories.
She spins around like a lady in a music box,
humming merrily,
so beautiful and lovely.
I lay awake in bed,
watching as she glides through the open spaces
and into eternity,
and I think of how happy she must be.
Will I ever be as happy as her?
Is she my after,
and I, her before?
What is it that lies ahead for me
at the end of this moment,
this space in time?
For I know it will not last.
There will be more, I’m sure
as she dances to life,
all hope is not lost.

Always too eager for the future, we
Pick up bad habits of expectancy.
Something is always approaching; every day
Till then we say,

Watching from a bluff the tiny, clear
Sparkling armada of promises draw near.
How slow they are! And how much time they waste,
Refusing to make haste!

Yet still they leave us holding wretched stalks
Of disappointment, for, though nothing balks
Each big approach, leaning with brasswork prinked,
Each rope distinct,

Flagged, and the figurehead wit golden tits
Arching our way, it never anchors; it’s
No sooner present than it turns to past.
Right to the last

We think each one will heave to and unload
All good into our lives, all we are owed
For waiting so devoutly and so long.
But we are wrong:

Only one ship is seeking us, a black-
Sailed unfamiliar, towing at her back
A huge and birdless silence. In her wake
No waters breed or break.

Philip Larkin

He’s lighting up a cigarette in the parking lot after work.
He’s leaning up against his car and looking down at his shoes,
worn and tired of walking around this town.
His girl is waiting for him at home, but he doesn’t want to return to her tonight.
He’s thinking.
He’s thinking about Jack Kerouac.

Parking Lots. Searching. Playgrounds. Empty movie theatres. Hospital beds.

“Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate.”

(The final words on the Gates of Hell, Dante’s Inferno”

“Abandon any hope, you who enter.”

Goggles. Balcony rails, Ex-lovers. Dispensers. Chimney smoke. Lunch boxes. Temptations. No.2 pencils (fully sharpened).