1
I remember a silhouette
its slow kitchen-dance on dilapidated walls
and the rose hush that blanketed the air
I have the faintest memory of laying down colored pencils
pushing my art du jour forward
pausing
we played a game
a quick number where my eyes chased its zigzag movements
where my heart expanded up
outward
rising like sunrise along incondite alleyways
it was a nippy par four
and for a moment I felt close to her
for only a split second
as tulips drew their lips in and the fog on our windows
cleared
the cement on which I sat shook
like it was going to open and swallow me
when it didn’t
the apartment seemed to warm
though we hadn’t had heat all winter
2
I squeezed them in a past life
those wolded hands
those fingers
long and thin like fashionable skyscrapers
how they trotted off magazine pages
and danced a black jive in front of my face
hands
still the color of a malted sunset
but now
midnight cracks
gurgle stubborn veins
and she thought she’d never get old
she really believed she’d live forever
a historical image that sticks
too moving to let it move on
a smell that follows you from morning
till perhaps her ashes will flutter
winging free from the confines of this American urn
perhaps they will catch a ride
hitchhiking
settling on the broad back of time
3
therapy sessions are held in my closet
where pleather thigh-highs hang their tags
on the wall behind them the small font urging
me to give up squinting and look elsewhere
where they stand upright and stare at me until
I begin to speak
twice a week we do this
and I lie on the floor
the carpet both itchy and scratching
the boots point their tips in my direction
they jab without moving
they huff without breathing
so I close my eyes and try to breathe in her smell
try to pretend that her feet are slipping into place
her gentle hops stifling their mutters
and soon I can hear the plastic ruffles of the pleather
the grunts and curses as she rubberbands
boots over thick brown thighs
4
when I add it all up
the sum should configure hate
when the numbers crunch
their staccato punches
should produce an irrational product
a figure that won’t divide
won’t multiply
won’t add
just won’t
when my lids curtain down and my lips purse together in anger
when my hands shake
those tiny ticks of unresolved business
when my left foot twitches and my thighs cringe in cramp
when this happens I know to open my eyes
stand up
and get the hell out of the closet
