for Jonah, i will write no tragic history.
the magazines in the library of my heart
are mostly porno or chinese romance.
there are smiles among the broken sharks’ teeth,
a bedroom on fire, incense, ice cubes,
heat, thirst, and lust.

the sky puts out its lights. the sage of love
meditates. there are candles, whole nights
of laughing, ferocious arguments, threats
of suicide. beautiful words,
collected ants, acorns, moss, and lightning.
then love left home carrying a bird
and a branch and a well-honed scottish dirk.

but for you i would write poetry like a nightingale’s cry,
the colors of May, the works of Chopin, a deer’s gait,
a lonely moon, a palm tree, a quiet death in a red closet,
a stack of second hand goods, a taste of grapefruit
with a bitter aftertaste like sorrow.
a rocking horse floating like a phantom,
a silence like handcuffs,
a secret vanishing in me,

not a bit like Jonah

you and i talked of a myriad of things–
disasters, desires, wonder and dread;
leftovers in the microwave,
bookcases, milk you forgot to put back
in the fridge, table lamps, paisley bedspreads,
guns, knives,  and leaky radiators.

we talked of families, poetry,
sex, lying to loved ones, siblings’ shortcomings,
unkempt morning-afters, cellphones
toasted by the sun, kid ballgames,
mountains, rivers, forests, deserts,
oceans, desserts, and dreams.

we talked of love but not of how words can hold it
together for just so long until Gog and Magog
lick up the walls of sanity. we talked of old wounds
and seasons we feared, but never of the
sibilance of sorrow creeping
up behind us,  we talked about talking
until the world ends, but not about how
our world was ending;

nor about the fact that you are almost Winston