A recording, unfamiliar, pleading

pathetic parasite, phone booth floor-dwelling

cur, do sixteen pushups and hit the rowing

machine like you used to, it won’t make any

difference in the run, because you fell

in love, and now you know such joy

as you could not have imagined, unless

you were in the middle of a fit or something,

in a paranoid fantasy you may have dreamt up

a story like this, where all you could need

is nearness, getting to know yourself is hard.

 

Because I’ve never experienced a feeling

like this before, and to have it all the time zapping me

to my reaching out, and to feel a yipe

singe, ya know, so I get over it but goddamn

it feels like a hell bite, like oh shit what did

I do?  To let this crazy bitch, with more baggage

than a freight train, into my brain bleeding

ecstasy, making me drunk on it, and I forget

that I sound like a retard, it’s disgusting.

 

It’s not terrible, I know, and I understand

that you know what I’m saying, but goodamn it

I know what it sounds like, it sounds like

a grocer thinking “oh boy, now I gotta deal with this

shit I don’t need,” but that’s not even accurate,

it can’t be expressed in words because

it is so subtle I can’t really be sure I’ve ever seen it,

the genuine reaction to my glorious voice,

but I am sure, because I feel it the same way you do

staring into space, when you’re shadow is

a lamppost, I can go nowhere but straight

forward, into your arms a thankful grin.

 

Knowing yourself is worth nothing, for your love

is not you, holding reins with orders

barking, your champion is the spirit of dawn

and dusk, pulling you on chains to the dawning

adventure burning into the sky with a singeing

tail, chattering wordlessly with your old friend

in the darkness, passing out on Theta house lawn

where they don’t talk to you anymore, opening

the door to a knife cut horizon, carving you

a path, downward through time and space.