dry

I drink (gulp) water 'til i'm dizzy, and still i'm thirsty all the time, pouring it down my throat and dripping on my chin and soaking it up 'til i am all just dewdrops and muddy rainfall and those puddles that splash up yr back. she unfurled a pennant for our long list of to-do's. You never pick up the phone, except to call me at 3 AM with booze and uncertainty in yr voice. I proposed to you on New Year's Eve, and recanted the very next day. He never asks me about you, but I can hear it hovering around the clouds of his breath. So many of us share the same names, and who can keep them all straight? (And how can there be such meaning in names, or in stars, or those cards we flip over and over in order to invent truths for ourselves.)

In New Orleans, a fortune teller named Velvet gave me a red stone for love and luck. She smiled at my smudged face and weary shoulders like she'd seen my kind before. I hope she was right. She told me it was time to rest, time to heal. I can hear from across the room the whispering feet of my ghosts. I pretend to sleep all night, but I stay awake, heavy with breath, to listen to them sigh and swear.