Beautiful and Successful

Today my wife sent me a note.
She is feeling beautiful and successful.
I am feeling diseased and despondent.
But is that something you say to someone
who feels beautiful and successful?
No, it's not.
And I don't.
And my silence echoes in her happy house.

The Old Man and the Dog

The sound from the dog's throat,
a throat not designed
to wail or shriek,
not designed
to scream
through a froth of blood.
The man's soul hesitates,
hovering, just touching
the hot black road.
The sound cuts him to ribbons.
He floats, waiting for the quiet dark
that never comes.

Armistice

Life, you jackbooted brute,
I concede.
I will open my mouth
and let slide
my filleted friends and fellow travelers,
chickens and carrots and such,
down my gagging throat.
I will tilt my face to the sky
and pull hard at the air,
folding my scorched lungs
but not flinching or fighting
the flow of oxygen,
though it makes the fire burn so damn hot.
And water, cool and sweet,
the perfect balm, I will divert
with a sly flap of my epiglottis,
to pool uselessly in my knotted gut.
I will sit on the porch
with Seligman's exhausted pooch,
as the sun casts her shadows across the yard,
and we will wait quietly
for the next jolt.

Late Night Lights

So lovely, distant lights bent and refracted through a fresh splash of tears. Such a shame that the cost of the ticket is unendurable sadness.