The work of being lonely

i’m so lonely.
‘God, I love you – I can’t wait to hang out’
‘We love you for your personality’
i can feel the warmth of the words
like a homeless person and a trashcan fire
separated two arms length
by the warmed flesh of others.

and now – right now – why the trembling fatigue of anger?

There is no welcome death – no avenue for fulfillment
the aspirations of youth have crumbled
the relief of being Wanted –
Thought after –
Hoped for –
Depended on –
desired

The barbed fence of love that separates id and ego
reminds me that my fulfillment means pain
and further distance from those i love most.

I’m so jealous. irrationally jealous.
Why you? Why do you deserve this?
how i love you – how i understand your failings –
how i pity
an ambling walk and a breakdown
an unnecessary masculinity
a lack of desire to understand
Why you? You have what I wanted.
what kept me anxious about the possibilities of the future
Why am i still so lonely?

Advertisement

The Bee

I found the bee not moving.
Her yellow stripes were like a blob of honey
against a white parking space line.

‘It’s winter, after all’, I thought.

I stooped down – an ugly warm ball of grease and flesh
and poked the bee lightly with the end of a car key.
she did not react. She was dying.

‘It is winter, after all.’

But here? on this parking space line? On this liquid spread of minerals
which were squeezed out of a nozzle
to delineate where the machines whose waste choked you in life
may be allowed to rest?
here?

I placed the car key underneath the bee’s head
she grasped weakly and held on
like a leaf caught on a wool sweater.
I walked her to the grass.

I did not know what else to do.

I placed the bee into the grass –
by that bush – just over there.
she grasped a still green frond
and positioned herself to look up at me.

In the distance, I heard the low and cycling drone of an airplane –
within sight-line of the upward-facing bee
that she may meet with one last sense of wonder
and I will drive this car home
and rest in the lonely darkness
of winter.

(car n’y a pas)

Below I wonder who’s fallen in love-
who lies across from, under, alongside
who lies on the floor, considering warmth, stayed and practiced

Why is it that I can’t think my hand into movement?

sigh, hope, movement

The last chord in a thickening love song –
The tone that rings out when you long
as hollow and as cold and as stark 
as the moment you realized there would be
no more

when is it, really, that you die?