the watch...

listen to me...
the ears i touch are stone.
i cannot speak plainly...
they told me i must not, or...
i will steal your agony
like a petty thief in the night...
it means nothing to me now,
your fears are a microcosm of me,
instead i will take your goodness;
you have so little––it will not be missed...
mine is bereft upon the train
eating the track ahead, behind...

i have turned away from mystic steeples,
they consumed my disbelief...
i have refused the sexless, searing my soul
with impotent eyes
stunned by my ancient sterility...
the animal in me was drowned
in a flour sack on a back burner...
my voiceless birth shrouded
by a woman who refused to let me go...
my nightmares return to the womb
devouring my soul in solitary darkness
awaiting the soft, cushioned recess of the ceaseless dawn...

determined to crush me with scorn...
but, i have stolen what i need and refused all i can,
now, i must feed you, from this cell
where babies cry from hunger,
gnawing accusations with unclipped nails of birth...
i have felt need; i tried to imprison the kindness i stole...
but the bigoted anxiety surrounding me refuses to be stilled...
you must take it from me, on this eve...
or she will crucify me with nails rusty from tears...
i have lain waiting, hoping, for release...
the black sun is so anticlimactic.

you would close the curtain
like the shroud of a corpse, a stranger
you once made love to without the pain of loving...
closer, ever closer, upon your knees to listen to the whispers...
which at long last conquer my soul...