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I have a few more beers then get up to leave.

she waves me over.

“you go?” she asks.

“yes,” I say, “my wife has cancer.”

I shake her hand.

she points to a sign behind her:

DON’T TOUCH THE GIRLS.

she points to the sign and says,

“the sign says, ‘DON’T TOUCH THE GIRLS’.”

I go back to the parking lot and wait.

she comes out.

“did you get the pills?” I ask.

“yes,” she says.

“then it’s been a successful day.”

I think of the dancer walking across my

kitchen. I can’t visualize it. I am going

to die alone

just the way I live.

“take me to my place,” she says,

“I’ve got to get ready for night school.”

“sure,” I say and drive her on in.

dark shades

I never wear dark shades

but this red head went to get

a prescription filled on Hollywood Blvd.

and she kept haggling and working at

me, snapping and snarling.

I left her at the prescription counter

and walked around and got a large tube of

Crest and a giant bottle of Joy.

then I walked up to

the dark shade display rack and bought

the most vicious pair of shades

I could find.

we paid for our things

walked down to a Mexican place

and she ordered a taco she couldn’t eat

and sat there

haggling and snapping and snarling at me

and after eating I ordered 3 beers

drank them down

then put on my shades.

“o my God,” she said, “o my God shit!”

and I ripped her up both sides

most excellent riposte

snarling stinking marmalade shots

shit blows

farts from hell,

then I got up

paid

she following me out

both of us in shades

and the sidewalks split.

we found her car

got in and drove off

me sitting there

pushing the shades back against my nose

ripping out her backbone

and waving it out the window

like a broken Confederate flagpole…

dark and vicious shades help.

“o my God shit!” she said,

and the sun was up

and I didn’t know it.

they were a bargain for $4.25

even though I had left the Crest

and the Joy behind

at the taco place.

prayer in bad weather

by God, I don’t know what to

do.

they’re so nice to have around.

they have a way of playing with

the balls

and looking at the cock very

seriously

turning it

tweeking it

examining each part

as their long hair falls on

your belly.

it’s not the fucking and sucking

alone that reaches into a man

and softens him, it’s the extras,

it’s all the extras.

now it’s raining tonight

and there’s nobody

they are elsewhere

examining things

in new bedrooms

in new moods

or maybe in old

bedrooms.

anyhow, it’s raining tonight,

one hell of a dashing, pouring

rain….

very little to do.

I’ve read the newspaper

paid the gas bill

the electric co.

the phone bill.

it keeps raining.

they soften a man

and then let him swim

in his own juice.

I need an old-fashioned whore

at the door tonight

closing her green umbrella,

drops of moonlit rain on her

purse, saying, “shit, man,

can’t you get better music

than that on your radio?

and turn up the heat…”

it’s always when a man’s swollen

with love and everything

else

that it keeps raining

splattering

flooding

rain

good for the trees and the

grass and the air…

good for things that

live alone.

I would give anything

for a female’s hand on me

tonight.

they soften a man and

then leave him

listening to the rain.

melancholia

the history of melancholia

includes all of us.

me, I writhe in dirty sheets

while staring at blue walls

and nothing.

I have gotten so used to melancholia

that

I greet it like an old

friend.

I will now do 15 minutes of grieving

for the lost redhead,

I tell the gods.

I do it and feel quite bad

quite sad,

then I rise

CLEANSED

even though nothing is

solved.

that’s what I get for kicking

religion in the ass.

I should have kicked the redhead

in the ass

where her brains and her bread and

butter are

at…

but, no, I’ve felt sad

about everything:

the lost redhead was just another

smash in a lifelong

loss…

I listen to drums on the radio now

and grin.

there is something wrong with me

besides

melancholia.

a stethoscope case

my doctor has just come