A year to the day
to Valentine’s Day
I sat unable to write
only pushing at buttons
as though meaningless
codes of pearl
until my heart snapped
and my hands declining
took away the wall
they had erected
between wrists and forearms
elbows and head
and I began
with a cigarette
clenched as though
some third tooth ground
with the face of a woman
a soon to be dead woman
on my lips revolving
and I remembered
leaning naked
upon a radiator
and I remembered
feeling cold
between flesh burning
and I remembered
my future the past.
[February 14]
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