Only Joking

Close the door, please. Open the
window please.
Stand, in the shadow of the sun. Smile.
Make eye contact with the devil’s
souls. The ones that leave trails.
Fingerprints. Scents.
Dance. Mingle. Laugh. Breathe.
Mouth the words to myself: Stay calm.
Have a drink. Sink;
into the temporary release
that comes from the gift of drunken affection.
Light a candle.
Pace. Avoid my own face
in the mirror every single
time I pass it.
A reminder that my heart beats
despite my every effort
to drill a hole
through it’s core.
Who opened the door?
Who closed the window?
I can’t breath.
Light stabs at my eyesockets
like vultures come early.
I ache like, I have been buried in the
ground and pulled from it and forced to
walk. Walk a walk of shame.
Except,
there is none.
I have only just learned to
bleed when I am supposed to.
I will wrap the bandages around
the gaping holes,
for you.
So that your pain softens.
So that I don’t have to interpret the
complicated riddles of need that
drip from your lips like
a foreign soap opera with
subtitles that flash across the screen
too fast for me to read.
Let me sit, in this space I call peace.
The one that lays parallel to grief;
and keep quiet.
With the door closed,
and the window open
please.