by Ryan Adams
makes me go lost
like a shaking a curse
or cops
if she or i were a punk
with
eyes on the stranger
past a hot dog stand
body and soul all tired
again
or
white snow flurries come
onto cars
and the sides of buses
onto the christmas body rushes
she sees an old lover
but i have given her to me
and i go
a given thing
now as a gesture
of closure
for
this awful thing
a new party of one
did you see?
did you see that?
fast fast fast
letters turning to ice
like winter breath
those nights
gosh they came and went came and went
i am not at the party
not dancing
not laughing
not drinking
not holding a glass
not seeing your dress
not under a moon
not with you
not facing east or west
did you see the witches moon
it hovered and stalled
like a car under piles of wet
puddles oil snakes dancing
inside them like metal rainbow worms
in that dirty mix
i am not with you inside that room
not under stairs
not under lights
not hearing music
not talking
not knowing if it’s alright
you are not putting your hand on my knee
i am not breathing
i am not at that party
not tonight
i went
fast fast fast
did you see?
did you see?
i think i thought i loved you
i think i thought i loved you
i always did
vampire eyes
milk skin
i think i thought i loved you
how you moved, your body
ownership driven
natural slave runner
i hate you
your matching pairs
your split ends
your dying figure
your shadow
i hate you
your collapsible will
your petty drip
of a wordless silence attempt
you bite your lip
moons crack
you looked like a hill
climbable
of clouded rose
tree spirit and blue-eyed explosions
of marble-headed jar break
on the cement
full-on spring
light everywhere blasting
but my how evil are you are you
tornado t o r n a d o
in a neighborhood
soft
with us quiet dreamers
i think i loved you
your power pains
your hungry stomach
your hair falling out
your scraping shower gloves
pink and blue
i think i thought i loved you
in the shower
trying to remove yourself
from your own body
into a drain
clogged
like my mouth forever silenced in awful
horrid
disgusting pain
i hate you
i hate you
my god
once
once in a while
i think i thought i loved you
Your Side Now
on your side now
is books
i moved the pillows
up top
like they forgot
or i did
but we did not
me and the pillows know
something’s missing
and the room
the room does too
it sighs
when i come in
the door
when i arrive
thinks i am you
and sighs
or is that me
my insides
hmmmm
i scare myself
see my shadow or myself
in the mirror
sometimes both
i sigh too
on your side now
i leave the phone
the books and space
any single lifetime takes
if it took breaths
like it climbed
a summertime hill
all day
that bed
so sad
it limps and lies down
shuffleboard headed
old
and
on your side now.
enough rope
if only i had enough rope
i would lasso that moon
down
and deliver it to you
even though
it would split the ocean
and the sea
in twos
and threes
i would beg for your mercy
i would cry at your knees
god
i miss you so
you have no idea you know
i am lost
this place in time, where is this, what is this, why
why did we do this?
to me
it is done
by us both
the isolation
and speculation on, how much rope
is enough
enough rope
i am imaginary letters
hopeless telephone feathers
zero till fade
i am white-out
ghost after ghost
33 and in ruins
i am research now
a controlled experiment
for her favorites
i am in the out box
no return address and no topics
a landmark
a call for help
red
surrounded by three guides
truth beauty and justice
a t.v. screen
i once walked across–cowboy-boot drunk
on a glistening ship of a night
a four-post bed
where everything that happens
is only something in my head
in my mind
and outside
it might as always be snowing now
for the lack of going out
or in
how sad
how sad
and this
this is no way to begin
but i take meaurements
to keep me sane
to validate
what is real
and
what is pretend
just for now
just in case
how much
is enough
enough rope.
Closed
closed
that is what i am today
closed
robbed
isles fucking broken
baseball batted
winged
with colorful sweets scattered
all over the floor
God, I hit my knees that day
and wanted so bad
just wanted to say
“please, please bring her home,
back to me …”
but all my mouth
could sputter
with tear dribble
was,
“i am so weak”
“i am so weak”
like a record player
floating in space
forever on repeat
w
ater
running down my snotted face
from my eyes
at the foot of the bed
head touching the throw blanket
i used to fuck her on
and sleep next to her in
Jesus,
what a thing to feel
the eyes of Brahman
and us
upon the wheel
and in that moment she was on a beach just then
with an old man who collects million-dollar checks
from taking people’s businesses from them
and breaking them into things he can sell
their hearts ripped out first
and placed at the ferry well
eventual ice-box dinner food
microwaved
and fit for moveable trays
and football games coming
those poor people of the long winter
a fat fuck with a driver, a car
and some special foreign name
on a beach,
two of them,
him, at least 50-something
while I was asking God,
asking God for someone
God,
who must be so busy his doorbell is bloody
on a beach
the two of them
i saw a photograph later
and puked
into the toilet
my guts
for what I had left of love
or the knowing
closed
that is what I am now
closed
robbed
riddled with effects
of a clearance sale
when everything goes
but the walls
skin and bone
so lost
and
closed
Brass
… when
when the brass blows
down that crooked lane
is that when
is that when you will
you know
say my name
once more
and
maybe even cry
no
no i doubt that
very
very
much
… when
Terrible
in the days of a man’s life once in a while
it happens,
where you see the whole thing
a whole life
on a carton of milk as plain as day
like you picked your own pockets
and your heart alights
and you see
all
the
way
down,
to the end,
in the days of a life,
as a man might,
i have peeked into that room
maybe once or twice
at the shining ember
the ash
of a life
that i once had and it keeps me
and it demands
demands
i steer this into worse waters
further i go
obeying its commands
a death’s
each time
because inside tough guys inside men
is just nothing but
crocheted lined dangling legged walls
of afraid kids
making up names for things
telling ghost stories
while the walls rattle
of something cruel
something terrible
just
outside
the
door.
Carnations
missed birthday
forgotten
slipped my mind
under the door in the doorpile
of forgots
and a fistful of carnations
just browning on the edge
that was NOT me
not me
i had a silent view of the backside of the buildings
and i looked through
and i saw a family
a couple
their privacy
untouched by my sitting in the chair helpless
alone
wondering where were you
and where was i
and what does it mean
when the bedroom
says,
“maybe lie down now and don’t get up”
and,
“i will hold you in a dream until you close”
clutching a cold cell phone
wondering
helplessly
dying to show more love
like an animal
feasting on the remains
of a carcass
of my own dried bones
in the desert
with two blankets at the foot of the bed
one blue
one brownish red
Goodnight Little One
when the ship goes funny
you know, on the sea
like the bed were a boat
is that you?
or is that me?
because i lost my glasses
like two summers ago
and i can’t fucking see
for shit
i dream more about the desert now
which is better
less animals and sand traps
less chance of civilization
people like you
and your friends
so shallow
when you die
you will look the same
like laughing rattling bones
on pirate ships
smiling like corpses
surrounded in gold
i fucking hate you
your shallow madness
anyway,
i am almost home
and my ship is flying steadily through the air
tonight i am going to go find something to send me
sixteen thousand times higher
than air
and look down on you
as i die
and laugh
as i return to the part of the sun i am of my father Ra
and wish doom upon the parts of you
that destroy yourself
your ability to heal
or anyone
and you will live again and again many times before you learn
i can hardly see for the
rays in my father’s
cauldron
so goodnight little one
Every Time
every time
each tide
each continental drift
each and every time my house must move,
my apartment,
my whatever,
for all the loose things in it
i did not know
until today
one was you
that they could move
become displaced i knew
but you
or us
in that brown shadow of a wall
could go into the mellowing
if it grew darker
in time
and left us yellow
and like smoke
in the room spinning out
and upwards
and into the draft
and toward the places in the window
where bigger things were kept out
and people too kept out
some people
where smoke goes
hurling into the safety of a wind
outside
this vaccum
of home
something dies
every time
Real Fucking Dreams Come True
forget the sea that drug your body ashore
and the murder
if that is what you wish to imagine
this heartache was
because
like s
omething in a dream
this did not happen to you
it happened with you
and
you don’t care
you
really don’t fucking care
the
champagne will be aboard a boat
the streets will be made of cobblestone
and
the moon will be yours
you will recover
but
when love takes the very thing from you
that made you what you were before
by fire must your bones alight
and
your soul should not return
for true love
is
more
more than the money’s worth
and on good advices are the graces of the gods
the seas are parted
and
the waves are long
for
the hunters
when
the innocent scream and theirs are the words of pain
recognized
by
a fateful world
with
a merciful law
of
ebb and tide
and
for that
any shore is too expensive for a loss
when it could walk away and leave in dust
nothing anyway
and
keep those others talking distracted anything
but
in the way
of
those here to concern the world again
with laughter
and
real fucking dreams
Sit Down
when the house goes quiet
and she stops
you know
moving around inside me
i can see her
smiling
made of flesh and bone
heavy as a jewel factory
and bright inside
and brick outside
with lights
lights on
and the sound of typing
endless and still
moving through my head
on the windowsill
basking her in unneeded light
we made it through
summer
winter
not always night
but we made it through
to this
this end
when the bells crack
and the door gives
and all a man can do when he feels her go
who doesn’t drink or die
is sit down for a second
and thank God
she was born
and cry
too much night
If I were as mean as I would like
I would be small
and
your stolen bike
I would