jonberger

Every dollar gone.
Every bit of sense expended.
Every buck wildly misplaced
from my billfold.
Everything is lost.
I am exhausted.
I am beaten.
I am spent.

It wasn’t so long ago
that I was flush with excitement.
Opportunity abounded
and I was able to express my appreciation
for the world around me
with thoughtful donations.

Times change,
and now nobody wished me
to deposit anything of mine
anywhere at all.
Not that there’s anything left
to share.

I am now without.
I have nothing.
I go on
with naught to give.
I can’t even provide fresh words
to describe the predicament
since I’m spent.

We talk about a lot of things
except the things
that are important to you
but I cannot bear to mention.
You want explanations and resolutions
and I just want to get through another day
without incident
or any discussion
of any import.

You want to talk
and I want to be.
You want to love
and I want to go.
You want a pair
and I want all the Jacks
but I can’t explain it.
I won’t.
I don’t want to.

So
the holes
in our conversation
grow
and we both know
what we know.

She asked me what I wanted.
"What you really want," she said,
"if you’re being honest."
So I thought
and I pondered
and I wondered if I’d ever been honest with this girl
or any girl
or anybody ever
in my life.

And then further,
I asked myself:
"What do I want?
If everything was available
what then?"
If all needs were met
all wants satisfied,
I asked myself again,
"What then?"

And I wondered and I thought
and I pondered and posed paradigms,
diagrams and graphs to myself,
and finally, I answered,
to the best of my ability:
"I would like
a peanut butter pie."

Silence ensured
for what felt like hours
but was probably less.
"A piece of pie," she said.
"No sex acts.
No statements of love.
No gestures for the good of humanity?

"I do not know,"
she said,
"If I care to continue our conversations."
And she left
and I wept
not just for her
but that she didn’t understand the difference
between a slice
and whole damn pie.

While Peter had his stroke
I was eating cheese puffs
getting blown by some overaged professional
thinking “it doesn’t get much better than this.”

As Peter raced to the hospital
I was ordering another pair of pies
from another international pizza chain
that was trying to take the food out of the mouths
of working mothers.

While Peter was lying in bed
unsure if he would speak again
I was talking back to the TV,
telling Sam to just marry Diane
and get it over with.

When Peter was recuperating
I was masturbating,
When Peter was healing
I was dealing to some friends,
smoking up most of the profits.
When Peter got well
I left town for a spell.

When Peter died
we’d been out of touch for years
and I didn’t know.
My soul, though,
had left this world
long before his.

You know what I hate?
You know what really burns my bunions
– but in a bad way?

It’s when someone takes my idea
– just takes it
and creates with it
making a song or painting or poem or dance
and lets it out into the world
and makes a million jillion dollars from it
and when interviewed
gives me credit for the inspiration
and tells everyone to go to my website
or my shows
or read my books
– if they can find them
and after that I check the hits in my website
or my numbers on eBay
(where you can find my past publications
at low
low prices)
and there’s no traction.
Nobody cares for my work.
Nobody cares what I did.

I’m like Bob Dylan
– if I were the voice of my generation
or known by more than just family and friends
or was really any good.
People like me in theory
but don’t care about the reality.

This is my cross to bear.
This is my bunion to burn.

I knew it.
Something was nagging me all day
that this was a day I was supposed to remember
but I couldn’t put it together.
I knew it wasn’t your birthday
– or mine,
nor one of the big events
but there are so many small things
that we used to celebrate.
And now…

I figured it out.
I did.
I know where I went wrong
but really
wasn’t it just
that I made too much
of those events
so long ago?
Shouldn’t we treat every day as something special
rather than elevating certain occasions
to those of highest importance?

I love you.
You know this.
I suspect it’s reciprocal.
Can’t we simply treasure that
day in, day out
rather than spend such seconds celebrating
the first time we kissed
or dated
or fucked
or –
it was the last?
I got it?

Happy anniversary, darling!

The muffin crumbs cleaned
the dishes dried
the hair combed
and belts buckled,
we are ready to start the day.

We have classes in the morning
Recess in the afternoon
Music afterwards
and then some Fencing or Chess,
depending.
That gets us just past six
which is when things lighten up.

There is dinner
and homework
and dishes (again!)
and TV
or computer time
if we’re real good.

Then some tidying
and hair/teeth brushing
a couple of songs
and Story Time.
Then eyes closed.
Then mind closed.
Then dreams open
then snap shut.

And then:
repeat.

In troubled times,
let me help you.
Come to me
and I will protect.
Stay with me
I’ll keep you safe.
Don’t let this time
be in vain.
Escape the rain.

In hours late,
I am your phone call.
In evenings dark,
I’ll shed some light.
I’m said to share
a little wisdom
even when
I’m not that bright.
Come here tonight.

I want to be the kind of man
who can help you when things are bad.
I want to be a man
you can rely on.
I want to be a man
for you.
Help me be a man.
Please,
help me be a man.

When you find yourself
in troubled times
always know
where you can go.
When you’re lost in space
and you need a place.
If you’re in fear
you can just come here.

If I’ve learned one thing in 2016,
it’s Elvis Costello.
If I discovered any song this year,
it’s "Polythene Pam".
If I met any Python this year,
it’s Douglas Adams.
If I heard anything this year,
it was "you’re a great guy."

I’m not clear
what any of these mean
but I experienced some other things,
too,
this year.

If I danced any dance this year,
it was sweaty.
If I killed anything lately,
it’s still dead.
If I dyed at all recently,
it’s brunette
and if I watched any horror his year,
it was with Vampires
not fucking zombies.

Fucking zombies suck.

If I hated at all lately,
it was because of paralysis.
If I was rejected at all,
it was due to fear.
If I came to any conclusions,
I can’t share them
at least
until next year.

It’s not that late
but I’m really tired
and I’m not sure what to do with myself
which is the kind of time
when I’m thinking of you
a sequence that occurs
probably more than it should.

I am tired because I keep myself busy.
I race through the day
to avoid my racing thoughts
and what was once a racing heart.
I am dealing with external things
and keeping the internal
locked up tight.

So when I have ceased to rush
and come back to myself,
that is when you come to mind.
And I wish it were not so.
I wish I could race for more hours
pacing the city
until
exhausted
I reach home and bed as one
and have no waking time
that you can occupy.

But my body can no longer
work so long
without respite.
So the downtime must exist
and
as exhaustion creeps over me
so do the thoughts of you.

You never need know this
in reality.
I can keep this quiet
simply between myself
and the imagined you
I always speak to.