POEM A DAY II

this year in feeling unknown I 
started to remember. new bras, old lime juice, 
the vodka cut down its middle well enough.
racing for poems against daylight, against the dimming
fancy teardrop bulbs delicately twisted into
their webbed screw necks 
beneath the ceiling yolk of this
loophole, where we go round and round 
our sleepless sudden understandings.
this year i decided doing was better,
even trapped by metal, enough to make me climb,
like can i move myself with myself,
can i shove myself with myself, 
can i steady myself with myself, 
can i betray myself and savor the drama,
lychee candy after salt coma, can i taste it 
and taste what tasting tastes like?
I could go on forever and i bet you could
too, it's why i never want to let you go.
it turns out trying to weave a willow basket
is very hard. some of you are highly skilled and
highly intuitive and might disagree.
making an emotional sculpture with a safety vest orange
onion bag was more available last time i tried.
saying the right thing is also very hard.
my slippers are as red as the blood that surges
in striving. the clock is an hour late but the seconds
never slow. the lime makes my lips taste their original
fullness, the fullness of numbing as prerequisite to
kissing. now, i don’t kiss. barely drink.
but this is friday, january 30th. 
only one match left in the treasured iridescent cup.
the candle a grease pool.
new options for living have made everything
fill-in-the-blank thesaurus arithmetic,
or something worse i would not dare
say. but nothing beats a simple phrase
said out of mind. thank you
for saying those to me, 
sometimes.