Goodnight, my love (a dirge)

Goodnight, my love
I'll miss you
your spirit in the skies
but I know you're with me
when I close my eyes

Goodnight, my love
and thank you
for the time you spent with me
looking in my eyes in the afternoon
with our child on my knee

Goodnight, my love
and God bless
O how I love you so
even if you lived a thousand years
you could never truly know

Goodnight, my love
and so long
so long and see you soon
I will meet you in the spring-time fields
when the blossoms bloom

when the blossoms bloom

Some disease

This must be some disease
to be someplace
to not feel anymore at home
to be perfectly content
and want to be elsewhere

that commonality
that fear of failure
thus lack of attempt

such a pretty night as this
and I am pensive
I am lost in self contempt

the girls here are all legs
and little else
I can't say that I mind
unless I'm wont for conversation

and when all you need
is a self-confidence boost
it's poor a thought to force one to listen
and pay one to respond

to write down the words
you wish to hear
and coach them on inflection

to not be able ever to love again
and then fall in love far too easily

to be fragile as glass
yet crumble like concrete

Why do you do it?

'Why do you do it?'
he asked...

'What?'

'It,' he said...
'Why do you do it?'

I thought...
not long, but long enough
like a referee making a call
processed, but not overdone

'Love,' I said...

he waited...

'Not so much love for what I do,
but love for who I do it for,'

he stared...

'Love for my friends,
Love for my future family,
Love for you...'

he smiled, but remained silent...

'I don't mean to sound unselfish,
but that is why,
I have no interest greater than my friends.
There is nothing I can do
longer than have a conversation.'

I work only to be able
to buy them dinner, to spoil them
not because they want me to
like they wouldn't smile
if I didn't pick up the check,

we could eat peanut-butter
sandwiches at two-fifty a week
and still share in the same laughter,
but I love to take them out,
to surprise them
I study so I can stay in school,
stay with them
I don't really have any other
interests besides my friends,
well interests, yes, but I mean loves...

even writing, as I write this down
is just a hobby, everything, is just a hobby
one I'm sure I will grow tired of,
but never could I grow tired of this,
sitting in your passanger seat
carrying on long conversation
that depress me greatly
but make me so much happier,
Love,' I said...

he nodded,
'Okay...good.' and started the car

I think I'll go away

I think I'll go away,
I told her,
but I cannot tell
if it's a forward charge
or a desperate retreat

she seemed taken aback,
I must give the illusion
that I am beyond happy
in my near perfect home

I think I'll go to the country,
I told her,
and write and read and paint and draw

she asked what I would do for money
What, my works won't sell, you think?
I tease her,
No, I said, I don't need it
any more than I have, that is

How will you eat? she inquired
Her tone logical
her role as the devil's advocate,
not giving an opinion, just knowing
that I've thought nothing through

I'll farm, or work at a local pub,
or teach at the university,
or act if it comes to that,
God willing it won't

We share in a chuckle,
I can see the pain
starting to leak into her eyes
as she slowly realizes how serious I am

she doesn't seem to know
that this is my asking
her to come with me,
or how easily she could convince me to stay

Crystal Night

My father was a butcher
a shop in our hometown

the torches lit the street
as the shadows washed the ground

I do not blame you, Hershel
or the words that Goebbels said
only Hate could break those windows
two-thousand people dead

My father was a butcher
they threw a brick through his shop

The glass collapsed in pieces
shattering my soul
although the wood went up in flames
my heart remained whole

My father held me close
my sister was not found
I swear I saw a crying ghost
as they burned our shul to the ground

If I never find my sister
my eyes may never close
in hopes that they will see her
her eyes in ragged clothes


I bit my lip and cursed
these hateful bitter thieves

My father was a butcher
but never such as these

Sit down little man

Sit down little man
and learn your place
put your weakened hand
back over your face

Cover your eyes
and enjoys these lies

Sit down little man
and learn your place

Though our love may last

Though our love may last
the life of a red round rose
we'll always have the past
dripping down the tip of your nose

You walk shotgun into a room
I turn on heel and walk out
you yell and curse and scream and loom
I claim to not know what you're talking about

We first touched lips
in that ragged pink pedal boat
Perhaps not quite our first kiss
I explained in my last desperate note