* Crane *

after she told me all the things she hadn't told me before, I
was

i was like

like a stone
like this had all happened to me before
like i knew it was going to happen when i opened my soul
and like
like it will always happen to me from now on.

halfway through my heartbreak it had started to rain and
thunder.
all the things we associated with us
and love
and making love in the rain
(that was my dream)
that was my dream and hers too.
i would stand behind her
and kiss the back of her neck
and whisper things she wouldn't hear over the thunder.
my hands would reach for her belly and then move to her breasts.
she would arch back as i kissed her shouldrs and my hands would
find her nipples underneath her blouse.

the lightning would flash
the thunder would crash
and she would turn to me and we would kiss deeply
and drink of each other's deepest wishes
and seal our promises.

...my kisses would steal down her throat to her breasts and
linger, while my hands caressed her hips and back.

and then her stomach and navel.
I am facinated by her navel, and I'd be kissing it and then her
hips as i slip off her dress.

I would lay her down in the wet grass and the rain and touch
her..

i would have touched her..
but instead

tonight I'm standing outside in the rain, half wishing to be
struck down by a thunderbolt. smoking a pipe and wishing i had
some sort of drug that could help me not care...

there's a packet of matches in my pocket.. from caesars palace
in las vegas, where misery much worse than mine is on every
streetcorner. i take out the matches, ripping them out of the
book and striking them one by one and letting them drop onto
the wet pavement.
for a brief moment each one blazes like love in a young man's
heart, a shining star that seems like it could live forever,
falling free in the sky.
then they meet the sidewalk, sputter a half-moment in a
struggle to survive.
then they die...

sixteen matches in a row blaze and die just like me.
i counted them.

the last 10 wouldn't light at all. the book was too soaked from
the rain and my tears. i wonder if someday i'll be too wet and
tired and used up and full of futility that i'll refuse to
spark.
that i'll refuse to even try anymore.

in another pocket i find a few sheets of blue square paper from
when I was learning origami.
i take one out and start making a crane in the rain.
it reminds me of shapes
which reminds me of her
and how beautiful she is
and how delicious she is
and how much i wanted to touch her
and explore her
and how much i wanted to make her mine...


the crane falls from my absentminded fingers to lie with the
corpses of the dead matches.
in a few seconds it floats away into the gutter and
disappears.

but i'm not thinking about the crane.
i'm thinking about her.
and i'm crying
but you can't tell in the rain...