He says he's killed people,
which I affirm, but not in the way he means.
I want to list for him his trail of dead bodies,
want to write eulogies for all those corpses
with the sticky warmth of my wasted blood.

He wouldn't understand it.
Irony doesn't go well with wine, and worse with
whiskey, because, then, only knuckles will do.

I don't know about anyone he may have shot,
or stabbed, the situations he mourns over now.
I can only attest to the times I tried to split myself,
in order to get him out of me. Murders for which
his hands are red but he hides them behind his back.

Still, I don't wish him guilt, don't wish him
sharp edges or pastel colors.
I'd love to see him whole again, poisonless,
sharp-eyed and free of self-pity.
He'd acknowledge what he had done
and we'd both say, "Okay," and be fine,
people healed and human, orbitting not each other,
but the same benevolent sun.

08/18/2006

Author's Note: Another Andrew Blair one-time production.

Posted on 08/23/2006
Copyright © 2024 Aaron Blair