Sometime after 2am
they're going to start the search
and when they find you
tangled up with some
down-on-her-luck
but quick on the uptake
Pollyanna
or whispering indecent propositions
in the mouth of a bleary-eyed
Brigitte Bardot
who never knew
better days
when they find you
they're going to tell you
that I've burned it all
down
You really should have seen it
coming
The years with you and your particular brand
of back-handed bargains
for a bit more of my time
have made for parchment-thin
principles
and twisted-knee prayers
I've developed
a very intimate relationship
with the pattern on your
living room rug
an apology of sorts
for never quite being able
to break
my fall
When you sort through the ashes
of this house
that was never
a home
you'll find fragments of me that
I left
behind
annotated diary pages
where I crossed out the word love
and left it blank
in memory of your inability
to fill in spaces with anything
but the sounds
of why I was never
good enough
I'm not telling you goodbye
I'm telling you
I was never
here.
It's not so much that I'm gone
but that I'm going
all the better for the knowing
the worst that came can't beat
the best that's leaving
Chiaroscuro nightmares with their
double-innuendo implications
gin soaked reveries of revelries
that only left me with torn stockings and
split lips
I'm nothing but a witness to the persecution
a shaky testimonial to all that can go wrong
under a streetlight, with a cigarette and a vitriolic kiss
the bitterest kind of pill to swallow
I never asked for your particular brand of kindness
a pawn shop girl doesn't wear real diamonds
and in the moonlight all you'll see
is a eulogy of scars
amid the flush of memory
So
I write you this serrated sort of valentine
a jagged little reminder that
I'm never going to be the blushing bride
it's a gritty sort of memoir
and the last gasp of wounded pride
I'm the cheapest kind of parlour trick
but you wound me up just to hear me tick
And I've finally
run down
my dance hall melody
is well and truly stuck
on the last strains of a
funeral dirge
And as you sift through the charred
skeleton
that used to hold this body
just know
this isn't revenge
it's just your hard luck
you fell in love with a girl
who only ever looked good
on paper

02/02/2010