Poetics
by Alison Daniel
  

The Recidivist
 
Our confusion is what makes the world interesting
and no matter how brilliantly
incoherent you are, I’m not interested anymore.
  
There’s no blur between haunted and hunted,
no discussion about purity
and degradation when you’re predictable
  
as history repeats conflicting lies. I’d like you
to tell me how it feels
to be empty of concept and time
  
but that’s a waste because I don’t understand
the criminal mind,
intimidation, the threats until after you finally left
  
I remember you said you’d never be with a woman
again, a blatant conflict
from what I saw today. Perhaps everything
  
you say is the same as psychopathic manipulation
like the time you mentioned
if our marriage ever ended you’d disappear with drugs
  
and alcoholic drinks but that would be identical
as saying you’d refuse to think.
How strange. Thinking has never been an aspect
  
you could honestly claim. There was no
surprise when I saw you walking hand in hand.
All I could do was open my mouth
  
and laugh so loud I’m still laughing now.

A Mountain Or A Molehill?
 
A question popped up
on my computer screen from a stranger
who plays pool with my husband
on the Internet.
  
He wanted to know if
progress had been made after I answered
the phone
to hear my husband’s ex-girlfriend
  
say he’s been fucking her.
It sounded like something from The Jerry
Springer Show, the drama
of wanting to be completely obscene
  
even if in reading the computer screen
the following day I see ‘my wife is getting
out of bed ... write later,’
I’ll tell you the rest.
  
Strange things happen when I suffer
lack of sleep the same way a question
answered is never complete.
I was expected to believe the pool player
  
was really asking is it okay to go mountain
bike riding with a girl he used to know
and because he’s shy the secret
had to be kept which makes me wonder
  
why the stranger from the Internet
knows more about my marriage
except for one small thing
that has nothing to do with mountain
  
bike riding or fucking an ex.
No. It has everything to do with my husband’s
addiction to morphine
swallowed as he sat on the couch
  
watching The Jerry Springer Show
twice a day until I asked him to leave
and when he did,
  
four days later there he was,
happily walking hand in hand
with the ex who had phoned
when he wasn’t on the Internet.

The Book of Scorpio
 
You dressed
like any black winter’s night
  
and escaped
before I had time to tell you
  
how much I hate you.
It may be true the sea laps shattered
  
peace with salt
stinging and undefined attitude
  
when you promised
you wouldn’t wear black
  
without the pride of an artist.
The effect
  
was more precious than revenge.
You phoned
  
to say you
wanted me back and all you got
  
was explosive
sounds of silence
  
frozen
deep in Scorpionic sea.

Bifurcation
 
Before you left this house
torn open, a spasm
of nerve endings screaming
with neglect, you said
  
you’ve been waiting
for something like this,
that every day
you’d wake with relief to find
  
me by your side, happy
remembering I’m your wife
instead of those many plausible lies
tying trivia to the tendency
  
to transgress.
It’s not the same as secrets
betrayed in the chaos
psychopaths bury deep
  
inside the talismanic
trauma, the shock of looking
at your unblinking
reptilian eyes.

  

© 2005 Alison Daniel

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