Its author trying to save
us from his own sad story
never apologizes
for love destined to end with

slipping kisses dripped thick as
mercury between parting
lips, fingering in from ten
trembling tips this elixir’s

medicine, breath suddenly
sublimated, changes when
exasperated, worn, spent,
exhaling effort enough

to make it pass for hatred
vanquished, nothing left but feigned
acceptance of aching loss
pretense plays its part making

parting with an emptiness
as nagging as this flicker
set alight, to full blazing
for once feeling alright, or

worth its wait, when with complaints
this myth anticipates truth,
in the abuse of his youth
how this author proved wrong those

of you his words worked over
before any of you could
grow out of being your own
jokes punctuating lines he

wrote, whispering from edges
perception tends too often
to not let men comprehend,
when he was in the margins

he was in the trenches, next
ones battling exes heaven
or its executives must
have sent to edit messes,

apocalypses genres
disastrous artists prefer
to publish in after left
not broken-hearted but bored.