Doctor

yes, I'm real mean
and I'll crush your
head between my
knees, it's okay
to lie down and
give up.

oh honey, it's
a rough night
working alleys and
slaying cops
with only
what god gave me.

it'll pay off in the
end because I was born
to hunt them down
all the sinners and weepers
I am the Purifier
of all I see,
I lay claim to each
darkened night street.

baby, I got your
number scrawled on
my wall, and I'm training my
eyes on you,
you're next 
it'll be over real quick,
real clean and I won't 
even linger when
you pass. 

and I'll put on my
coat in the morning
lay the snake
of stethoscope round my neck
and take and take and take
some more, 
cleaning up what god laid
down because sometimes
he got it all wrong.
little bodies curled bones
beneath the threadbare sheets
you were all wrong
all dead to me
I am cleaning up
taking out the trash.

room 303 I am sneaking
in to say goodbye with a 
black kiss and you'll be gone
crossed off my list
I told you,
I'm the Purifier,
the only one to make it right.

Persephone

I found it appropriate 
that night,
to light every candle
I could find.
27 in all.
Glimmering their 
stupid light
against the windows,
the polished wood
of the coffee table.

To be alone,
it looked like a shrine
to myself,
to some misfortunate
god, lost enough to
reside in my
broken body.
I slumped into
the throw pillows.
Feeling the light of my 
temple.

A sacred sleeping
I felt it coming on
in the first snow
as it hit gentle
against the dark casements.
Each soft falling
rang in my ears
incessantly.
The darkness at 3:00,
the radiator's fit-full
hissing in the night.

The buttery light
of my foraged candles
trying to block out the cold,
the season of death,
a despair to Demeter.
I cursed the whole Pantheon
for letting this happen,
as I sat in my living room,
my face washed in a religious light.

I fortified myself against
the snow, the cold,
telling the wayward god inside
to please,
stay a little longer,
burn these candles with me.

Meghan

I threw her a party
and in my mind there was
so much laughter
the little twinkling
of bells and the louder
ruddy sound
of tin cans in the
rain.

We all walked along the street
so many of us, seven in all,
bundled in coats and scarves
flying with the passing of cars,
it was twilight, a somber
autumnal pink
and I couldn't breathe
with your body against mine,
and hers against yours.

It was a party
where I wrote your name
on the cake in blue gel
and messed up so
the 'M' was too big, 
and the rest of your
letters too small.
But it was 
something.

We stood in the wind on the stoop,
all huddled round like penguins against
the wind to light the candles,
In the dark the little flames 
illuminated our faces 
which were cracked with 
shiny teeth, smiling.

All of us 
together as we sang
horribly out of tune and 
too quickly,
knowing with the 
pressing heat of our bodies
and the promise of a new
year,
we could hold onto each other
and not be blown away
in the night.