Ground into the Hurt

Ground into the Hurt

I’m ground down in the Hurt like cigarette
in ash tray — broken over, splaying ash,
tobacco, paper white or splotched, and felt
(the filter). I’m a car forever crashed,
a promise I did not keep. Can’t even melt
completely: No, I linger like dried glue
from hot glue gun on craft-time table top.
I linger at the door, at all doors you
have ever lived behind. I just don’t stop.
I ring the bell. I knock. I call your name.
I say can you come out and play. I hop
to glimpse your window room. “Is it too lame
if I ask you to homecoming?”, the prom,
the Spring Fling, anything? I pace the lawn,
I smoke a cigarette and politely
walk down to the street where I smear it lightly
across asphalt made sacred by nearness
to you, my fragrant shelter. Little miss,
please watch me grind my hope out in the road
an inch from a curb that fronts your abode.
Oh, never mind! I seem to stay right here,
Expecting still your footsteps drawing near.

I seem to prefer sitting alone on the curb outside your home
to admitting you have chosen another way and I am here alone.
The Hurt was born before you.
It’s not your job to fix it.
The Hurt has torn me. But who
could should would lick this bit?,
so I might believe myself a man
while not feeling so very alone.

I’ll just go
Can’t help these mix-ups once they’ve happened.
But the fog’s so dense and grainy today,
a man could slip away,
could go start over
some place where he’s not
already gotten it all
mixed up.

Author: BW
Editor: AW
Copryight: AMW

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