i spit those words out
angrily
with the gumrot
and toothpaste
and last night's bacteria
(single-cell remnants of
a sleeptight kiss and
those screams[violentshudderorgasmic] you tried to suppress)

our mattress still trembles
with(out) you

my teeth are dull
and unamused
feeling insulted by the soldierlineup
of ceramic tiles
left/right
left/right
humdrum droning between my ears
and an underthedoor note
while i lather in a plastic bubble
(rinse/repeat
[i hate shower curtains]
rinse/repeat)
reads 'out of service'
despite your best intentions


i put on my unbest dress
(my upper lip starched to linencrisp perfection)


i'm your brightside passenger

you watch me hear music
devour it hungrily
as though i'd been audiostarving;
(wasting away
in radio static)
i command the stereo:
|fast}}forward|
|re{{wind|
|st[ ]op| (!)
in the very way i cannot |pau//se|
this daytrip nightmare


we laugh stupidly
brashly ignoring the trafficflow
and where it's
sweeping us
(mostly because
we are too afraid to breathe
[a waste of
conscious togetherness])


reluctantly!
i climb out of the car
i have [(not nearly) so often (enough)] loved you in
and we board a shuttlebus
whose doors hiss
with finality
the modernporter seems surprised
at my one modest tote--
apparently, i appear as though i should come
with more baggage


my shoes don't fit right
and i'm panicking:
i'm going to break this corkboard corkscrew notsohigh heel
and you won't be there
to steady my offbalance heart
as it lunges
for my throat


they detain me
for extensive security measures
(wish i had rigged a bomb
with my underwire;
hindsight? 20|20)
i make mouthsounds at the uniforms
and reassure them
i'm not a terrorist just terrified
in sheer yellows and a
watercolor rosebud screenprint


the no-smoking light is kept on
according to corporate policies:
i consider it a kind gesture
to elongate my life
the length of a lungful of ash and
i muse over this
while ignoring the tooyoung stewardess
and her incaseof--? advice
i'm hoping i'll regret that later

at cruising altitude i beg for a nosedive

i feel closer to you
at thirtythousandsomething verticals above
than fivehundredorso horizontals away
in another airport
another city
another empty bed


i crawl under the covers
and wish i were under you
or my homewrecker airplane