let this be the last chance for choosing

for there are no choices left.

birds freely enter my house

circle the ceiling

searching, never finding sunlight.

for it is midnight

my home is a cave

made from feathers.

life sometimes executes us slowly

knife slashing at our hearts

our blood bravely coloring treeless sidewalks.

and death patiently walks behind

waiting to see how I might react to its tap on my shoulder

to read what I write

to approve who I meet

to mock how I will cope with being forsaken.

still, there is time,

even after clear eyes get Monday,

there is enough time.

a remaining choice

cannot be as clear

as bringing flowers to a stranger’s funeral

somebody else’s suicide.

what other alternatives?

eggs over easy with

whole wheat toast and blueberry jam?

that simple?

sit and laugh as the slit in the world widens?

dream of women becoming President?

sniff a finger of bourbon in the gut

while singing the praises of vaginas gone cold

penises discarded sour

passion permanently out to lunch?

there are rumors of male lovers

climbing over the walls of your mind

ants over a honey jar.

have any of these bachelors presented you

with alternative plans

improvised from your moon in Cancer

squaring your Libra heart?

there may be no choices left this season

waiting for some inspiration to cut across all this ice

suffocating us inside this sauna.

choosing to do it all over again

without guitar minor chords

watercolor pastels

and Keats.

there is a subway train

moving beneath our sanctuary

straight into the sweat of the City.

there are purple mountains

forming beneath our sanctuary

amongst the whimsical skies of New England.

there is an East Village bar on St. Marks Place

relocating beneath our sanctuary

decadent from the hustle and stench of drugs.

there is a black widow spider

aching to sting me into

sweet poison inevitability.

there is a full maned lion

chasing me through the fires

inside my African brain.

is it really better to have a choice

how to lose again

or is it preferable to stand inside numbing rain

becoming part of another merciless cycle?

choices can be like mixing colors-

too many and you get gray.

finding the strength to say “no” can be like

the loneliest state highway this side of Idaho.

lying alone with your lover

can be like fucking a hole in your mattress

crying wet tears the first time since the big cut.

so lead me on a journey far away

to fight in a war

without learning to kill.

so lead me on a journey far away

to drink from another fountain

as it gets terribly thirsty down here.

so lead me on a journey far away

to silence any search

amongst the ashes

of love’s unforgiving cinders.

Bisbee

Summer, 1980