And I fit my problems in the valleys
'tween the mountains of my stucco ceiling
Painted mint green to freshen the taste
                                     of betrayal.

I solved them by reading books
about people whose lives I could never touch
and feelings I could never taste.

        for all my artisan prowness, I just wasn't
                      creative enough
                           talented enough
                                known enough

     to paint my way out of the corner I had
            so unwittingly written myself into.

Words create situations,


                                      but can they change them?

          We deemed stucco old fashioned
                           and covered it with a wallpaper
                                        darkly vibrant,
                                        deathly humorous,
                                        agonizingly simple
                                             and fake.

          (   You                still            the
                         could            feel              bumps;

                                  you                 still           the
                                             could           see            shadows.      )

I wrote for pages
               about the inevitable.

          The inexorable
                                          pounding
                                                                   of the summer rain

                      The thundering
                                                       sadness
                                                                               of the pettiest of pains

          And it was true, that life made the best story.

                          I was just scared of what the ending would be.

    I dreamed about death and the beating of wings.
              of spiders and wheat and the tapestry of all things.

I laid awake and wondered why we never counted stars.

                    I sat still in the dark and wondered if it wasn't
                                the light that was the shadow;
                       if we weren't by nature darkness
                                    casting a feeble light on the holy relics around us.


        I closed my eyes.


                   I        CLOSED        MY        EYES




                                                        but you were never there when I opened them.