Summer season of self repair, motel bathroom and reclining chair. Novel genre, being alone, fiction ego, paper throne. Barron locations, town and range, a couple months brought down in two days. Consolation in isolation, consolation in isolation. Homeliness in loneliness. // The last time that I wrote to you was two addresses ago. I think you’d like my outfit, but I’m losing it steady and slow. Anyways, it boggled you to think: I felt the way you felt about me, about you. Isolation, insulation in isolation. Wonder how you feel now. // He’s in a willow tree grown taller than me, reaching for the sky, for his son. One more day with him, please, I only ask for one. I can see the hospital bed, I’ll remember good times instead. Consolation in isolation, consolation in isolation. There’s a hole I’ll never sew. // Sickly season of self repair, stressful sleep and stubborn hair.

… periods of time … My life … periods of time … My life … measured in periods of time … My life feels like it’s measured in periods of time … My life feels like it’s measured in periods of time in between … My life feels like it’s measured in periods of time in between seeing you My life feels like it’s measured in periods of time in between seeing you // You were the only one I ever wanted to impress. You might be surprised how often I think of you. I had a dream where we kissed, I said “are you sure?” you said “yes.” // My life feels like it’s measured in periods of time in between seeing you My life … measured in periods of time in between seeing you My life feels … measured in periods of time in between seeing you My life feels like it’s measured in periods of time in between seeing you

From as far as I can tell, you are just my lab partner. From as far as I can tell, you are taken by another. Half unknown, I’ll leave you alone, though it looks like I’ve been looking for you. You tied a string around my brain, he’ll tie a string around your finger, for the best. No goodbye but maybe I won’t see you again. // Yes, I know that you want to live in a different state. Well, I guess I noticed you a little bit too late. A change in tone, now you’re on the phone, I think it’s too late for me to come over. I’ll walk with you now but next time, you’ll walk alone and right out of this town. I should have known early on, but this time would still come ahh. // Power over me, I listen what you say. But you’re out of reality, in this foreign place. Far away from home, kept unknown, you stuck to me like that clay. Once in a life with a dress so bright, in a new setting, but the story’s the same. I’ve known her ten years you all are not quite the same.

Relation in blood, relation in spine. Now one is gone, my water will never be wine. // The youngest of fourteen, just a boy growing up on a farm, From a boy to a man, a man to a dad, a dad to ashes; He’s living off of borrowed time, in dreams and photographs, But when I wake up or look away, he’s gone all over again. In our family videos he’s happy, hard to hold my tears, If he could see through the screen, he’d be proud of me, rewind to those Cedar Road years; He would always regret his absence at the harvest of the corn that he grew, Does he now regret missing most of my life and widowing my mother too? // Forbidden fruit in the form of a bottle, a bottle or a can. Forbidden fruit poured into a glass, over and over again. // He made it off the farm, survived the navy, and the city, Who would have thought that what would end his life would be an amber colored pity; It’s legal for adults and overlooked for kids, so surely you can’t get addicted, I’m told I would have a little more fun if I had one drink and then two more. At too young an age he was offered a deal: perfect life, poisoned body, He took that deal, he left us with money, he left us for good; He would say “you’ll miss me someday,” like we didn’t love him then, Well we missed you then and we miss you now, was it worth it in the end? // Forbidden fruit in the form of a bottle, a bottle or a can. Forbidden fruit poured into a glass, over and over again. // He tried to hide it and I guess he did, from everyone but us, Other people knew a different man, he’d never lost their trust; He would hide it in his computer code, trees, and toothy grin, Well it’s hard to hide when you cough up blood and commit one too many sin. This story isn’t new, we heard it a year before, You can win the battle on a Friday night, but on Monday lose the war; People still drink in this dairyland, every night of the week, But I’ll remember I was left with just a mother before I could legally drink. // Forbidden fruit in the form of a bottle, a bottle or a can. Forbidden fruit poured into a glass, over and over again. // I guard my liver, and I guard my heart. I stay sober and lonely, time to unearth my buried parts.

Neighbor offered me a sprig of mint, distracted by a square stemmed sentiment. Distracted from things I can’t even think about, parts of me so deep down, don’t know how to get them out. So many words left to give you, so many words and deeds to take back, but this man from next door doesn’t know all of that.

Both of my grandfathers gone, before my memory, one rode the caboose, the other planted trees. I fear that pulling out one memory, will bring along the rest, nostalgia for another person’s past. I trust men that smell like coffee, wood, and cigarettes, the worse I’m feeling, the better I’m dressed. Everything is backwards, everything’s the same, pain brings me pleasure, and pleasure brings me pain. One week of reprieve, in my rubber boots, twenty year old carving, I burned my birthday suit. Good things come, to those who wait, well these good things, are testing my patience. // If a year ago a beer can was put six feet up a tree, at what height will it be, when the one who drank it, becomes deceased? Looking over trees, to see the sturgeon moon, A few weeks with a woman, who plays the bassoon. Out of season heat, brought water up my tires, descended from, women made of wires. The next three months, all happening tomorrow. The past five years, all happened today. Washed up in outwash, danced with death, my first love still, makes me catch my breath. It’s not good, but it’s the best you’re going to get, I try so hard, to make it look effortless.