starved and fed

you used to get by
on winter nights indoors,
bordered by decorative banners
strewn with holly and mistletoe,
wasted and boiled:
the cost of the year for
the last of a
ruined breed,
whistling and splitting
in no age for purpose,
with the roar of a wet mile torn
black by pounded snow
for its only company.


the dinner theater storyline
lacks suspense down to
its posed broad questions with
the word "wrong" on your mind,
spit in time with a response.
proud to be loud, i know.
i know you too well for talk, lately.
your jaw sets like a stonemason
in good health, slipping
threats beneath chemical flowers
from your breath,
and banging morse code messages
with your thick, wooden fists
along the halls through fitful sleep
as if the next day
would be your deathbed.