looseleaf

my old coat is getting worn at the
elbows from thinking too hard, and
getting in one too many fights for
pride and all sorts of things you
forgive me for, because that's
what you do.

and you know when you're gone
i dream of hotels where you lie
surrounded by black and white
television and dream of a boy for whom
goodbye was too good a word and there
we sleep, eaten alive by napkins and
monsters under the bed but we don't
mind much for they have very comfortable
stomachs and really the daylight was
a hindrance anyways.

i love you paper airplanes, and
you love me a mermaid's silver nose
and really that's all that matters
to either of us, but i think you have
too many hearts in your collection
and we'd better make sure you're not
holding on too long.

so i'll meet you in the field at dawn,
we'll take color photographs and wish
we lived in a charming black and white
mansion that doubled as a hotel, and
i'll play the guitar and howl a bit,
saying "fare thee well" and writing
you postcards that are described by
the historians as surreal and esoteric,
but you know exactly what i'm saying
and wouldn't care if you didn't, because
postcards always remind you of back home
and the way poetry can be like a smell:
it sends you colors and stories and
shivers up your spine, but you don't
always know what it means; it's like
a dream where you meet strangers in hotels
and they help you out, just as if you were
in an old movie.