a goodbye note

you sit there in your borrowed suit, live, drunk

and he asks you where the poetry comes from

love, sadness, frustration. all that and more, you add

with a wan smile and a vague wave of your hand

but no, there’s never been a paucity of love in my life

with women coming and going my days have been rife

of course, but is there anything, he then ventures

that you ever really loved: a thing, person, maybe a picture

for some reason my heart begins to wildly beat

as in a lightning premonition that i wouldn’t admit

i already know your answer that i don’t want to hear

that picture did or could never exist, for all i loved were

someone’s hair, another’s fingers, sometimes lips or just feet

but that picture that i would love, was never complete

i’ve been sitting very still, though unable to speak

and only now does a bitter tear roll down my cheek

don’t blame me and i won’t hold it against you, for again

we both know that you’re married to your idea of love, your pain

that you’ve sold yourself to the audience; your life, in your wretched words

and you know they love you for it, for your heart-rending verse

for your morbid tales of love lost that you embellish with rhyme

so while i pack my bags to leave ‘coz i know you can never be mine

you sit there reciting for them your miserable ballad of love forlorn

you belong to the poem you’ll write, mourning when i’m gone