snap

i held you between
my fingers
somewhere between
all the beer and cigarettes
and my skin became
yellow with the thoughts
rotting and maybe even dreams
rotting
and the only thing that's coming
that's still beating
are the bar flies buzzing

i kept you for too long
like preserves in a mason jar
and no matter how many times
i crash a car
i still walked away
with thoughts of you
i couldn't drop you
just like i couldn't drop
the bottle of stereotypes
that i was holding
or was it holding me?
i couldn't really see

do you have any idea
just how many times i tried
to find me sitting at the bar
instead i got a booth full of you
and it was every booth in every bar
i tried to wash you down with the booze
and i tried to put you out in an ashtray
but you lingered in my fingers
as i thought of how many times
these fingers touched
just as much
as how many times people
wrote how many poems
of this exact same thing
and i've always hated repetition
and i hate you too
but i'll do me justice
and write only one poem about you
and i just hope this doesn't make any sense
i hope you get lost in the metaphors
or typing errors of so many meaningless words
of "I heard that one before"

i wish i could kill you quickly
like a haiku
but three little lines are not enough
to destroy you

but no more sonnets
no more "oh woe is me"
i cannot be
another one of those poets
losing their voice in the echo
because we've already heard this poem before
perhaps i could lose this
in an anthology
where no one can find you
and then it won't matter to me

i just want to slam you
the way i slam words but
this kind of misery must never be made good
because this is not about you
this is about me trying to be understood

perhaps i could turn this into
a beat and we can all snap snap snap our fingers
just like every other beatnik
but i'd want to break those fingers
and then i wouldn't lose you in the shtick
i just want to snap inside because you are inside
still lingering but perhaps if i snap
my own fingers
i will come to
i will come to
and forget about you

c.JoelWaters2004