Being Near You

.

     Being near you is like that small, tickling

stomach lurch of primal disgust

       swallowed, a half-asleep realization that

          crawling sensation tingling along an inner thigh

               is some diseased cockroach probing

                    toward unguarded private door…

far too sickened to stop it.

.

     Or like those fever moist,

night drawn, embalming fantasies, poison dreams,

     buried bathroom memories

          of some relative other

using a pretty doll as a personal convenience store,

     a pocket-sized, anatomically correct pleasure toy…

          always too shamed, forever scared to scream.

.

     Or like these eternal shattered crystal

headaches, which define

     my existence,

          and beg for release

               and make me angry

                   and make me cry

                       and make me deny

     there was a world, a sometime

place you never were,

      where I could laugh, love, live,

          maybe finally rest in peace…

.

     Being near you

isn’t

     worth

          these sleeping pills,

               this lulling bath,     

                   that blooding blade,

or stolen life.  Is it?