Red

After Mary fished the ring out of Raph's pockets
and put it on nodding yes with two squeezed tears
rolling down her cheeks, I found a legion more
dripping off my face onto the mountains of paperwork
I've come to accrue these past weeks, playing
secretary to you instead. Do you know what
diluvian means? Do you know what real means?
You laugh. There's no use crying over Latin.

2am, two summers ago we traipsed
drunk down Malcolm Avenue towards your
old apartment in pitch dark
except for the occasional triggered garage lights,
for once, my hand in yours, and even then I wondered
how I would remember this night, your gray coat,
Nazi-swastikas lining the bases of antique streetlamps,
Marilyn Monroe buried a few blocks away,
my hand still in yours, a miracle,
perhaps you'd forgotten it was there altogether.

Even as you slept last night, I could not say
to your steady heaving shoulder
the words that you detest so much
burning to catapult from between
my clamped lips, for fear you'd wake
in disgust and leave. Lover, I love you.
The silence poisons me. And you and I know:
I'm not crazy.