Old Love

You can't impress me with that crap of yours
About the truth. I don't believe you'd know
Truth if it smacked you in that spot below
Where you've developed gonorrhea sores.
Sad platitudes are leaking from your pores
And you spread garbage everywhere you go,
All day, all night. The winds of Monaco
Are ripe with lost bets and disease-filled spores.

You told me we would win on thirty-nine,
But thirty-nine remained an empty slot
Through fifteen nights. The air was salty, hot,
And I turned forty. Someone drank the wine
I saved for celebrating in the shrine
Where I was promised new love. It was not.

Easy to Explain

The mast was loose, the morning we set sail
And drove towards the west, grave and resigned.
We watched the untoward east wind unwind,
And promised, falsely, we would never fail.
The mast fell, and the galleon in the gale
Began to founder, finding us as blind
As rats drowned in the bilge. But never mind:
It's easy to explain death to a nail.

Remind me how it happened we survived,
Rejected by the sea, borne, still, blown through
And heartsore, compromised by a rogue crew,
Remained afloat when all the lifeboats dived
Deep in the cold saltwater. As we thrived
The world came to an end — no, that's not true.