We sleep in the abandoned house 
On top of a worn, rough carpet. 
Small creaks are heard underneath 
From floorboards, that are 
Exposed in spots 
Revealing coats of wax and stain. 
 
We wait for morning’s blur 
Pushing ourselves up 
With scuffed hands, still soft 
After the night’s search 
For baubles & bits worthy of trade 
From dumpsters, the urban Pandora’s Box. 
 
You found a book, still new 
Though its cover is creased 
Said you’d become a writer 
Said it’s already been written 
...Somewhere. 
 
The city seems to flicker. 
We wait ‘til afternoon 
To take a shower at the center 
Looking for a cure  
to the night.
 
In the rec room 
There’s television news in the periphery  
Featuring the fallen... 
Car wrecks and shopping malls 
Losses of temper & savings accounts. 
Fashion zombies writing best sellers. 
Cops, cops, and more cops. 
Snow at five, touchdown at six.  
Stay tuned for murder at eleven. 
 
The walls at the center glisten  
But so does everything. 
Oil shapes our safety 
From the gloves that handle our births 
To the glossy final finish in a box. 
Life unravels in microfibers. 
Even the old floor we sleep on 
Is topped with a polymer that flakes  
Its bits colored like peanut brittle. 
 
An insane medium sits in a corner 
Next to a group of schizophrenics. 
She says, “Pick a fate. Any will do. 
But it must be done not as you, but by another you. 
Amass! Amass! Be a mass cookie cutter 
Fender bender, beach comber 
Record collector, gas cap aficionado, murderer. 
This isn’t reality TV, this is reality.” 
 
We pick perfection as our fate 
One where our bare 
Feet glide across a tiled floor  
All smiles 
To a refrigerator filled 
With presents to ourselves, where 
The fat has gelled inside our ground beef 
And broccoli, still firm 
In its plastic bag. 
On shelves, there are jars of berry preserves 
As red as the day they were picked.  
There is a real bed, with a comforter 
We would make love. 
 
Millionaires and sports heroes have come  
to the center to serve turkey to the homeless. 
It must be Thanksgiving. 
A news crew is here to tell the story  
About how real they are 
How clever they are to have picked their fate. 
They seem uncomfortable handling mashed potatoes. 
The medium smiles at us and helps herself to a huge portion 
Of cranberry sauce. 
She says, “Fate is that little dog that won’t stop barking  
At everything and nothing.” 
And she laughs, mimics a dog bark. 
Her lips are stained a weird kind of pink. 
 
The cooked turkey is greasy, 
Oily. It’s basted in something unique. 
Our fingers become slick 
We lick them dry while heading back to 
The abandoned house 
Carrying leftovers. 
 
You’re wearing your jeans 
The ones you have worn a hundred times. 
I know them so well 
I’ve memorized the weave 
Of their blue threads and 
The one button that won’t stay buttoned. 
It is as if you’ve written these memories down 
Inside of me...somewhere. 
We lie down on the ragged carpet 
Waiting for the night. 
I kiss your lips. 
They are softer than any other  
Lips in existence.