I keep forgetting to include the kiss
fear of forgetting cannot be cured
with remembering

I hear a voice on the plane intercom
mumble something
no one else hears

I can’t make out what the artist
who creates mummy sculptures from shrink wrap
says about their souls

dead fathers are as proud
of their daughters
as when they were alive

scratch that
no one knows
what a mummy desires most

the one I dream about last night
is not the one I touch with my lips and thighs
26 years ago

he is the one who shares a chicken dance
with the one I touch
that second night in a backstage trailer

that doubles
as a green room
no green in sight

not even under the table
with tour rider leftovers
spilling forth

his brother dies 22 years ago
from a drug overdose
in the dead of a deadly cold Minnesota winter

he used to play cards
with my two closest buddies then—
both dead now too

he used to call me his Amybody
the brother that is
not the one I dream about last night

doesn’t call me anything
that time he and the lead singer
drop their jeans to their ankles

just cackles
a signature cackle
you know the one

I keep forgetting
whether I forgot to take my pills
so I take another

am I an amnesiac
or an addict
or simply an imposter in a silver dress

to the tabula rasa man I say
clean your own slate
clap your own erasers

I’m busy
pretending I haven’t
considered you naked

I remember that Indian girl in first grade
her father is missing some fingers
they say he lost them in the spokes of a bicycle wheel

a bike turned
upside down
but that makes no sense

a 27-year-old man tells me
about riding the Coney Island Cyclone
how he would take greater risks

when he was a kid
I think
you are a kid

you are the age I was
when I rip my life to shreds
just to get a better look

at the lakes from plane view
eventually falling
into one of them

I do not drown
I do die
I do not drown

you mention the beauty
of Leonard Cohen’s song
you want it darker

you look directly at me
when you say this
yes go darker

and I say
that voice
I am always saying

that voice

the airplane bathroom
is held together with magic blue
masking tape

you warn me
not to get attached
not to stick to one for long

we torture ourselves
with the choices
we don’t make

we torture ourselves
by returning to the scene
of some stolen love

you know the ritual
we are both trying to recover from
an incense hangover that has no cure

when I tell you I have accomplished
my two lifetime goals by age 27
you tell me

don’t just run a marathon win one
don’t just publish a book publish a novel

our story begins toward the end
of the third act
has nowhere to go after

the is it mine question
I want to listen
to songs that make me feel

like I’m falling
off the edge of the earth
into an algae bloom infested pool