Are you, after all,
comfortable using a knife?

Is there some great love in you
for how that will feel —

like a pillow resisting
until it suddenly surrenders and breaks?

Are you sure you want
to be forever known this way: a man

with more than a plan?
A man with an act at hand?

Are you comfortable there, sitting
in your car’s front seat, sitting

in your empty garage staring down
at your lap? Are you ready to pick it up?

Are you any clearer
as to what it will mean to see it through?

Are you ever going to stop shaking
long enough to make this happen?

Are you ready?
Are you a man or a missed opportunity?

Are you awake anymore?
Are you already done?

Are you already skinned and
dressed? Or —

are we going to have to go through this
again tomorrow night?

Well, then.
We can do this again —

I will be here tomorrow night.
I will be here until I’m not needed anymore —

waiting and honing
my whisper for you,

my boy with a blade;
all for you and your slippery heart.

-I-

There once was a man from Nantucket,
Who kept several snakes in a bucket.
Said he with a smirk,
“A cage didn’t work.
After several escapes, I said, ‘Fuck it.'”

-II-

There once was a man from Nantucket,
Who reviled football player Jim Plunkett.
The guy said, “That bum
Just sat on his thumbs.
And now these Pats are champs — who’d a thunk it?”

-III-

There once was a man from Nantucket,
Had a pipe that was too clogged to suck it.
Said he with a giggle
Giving the stem a wiggle,
“Dude, there’s so much resin in there…wow…somebody gimme a paper I can wipe it on, this stuff is sweet…no, no, roll one anyway, this’ll take some time…and put on that Phish tape from the Maine shows…”

I still love
every lover I’ve had
I swear

but a fog settles
on my blood
thinking of all of you

at this point you are
mostly mist
to me

I wish I still knew all your names
I wish I still recalled more than a moment
of what we were like together

I claimed to love you all
I claim to love you still
I can’t even see you well

there’s a shadow growing around me
as if a dam that holds back horror
has started to leak

can I truly be a man
if I never remember every one of you?
or I am just playing myself

like an old actor at career’s end
with too many speeches delivered
to recall any one in detail

I pray it’s true that actors are not
responsible
for their characters’ deeds

for if so then
I may be absolved —
and yet, there’s this:

who, exactly, am I then, this hack actor
without portfolio
standing here dreading night?

and who was that who was saying
he loved you? who was that holding you?
who was that man I was pretending to be?