time is deep into the night
i am alone as i like it.
about 20 feet away i hear my puppies
licking themselves.
a noise that keeps the monsters away
and lets me know
that i am thinking,
that i am alive,
that i am aware that
20 feet away is life.
 
goodnight Michael.
too bad i did not get to meet you in this plane.
i think initially we would not have liked each other,
then maybe i would have liked you a little,
then maybe you would probably have thought…
 
i was hysterical and crazy.
but maybe i would have been in
the pre-contemplation stage of maybe thinking
of liking you a little bit more than
the prior day.
but it doesn’t matter anymore,
does it Michael?
 
i will tell you a secret.
i went into the computer today
to hear your voice.
it was soft and friendly,
priestly at times.
it made me very sad.
as a matter of fact
i wasn’t sure what to expect.
you are smart.
you are far away.
you are in my walls,
etched in the clay of my skin.
unbeknownst to us both!
 
are your pictures your memories?
your newspaper lines,
your broken parts,
your Chinatowns,
all of those colorful delights?
i feel you at the base of my brain.
my heart is nauseous
knowing how you suffered.
my heart is very nauseous
knowing i cannot fix myself.
Michael i think you would have dismissed me.
 
i have two left feet
and could not have danced for you.
your memories your pretty dancers.
your pink pajamas hit me fucking hard.
you are unfair.
i never met you.
i never shook your flesh or looked you in your soul.
like men,
like cowboys and astronauts and Superman.
Michael in a most secret and non-sexual way
you have made me into a woman.
like a cure with no disease,
i continue to think like a man.
 
in my boxes,
and my pen,
and my quill,
and my colors,
and my spoons,
and all the steps
i have to take.
12 aren’t nearly enough while believing not in one,
but smiling so they can survive
through you.
 
Michael i have learned to communicate.
a lesser temple granting me what no one else could
grant me here on earth.
you saw it in my inner fears.
the deepest of my perils,
from the cave men to the banana men.
all of humanity beyond you were there imploring,
when i implored for my father
and you knew how i felt when i was 4.
discarded twisted teddy bears.
my menagerie of life.
 
how could you know how i felt?
i don’t understand Michael.
all of my gambles crystallized in one screen.
your words and your contract
gave me a wall to wail upon.
when no one else willingly accepts
what has been created of me.

for Mike Kelley