haunted house

perfume (yours) lingers in my room

though you haven’t entered it since october last

chasing it out with cinnamon candles and burning sage

can’t wash it from my sheets

fingers blue and cold and skeletal

i’m fascinated by the way they move

i like to watch them twisting and

in the dark club i watched the girl caress the microphone

and cried because her hands were just so small

and the way her teeth gleamed, too

was enchanting

there’s shoe prints just outside my windowsill

in the thick blanket snow, colored grey

you asked me once if i thought much about the universe

no, i said, it makes me nervous but

i did hear once of this wonderful color called

cosmic latte. how nice to think that space is

coffee-cream

the bones in legs and stockinged thighs

i stare at the ankles and wrists of passerby’s

at mid-afternoon i’ll think of psychosexuality and

my childhood fascination with cannibalism

i’ll wonder about how shoulder blades look

somewhat like angel wings

on the subway there’s that one line i won’t take

where we kissed our goodbyes and

you probably still take it to work

if you even still live here. if not then your ghost does

see-through hands holding leather-skin briefcase

i eat breakfast with said spirit

jam on olive-oil soaked bread and terrycloth napkins

and i’ll count to the air how many months that i’ve known you

cause i caught myself in the clothing aisle

telling a girl about somebody i used to know

which is stupid because once you meet somebody you know them forever

is that awful or is it just me?

i don’t wish to go on knowing you

or your fickle ghost that weaves its way around the city

and sits, still, on my mattress

and bends like the smoke from my candle collection

that’s collecting dust

my nose is pink with autumn’s cold

i lean out the window to see if the footprints have vanished

and they haven’t