Happy birthday a few days late Aug. 2, 2014

  

No birthday cards, nor well-meaning emails or texts.

I let the day pass unremarked on except in the back of my brain where I struggle to recall how many candles I should put on a cake I know you will never eat, though I know somewhere on that special day you celebrated, the clock ticks for both of us, through mind has marked much more considerable passage.

Still, I mark my birthday on my calendar if only to acknowledge its annual coming, then trying not to remind myself of what it means, while with you, surrounded by friends and family, times moves much more slowly, something hold up the sand in the hour glass – it always runs quicker later when there is less time to count, my worry, not yours, though on this day, this year, you have to ponder fate and if the new year will grant you what you ache for in the year that has passed, and I wonder, do you expect me to remark again as I foolishly once did, if so, here it is, though I don’t believe you will ever get to read it.

email to Al Sullivan

I can’t see the stars April 18, 2015

 

I can’t see the stars for the skyline, the night time blaze I’m sure you can see where you are, from the vantage point far above the place where Burr murdered Hamilton, just not out of love, old poems filling my head about you being the brightest of these stars, only I am blinded by the brilliance of the city that never sleeps and can’t see passed it to see you, even at this late date, even when I know where you shine and when, it is not for me, and I settle for the illusion that you light up my sky just for me, and that if I try hard enough I can see you, even when I know I can’t, your light reflecting on this river that keeps me company when you are no longer here, a river we share, the pattern on the water taking your shape if I stare hard enough.

email to Al Sullivan

That face Oct. 12, 2025

  

I see it; I don’t believe it, all these years later, the same pang I got when I saw it way back when, different only in the periphery, hair longer, reaped over her should, n ot not the mouth or eyes, looking out from the picture frame as it did when I first saw it, drawing out of me the same acute reaction I can’t help but feel.

How this is possible, I can’t say, our livings having diverged, off into opposite directions, she finding the niche she spent a life time seeking, while I remain, like a rock, here in the same place, feeling the same as I did, helpless to modify the intensity of it, and so much do as I have always done, endure, taking off comfort in the fact that she still exists and is as hard to resist as she always was.

 

email to Al Sullivan

I’ve just seen a face April 6, 2012

 

  Everywhere I go

I see her face

Popping up on my phone

As if by magic,

Her slanted lips giving

A sardonic smile

(like Mona Lisa),

Her deep, potent eyes

Stare right through me

Right through the phone,

Just as she does

On Facebook,

Like a billboard I

Can’t possibly miss,

Too painful to look at,

Worse not to,

A face I can’t touch,

Yet touches me

Down deep,

Ike a wound

I can’t remember

Being inflicted with,

Aching from it,

Her face, her eyes,

Temptation beyond

Reach, her stare

Looking right into

My soul,

Raising the memory

Of that old Beatles

Tune,”

I’ve just seen a face

I can’t forget,”

Playing in my head,

I never stop hearing

The song or seeing

The face

Even when I’m

Only sleeping.

 

br>email to Al Sullivan

Come -- together March 21, 2024

 

Warmth greets me

As the pads of my fingers

Caress there,

Soft, wet, vibrating,

A shudder, then

A sigh,

A slow touch at first

Getting faster,

Until the earth quakes

In you, this

Piece of me,

The key in search

Of a key hole,

And the lock I must

Unlock to find joy,

I feel the heat of us

Spreading up

From where my fingers

Touch,

The first sparks to

Some wild fire,

Ready to ignite,

If I can keep pace,

Not too rough,

Not too gentle,

Just rough enough

Making the feeling

Grow more,

As I spread you wide

Where my fingers

Can feel even more,

The shudder

The stirring,

The deeper I go,

Searching for that

One place

Where it all

Comes

Together,

For both of us.

email to Al Sullivan

I still feel it May 14, 2025

  

I still feel the chill of the beer glass in my fingers, even all these years later, the dark bar, the old couple, the bartender she seeks to impress, and me, lingering on the edge of the stool like a truant school boy.

I still feel the chill of it as if it made its way down into my bones, this lingering sense of the inequitable I can’t shake, which grows more and more intense this time of year, the card and candy I foolishly brought, set aside on the bar, abandoned, if not forgotten.

I still feel it, as vivid now as then, as haunting ass the regular arrival of a full moon, stirring up something ugly, something I despise, something I wish I could take back, but can’t.

I still feel the chill of the glass against my hand as I pick it up to sip, inebriated by more than just hat the glass contains, and always will be.

email to Al Sullivan

Who she is now` June 10, 2015

 

Heavy rain comes and goes, pausing briefly as to provide some relief as I stroll again a landscape that reminds me of her, old buildings pressed up against new, painting gray by a moody day as gray as she must me.

I have no vision of her other than that impressed upon me on the oft chance she posts a picture of who she is now, when I envision her of who I remember, images of a past that has long ceased to be except as a dream, the remake of a reality impressed on my retina, too void of details to fully be real, and yet, it is what I cherish, the face I see when I close my eyes to sleep, the person I knew back then, when the person she is now remains a stranger.

 

email to Al Sullivan