Five Poems by Rp Verlaine

 

Disconnect 

 

A sleek cell phone

dials her wrong number

till I guess right.

 

The vacuum she left me

to feel invisible in

never lifts for long.

 

Flashbacks in stasis

recall her in shadows

where I found her lost,

 

We shared love's illusion

while others wanted casual

but her pride said no.

 

Then a bad marriage

a three-day honeymoon

and weekend divorce.

 

Tonight, she entertains

another certain to leave her

before the candle dies.

 

I hear his laughter

as she hangs up phone

while I wish both harm.

 

Until I find a bar

for broken men

nothing will make whole.

 

8 whiskey shots

buying rounds on credit

like fading old fighters

 

Later I will walk

home in a spell

broken by police sirens.

 

Just one block

from where I live

Yet jail seems closer.

Sting of Summer 

 

Uninvited heat 

wakes me each day 

with its torturous reach

leaving shadows on 

a broken air conditioner. 

 

Her last goodbye 

rewinding like a top 

going backwards with 

the spin it was 

all for the better. 

 

Yet I miss the warmth

of us dancing close

in loud and liquid ballrooms 

envied by those sweating

towards a missed perfection. 

 

5th day in row 

over ninety-five degrees 

the shade as unsparing

I miss her being close 

and games we played with ice.

 

Artificial Sweetener 

 

Unwritten exceptions

undermined escapes

our novel approach.

 

Tactical engagement

of unspent collateral

in linear non-speak.

 

Suggestion surrenders

impulses as electrical

discarded warnings.

 

Uninvited 

in my own body

I want yours.

 

Trying to be human

in this android factory of

dazzling spare parts..

 

Immobile until

inertia surrenders

remote possibilities

 

Love becomes

a tempting commodity

others manufacture.

 

We take our places

In the assembly line

the latest models.

 

Testing love as placebo

an  artificial sweetener 

we’re both devoured by.

Tubular 

 

Overwrought

your a special kind

of fragile tonight

hallowed out and all

recognition is void/ lips numb

mascara slow motion runs

to your faint blush a lie

while Don't and Not 

imbalance attempts to converse

each a pivot timed to look away

and escape it all .

 

I confiscate your pills

take a few /hide the others

I can't leave you or stay here.

manic past reason.

You’re a threat to others

stalking empty space like

It has any answers.

 

in the next room I wait

arms outstretched while

outsourcing  emotion 

waiting for your drugs 

To obscure, eclipse, pass

& no longer  reach you  

where our future is hiding.

Tender Bruises 

 

Her gold ankle bracelet

advertised fetish work

that would cost more

than it would hurt.

We do lunch

2 dinners

and drinks

then more libations

in one night.

 

When the sun comes up

we are beautiful in the sunlight

but also naked at the beach.

With  tender bruises we only

partly remember...

the police asking  many questions.

Rp Verlaine lives and writes in New York City. He has an MFA in creative writing from City College and taught English in New York public schools until he retired. His first volume of poetry, Damaged by Dames & Drinking, was published in 2017 and a second collection, Femme Fatales Movie Starlets & Rockers, in 2018. A set of three e books titled, Lies From The Autobiography 1-3 followed in years 2018-2020.