pieces of paper on a washroom floor

i.
thoughts spill around my feet
puddles i have yet to kick my way through
water yet to find a gutter and spill its way
coursing gush towards these polluted great lakes
all of the great loves and abandonment
i was taken in by a smoky girl with black painted eyes
she held me on her black canopied bed, smoked
hashish but then snorted heroin
i laid next to her, convulsing
everything i have ever held too closely flees in the night.

ii.
my father was a mirage,
brought on by the heat of a needy boy's mind.
i assigned to him all those paternal stereotypes,
we played ball while he was already drunk,
soft back and forth baseball tosses in the backyard
my father smelled of dark wood, bourbon, entire
cartons of light cigarettes.
he ended up on a plane to south america, all things go.

iii.
you managed to crack me open, laid me bare
like waterfowl struck by a passing sedan, on a state road.
my wings bloodied and broken on the gravel,
you found my heart buried in resin and regret
left me staggering
as you traveled eastward,
my heart dull in my throat.
nothing cinematic ever happened, i just
never took the chance.