“That’s the Thing About Us”

“That’s the Thing About Us”

The I’m-sorry-s could cut a thin strip

a pirate’s cutlass, caught shaving

on the plank

you anymore:

that’s the thing about us.

That’s the thing about us:

when love gloves in phantoms

rainy fountains under green night suns

thunderstorm birthdays

clues rot beneath drawbridges

a mystery arrives, bitten

flesh removed to the bone

but we’re having a pillow party

chained ear to ear:

that’s the thing about us.

When the wind whistles

through the streets

and excites the flagpoles

of our seaside town

my uncle beneath the meat wagon

your butterflies

to exercise your thighs,

yet we’re still cheerful ghosts

even when motorcycles screech to halts

and halter-tops breech

electric fog perimeters

green dots on a video game grid

holding hands through a thousand years

of inhaled, bone-chipped stardust:

that’s the thing about us.

Thin azaleas walk by

a psycho train providing blue milk

on a vast desert,

sharing our knife wounds

struggling to trust:

that’s the thing about us.

Tags: Nicholaus Patnaude, poem, poetry, that’s the thing about us