DE PROFUNDIS
It isn't a wilderness, through which no man passes.
It isn't a shibboleth, which guards the door.
It isn't a serpent, which circles me now.
How alone I am tonight.
Beyond my seeing
The dotty neighbor licks his chops.
His eyes graze vainly on chinks of light
And his drooling mouth knits for a kiss.
Responding to a 911,
The paramedics found her pickled corpse
Stinking on the couch.
I am the penumbra of an uncharted moon.
I sampled
Your absence from a public spigot.
A vice grips my head;
Vectors invade.
It isn't a river, which leaves my limbs.
In the morning I piled onto the metro,
Deluged with dross and pillage.
In the adjacent seat
She resurrected your ambivalent smile.
r.l. swihart
R.L. SWIHART says, "Though I am many, I'll be contented to spotlight only my quadruplicate-self which, like a nested Matryoshka doll, consists of me and the-family-within: RLS (I'm shy, so until we're more intimate the initials will do), Ania (the devoted wife), Katia (started 1st grade in September), and Nadja (quite the fledgling at 2.5 yrs). I read heavily. Imbibe moderately. Work when I have to (math teacher). Am hounded by all nine muses at once."
