Russian spring bleeds damp into narrow gutters
as my socks grow wet and rough,
cat tongue in my boots.
The cracked ice of the river is clear,
and the steady rhythm of teacups clinking promises
gives me comfort. In my hands a basket of garlic
and onions, brussels sprouts for his liver,
a tin of wild blueberries for his nerves.
All of which he will most certainly hate
and let rot. His building glitters white,
nestled in the thick morning dim.
I make my way through a hallway dark
and narrow as a murderer’s mind. I know
he is listening to my footsteps creaking wood,
paranoid as he is. The tree trunk of a door
is open when I reach it, his eyes moody
and sunken, yet somehow bright as his mind.
The only light in his room from the semi-circle
of a window high on the east wall,
and one tiny bowing lantern threatening to burn the place
down. He sits squeaky on his bed of copper springs,
as I plop myself onto the worn armchair,
cracked leather scraping my elbows.
The whole place ridiculous, no one in their right mind
could stand to live here. Which is why I love him.
Those eyes grin at me in the yellow fog of his room,
and he knows my question before I even speak.
He says between clean mouthfuls of vodka,
“The goal is to be precise as the planets’
orbit, like my fingertips on your right thigh,
like your certainty that death is the end.
Precise as the second your car sailed
over that ledge. This is what I know,
and all that I can tell you.”
And in the distance a train screams, there is
only you, as I cross the short distance to him.
Our bodies threatening to crash through the old
wooden floor, our weight exhaling time
on that weary excuse of a bed.