i gave my all, then...

i gave it my all,
then gave it
some more
just in case.
and it was
the story
of my
life
in
a
com-
pact
space,
packed
to the
rafters,
the moon-
beams, and
the seams of
reality slip and
slide and i gave
my all and then
the world beg-
an spinning. i
am spinning
still.

i gave my all
and i have al-
most nothing
left and i am
leaving and
i am filled
with emotions
from one end of
the spectrum to the
other as images flash
through my mind and
collide with memories
and crash into scenes
from this book or future
books or poems or what-
ever it is that eventually
sets me free because
i gave my all and then
it was time to give a-
gain and no gain or
return in the way
he wanted and
he weighed
his motivations
and came up short
for having a really good
reason to be so infatuated
and he was thirty six revolutions
of the earth around the sun old
and that's creepy maybe here
with no one knowing the
reference to the book
or the looks or the
faces or the
smile or
the. "what?"
or the "go now,
please" and i drift
away to my place, my
cave, my castle, my home,
my novel birthing planetary
space station and i try to
pluck and pick just the
good thoughts, but in
my mind i know the
truth. and it's not
an awful truth.
it's just the
truth. the
trust. the
sense of
nothingness.

i gave my all
to poetry and
i lived a simple
life knowing i'd
never mesh into
the real world of
day to day living
and the desire
for normalcy and
i do have that de-
sire so much and
i wish i could lay
next to someone
and not have my
thoughts explode
all over the room
and it's frustrating
for everyone involved -
the poet, the readers and
all the rest never seen.

the scenes change,
flash by in his mind -
the whole damn day,
almost every moment,
and it's overwhelming
sometimes to be set
adrift in the midst of
it and to have to live
with it, somehow
live with it. and
i gave my all
and still the
call is never
placed or the
phone is hung
up. whoops.
no goodbyes
just disappearing
and it doesn't matter
because my eyes are
opening as i give birth
and hope it's not still-
born again, this col-
lection of words, a
lecture on time and
love and the mixing
of human emotions,
a dangerous act under
even the best of conditions.

i gave my all and it wasn't enough.

looking back, it was as if i gave nothing
that was real
anyway.

i gave my all but maybe
wanted too much.

i gave my all, but she didn't
understand what i was
giving.