Underneath the Floorboards and Months Across these Doors.

He sat there, turning his fingers around and studying the fingernails that

tip tapped

against the windows I had kept...

closed...

for fear of seasons dripping in, he

sat there

with no concern for the curls that fell across my winter worn cheeks, for the moisture that covered my face, for the blue eyes that stripped him...

he decided...

nothing.

I ignored the lack of depth in him and measured his silence with yardsticks 2 feet too long, his inappropriateness excited me...

and I dissolved somewhere in the mess of sheets on a Tuesday afternoon, while he

tip tapped

telephones and excused selfishness with a kiss upon my skin, Decemeber-drunk and ripped

between his teeth.

I reasoned with logic and mocked the irritation of my heart, he was out of sync with tomorrow, she breathed him out with the sighing of dandelions, he stuck himself

right in the middle of me

and I accepted nothing, the edges of my brain stained with Edger Allen Poe and the absence of literature inside his mouth...

I could smell him down in Florida and I knew....

somewhere in the cracks of me I still wanted him, he bled from my skin with no

concern

for the

tip tapping

that now resided in my head, I was nothing more than a corner to him, nothing more

than cobwebs and something

a little bit

beautiful.

I shocked myself with his disdain for acceptance and watched him dirty himself with pride...

I

tip tapped

my fingers on his forehead to hear the rattling of thoughts

and silence screamed back with the audacity

to mock

him...

but winter loved us once, and arguments mirrored secrets, he slept, violently, and I rocked back

and forth

on the edge of these memories yesterday

as I washed his

blood

off my bathroom door.

Reviews

[Marie Anzalone]

The imagery in this is pure astounding, and you weave a tale of suspense like few I have seen. I am unsure whether to take the ending as fact or metaphor, but it deos not change the slow descent into realization, one whit. This is a piece that will saty with me, and will leave me pondering the repetition, the way you strung the images together, and the way you inhabited the narrator of the poem so deeply i could feel her breathe. Spellbinding.

[Antonio Valentino]

Good lord Jean, this is sensational... whew! What a wonderful talent you have, I'm glad I got to meet and read you today, this was... perfect in many ways I can't even explain quite yet. I'm sure as I read this and more of your work, it will dawn on me why your writing clicks with me, besides that its just amazing.

[Doctor JKC]

I get the Poe reference.

It's hard to get rid of something/somebody
whether in your mind on in this reality
known as "these days."

I hope you used lots of bleach
and a fine cutting tool.

Excellent!
Dr. Callaghan

[Perdition]

Good Lord where to begin or end...
First of all...To be measured in depth of Mark Twain...A shallow depth indeed .but the man behind it's name...wow ..such hope. To let these ledges in and begin to hear Poe tapping beneath the floorboards in tell tell Heart, let it wash away with the blood of disdain or to see a web of lies spilled into corners The understanding...the spider.
All the while growing mad in the stillness that rests upon your lips when windows have once more been closed yet the tapping of fingers still inside...
Oh to be "alone" again...in your brilliance....Only this and nothing more.