My feelings walk inside me like a man with a hammer— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —
The year of thirty must be by far the strangest one yet
Joe’s gone, his room says over his leavings,
and Rose and the house are harder to bear each day.
Soon the last shreds of her love will be torn
and the last of my security flown away
Its an ache to be there and yet I’ll probably always return
for Danny
I dreamed Bob the night before I met him
and when he arrived I felt prophesy on my shoulder.
And, tonight, when Rose told me
he wasn’t going to San Francisco
and that he’d been asking her out behind Nona’s back,
my dream came to reality.
“I’m seeing Rory”, she said, and I smiled…
I like Rory and he can’t make me insecure
Sorting photographs … cleaning the garage
talking, with control, to Bob and Nona,
eating Rose’s chicken and feeling this hammer.
I’m going to be alone again soon as I’ve not been
in a long long time
and on none of my fantasy girls can I rest
until this hammer has spent itself
I pray thee, thirty, move on.
gallagher
04 apr 78
Archive for April, 1978
1978-04-04
Tuesday, April 4th, 19781978-04-05
Wednesday, April 5th, 1978Living crazier day by day— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —
sometimes I wonder if I’ll be swept away
could my fortunes drop me off some edge
I feel the wind sometimes from that precipice
Its not a plan, I’m just staggering now
riding the crest of a good job
and my health
and knowing it for luck and youth
thinking I’ll get used to living alone
and writing poems like these
Rose would have me still
but I can’t find it in me
to give up this quest…
I want to squeeze life
until it reveals why it drives me so
and I’m not sure what I’m after
my youth’s passions will fade
and my lovers eyes will jade
our bodies grow old
and our careers peak
will this questing flame be so strong later
when love’s far behind me
and these illusions fallen away
I clutch it to me
perhaps just a small mirror of my ego
and I gamble everything away
day by day
gallagher
apr 5, 78
1978-04-05
Wednesday, April 5th, 1978Its so different between here and there.
just a dream two memories share.
and I remember from the other place
that her eyes and lips have pressed my face.
Its not easy to see her here,
amid the phones and the business air,
and sometimes we smile and say nothing much.
its empty and far…so far from touch.
Ah, but I remember where…remember where…
In the soft light I can see her eyes
looking at mine thru our impassioned highs
and her pursed lips waiting, dusky soft and square
like a crushed rose that cries for love’s repair
Yes, this comeS to me here, in the office now,
thru this glass wall amid the computer’s howl
that my soul has touched her’s in flight
and all these bright hours only await the night.
gallagher
05 apr 78
— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —