Creaks

1. Birthday Week
.
.
They feel obliged
to tell me what
they really think,
as if this
were going to be their last
.
chance. I spend the days
squirming in the
forgotten past. I draw
more of the wrong
connections between
.
memories. The candles
on the cake
burn out
before I can
blow at them.
.
I want to go back
to the silken rooms,
personal paradise
of private
memory.
.

2. Movie about Carolina

.

.
What can they really give me
those others in far away houses?
Even as we gather. l see them clear.
That makes them distant.
We never join. Their strength never
enters my body. I remain alone.
Sometimes the cold
makes me afraid. Cold
and fear are dread. Dread
makes endings.