By Amy Simone Piller
I barely know you
face so swollen
years passed too.
It shouldn’t be such a struggle
to tune out what does not matter—
music from another room,
someone else’s troubles,
getting whole milk out of public schools,
breathing, diaphragm and trachea,
(plunging into anything)
I cannot fathom
that you are a man
or alone.
But we see with stethoscopes
misunderstanding created by ropes
wondering what’s beneath
worried over approval stamps (not cheap)
symphony of typewriter clinks
silenced
new machinery
the silent car
disappeared process
Where’s start?
In chorus the family repeats kaddish
try to give the love that’s missing
the void that will never be filled
You were my first crush
first hope of touch
the rush
of feeling.
Your mother suddenly
taken by a bus
bike helmet and all
the greatest precautions
gone.
Vulnerability at its worse
hurts like nothing else
we’ll ever know.
By Amy Simone Piller
In my not trash
you are
amidst spam
saved for later
bills, the dishes—
invisible-making things,
we love our cogs
in a rectangle
stuck on our own watersheds
of unavoidable emissions.
One cannot disappear
the particles
of composition,
the components of
what we do not want
to waste time on
but feel we must.
You catch me,
momentarily
unmoving in
the universe’s whirl
stronger than wind
hair still billowing,
enchanted
with molecules
and their placement.
By Amy Simone Piller
You are so kind
to my wounds
soothing.
I need you to maintain
my selfish habits
above anything else.
Why are you still alive?
Rebel! Go on and die!
Where are your mold and rot
for me to consecrate?
If I feed you enough times
after half your appendages have gone
will you forgive me?
Will it really be forgiveness?
Will sorry have meant anything?
I am sorry,
I did not mean to destroy you.
I thought I’d killed you long ago.
What did you go holding on for?
By Amy Simone Piller
All winter you sputter and hiss
fighting equilibrium
unnoticing how cold it is.
Something stops
underwarm you are
craving childhood womb.
Unable to wake
you become accepting of
throws of warmth within.
You are meant for use
you cannot excuse
yourself
bleat air valve
struggle.
Radiate
radiate
all day we do.
What else is our calling
but to warm up a room?
By Amy Simone Piller
So many things to enter
let enter in
say the bar is the place
or the pencil the point
the drink the lubricant
the hand the motion
the gesture the spawning
the way we say hello.
Also there is the option too 
of not doing
staying home
turning in
to other pages
already had.
Was 
and will 
create
like eyes that never get the chance
to dance about one another.
Peacocks haven’t quite got it
though two eyes won’t do.
You will come inside me 
won’t you?
Expel what came, 
with what threatens.
Be here, 
be now.
By Amy Simone Piller
the notion all started
with a timer
no ding
just
sand slipping
holds an idea
something was someplace
appropriate once.
The boardgamed hold
youth says never
end this game
of “supposedto†as the sum
of its letters.
No news that
a
triangle
has 180 degrees
internally
theorems proven
things known
the triangle’s internal angles
add up to 180 degrees
the
the
difference.
Facting happens.
At some point
you supposed to
know how
to spell.
When did an end become an end?
When did a beginning start somewhere?
By Amy Simone Piller
The wretched alarm clock rings
but on balance it is not all bad
wretched alarm clock
a dream,
you beside me
asleeping
in wait.
Waiting for morning to come
amidst dreams that keep us awake.
From here who knows where we go
I will love you as if no more time
the blessed alarm clock does ring
I will love you though time tick-ticks on
I will love you though morning’s the same
I love you asleep and awake.
Where is the accompanied image?
The photograph to yellow and curl
the things that fade not yet made
Willingness develops a love
stronger than need
for alarm
constant as breaking of day
new as what can’t yet be explained.
When mid day you long for your bed
when midstnight you seek your defenses
find me preoccupied with your mind
our lives in parallel pressing on.
The blessed alarm clock will ring
tango of love
parabola
anti death.
By Amy Simone Piller
You still appear in my dreams
gone nightmares
where bionic cockroaches crawl
my kitchen floor
not quote scary enough
to scare me.
Sometimes you laugh
more often you don’t
even smile
which you always did
on command.
Instead you’re frozen
in the place no one watches over
where I left you
a figment of my dreams.
At a party someone said
I should call the news.
Make a scene
about your being
above and beyond;
the unfairness of where you are
the one chance application your teacher lost
the way your father appears;
the way it scares you;
the news?
On 6th and D you tell me
“I’m on my own from here,
it isn’t safe,â€
(you don’t say for you or me),
spin on your heels and
I watch you
disappear
clutching your bag of books—
the threads
we have in common.
Spotlighted by the bodega neon sign
I wonder,
will I be useless?
By Amy Simone Piller
Take a deep breath
you had your feet
kicked out from under you
the wind knocked
out of you
were caught
by surprise.
In nightmares
you take the part
of the torturer
torturing
yourself
for the mess in the coat closet
that isn’t even yours
the human need
to protect
disallowed
in your anxiety.
You should not drink
so much coffee.
Should you try
to care less?
By Amy Simone Piller
LOST THOUGHT
How was it,
how was it,
how was it? Again?
Lost it
not knowing
what I had
to lose
Thought floated,
gift unopened.
Shame to my tongue
for letting it slip
down my esophagus
what a miserable undigested mess
life needs
more time
remembering
not forget.