Half Truths

When they ask you if you’d hurt yourself or someone else

You say no. It’s what you say.

So when I went out from the clinic to kill myself

I drove very carefully.

Wet sage from thunderstorms.

Hard light crying off the moon.

Almost makes you want to stay here

Until you get to thinking.

There were horses near the highway

Outside of Toas

And I always liked horses

So I was holding

This dun cheek in my tar covered hand

And then I couldn’t see too well

So I sat down against a fence post.

The road home was still all wet

Along the grass line

And the greenness was

As suffocating lovely

As tallness or speaking just inches

From her ear.

There were dogs and coyotes arguing

And skunk musk a long way off.

My god, the moon crying so hard.

I drank two more so I could sleep

And took off my boots

Thinking of the tall, pretty one

I never kissed,

And I tell you that was the end of it.