I read a little

I read a little

Waiting for indolence to ease,

It rarely does.

Bukowski understood

He wrote about a redhead

Which echoed my first thought.

He had the same experience

Floored

Without seeing it coming.

The fierce beauty

The jagged radiance

She was real though

To me

To him.

There is something about a redhead

The fact of their existence

Reveals a truth about me

So rarely laid bare.

I thought I was thick-skinned

Until she peeled back the layers

Without even trying.

Leaving me raw and exposed

Afraid of dying

Before I could make sense of it.

The alcohol burned the last

Of me away

Until I was a shell

One foot in heaven

One foot in hell.

Perhaps that is how it should be

Age does not wither experience

Flesh is a fabrication.

The greatest things about life

Are the simplest

To find

But the hardest to keep.

I remember thinking

How stupid it would be

To try again

Even when physicists argue

It is theoretically possible.

There are too many cosmic strings attached

To turn back time

And wormholes are a warren too far

For me as well as Alice.

Lives would change with a touch

The chaos it would cause

The ripple effect

Would evolve into a Tsunami

There is nothing worthy

In a cause-effect.

All I have is a memory

Of a Redhead

Holding me together.

How wonderful to have that thought

As something real

Even for a moment.

I can live with that.