It's because my anamnesis is stained with
the thick syrup of desecration
That I give in to the aged scent, open mouthed
Pretending deeply your mint
with a savagery intent on burying my aching in you

Scraping the taste of familiarity from my mind
Preferring fabrications of innocence
Hoping in some delusion to escape the guilt from
prematurely indulging in my vulgar hunger,
my nasty, greedy fingers, molesting you angrily
desperately searching for some newness of you

I return to my sickness like the dog that I am
having created an appetite for it:
a junkie, shamelessly slave-driven,
my lips burning for the sticky, hot liquor
that has become bitter in the stomach of my soul.

I make love to a dream sacrificed for immediacy and
having lost my hope for you,
time's become a house of fallen cards;
I can't remember where today is,
pressed with conflicting urgencies to remember...
and forget.

So I take you again,
having survived my impatience,
surviving my dream stealing eagerness, but not living the promise,
and practice the repetition of this habit I've formed,
trying to remember the virginity of love.
June 10, 2004 (revised)