so many blank pages so many alphabets so much trouble spelling it out
                                                                                                                            for G

1  she tells me
he was the last one to see alive
his brother who died less than one year ago.
his father killed himself eighteen years ago.
this is the simple information.

she tells meher surviving son after years
of hallucinations drug abuse suicide
threats schizophrenic labelling
and just two months after going berserk
one month incarceration psychiatric
ward is refusing medication living
she does not know how—in other
words the nightmare continues
full force careening.

she says he knows i’m here.  i can’t
call him, i can’t
think about him.   I don’t
want to know until
i have to….

2  blank pages
sometimes all you can do is record
the rising falling temperatures
of the soul.

there is no such thing as good advice
no path clearly marked already
travelled through this
aching universe which is why
there are so many blank pages,
so many lonely words
a single tear a drop of blood
and alphabets
no one has seen before
in every volume
of the Handbook of Suffering.