Jack Henry

the thinness of walls, 2

we sit around a cheap motel table
she & i
cut lines w/ a credit card
borrowed from an unsuspecting saint –

she wears denim shorts, a thin blue
blouse –
smile hangs frozen in place
fingers tremble
just a little –

we trade hits,
trade lies,
trade dreams too naive to repeat,
fall into a rented bed as trucks
ramble down a broken road
outside the motel room door –

i ask her to take off her clothes,
take off her mask,
take off her innocence –
her smile tells me our first embrace
would open up a shiny new world,
but i know, as i enter her in a
traditional way, hell would be
the next world i would know –