There is something sweet about my dreams.
Relief—and when I wake, my face stays pink,
my eyes cracked like sunshine through leaves.
I wander to the alarm clock—to the sink
and wash away last night's sweet wine.
At the mirror, I scratch sleep from my eye.

I can see your face reflecting in my eye.
Cold thoughts— Cold water washes away dreams.
I think of last night's dancing and wine.
How you scowled at me and my drunk pink
cheeks. I ran from our dance to purge in the sink.
You left me, shooka branch, and rattled the leaves.

My chest heaves to inhale your shattered leaves.
At the window—pain frames your elastic eye.
I rinse off my face and clean the sink,
and you heave to inhale our shattered dreams.
Gazing, even now my cheeks are still pink.
I forgot to put the cork in our wine.

Spoiled, spoiled, spoiled, spoiled wine—
Dead trees, dead grass, dead sky, dead leaves—dead wrong.
But something inside you turns me pink
with life to spring from fall with watery eye.
So, I put the cork back on all our dreams
to chase reflections in the kitchen sink.

This time, you wake and rise. I break and sink,
run and hide last night's berry wine.
We sit. Sip coffee and confess sleeping dreams.
Seems just as cracked as those veiny leaves
dry as the corners of your needle eye.
The sunrise shines blushing— Rushing in pink.

A sickening, sickening rosy pink
flings through the window and bounces off the sink.
So I put ice on my bruised, cracked eye,
grab a glass and fill it full of wine.
I sit to watch trees die; drop leaves.
I drink to give life to my failing dreams.

My pink cheeks, bruised face, bloody sink.
Your evil eye, cardboard cork, shattered leaves.
But you say it's me—my wine that drowned our dreams.

I still don’t agree.

Bathtub Gin, Issue 7 (Fall/Winter 2000)