dealer’s choice

There is no method to his madness,

modus operandi or sense of urgency

no desire to show his cards—

in fact, he keeps those hidden under the table tucked from view,

his thumb and forefinger covering their worn edges from wandering eyes.

Yet, it’s the cocktail of reckless abandon mixed with icy hot frugality

and the way he holds me in his arms till birds sing their gleeful songs

that renders my caution futile.

The way he drinks me in like a diver’s lips to its oxygen

swallowing life as slowly and soft as blue lines on the horizon,

or the ones crinkling beneath his eyes when he smiles—

this is the stuff that kills me.

“What will I call you,” he muses,

exposing himself with each candid word said

then pretending ignorance while we lay in bed.

It’s leaving at 4 am when he could have stayed

and the texts never sent that force me to play.

And when all is said and done,

as the truth becomes clear and nobody’s won—

it’s these nuances that scream

it was all one big pathological dream.