when the last person to know you is the one you cannot name
when i am tired of the taste
of buttered words,
tired of sanitising and diluting,
tired of my greed scorned
and my scorn condemned—oh
i think of you and me:
cut from the same dirty cloth;
easy to resent, easy to love;
standing either side of the teasing line
between simile and metaphor,
hands tied over the divide—
me and you:
sharp teeth and sharper tongues;
ugly apart and uglier together;
wretched beyond recognition;
existing only in each other's eyes,
leaving phantoms for the rest—
you and me:
calling bluffs no others would dare to call;
laughing over the ruined hand;
mocking the useless poker face;
left disturbed from unexpected loss but
hungry for the truth of the game—
me and you:
accomplices unspoken, unexplained;
two quiet liars, two pretentious beasts;
shameless in our undressed indignity and
sweet in our good-for-nothing smiles,
never to see the light of day again—
ah, even to remember is a sin.