Today is the first of August. It is hot, steamy and wet. It is raining. I am tempted to write a poem. But I remember what it said on one rejection slip: 'After a heavy rainfall, poems titled 'Rain' pour in from across the nation.

Every day is precious and I feel infinitely sad at this time melting away from me.

I felt wise and cynical as all hell.

Let me not be weak and tell others how bleeding I am internally; how day by day it drips, and gathers, and congeals.

Cold glass, how you insert yourself Between myself and myself. I scratch like a cat. The blood that runs is dark fruit- An effect, a cosmetic. You smile. No, it is not fatal.

In spite of everything, I still have my good old sense of humor.

What have I eaten? Lies and smiles.