When I fall asleep I can’t breathe
I wake up gasping for air
Angry
I need to see a doctor
One that my insurance covers

Something’s wrong
A guy’s gotta breathe, you know

I shouldn’t be here
I should be at home looking up the names of doctors in the insurance company’s big book of doctors

But here I am with my coffee and my headaches and my dreams

And my day is all planned out
I will cry at my therapy
I will cry at my haircut
I will cry at my day job
Yes, there amongst the art for sale at auction I will cry

And then I will go home and cry myself to sleep and wake up in an hour and a half gasping for air
Angry
Angry at the doctors
Angry at the insurance companies
Angry at the girl who won’t call me back
Her name is Alexis
She works at the Simon & Schuster audio book department
She’s got red hair and blue eyes and I was sure we were falling in love

Something’s wrong
A guy’s gotta breathe, you know.

I’m writing a book
The title: Advice From An Old Poet To Another Old Poet

Always do your dishes
You never know when the water might run out

Always be nice to young women who are nice to you even if you do not love them
The ones you love will treat you poorly and worse, ignore you

Always get up early to write your stories
At 7am the coffee is magic
At 10am it tastes like medicine

Stay up late if you can
Be in silence
That’s the only way the find out whether or not your apartment is haunted

If there are dirty clothes on your bedroom floor then pick them up and put them in a bag for dirty clothes
Unless they are the dirty clothes of your lover then leave them where they fell
Savor the memory of that moment
There will come a time soon enough
When she will no longer want to tear her clothes off for you
There will come a time soon enough
When her clothes and the care and the maintenance of them will be more important to her
than getting naked with you

If there are new sheets to purchase, purchase them
Some stains in life cannot be removed
And one must be unburdened of memories of good sex with old girlfriends
Memories running over and over in your head like the looping photo slide-show on her old Myspace page

Get out of town
Go quickly carry very little
It’s important to arrive at your destination free
Especially free of the brown Adidas shoes she bought for you last fall just as she was disappearing from your life

Never ask for anything that you really want
She’ll give it to you then she’ll silently hate you for it
She’ll hate you so much that she’ll break up with you without really telling you that she has broken up with you
And when she DOES tell you that she has broken up with you it’ll be over dinner at your favorite restaurant so now you can never go back there again

Something’s wrong
A guy’s gotta breathe, you know

Advice From An Old Poet
To Another Old Poet

Live Alone. Live Alone. Live Alone. Live Alone. Live Alone.