Love In Two Parts (McKeown Erin)

"there's hope in poetry, comfort in fiction like the voice of walt whitman, for example. i have noticed something you will have noticed it too we like truth with lies black with white we are the virgin and the whore you will have noticed this too so i am led to say purely for example, purely for survival and speaking of course from my own experience when i'm drunk it's easy when i'm sober i try not to love you so hard will not love you so hard you will have noticed this too, for you were on the other side. in a san francisco loft you couldn't pay for i could feel your heart beat through the floor boards i waved my hope around like a cheap flag whose colors had faded whose emblem was laughable what is whiskey in the morning but a clear path to the door what would uncle walt say to the silent floorboard? hope? hope "