Satan was an angel before.

 

For a few nights now I have shut the door at bedtime, before either 

of my cats can get in and can’t be bothered. I do this from time to time, when I need the solitude. 

I can’t masturbate with either of them in there. 

I’m not ready to conjure

 such a spell, 

condoning such inhabitance, that kind of oozing candor

like a deep throat morning kiss, scattered bills

unfolded laundry, a phone call on speaker in the living room

Unsolicitedly joining 

the speaker phone conversation with your friend’s parents

 you haven’t met and maybe never will

inhabitance, like snot crust curtain on a nostril, 

crying in such a way that it sounds 

like you’re laughing.

rubbing myself, fucking myself

with a cat in the corner sitting on the furnace seems like a mistake. 

But see it’s not always just to masturbate. 

It’s often just to sleep without seventeen

extra pounds on my knees, or to read without

a snout appearing from the sides, knocking my book over.

 I see them in the morning, snuggled together on a chair. 

They take me back no questions, falling into my hands

pressing their purring faces in between my fingers,

 arching their backs so as to put all their weight into my palms. 

Now prostrate in my hands, they look like little cherubs

perhaps defected, really just a little different. 

Satan was an angel before. 

I won’t see K for another seven days and I am reeling,

I’m building a dam to withhold the waters of my longing. 

My cat meows imploringly and I groan, why do you care. 

My phone buzzes, K’s name shows up with one word beneath. 

The same word they sent two minutes ago, it’s just a reminder. 

Bittersweet, that’s what Sappho said. 

I feel like I am always on the edge of

 an equation, an outline of what I hope to come. 

Don’t call, don’t respond. They loved you three days ago, you can’t be 

that different, don’t invite such conjecture!

Another imploring meow

shameless green eyes and a paw reaching for

my wrist, closer, more, more, my cheek needs you. 

poor animal, the subject of deep, self loathing projections. 

I am building a dam.

 I remember several years before, sitting at the desk of my desk job

a student, an older man, with large circular glasses, 

sometimes black, sometimes purple, always a close cropped hair cut

 comes up to check in.

A psychiatrist by day, drum student by night. 

You know, he says, there’s this study performed on rats. 

They were placed in a cage where in the corner there was a lever to press 

and once the lever was pressed a pellet would emerge. 

They observed that the rat quickly detected a pattern

press the lever and nourishment will appear. 

Well, he continued, they decided to mix it up. 

Intermittent reinforcement, they began to omit the pellet on some trials. 

The rat would go to the lever and press it, 

only to find that no pellet was there. 

The scientists 

these fucking mean deviants 

hypothesized that the rat would lose interest with the contraption

a new

pattern of behavior would develop

the lever actually doesn’t yield nourishment. 

I remember seeing where this 

was going as the psychiatrist relayed this

ah, but in fact…

But in fact, purple glasses psychiatrist said, 

the rats came to the lever even more, almost obsessively, 

let grooming habits go 

just kept going back to

the lever, even 

more than when 

there was 

consistently 

a pellet. 

I see little pink hands 

gripping

I am reminded that I have tear ducts.

I am building a dam. 

You see

he said

intermittently

there would 

be a pellet. 

Rather than conclude

that it would only 

sometimes be there, 

therefore don’t put

too much energy into it, the rats

became 

obsessed. 

They kept going back. 

I nod, I say this is interesting. 

I don’t say heartbreaking. 

You see, he said, from this 

study they found some

insight into unhealthy relationships. 

It showed that intermittent reinforcement, when he 

(lol, he)

is sometimes nice, sometimes sweet, sometimes doesn’t hit me

it is harder to decide against it. 

Satan was an angel.  

I am in my early twenties and wonder

what kind of pathos I must be dripping with

in order to provoke such a story. 

I mean, yes
my dysfunctional ass workplace

is terrible but pays me every two weeks,

enough to keep a roof over my head, 

peanut butter sandwiches in my gut. 

But, I don’t think he perceives me 

as a victim

of late stage capitalism. 

My eyes are always tired. 

I don’t sleep well, 

but it’s because I am practicing late into the night, or 

watching twin peaks with my girlfriend, sometimes slipping 

our hands into each other.

I suppose we are reorienting the lever together, wow.  

Anyway, WHAT IS THIS GUY’S DEAL. WHY DOES HE THINK I’M BROKEN. 

Wow, that’s really fascinating I say. 

Yes it is, he says to me. 

Have a great lesson, I say. 

Thank you, I think I will

he says back, smiling, rendering me 

a little less repulsed. 

I am building a dam. Satan was an angel. 

I am intermittent reinforcement, chickens and eggs.