My Hourless Job Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Having nothing to really show for ourselves,
And the show is done: the liquor is just the spit on our bottom
Lip and where will we go now:
Now that Alma is at home and fast asleep,
And her son Michael went bowling today, while I cradled Alma
In my lap and she told me
She had bowled just once, and she wasn’t any good, which is
What I expected;
And I showed her pictures today of my other muses, Caucasian and
Far lesser than her,
Here and there, like paper snowflakes in Colorado,
Like songs that sing themselves to sleep:
And then we made love, and I showed her the dress I had bought for
Her even though she doesn’t like wearing dresses;
And I have taken walks with Alma to the very places I have written
Novels that will never sell;
And I have been underneath the overpasses of those novels to buy
Unrequited gifts for Alma,
Because her very name means so- and she has been the only woman
To see my soul burning as it does for her,
And to accept me for that infinite flame- to taste my lips and lay down
With me atop the azure caesuras,
Even if she cannot say that she loves me:
Alma, you are younger than my youngest sister, and more beautiful,
While the cops head out tonight to harass unicorns, I will keep
Blowing my instruments for you, hunting for your body
Because we make love
As infinite as all of the possibilities in the seven seas, and we both
Have skipped into movies;
And you don’t know exactly how beautiful you are,
But I am still here happily doing my hourless job, which is to
Tell you so.