Smoke And Mirrors

lucky charm

i would look at a text

thumbnail skitter over message, scroll,

and think that this must be how real people talk

i looked for the answers to the universe in the

scuff of nail polish on my desk, or

scried my future in the blue tint of

lucky charms milk,

but there was no supernatural to be found in the ordinary,

no simple magic to the daily

and i woke up before the sun rose, but even then i

couldn’t find anything to be happy about

or any beauty in the darkened world,

until the gray light crept over the sky, illuminating the ugliness

the bus stop smells, and

fetid streets, and

the ants on the counter, crawling over their dead friends’ bodies,

among the pesticidal waste

and i wonder if someone wished me out of existence,

or if maybe, it stuck, when you told me i couldn’t be real

on fall

fall is a season for the lovers

transitory and fleeting,

never quite settling in one place or time

fall is never landing,

a leaf carried by the wind

pushed by forces outside you

to places you didn’t want to be, perhaps

but you find yourself there regardless.

fall is the gentle whisper of the breeze, transformed

to the violence of a hurricane

wind chapped skin, fingernails brittle, you fall.

clawing for something you’ll never have

praying for something you’ll never be

desperate to affix yourself to the branch

but you’re adrift now, and

there’s no going back.

fall is still falling,

after the storm ends

after everyone moves on and forgets,

fall is left behind.

memory trapped in a brittle, orange leaf

sliding to rest on the slope of a dying hill

“home at last,” it whispers, as it flakes away

“home at last”

fine wine

see me

strip me with your eyes

my witness to my life

break me

recreate me in your image

phyletic mental fission

taste me

twisted essence on your tongue

claw-foot decanter drunk

i want you to want me like a fine wine

a taste you cant get out of your mind

i wish you’d drink me down

and tell me that you’re mine

ruby splatter on a white shirt

the way your fingers make a clean cut

chanel on the collar that brushes my hip

a pornographic shine to your lips

press them to me

let me devour you

twin souls entangle to one

let me bury myself under your skin

stretch to make room for the fit

a flush to your cheeks

wandering eyes across the room meet

take a slow sip, go on, let me see

the things you’d do to me

if i were a fine wine

spilled carelessly on the bed

red bleeding like ink hair from my head

wrist pinned to the sheets

would i gasp,

would you plead,

we’d make a pretty picture, indeed

from a fall walk home

i walked a stranger's footsteps today,

there seemed a poem in that

i turned my feet to match his gait

slowed mine to his own crooked path

he walked with haste irregular

tempo change could not meet the eye

but i felt it, for a minute, we were one

on that path, in that space, he and i

he does not know, for a minute there

another walked his rhythym

his stride was longer, his steps were quicker

perhaps he sought to make haste

and sure, it was weird

he would have found it so, too

but for that minute i was him in delay

i understood his perception

and the give of his limbs

i knew of his body's affections

soon our steps fell into disfavor

before leaf underfoot gave way

we were entities once more, unique paths on the ground

before my door, i turned but he walked away

maybe i will see him again, on my mellow walk home

maybe our eyes will connect

i would not know him by feature nor face

but maybe i’d fall into step

and recognize a gait from a dream long ago

a temporal space once inhabited

it was you, i would think, i was you for a minute

and we’d pass by and walk on again

the heart

i want to write poetry but there’s no words in my mouth

saliva foams to the surface and there’s no sink to spit it out

clogged with frustration and rage,

i tell you:

i stopped trusting myself a long time ago

the heart is not the guarantor of interest.

i go back, again and again

find solace in the cage,

my present moment unsatisfying, and yet

more concievable than a future where i changed

the heart beats and tells me to listen.

mortal hand, electric flow, i tell it no.

action potential, depolarization

numb limbs, itching skin, proof, here;

that my body mattered, in a way, in the end

when they pressed an ear to my chest

still warm with fading beat,

ready to rest,

it told them, whispered secret;

she tried to escape me, separate me, deflect

and when the soul goes unnourished, body suffers

the energy pervades, more spent on the physical

on mental toil, means none for the rest

when she hated herself, she knew it was wrong

but she couldn’t convince herself of the best

good was not worth it, and she sunk, and i beat

until she finished me, too, inevitably, like the rest

‘now bury me quietly’ it said happily, contract and release salted life

the heart was right, in the end, as it is

neglect mind, neglect body, neglect soul

i tried to love you, it was supposed to be you

but you were never the goal

unsent

i don’t like saying ‘i love you’ because my heart catches in my throat every time,

the truth can be written with greater ease:

i love you so much it hurts.

and i know you so well, all of you

yet your favorite color still surprises me

i cannot think of who you’d get along with, or what you’d like

because you’re mine, even if i know, i know it’s just a little part.

i think the beauty and fear of knowing someone comes from the vastness.

because you are an endless impossibility,

a miracle.

shall i compare thee to a summer’s day?

or a winter’s night?

or the first taste of spun sugar, melting on the tongue?

shall i compare thee to a sunrise, all dusky blues and cadmium hopes?

shall i compare thee to the calm before the storm,

the silence that descends at the first pluck of a string;

reverent?

you are more than all of it, of course, and maybe one day,

when it feels a little less raw,

when a brush against my skin doesn't send ice skittering through my lungs,

maybe in a week or two,

i can show this to you,

all rapt nervousness and unmet gaze

even in the surety of reciprocity.

and maybe i would say, ‘i’m sorry’,

and you would understand that if i felt it any less

then i swear i would tell you so.

shuffle

i think that when i saw something pleasing in the cut of your cheekbone and the cruel uptick of your lips, that i wanted something to call mine

and i knew you looked like someone who would hurt me but the all the tv shows in the world taught me that danger is exciting, and all the warnings in the world couldn’t stop me from getting in too deep

even though i never really lost anything, it sometimes feels like i lose everything, again and again

and i want to find that happiness, the sparkle of an eye and the softening of creases, i want

someone to make plans with, i want to be so in love that it’s disgusting, and all the tv shows in the world convinced me that to get to the happy ending, you were supposed to find love on the way

but i’ve kissed a couple guys, and none of them stayed, and as they fragment my trust and my perception of loyalty, 

i’ve more frequently stayed my hand, and perhaps a part of me looked at the patterns and recognized that something easy might not be in the cards

and that i was maybe unloveable or simply incapable of loving in any way recognizable by someone with the capacity to love me back

so i try to decline the danger to protect my heart from getting hurt, but its a self fulfilling prophecy, that when you don’t show your hand youre on the defensive

and it’s a perverse self-torture, but i imagine you reading these and knowing me, an exchange of understanding that doesn’t have to involve spoken words

so often buffered by meaninglessness and impulse

but there’s hurdle upon hurdle of expectation on reality and movement slow and fast, and besides, love isn’t real anymore but simply fighting, in a game that was never supposed to have sides

and once we draw, we reshuffle and try again 

burning

to care for something is a delicate thing

to cultivate, to put a part of you into a vessel outside yourself with no guarantee of success

like chipping a piece of your heart that you might not get back

it's a gamble

but you take that risk because you always hope that what you feel, so may someone else for you

a singular attention

but people bite

and you don’t know if you’ll ever get it back

and what if you gave more than you realized

and when they’re gone, you look down and all that’s left is blackness

blindfolded in a ribcage, entombed by a heart that doesn't beat for you

by lungs that don’t breathe for you

by lips that don’t lust for you

and you are shunned and quiet and can only say, oh, okay

and give no sign of your smile chipping away, that skipped beat and the cold creep of dread

and give no sign of the disappointment, lest you look closer and know its because you had the audacity to have expectations

and give no sign of the hurt, lest you find yourself realizing it meant something

to be vulnerable is to be peeled open, raw and turbulent, strapped to a table with a knife hovering over you and a trembling hand against it

it's the pulse in your neck as something unknown grazes your skin

the flex of tendons desperate to recognize what’s beneath them,

the lump in your throat that never seems to go away 

it’s the hope that the contact was lips and not teeth

and some say the risk is worth it for the chance of love

but this year it is a brittle winter

and the truth is so warm within me, 

to the point where i may set ablaze 

and nobody will know why my body was charred from the inside out

sleepless

it whispers to me, 

it wants to know

it will not quiet

it can’t let go

beside my pillow,

loud beat of heart

it cannot stop,

it cannot start

curiousity disquiets the head

circulate, metabolism

energified, stomach dread

tap of toe, pick of finger

sensual slide of bared leg

i cannot settle, unscratched itch,

i will not ever be at rest

sealladh

their majesty was impossible to comprehend. 

it was not a view that could be captured and bottled in a picture, reflected as it was in the eye of a camera. it was more - 

vast and swelling even without an orchestral score. it was the impossibility, perhaps: 

the stretch of the water, endless in its breadth, the patter of rain against lush grass, the vibrance of flowers unfurled against an overcast sky. 

it was fog on the opposite coast, a river cutting through the hills.

 it was all at once a tender kiss and a giddy laugh, ancient and ephemeral and undisturbed. 

of course it inspired words - endless poetry, song, folklore, myth. for what was left when even pictures could not suffice? 

you needed to live it, feel it, breathe it, and even then it was not enough, an endless waterfall with only a droplet slipped between wanting lips. 

it was simply too much - for how could anyone begin to understand the edge of the world? It tasted of endings, 

it tasted of beginnings.