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Friday, August 29th, 2008
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2:48 pm - matchbox
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it’s quiet tonight and you
instruct me where i should place my head,
looking straight backward instead of
pressed against your cheek .
in the midst of our arena of love-making and hope
my gasoline-drenched legs rub against the gunpowder of her smoldering words
and one morning it was all burning,
bandits of courage, burning
bandages of poetry, burning
bees and honey
and anthologies of a mere thought named Peace
and i'm still gasoline,
lying here with pieces of past
strewn all over the ground
it’s quiet tonight and i
listen patiently to your chest
while the swords of your breath
challenge duels with the air
“Let me explain a few things,”
you offered in the dark
and in your wordless explanation you
fastened your body to my arms
and reminded me with galloping silence
that love is not always melancholy
and songs are not always sad
and poetry doesn’t always burn,
and peace can be more than thought
and breathing doesn’t always mean fighting
and if these are the nights of vulnerable hands,
let me be water this once
let me break against your harbor of sand.
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(arise)
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| Friday, June 13th, 2008
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10:18 pm - this too shall pass
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| Tuesday, April 29th, 2008
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10:28 pm - of rivers and men
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i.
your army-green jacket’s sleeves sit awkwardly against the surface of my skin while
its collar peeks around my shivering shoulders
the leather couch smells like leftover fireplace ashes from winter while
the air smells like slow-coming (ambling) spring
after w(h)etting our cheekbones with curiosity, the colorado river sleeps beneath our feet.
rachmaninoff’s weary hunger rolls listlessly around in the hollow between our bodies.
ii.
i’m shaking now, like starlight,
and the ceiling fan can’t keep pace
the mississippi groans of windy wounds
while your fingers trace my shoulder blades
the day is heavy as the steamboat’s shadow drags against your belief that
“good things come in time”
it’s summer in texas.
i’ve learned to ignore this kind of heat.
yet still
your hesitant hands cradle my thighs and we lose our place
somewhere between
the hot blankets and Coldplay’s burning rhymes
tonight, my eyes stay firmly shut against the fury of your lips
there are no question marks in your eyes, and so (willingly)
you never stop to recognize the ones in mine
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(2 awakenings | arise)
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| Thursday, March 27th, 2008
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10:15 pm
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it always happens, half a year later or so, suddenly i find myself reeling from the heartache that comes with your absence. i spend months ignoring it, or drowning it,
and now here i am, watching perfect sunsets in midair from a plane window, shaking from the memories of the way i loved you.
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(7 awakenings | arise)
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| Monday, March 17th, 2008
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10:01 pm - unfinished
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i learned the foreign language of your movement,
piecing together the grammar of your skin
your fingers traced the vocabulary of my unsteady breathing,
whispering, "if i save you from drowning,
will you promise to not to leave?"
tell me a story. tell me something real,
like the way you said my lips smelled of vanilla,
and the way your apartment smelled like peace
our breaths fiery with wine
tell me how our hands crossed,
your fingers laced with mine
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(2 awakenings | arise)
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