Poems

Breathing too heavy air scraping shallow scars

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Twisted fingers entwined through time
Dancing dreams scream the bereft
Last chance echoes slip behind curtain
Called by your voice
Accent makes me climb the walls
Prisoner of our times
Deliberate voice raised in song
Unheard in distance
Wistful by the wishful
Care for the casket
Drum beats exhorting abandon
Too still to be seen
Control gives in to silence
Weeping hearts begging to be loosed
Never was a simple thing
Love which beats wings against cages
Saline trails through grimes soaked skin
Wishing tears were bullets
Watching the disintegration
Loosed arrow
No missive massive enough to wake the lobotimized
Asleep by choice
Stress flakes away hard won demilitarized zone
Refuge in your arms
Head on my shoulder
Old habits waking
Muscle memory creeks hoping its recall is sound
Torn

And base truth
That all I want is you in my arms
Your voice speaking truths in my ear
Our hearts beating faster
Safe
And loved.

Candy crinkle bonfire stirs once cold heart

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Somber reflection lingers too long
Trailing fingers slender with longing
Through water caught twixt one breathe and the next
Yawn thoughtfully
Pondering skin
Watching in wakeful yearn
Steps distant that still
Too far
Hands move forward toward
But stop ere flesh yields to simple caress
No time like the present
Only place all wrong
…in heart flutter deep resonance
…”With you, all places are right.”
And only conviction keeps
To furtive looks
Soft smiles
With bedroom eyes
see the sleep but not the flame beneath
But I
And you
Know
We but look for a place to burn

Long slow fall to the cold stare of the middle distance

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These long hours of silence
Of hearing white noise hearts and swift blood
Attenuation
Feeling cotton abrasion from old cloth pressed down against skin
The soft of new starched straight yet pliable
These textured off white walls and bed splashed crimson hoping to wake in core some semblance of joy

But the quiet stretches out
And too tired soul
Weary from fighting for smiles and hopes
Falls to knees
Beaten without solace

The shiver as hair raises against skin pushing out
Adrenaline wanting nothing more than a few minutes until exhaustion leads its way through collapse
The beckoning oblivion of sleep
To dream of lives unlived
To be for those few minutes happy

An edifice collapsing under the weight of its needs
Too much for any person to sustain
That subtle lack of home
While house stands

Places feel so empty
Without

Sipping heartsblood on the razors edge

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When I feel the fear perching in the back of my chest
tongue lolling out of gargoyle visage
heart pumping adrenalin darts
I lean in
embracing the pain and fall.

This hot prickle constricting air in lungs
eyes bouncing looking for a way out
until I take that action that makes me feel like screaming and hiding and running all at the same time
then it tramps down to quivering smiles and anxious waiting
cause
as ever
my fears are bound up in the uncertain possible of what someone else will say when I ask or say that thing that scares even me
waiting for the Yay or nay like a gladiator looking at the crowd
waiting to be butchered or to live for a few minutes more

Stress fractures break the mask

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Heart full of blood and shadows
Cupful of salt
Distilled from bones left in the sun
Mind races on a track
Round and round
Stopping only to kiss you
Waking with the midnight sun
In the quiet
Fur and chocolate
Late nights become early days
Hourglass sand
Spills

The Sky crys the tears I am unable to

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To justify my love
having been told so often that it can’t be
that it’s too soon
I find myself in a constant war of justification where I say “I love you…”
waiting for the rejection
waiting for the no
waiting for the hesitation that says your love is scary
and I say
in that forced brittle cheer of the beaten
and all flinches “…but I love everybody.”
which is sorta true
I love all the people I love and have ever loved
but I diminish my words
scrunch down to make them fit
this too small container of what is acceptable
I’m the broken one for my love
I’m the tragic fool for my open heart
it’s always too soon
until it’s too late

Little stories for big truths

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She looked at me, eyes filled with tears and bravery
She looked at me and said, “Things have felt wrong my whole life.”
She looked at me and said, “I’m they. And gender fluid.”
They looked at me. Imploring my understanding as my face stood blank and brow furrowed in puzzlement.
I said, confused and obvious, bold and unyielding “I love you. You. You have told me something important. Something that makes you more you. The only thing that’s changed in my heart is that it’s lighter. Knowing that you will be happier.”

Uncertain steps, face upraised to a storm swollen sky

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There is a dance that rages through my bloodstream
Demanding steps be taken
Demanding music and light
Demanding quiet whispers and moans

It filters through my skin
Permeates every cell
Binding closer and close

Passion reminding us to live
To risk all
For each turn of the wheel
Each shift of night into day
Leaves behind bones stripped bare
All meaning carried along in pockets grown swollen

And still
Buried in the choices we’ve stuffed ourselves full on
Crappy breadsticks before the meal
The song calls

Discard the knives buried in flesh
The Flashfire and freeze
Remember but be light
Remember
And still brave the waters

And dance
Whole and broken
Joyous and bleakly
Dance
In grace and stumbles
But always
Always
In my embrace

Caramel to the tongue still hinting of spice

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No bold blue yields its colors to the snap and wave of soft hands
Lost where softness breaks harsh words
Structures flake away yielding bare steel
Heat bending light to sinister purpose

Noises hinting distance
Wistful with haunted lungs
Wanted by the tracery
Feel blood course through capillary shunt
Sweet songs sung to unfinished completion

And I
And you
And choosing

The silence stretches, speaking your name

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She as water
Flows through my mind
Graceful and brash
Pulling joy
As if a magician producing scarves
Voice full of temptation
Of willful willingness to be taken in hand
She the torrent
Awakes cells long dormant
Alive for the chance of her
Too public to sweep her into arms
To hold her close and make clear my affection
Settling for
veiled words
Knowing looks
Skin taught in the yearning
A promise of tomorrows