of a star drowning
in her red,
melt into skin
engulfed with tears,
a sky split between
of sun brightened eyes
and a hand not met
against the window.
To begin again;
The tide turning
Upon a faith rendered useless.
So unkind, the darkness
Carried in the same hands
That ran so slightly
Over skin—barely touching,
Hardly skimming the surface
Beneath a midnight veil of sheets.
The thought eats through me—
Who are you,
But a soul, nothing
But spilled ink staining
The pages of a journal—
When the heart swells
And chokes the mind.
But their significance—
A heart, a home
Of brittle bones
And words unspoken,
Left plastered on the walls—
Are your eyes, slurred
And a plea for mine to meet.
Raising mountains upon flesh
Your fingers trace the pulse
Of a heart in rapid fire
Breath wanes, collapsing lungs
Making room to bend
Skin against skin
Until ribs interlock
Until each bated breath
Falls into the same rhythm
Your touch becomes my own
As the dawn becomes
Your warmth and mine—
The flame burning
Sunspots in our eyes
Hummingbirds often thrummed with sugary beaks, tasting the sweet nectar brought forth by the rain, entranced with the season’s homely grasp. I could not find myself, as I was lost in someone else. I was but an empty body in the garden, yet somehow found myself looking around, taking it in. The ghosts of my troubles escaped me, unraveled the roses until their petals coated the dirt—vermilion remnants decorating the cold, brown soil. Morning glory crept upward along the side of the house over the years. At last, they reached the window, blossoming flowers along the sill—sweet-scented and lively. The marigolds below sighed—with the same warmth that colored them—into my hollowed lungs. I could breathe again, only to be captivated by the handsome, dark strawberry avens. Their saucer-like petals doubled over themselves around their yellow-freckled centers, offering hearts to the flitting hummingbirds.
There was a great oak in the far corner whose branches stretched into the sky. Its leaves were tiny hands reaching out to gather up the sun, as if to deliver its light to the petunias caught in the oak’s penumbra. Their flushed color appeared endless like the stars still beaming, though their lights’ homes are but a carcasses of dust.
The heavens continued to unfold, enveloping my soul, pledged to a heart wrung with hunger for the sky’s kindred spirit. I was unaware I closed my eyes until I had to open them to see, and when I did I noticed a single white petunia alone in the middle of all the others. I picked it from the soil. So pure and white, I plucked its milky petals, sending them flying with the calling breeze—relieving perfection of the pressure of a world trapped in blindness. When the last petal flew from my fingertips I felt faithful despite my stagnant doubt. I finally felt full and alive. I grew familiar with the garden, and thus with myself.
Note: So beautiful, as always.
How the tree in the winter longs for her leaves,
as the ice collects on her branches
and frosts her with a pain
of loneliness, a pang
for her love to return,
this is how I find myself
when I remember
The sun shall return
and with it life bring,
but I shall remained submerged beneath
the blankets where your breath still lingers,
memorising the words
of the books into which
we pressed the reddest leaves,
the remnants of our favourite tree.
I sit by her before sunrise
and sing her songs
of your unending smile,
the one that could make
an angel weep.
She understands the sting
of water slipping through her fingers,
as she yearned to drink it
before it ran out.
The dent at the centre of my palms
will always be my hollow nightmare,
it shall remain my spirit’s
The spring will return her leaves to her,
but it shall never comfort me.
Morning hands against my eyes.
I hear her crying, listening to the melody—
The gentle serenade of time
Running by again and again.
Her heart beats in rhythm with the sea
That carries you like song carries color,
Sparking up the tide in your smile.
Fog rolled off the grass, like your spine
From the quilt—leaving ephemeral scars
Upon the skin as you laced your boots
With fingers accustomed too raising mountains.
She wonders if you can hear this song too,
The chorus of the waiting, silver moon
Shining through the smudge covered window;
Through the bed sheet sails align with the bow.
Can you hear her croon, a lark balanced between
You and her and the gap in the fence of melancholy—
That bitter taste stinging your throat
As the words abandoned shudder
In the absence of speech.
Prayer cannot heal the loss,
As the sky will split blue,
Much like afternoons spent caked in dirt.
Her hair reached her hips and flickered your vision
With the motion of the tire swing
Hanging from the great oak.
Laughter stains where grief has been,
Creating a stagnant ache—it only hurts to touch—
These things that love can’t cure.
Painted skies mask grief
Sauntering behind hapless eyes
Of amber—rolling, rolling
Waves, regretfully permissive
To a touch that never lasts
Long enough for Nightingale’s ballad—
Sweetly harrowing against our hearts,
As if they weren’t beating fast enough.
There were nights when the wolves would howl to a full moon that cast a skeletal spell upon the intruding, silhouetted canopies. Somewhere in the morning a sparrow would wake and croon sweet melodies—perfect harmonies with the echoes of midnight’s faring language. I remember you like Sunday towns—streets full of soft hymns and the red-gold snow of autumn.
I am sitting here now with my feet dangling over the cliff. The ocean below laps at the rocks, tempting me to meet the surface. I stay put. Too easy, I think.
In the distance I can hear the seagulls screaming above the water. I imagine I can hear the houses in the town miles behind me creaking—shifting as they sometimes do.
My hands are scabbed over with mud. I went digging today, beside the roots of the oak tree bearing our initials. How cliché. Still, I could not find those pieces of us we buried there.
Oxygen is choked up in the clouds, or so it seems. My lungs feel swollen, but I realize I’ve been holding my breath. I feel the salinity of the air gently stinging my cheeks, where the ghosts of your lips blossom.
I am wearing the same dress you last kissed me in. I remember my long hair blowing everywhere in the wind, causing the sight of you to flicker between the strands. The grass tickled our ankles as we swayed together. It was brown and dead, and still very much alive—as long as your hand remained in mine.
The path back to the road slopes downward for about a mile. I look up and catch a glimpse of early stars. The hazy sky takes me like a cave. I cannot help but wonder where you will be tonight, beneath the lonely moon. I wonder about you; this moment and how I know that in the end I will be left with myself, open to a boundless chapter of loathing. These are the nights I feel most alone, forced into this culture of solitude.
It begins to rain. Little droplets fall from the sky and caress my shoulders, consoling me with their tiny hands. They touch the entire town all at once, and a moment later, not at all. Turning my back to the path again, I press my eyes shut.
I want to hold on to you, maybe because we can no longer hold on to each other. I can see you behind my eyelids, only for a second until you disappear again.
Do you remember me as I remember you? I wonder, feeling the air turn to wind against the nature of gravity. The ocean pulls me under, welcoming me to her homely depths.
You see my weakness
and I spend my time trying to want to cry.
When I fall, I hate you—
I hate you and continue to hate you
because these days have turned rigid, we sit
in straight-backed chairs. I look at you,
but my vision is words, words I’d like to say.
Catch my blindness. Pull these words brimming over my eyelids
because I can’t say them. Read them and catch my blindness.