comes up like a whisper
the open sky ahead.
like the pale dawn light
climbing into your bed.

wish i was with you
but i'm missing you not much longer
taxis and airplanes
will help to end this hunger

comes like a river
drifting towards you in my dreams
you reach out to me
and i gently touch your face.

this must be love

if you were to leave suddenly it would be
like the last day before vesuvius & pompeii


& and the ash will swallow the sun

in another eclipse of so many moons that orbit
your planetary love - oh
i trudge through the darkness of my own head
to coalesce in black with your own

if you were to touch me now i think i'd shiver
so sensitive and so easily bruised and
all goosebumped and fragile and
i'm too gentle to sustain much in the way of anger

so in the dark of the sky
airplanes lose direction
a death spiral begins.
do we sink to gravity's demands?

i want to tear the curtains away from the skyscape.
i want to make this blackout end.
i want you to cover me and i'll cover you and
it's our love i want to defend.

so i'll reach my hand out to grasp for yours
even as the shadows move to consume us.
even as the last pinpricks of light eke out their last drops -
to cut our anxiety away. to pierce to the heart of us
and remind us what makes us feel so truly for this.

and then at last cascades of light -
from a tiny little crevice at the edge of the night sky
comes pouring in frothing, bubbling beams
torrents become a deluge, washing over you and me.

Distant like viewing
The light fade through a peephole
Impending dread on your lips
Whiskey rimmed
Glasses clink, and glassy eyed
We drink to it.

Sauntering on &
The dust kicks up
As if to obscure what
I crave we extract -
To obfuscate and excavate
& Needle in
You're sick of it -

Over trestles now
The whiskey sour on my tongue
As bitter words pour towards
And fill up your glass
Like the exchange of you and I
Twisted all up in it.

And what divides and grows
From multiplication -
Cannot remove myself from this equation.
I wish to separate
From this dreadful state we've
Gotten ourselves tied up in -

cannot hide, i cannot bury
claymore mines ankledeep

i've run so far and i've run so recklessly
trying to hide the truths i've been so ashamed to tell

and a hiss and a whisper and a cracking sound and
now you know
and the coil unravels
and the cat'o'nine tails
lashes my skin in punishment

i've been so afraid of the lies i'm spinning
that they've been burrowing
but now i can no longer run
i can no longer hold this back from you

and now to you
from who i withheld the truth
i am so ashamed
i cannot begin to mend

the mines are about to explode
and i can't stop our legs and arms
from separating from our bodies

and behind the aegis of lies
now molten
now burning the skin
now immolating
now too much heat and friction
we must blow
we must explode

and in the ashes a whisper
of i'm sorry and forgive me
and i will come to you
naked and armorless and
lay myself at your feet

to take me in again
to try to stitch the wounds i cut
and to try to believe the truths
that i will tell

and in the cold wind a whisper
of i love you because
life is too short not to love
and to give love and mean it

and i cannot be afraid of it
i cannot be afraid to learn what you are
and intertwine my life with yours
and carry the torch to light
your darkest corners and

i want you unlike anything else in this universe
and i want you to know this
because i will be your aegis.
i will be who you want to hold you at night and
i will not be afraid of who i am because
i cannot be afraid of who you are
if i am to truly love you

i am two dark brown eyes that glow in the low light.
i am the light that pierces a black sea & seeks the shoreline.
i am the codex of everything you've ever wanted to know
         and so much that you wished i'd kept to myself.

i am the slightest breeze upon your cheek at first morning's light
        and i am so delicate but ultimately remiss.

i drink before i call you to calm my nerves
        even though you don't notice
        and the fear seeps through the line anyway.

i am a confession unheard by the priest
        but heard by the town busybody.

i am the touch of fingers parting never to connect again.
i am fleeting but indelible.
i am the twist of best intentions gone awry
        and i cannot for the life of me explain why.

i am the flame of love
only to be warmed by and never held.

if i were a dog being sent into outer space
i think i'd have bigger concerns than
accidentally ripping the tab off the soy milk
and having to stab into it with a knife
just to have a drink

it's the little things i'm overanalyzing
that make me so goddamn anxious all the time.
when it's really not as serious
as i'm always making it out to be
just stop and think

i envy the simplicity of the animal mind
fuck and eat and kill and stay alive
when all i know is fear, love, deceit, joy -
so much all mixed together but
i just don't mind.

when i sit next to you i feel as if
i could be struck by lightning at any time
the hair on my arms prickles up on end
and you notice the goosebumps when
you extend your hand to reach for mine

collecting shells with you on the beach
laughing -
in my invisible turtle shell retreat
in my head -
i fold up
and the laughs become ashes on my tongue

has there ever been stability?
i yearn to strike the balance
but instead i'm struck
by how vacuous this has become.

do you know what the brightest stars do when they die?
they become black holes -
and when two in the throes of love
one half refuses to symbiote -

and the tables turn and i find myself
on the outs with you again
another lesson learned of how to endure
someone who can't call me a friend

i've just got a tender heart
that's too used to being trampled on

i've never been able to write
                                   something compelling in 15/16
because it's too much like the sound
                                   of your heart skipping a beat -

i'm tired of trying to be the better man
& tired of watching my words around you
when it would be oh so easy just to let you have it -

what refrains the tongue? what keeps the lash
in check and what keeps the deluge
from drowning you? i wish i knew what held me back.

is it the drive to see any affection scorned
countered with an equal and just reaction?
is it the sick hope in me to hurt you like you hurt me?

i'm tired of trying to be the bigger man -
trying to tactfully whisper platitudes like "oh it's okay"
because like hell if you don't sting me.

because what soothes the burn? what aloe
do your words offer that can ease the pain?
nothing. they simply come to try to violate
and i won't let them in.

i feel galvanized to make a show of force.
that the cards in my hand were always a royal flush
and that you could be ash in my mind
at the simplest command.

i feel conflicted over incinerating ties.
that the memories i have of you could rise above the smoke
and i would be like ash in your breath
but you wouldn't take my hand.

What divided us in the first place
Is now rearing its ugly head again
And this time we cannot ignore

There's no coming back
To what we were
The past is where our dreams died.
This night is where
We say goodbye

You'll find me in the bathroom
Cutting my hair with no rhyme or reason
The tub overflowing and
A shattered mirror -

And you'll shut the door and walk away
Just like you always would
Never were there to make sure I was okay
Never were there to try
To pull me from the black water
That swallowed me up until
I became it

And overtook you
And drowned you in me

There's no point to any of this, is there now?
The "return to form" consisting of
Booze and sex and sacrifice
And all I gave up made me a martyr in your eyes

it's stupid how easy our love was.
and how stupid i was to let that love go.
how you took one look and knew from the first second
that i was the one for you -
to fit you and shape you like you shaped me.

whether entangled in your bed
or with your head on my shoulder
and my lips in your hair -
we had the world to conquer
so we did

& then destroyers -
we became each other's nightmare
each other's lucid dream -
to shatter the foundations
and send us crashing to earth

and there was blood
there were tears and
then everything was severed -
everything carted out
everything burned to ash

the two halves juxtaposed
our brightest beacon
now withering shadows.

you flicker in candlelight
as you make your way across my room
and into my bed

don't say a word...

you slipped into my life
like sleight of hand
i've got years on you babe
don't you understand?

i couldn't make it easy for you...

the morning sun
catches upon your face
as you wake
next to me

you slipped into and out of my hands
and all of this will be gone by morning

you couldn't make it easy to forget you...
i won't forget you so easily, babe

you slipped into my life
like sleight of hand
i tried oh so hard
only to get attached

you couldn't make it easy on me
i won't forget you so easily, baby...

you've grown tired of the tree
so now you're pruning me -

(run back to your drug because
it's the only thing that makes you free
because it's the only fire
that can warm your icy soul)

so you clip the buds from the stems
and shred away the bark from the trunk
the little sapling
could not endure

and now dying -

(if he's the only thing you ever truly loved
why did you put up with how he hurt you?)

we are like mirror images
pressing fingers at glass -
never to truly touch and
never to really understand.

(because it all loops back upon itself
and we repeat histories we couldn't bear)

little tiny lights of hope
and rays of potential
now long shadows of what could've been

love like you've never loved before.
and love like you it could be the last time
the last smile you give &
the last kiss you share &
love like rain pours from the sky.

when we say goodnight,
do i disappear?
am i a husk? am i
not flesh and bone
and breathing?
i am more than words.
shame on you.

when we say goodnight,
do i disappear?
you are on my mind
like anyone i know

skin and hands
and teeth and eyes
and smile

what separates?

the longest night of the year
and you and i are waiting for
meteor showers

little wisps of hot breath
lick the back of your neck
the night is beautiful
& so are you

are you still a mirage?
can the reality supersede
the dream?

touch me,
hold me closer.
i want to be yours
and no one else's.
curl up with me
and just let it breathe
what we'll be
so wonderful.

can we stay friends without the friction?
no way -

i'm not good at playing fictions
and it's not easy when you're
a walking contradiction

i wanna trace your spine
down the small of your back
no way -
don't pay me any mind

i'm foolish and unkind.
don't love me the way
you think i should be loved.

can we stay close without the burn?
no way.