apertureview

a lover stands alone
as a child sitting on my sink
with razors for knuckles
and sweats for centavos,
all bloodied and rusty stained-
a pretender in a young woman’s clothes.

this must be the act of loving:
to tire oneself in waiting
to still in refrain
while all quiet and never opposing
an uncertain kind that caves you open
from a touch to another.

too strange to weigh,
there’s a difficulty in strangeness.
how does one cry for a name that wishes
not to pronounce in the slightest.
the rest in reticence, the paused between compliance.

who are you in the look of a lovelorn child?