There is no madness
Darker farther
Than the depths
Of losing a daughter
I sit now praying
Her soul is
In heaven
And everyday
Is peace and warmth
And how I mourn
Her memory
Study her every feature
And how I
Wish to be again
Her father
And kiss her forehead
Tell her I love her
But grace is fallow
And nature cruel
And bad things
Can happen I knew
But I was only
Thinking that
The very day
You skinned your
Knee biking
I never knew
I'd be forever
Cursed to dream
Without you

I want your lisp.
To pull it out from between your lips, to spool it around my finger and wear it as a ring. To thread a string through it and wear it near my heart.
I want it for when you are far, to have you near;
And for when you are near, to have more of you here.

We speak carefully
without naming body parts.  
As if the utterance of a word
could evoke touch – which would mean
hearts racing off in jolty cadences, sweat and
altogether too much skin.

We move with hyperawareness of our limbs.
The air ripples and reaches with each gesture
in phantoms of feeling.
I sense the edges of your fingers,
I cannot ignore the millimeters of
space between our knees.

Your mouth curves down at the edges,
when your gummy smile splits
at the things I say. I remember your lips.
I cannot put them away
in a part of me that locks.
Your mouth opening against mine –

your tongue slipping in.
Put it away.
Your mouth on the pulse below my chin.
Turning back in your doorway,
the dawn light white on your skin.
Put it away.

This wanting is something I can keep
like a mantra - a bed with you
won’t again be a bed for me.
Now we drink as strangers or friends
who once pressed their bodies against each other’s –
but heavy snow covers only blur the edges,

nothing disappears entirely.
We speak carefully

to hide the pump of blood and memory.

I miss you
And you aren’t even gone yet
From experience
I know how this will end

One day you will find someone new
Meet someone funnier; prettier
You’ll slowly slip away
All while denying anything is wrong

When you look into her eyes
You will see a future
When you look in my eyes
You see lust and desire

There is no future for us here
so why do I let myself fall in love anyway?