a glorious storm and with each flash of purple you stand before me and are gone again
with every rumble and crash screams the echo of blue and black and
red
red
red
and lily white translucent apologies and into your arms i crawl again
always again
tangled up in all it was supposed to be
and don't you love me you said
and of course i said
and forever you said
and as long as we both shall live i said
and in the halo of white lightening i stand before you and am gone again
with each distant roar whispers the echo of silver across ivory and
red
red
red
and lily white translucent apologies and into your arms i crawl again
always again

she said: the light across your face just now is thirty thousand years old
(and something about the way she shifted seemed like she wanted to reach out
and brush away the sun from your cheek)

she said: drink deep from that ancient fire
for what we don't understand we can make mean anything
(and something about the way she said it seemed like you should have understood)

she (never) said: i am winding myself around myself and
drinking in the icy ink of this black night and
scratching and clawing and tossing and turning
(and trying to lose for you what you never had for me)

will you come into the woods with me?
so many words are lost there
gone like gretel's breadcrumbs
and there's just no way of knowing which direction we are going
will you steal the sun from the sky for me?
the stars were dead before they reached our eyes
so we revel in the reality of the unreal
and replace them all with wishes and
that one there right there do you see?
that one is my favorite wish of all of them
though it never quite came true

the sun has tattooed a red heat scratching and clawing and licking
the long expanse of white flesh a thousand miles from my toes to my hips
and i doze quietly
happy in the burning pain that reminds me that maybe just maybe
and then it is not the fiery touch of the sun that grips me
and i have never felt a hand so rough and yet so tender
feeling gripping pulling tearing open what no one sees
you lean in close and tell me everything
and for a moment i believe you

she wanted it to be the way she felt when painting
fearless messy vivid
instead of this faded photograph of a staged existence
and click click click she winds the film
dreaming cadmium red and deep cerulean
and the tightening of drying oils on her
fingertips arm lip pulling and biting at flesh like an old lover
wet sable slides across canvas
sweet turpentine and resin saturating the room
like the smell of sweat and *** lingering over some half forgotten affair
and back to the taut fabric again
in flashes of titanium white
the intensity of vermilion
slipping with animal instinct into rich umber and raw sienna
and a final stroke of ultramarine
click

no stars out tonight
and wishes are falling all around me deflected
by the clouds and falling and he is three steps behind me no
three steps ahead no
where
and i stop to listen and
do you hear the distant drums singing a song of angry men
and his hand is at my throat and i wouldn't be here if you didn't ask for me he says
and no i say who are you i say and then there is no sound
no drum
no wishes falling
just his hand at my throat and then down
and down to the ground and then the cackle of ten thousand madmen ringing in my head
and then i am three steps behind you no
three steps ahead and your hand is at my throat
and no i say and i know you you say
and the cackle of ten thousand madmen
and i am no one i say there is nothing to know

salty air whips her hair and licks her salt streaked face
through swirling smoke
she breathes you in from one hundred eighty six light seconds and a lifetime away
and no beckoning light comes to lead her to you or
you to she
and the ink black night is suffocatingly limitless
so pull the smooth coolness higher and wrap it tight around the empty eyes
of the girl you never knew
and kiss her salty lips oh so softly
once
before you walk away