inch-deep paper cuts,
sodden matches, dead roses,
mouldy coffee cups

So then is this how it feels
     at the end of the world?
Everyone is nothing, we are nothing,
     nothing in the ground.
Is this how it feels
     to watch the statues of Rome crumble and
buckle at the knees?
Everything is nothing, it is nothing,
     nothing on the funeral pile.
Is this how it feels
     to have armageddon abandon you,
leave you screaming on cracked cathedral floors?
I am nothing, I am nowhere,
     nothing underground.

He will be every callus on your painter's fingers.
He will be every warm winter
     and every cold summer.
He will be every drop of rain.
He will be every scratch on the roof of your mouth
     and every last scar.
He will be every shard of light.
He will be every book unread,
     and every cup of tea gone cold.
He will be every speck of dust.
He will be every tempting kitchen knife,
     and every broken promise.
He will be every single thought.
He will be every one of your bleeding gums,
     and each of your blackened lungs.
He will be every torn out page.
He will be every picture on a postcard,
     and every blood-stained bed.
He will be every shot of morphine.
He will be every pigeon feather,
     and every torn-apart crow.

Oh, would you look at that;
     the way you break my back
with your tiresome nihilist verse.
The way that you breathe in irregular verbs,
     your eyebrows knitting together
like some fine bridge between two bold constellations.

warm handprints
     lingering like desperate spectres
watery honey eyes
     blinking away restless sleep
phantom pains from kisses
     months ago you can't remember
dust motes on decaying skin
     parting breaths and livid smiles
you've never felt so alive
     as when he died

We exist, you and I;
not too much, not quite enough;
but we exist,
just like real people do.

I'd like to see your eyes,
     maybe one more time.
I'd like to see the blue,
     glisten like glassy globes
two feet underwater.

God knows I love her;
     even when my eyes are glassy and I will not see her.
I love her,
     if there's such a thing as crying in bed for days wishing you could be with her, somewhere else, that's love.
I love her,
     when there's everybody else and I cannot see her.
I love her,
     if there's such a thing as forgetting your commitments down to the last second and your heart swells with the sin you almost did, remembering her,
that's love.

À moi. L'histoire d'une de mes amours.*
He was light.
He was radiant,
     and he was rapt.
He was brilliant,
     and he was blithe.
He was sent,
     and he was sound.
He was bliss, he was my rapture;
     he was my God and my nirvana.

But he was grief.
He was woe,
     and he was worry.
He was mistake,
     and he was malaise.
He was anguish,
     and he was agony.
He was in my very flesh;
     the yellow pulsing tumour of wretched, blinded love.

Do not ask me to be patient.
Do not ask me to lay suspended
     in apathy until the world turns for me.
Until pages turn themselves.
Until my lungs turn cancerous before I'm done hurting them.
Do not ask me to be faithful.
Do not ask me to stare into your eyes
     in love and hold onto them forever.
Do not ask me to be pure.
Do not ask me to get drunk
     only on communion wine and bow to
a God that doesn't need the minister I'm *******.

I see us in technicolour delights,
    jabbing knives into old dictionaries to name strangers' children,
surrounded by foreign fire,
    alone but all at once together,
but borders and rivers cannot change our laughter.