Claire G

Claire G Nov 2015

This great acre of love, this minefield,
This warm ballooning of affection, this dark swelling,
This gentle melody, this thud against the floor,
This sweet nectar to swallow, this poisoned vein.
His voice is soft on my neck.
His cries are sharp on the phone.
I am sick in the head.
I feel worse than alone.

Claire G Dec 2014

One impossible muse

Writer’s block weighs on my hands like wet concrete.
There is an ache in my wrist and a light at the end of a tunnel;
There are some things that need to be said. You grip me
As if everything else is too heavy to lift,
You look at me with light in your dark,
Dark irises and I am still trying to fathom
How you can be both my reason to write and my falling apart at the page.

Claire G Sep 2014

something worthwhile

We’re all wrapped together,
All of us in his bed:
The pale strips of sun
Through the blinds,
Hands and fingers,
Him and I, arms
And legs, torsos,
Lips to teeth, all of us.
His voice is a blurred and
Narrow line and then
It widens; my heart closes
And opens as his eyes do.
Could I put my pen
To paper and find
The shape of his mouth
The breath in his lungs
In sprawling,
Lonesome black lines,
In my own distracted fingers?
Or does it take the whole
Of us:
Brightening sun,
His body in mine,
Together to make
Something worthwhile?

Claire G Sep 2014

Bleed

Let me place your skin back where it should be,
Let my mouth grace the scarlet tatters of your left wrist,
Let me speak until my words are strung dry as my
Throat is, and I will do it all, I will do it all with honor,

And stop saying you’re a burden, because I swear to God
You’re the best ******* friend I’ve ever had and I wouldn’t stick around otherwise;
But I don’t see light flooding the horizon, not anymore,
I see it leaving your eyes, and I feel your weight beside me
Disappear suddenly and throw me from the room, and it seems
So much like I’m breathing for more than one body,
And I don’t know what to do,
And I’m losing myself in the keys
Of your piano and the way your voice
Sounded that day we skipped class,
High notes and low notes running together like warm milk but
Sounding perfectly sweet and perfectly black,
Like coffee, or like a hangover after a wild night.

Don’t you do this to me.
Don’t you ******* do this.

Claire G Aug 2014

crack(ed)

I can’t think of anything else when your hand’s at the base of my neck:
A soft, narrow place for your callused fingers, the curve of your top lip.

It was only once I saw you hunched by your car’s back tire
And I felt the feeble, futile throb of fist hitting palm as if you held my heart there;

Over and over, I stayed on the porch until moths circled the lamplight
Until the drug relaxed its hold on your synapses, and you wouldn't look at me.

I can’t think of anything else. You’re grinning at the ceiling,
Your eyelashes rest on my cheekbone, Blackmill pours through the rooms;

Liquor works slow circles through my thoughts and my heart beats shyly,
strongly against your palm.

Claire G Jun 2014

The River

The river’s edge
Cutthroats and you
Nails on backbone
It’s nearly two

Eyelashes bristle
I’m spilling my wine
The pathway’s black
I’m wasting my time

You said you’d be good
You called me away
You said that I should
Stop feeling this way

As the river spins gold
My stomach is turning

As my fingers grow cold
The horizon is burning

Claire G Apr 2014

You and Saturday

The thing is that there was so much I could have done differently,
But it was too dark to see and the night was broken all over
So bits of it fell through, collapsed and disappeared, rose above the tide—
Every hour I asked myself where I was,
Every hour there was nothing to think but that you were there
And those were your arms, around the waist of somebody else.

You looked at me like we knew each other and I drank myself dry
There on the beach, I drank so everyone laughed at the things that I said
But there was still your mouth, blowing smoke rings, and your eyes cast sideways
As I threw rocks into the river instead of throwing myself,
And you asked me to come along with the rest, to one party, then the next one
For the life of me, was there another reason that I went?

The last party had two things to offer: strangers and bedrooms.
Everything else was empty beer cans and the way you looked at me.
I rose and fell like waves, I was somebody’s friend, then I was a drunken guest,
And I announced to the room that nothing mattered
Because my senses were flattened, somber; I knew I was there for one reason
I knew I’d laugh about it the next day and wonder why I hurt so badly.

But I am not strong enough to let it be; I was not so drunk that I couldn't hear you
I am not so healed that I don’t want you to want me.
On the contrary, think of me.
Think of me, please, miss my hands and my mouth and my sidelong lashes,
Swim through liquor by night until the morning cuts open your middle
Until you hurt in a way that is treacherous, blinding, until you’re left with nothing else.