your heartbeat drums to the sunrise outside your balcony door.
my chest shakes with excitement,
anticipating the blooming of your flower eyes
as you wake up from 6 hours of sleep.

i cant tell if i forgot you that night, or every night.
in my static bliss, you dont exist.
too perfect to be part of my imperfect thoughts.
overlapping memories and blurry realities,
none able to mouth out your name.

every encounter is a new impression for me,
i just dont know when the record will finally skip.

does it make you uncomfortable that i want to be in love with you?

im dying to read everything inside you
not highlighting the standouts
or ripping even-numbered pages
im living to know everything about you

youre the only prescription not in an orange bottle
over a sterile counter for me
no, youre white, not lab coat
white lily, lily-eyed, eye-height
hand fumbling hard in hand
sweet tea, sweet you, bitter me

ill take trains to see you
week after week
with coffee grind hair
and empty stomach fever
just for a small smile
and short arm brush

does it make you want to be in love with me that im uncomfortable?

im burning out on our fire sails
hard-bordered waves and pencil wasted oceans
how funny it would be to be a star
millions apart but still in sight

ill grow and peak and die
caught in your eye
shot and seemingly existing forever
ill tell you its been 43 minutes
and not much has changed

keep your boat at bay in the middle of the lake
i hoped youd build that
literal on-the-water home
just to look me in the eyes
every night

why are the planes so low when I am nowhere near the airport?
maybe it's a plot to crash straight into me.

which is exactly what you didn't.

the strings of light from street lamps
seem so much sharper through eyes desert dry of emotion.
I am void of reason from the faun following me
down a hill of rock and weeds.
can we be as symbiotic as rain clouds and lightning?

lifelessly occupying physical space while swinging beneath two pines;
maybe that's just a June night's spirit of nature,
wet, frozen, and alone.

I am 6.3 miles from home on an 11:30 night stuck worrying about the same thing of perspective.

The way I feel about you has driven deeper than casket nails in the past 10 hours. I know 3 weeks of my time will be a Friday night to you. Maybe it's more lopsided than my asymmetrical eyes, but these emotions go unrequited because of someone who is not me.

It's nothing of your persona, only your perfect idea. A philosopher doesn't fall for the thinker, only the thought. You're the vessel of my one flawless mental creation that came as a broken jar in an antique clay shop. I could have been born decades earlier and I still wouldn't have made it in time to tear you from something you never had to be attached to.

But now as I clarify my final statement on engineers and metal pieces, does the idea of me linger more heavily in her mind than yours in mine? I need a new appraisal and I've got 3 weeks and 18 miles. I have no expectations but I expect the world from you.

Paradox:

you are the terrifying beauty in all things,
i am constantly haunted by your everything,
yet i know you cannot be true.

when did a smile so smoked shrouded,
become so entangling in my mind?

say something new,
you benevolent witch,
so i can sleep at night now knowing
you are but aren't existing in something else.

without you i am everything, because you are everything.
with you i am nothing, because you are nothing.