So dear the art
I never had to finish

So spellbinding the love
That never got the chance to turn grim.

Frozen hour
Hazy season.

I finish your sentences by
Pulling the words out of your mouth
Lending language to indecision
Lending tongue to unperfected precision
When the others talked about the bad guy in the book
I never used my ears.
Horse blinders on my head on the fissured sidewalk
I finally saw the unfantastical you I was falling into.

I wanted to comb out the phone wires myself
To tell them it was all true
But with my fingers on your sleeping head
I could not bring myself to split time in half
And offer a moment where my digits didn't graze your face.
I could feel you confining me to the margins of a book
You were ready to return
But you bent me over too many times.

The first time we talked about reading
We laughed about how we couldn’t make sense of paperback
Unless we had a pencil.
We were more similar than you thought, no?

I still think about the highlights,
I still remember your lines.

I remember we took a walk most days that
allowed it. In step down the sidewalks,
we might have laughed at something
or another that I had said,
there was plenty of laughter
to go around then—and plenty of sidewalks.
They stretched around the river and
laced up the streets past the gym
where we met towards the house
that became our home.
Walking back, you might have smiled
or playfully slapped away my hand
from the small of your back before
leaning in to kiss my cheek.

Affection was neither of our strong suits
but it was a suit you wore better
than I did.

I remember you wore a black coat on our
first date and shrugged
out of it as we walked up to
the restaurant—baring a lone shoulder
and my first glimpse into your past.
I held the door and you rearranged
your hair, hiding it again.

I remember the scar was barely noticeable then,
me just a stranger and concerned
with so many other things.
How would the food taste?
How would the service be?
Would you like me enough to walk
those sidewalks home for another drink?

It was not until later that I would
find out what a burden that
small slip of flesh truly was.

I remember you had a slight fear of those
sidewalk cellar doors,
just enough to step around them each time
with a bit of a blush on your cheek
as if it were something to be ashamed of.

How strange, these things you remember.

This place to me now is not a city,
but an old ruin full and full of sidewalks
and, like a child with imagined lava,
I fear to touch them for the burn
of what remembrance they might bring.

For some freedom is a goal never achieved
but only dreamt,
for some, it is the adoration of an idealism that is placed on a
pedestal to remain forever just a symbol...
But for the wild and untamed it is the very breath sharply taken in
at majestic beauties beheld with a loving eye,
for the wild and untamed freedom is the heart unbound and adventuring
in the many fold wonders of the world...
I see in you such a wild and untamed soul,
be that freedom's torch that sets fire to those souls that yearn and dream...
be that freedom that lights the way
©2022 Junor

I came lookin'
lookin' far an' wide
for some cumbersome thing
that I could weigh myself down with
keep me from drifting away
something heavy
something true
a big thing
a tiny thing
just need a few moments of clarity
just for a moment where troubles cease
just one moment of knowing
just one moment resting assured
all is safe and sane in my world
all is good between you and I
that it has all not been
a silent recording
whispers never shouted
a photograph of the lens cap
Been looking high and low
for an encumbrance that could keep me here
to be able to hear you sing that song
without missing you
without wanting  
without fear

How tragic our narrative must be

To experience a love story
Without ears to listen

Soak me in the honey
of your *****
I want you to come
here with me
I want to drown in your sweetness
and look up at the stars
see the miracle you are

Let me hold you down
as you pull me in
Partake in this sin
with me

Baby, you and I
our universes collide
one big explosion
maybe two
maybe more
more
more
more

When you retire
exasperated
I'll keep you in this bed
of our love and our sweat
let you catch your breath
before I dive in again
and again
and again

You are soft and warm
and wet
I don't want to end this yet
Insatiable, relentless
Breathless, helpless

Your legs around mine
Your back on my chest
Maybe this is the best
night of your life
until tomorrow comes
again

You said it was the moments in between.

But really

It’s the moments frozen in time with you.

It’s the trivial patter of feet.
It’s way you squeezed my left hip just to let me know.
It’s the way you dry your hair and the world disappears.
It’s the way your head fully tilts back to laugh, and your voice drops a register. my breath only registering against your chest.
It’s the way you kiss my neck, breathing me in.  
It’s the way you allow me to know your thoughts, so that I may bottle them away to save them when I need to be enveloped in the ideas of you.
It’s the way you’ll dance with my two left feet, even though you know the way.
It’s the way your hands move when explaining versus describing, and the shifting of your brow.
It’s the way you tell me you love me and the depths hidden within your eyes.

While the moments in between may hold the foundations of your love,

It’s when time stands still

Where you hold me in the sunshine and the starlit sky,

It’s the way you tell me you love me, and I think I know why.

For you, I would reach up and pick the stars, as flowers of the night

Gathering near, gathering far
Lost in the wonder of what you are

I would fetch the clouds and stitch them together
A coat for your fears
Amid inclement weather

No torrid rain
No howling wind
Nothing could harm or chill you again

I say now as a man-
All that I am, was, and ever will be
Is yours for the taking

For you, my heart, my spirit, my soul
My love, for the breaking

I've seen the future and now bear witness to what I've always known

Your love will be the death of me

And after they've buried my body, long and low, deep and dim
My spirit will rise to write verse again

I shall burst forth from this atmosphere
Far beyond this temporal sphere
To pen your name into eternity

©Jason Cole

the world is a changed place,
what we became familiar with is gone,
we must either change with the world
or be pushed aside by it...
I have chosen to embrace the coming world
and trying to learn the "new way"