Marble lilies
Fingers crossed while I kiss you
You dip into my atmosphere
Suckle at my firebed
Press a penny on each eye
I bite my cheek and then your neck
I pluck the torch from the old man in the corner
Jagged fingerprints, metronome breaths
Spell my name with your heartbeat
I'll spell hers
Lean over the wretched vessel
I'm with her now
Rosewater, braided love
A brush, a wish, a linger
Your lilies shatter on your own expectations
She laughs like butter
I lick my lips

I don't want to live like Brian;
I don't want to live by dying.
Everybody wants to love him;
He doesn't know how to let them.

I don't want to be like Brian;
I know when he smiles he's trying
To regain the feeling --
The love, the pain, the healing.

It's overwhelming being
Obligated to love her back.
Love's a burden,
A burning match --

He holds it,
Watching it turn black,
But he doesn't feel the heat.

(Him)
Label me with love,
Bind and blind me with your love.
Unstable with your love,
I fall under your love.

Tell me who I am,
And I'll hold onto my secret.
You're a man in woman's land --
You'll never keep me, but I'll keep it.

.

(Her)
She sets the stars in evening light,
Plucks and places firelight.
Fingers gentle, sure and strong,
Lips tell secrets to my palm.
Her kiss lingers, rubbing pink;
I close my fist and keep it for me.
This is love and this is joy --
She's my man, and I'm her boy.
Pray for peace to a god unknown . . .

At the very least, I've found my one.

Pay for patience,
Pray for time.
Less is more,
but more is mine.

So, I'll wait -- I'll hesitate
To make the move you asked me to.
Your hair is wrong; your curls are long.
I'll think of hers when I'm with you.

.

Lydia lifted me up with her gaze,
And I pushed her back 'til our lips had turned chapped.
We danced the salsa 'til night became day.
No, you'll never match a magic like that.

I'm a beginner's violin,
A rental for newborns,
Carried crooked, strummed silly --
A hasty, cacophonous frustration.
Sometimes, my abuser will discover a melody within,
But I'm left abandoned each and every time.
A bruised composite of groans and tireless hours,
I'm useless to the former novice --
To the master musician seeking a worthy companion --
And I'm tossed to the next clueless dreamer.

I'm nothing but a stepping stone,
The first on the path -- the most walked-on of all.
I'm the start of a new journey, never the finish.
I'm the easiest one to trample.
I'm the training wheels that the little boy hates that he needs,
All too eager to outgrow and to pry from his bike of a life.

I'm the catalyst that pushes caterpillar to butterfly.

Most supportive, least desired,
Once I raise them, they're gone by morning --
Never a thank you, never a nod, never a thought.

Laying beside you, I'm a breathless contradiction:
Burrowed in the earth, held constant and strong,
Yet weightlessly floating above the seaside bluffs --
The atmospheric whistling sending me up, up, up.
I tried lifting you with me, but this wistless current was only meant for one --
Only sent to separate, to end before we had begun.

You're an accidental anvil,
A sole coyote that hunted a suburban puppy dog
And felt remorse.
The only one to regret killing such beloved pet
(But you know you'll do it again come Friday).
Survival outweighs compassion immeasurably.

Let me down now?
You always seemed so good at it before.
My lungs grew heavy and my tongue is sore
From tracing your name silently along the backs of my teeth,
But it's like an overworn stick of gum.
The flavor's right there on the package,
But all the taste is gone.

You told me exactly how we would end --
The rest of our stash of smuggled fireworks shooting out all at once,
The grand ******* finale.
But the one thing that you never said was when.
I guess I should've asked.

Slow, fast, slow, fast.
My mind moves in circles every time that you walk past.
But then we're a messy tangle of muddled limbs --
Your bony edges on my pale, pale skin,
And **** it, I let you in,
As if the world will wait for us to separate
Before daring to turn again.

Is it my turn again?
To be the one to calm your anxious mind,
To pull the end to help unwind, unravel those fears
Held in cavities left untraveled since braver, younger years --
But now it's time.

Pause the pain, halt the worry,
I'm still right here, no need to hurry!

Intimacy need not be cause to panic any longer.
I once was weak, but I've grown stronger --
Stronger with the smiles you share in the early morning,
My hair in your face and the tension forming
Until we decide to breathe as one for a while or two.
Somehow, I never grow tired of you --
Rather, tired with you.

And we'll stay in bed all day and throw our lonely lives away,
Convincing ourselves that hiding under blankets can stop the clocks --
Drowning out the ticking sounds with our legs interwoven,
Our desperate lips forever locked.

Or so it seems, but we both know exactly how this all will go...
But oh, I hope that this'll last.
Out of all the slows, let this not go fast.