even with the faithful sun now
sparing with her dawn strokes and kisses,
the naked earth breathing and pulsing
with underground seas and rivers of fire
now flat, still, and cold against my naked feet-
even with those throats i once savoured deep
the dance of snake tongues to music wet and sweet
seems to have forgotten the shape and taste of my name,  

i have not lost myself,  
still i know my place:  

*i do not belong here.

my gaze could no longer trace
the shape and space i claimed for my own
in the wide shifting canvass along with the stars
when and where as a child i vowed to become a man.

midnight strolls under the mango trees
where spiders inspired my fingers to weave
about how and when and where to touch a woman-
where my lips charted my chosen path and press
about how to flow soft and gentle as do butterflies and bees-
i know i stand but i could not find my feet
buried among leaves brittle, brown, and quiet

and there, in the space where once resided my hunger
after all these suns and rains now stands immaculate
empty and desolate, my roots shrivelled into dust
perhaps transformed into these breaking cracks
gaping as it consumes my reason to go on being
with a smile i now find myself pore by pore forgetting

your ears may never be again
the shore kissed by the waves
born from pages your fingers stroked
slow and gentle, nestled in the tender
warmth of your lover’s hand.

still, a thought of you precipitates
like soft falling rain gathering into a stream
for pages ****** and naked
as you once were, and waiting
for words to find their shape
like how you once traced and claimed
my own in the dark

your ears may never be again
the shore waiting to be kissed
by these new waves born from streams
flowing together in my lengthening nights and days
still, everything as it must be and still is

for even after us this still remains:
the afterstory of how i ache for you
with an emptiness equal to your silence.

gazed with a pure force of naked tenderness
caressing the leash of my raving blood
to be quiet and still

as if held inside your arms
laced with your soft kisses

never will i forget your eyes

like a forgotten lighthouse
sending signals across silent skies
will they ever find brief refuge in your eyes,
these poor words i kindle
from what remains of my fire?

while most prefer art on walls
of quiet houses, solemn museums,
along lonely hospital corridors,
i decided to be a walking gallery
with my canvass skin bare to be strummed
by needles with the stories of my dying

i vowed for no words or names
for they can be a reminder of a tender voice
growing into an acacia of silence and forgetfulness

my mother asked me why, of all images
twisted horns and roaring with flame
i trapped a demon (ah, it speaks with my name)
i would have chosen a butterfly, i said
if only life was gentle like wings on summer winds
and so it was outlined and shaded
in and with the memory of ****** skin howling,
like my innocence once lost, never to be reclaimed

perhaps i will never discover
the name of the woman who holds my pen
faithful friends keep faith that i will
though i do not really know how, where, or when

feasted by time, poisons in my heart and veins
my face has remained a mask
for my smile who has almost forgotten daylight,
from my eyes the ****** in my every gaze
sleigh of the mind for what i hide behind:
of mysteries and deceptions born
in the loving state of trust and rejections
into demons i seek to keep in chains

inked, so i could go on dying and writing

naked is her fire,  
from deep heart and with chaste eyes  
she gathers moonlight  
into spoken words reside  
to soothe sad souls such as mine.