the voices of morning
the call of the birds
the hum of fragile wings
and even the winds sigh
for they could not hear your voice
and thus they could not sing
and the sun would weep if not for her fires
would rather be blind
for her eyes could not find you
to give you your shadow
that once walked alongside mine

silence could not find its voice
for it has lost its rhythm, its home
between each syllable of your every word
and even the night feels the cold
that is dark and empty without
you in the distance, awake,
your heart beating and your eyes
set off to some distant land,
or to the sky where soars
your dreams and hopes.

and i
and i my love
and i my love stand alone
even my shadow dissipates
my voice fade as my eyes
dives into nothingness
with only a faint hope
that when morning comes
light and sound, sight and hearing
reveals your face and your smile
that rival those of the stars.

to share the sky once more
with you before you leave,
sear the colors in thought and memory,
lace and wrap it along muscles and veins,
your perfume the oxygen for blood,
your voice the lullaby for the long cold dark.

so i can endure, and wait
until the next naked moon.

godless as i am, your name
will be the prayer traced
by my serpent tongue and sinner lips,
may moonlight and starlight show you
and may your eyes find me:
with my bad penmanship
my awkward lines
my occasional typo
and grammar woes
imperfect as i am
worthy to be
your Poet

my Mousai.

in the false half darkness,
your delicate fingers
trembled and transformed
into a fist

your face was just a shape
against the soft white pillow
my eyes were blind, I do not
know the colors or the forms
yet my flesh grazed
by teeth and claws of the jackals
in your sleep

i wanted to be a predator
in the grey sky of your cold memories
so your petal fingers could bloom
fingertips seek, trace, and claim
the five points of my own
waiting so we can ignite,
in between,
a star.

you don’t have to wish
my heart to beat and learn how
to french kiss your name,
i’ve practiced since the first night
my first word when comes daylight.

you would be
an apple

you are both red and green
the hot blood passions and emotions
contained in your feminine form
dawns and springs from in me
these mint desires for touch fires,
your hand locked with mine under the rain,
the surging floods of our joined
subterranean volcanoes exploding

i rediscovered
shape and form of my desire
while you were sleeping
away the taste and texture
of words born from stupid mouths.

without your makeup
i see you as i know you:
flower in the rain-
swept, drenched by wind and water
unbowed, waiting for the sun.

soon you will be distant after you leave
while here i will remain in silent wait
with the stars, the moon, for you to return
so i may find form and shape in your eyes,
for the shores of my ears kissed by your voice
and I’ll remember more than just my name.

i will move, my lips repeating your name
as inch by inch and feet by feet you leave.
i know you cannot hear nor hold my voice
nor do i know if you care as i wait,
yet i will, with failing heart and poor eyes
for hope, rhyme and reason with you return.

from where you are I know you will return.
but will you remember me, or the name
of those that once found delight in your eyes?
will you forget or abandon them, leave
all thought to an eternity of wait
until it hears nor fears no sound nor voice?

i confess I close my eyes when the voice:
yours, caress my ear, as if i return
to the first night before i learned to wait
for secrets hidden and revealed by name:
of those that have come, gone, and those that leave
endless broken mirror shards in your eyes.

never will I forget your shifting eyes
that held me before you gave me your voice
that made darkness fade. glad i did not leave
for there was only madness to return.
the same night when you gave me your own name,
your gift for what ceased that night, your own wait.

in silence, not knowing, i still will wait
under day or night skies until four eyes
lock and hold, to each other trade a name
that could not be spoken in any voice.
only then will i know when you return
that smiles or hope have no reason to leave

here i will wait until I hear your voice,
eyes sleep and wake with hope as you return,
name in lips that only after death, leave.

between the syllables
of your every word, the sound of your voice
there is enough silence
in the words we speak and those
we never allow to be born from our lips

just as when our fingers
brush by chance or sharing a seat
on a tricycle, there is enough
distance in our nearness
to rival those among the stars

there is more than enough silence and distance
in the coming and goings of things
in the transport of time and chance
this may be my madness,

so let me be mad than to be
distant and silent from you.

eyes will seek for each blade of light
as it peels the darkness that may reveal
as feet will bind contract of contact with this earth
to span a bridge over flood, wasteland, or volcanoes
ears will decipher the language of silence and sound
a hunter’s sense born to trap scent in stillness and wind

because tomorrow is a promise written in salt
each day is Pandora’s box i dare open and endure

for you.

my tongue did not taste nor trace you as a rainbow
because you spawn hurricanes inside my chest

you have always been thus, and so much more
you are of fire and earth, wind and water
the elements and minerals gathered in you
transformed like carbon into diamond
revealing your reflections under light
sought by poets or lovers when comes night

i did not wish to be asleep
lost in a dream like a bus
bound to go places and spaces
far and farther away
until it arrives to waking
where you would be absent

because you are not a dream
i am awake and i wait

while waiting for your goodbye
silence takes it roots and blooms
in every stone, leaf and flower
as if the seeds were planted yesterday
and with each breath waiting
you go far and far away

with only this silence to remain
a graveyard to each of our names

it was morning
the light glowed in your skin
soft and mapped from a night
of love, desire
was a fire in your eyes

coffee never tasted as good
as when pressed between
my lips with your own
your tongue was a teaspoon
stirring my own desire

i did not seek to intrude upon your garden
to plant seeds for violent thorns and dark vines
take root upon your cheek and drink from your tears
nor a trojan horse for my starving madness
to feast upon your thoughts and rouse your own
yet i confess when i lost my innocence of you
i found myself clawing above the cold earth
where i waited the claim of roots and worms
blood in my veins decanted with gasoline
ignited into a desire to savour again the sun
raise my fingers to trace words and fires

even when you lust
for the strokes and licks of tongues
laced with the seasons of ashes,
why do i still desire to wash your feet
with my soft and gentle kisses?

how can i not crave
for crumbs, a thin slice
or a delicate bite
when in you and with you
i discover a garden of gentle hungers
in full bloom and fruit,
like when daylight comes to wash away
the dust and regret of lost chances,
give every shape and color a fresh coat
of promise so that starlight and moonlight
may find refuge for one more day?

a hunter for words yet i cannot
find the metaphors to trace and keep you,
you move, you smile, you glance
always forward forging to greet the sun,
the light on your skin tracing and caressing
your feminine form burns away
the desire and despair to be blind
from these tired and dying eyes

distant as you are from the kisses
of my eyes and my touch
i could not forget you, nor wish to
and so i will stalk the wind for scents
follow the stars and touch the earth
until the last blade of light
to savor the words, color, and shape
always emerging when i speak your name.

only in this naked sky
is where I can touch you

even if by chance together we gaze
you may have already forgotten me:

the memories they call warm and sweet
most favorite by time’s tongue and teeth.

but just as the sun rises
so it can fall to the sea

so will soon like stone be still
the rhythm of this heart for you:

*for now it will take a knife.

if one day you would wonder
why i kept on breathing, proclaiming
more than just your name and memory
french kissed until the moment i could no longer
may you remember the reason
why i loved you

in a lifetime struggling in the dark and my own lies
with you i wanted love to be simple: truth
so with more than just open eyes
i sought to see your darkness and your light
and it happened, the taste and textures of you
the colors and shapes unfolding in the wild
orbits of your lust for life matched
the empty pockets and spaces within me.
in you, with you, because of you
i learned to measure, mix, knead, and let rise
the recipe for a life of love for you.

on this day
if you remember my love for you
please, do not let tremors of regrets
ride with the beating of your heart
to break the outlines and shape of your face
i once held soft and gentle in my now absent hands;
please, do not let lost time brew poison and flood
the twin delicate shores of your eyes,
and please, not even a sigh for sadness
for not loving me like i have loved you:
for though i may have loved you first
loved you long after your own had died
in between, you did love me
with a love that was all your own,
born from your choice, in its own time

just as i have done for you with mine.

you rarely spoke my name
because there was always your smile
who took the place of your voice

born after so much waiting
after crossing ***** streets
to soothe the hunger of silent mornings
with the sweet and warm memories
of caramel and cinnamon afternoons

when you spoke my name
it was full of longing
laced with a certain sadness
as if i was going away, or dying
your tongue and lips traced
each syllable like an incantation
to bind me to your desire
to be with you

bound i am now to you
even in these fresh hours of dawn
when even sleep has taken her bed
my far away eyes set
to where you are
without me

as i am without
your smile, without your voice
with only the syllables of your name
to match the twin wet trails
born from my eyes

it is not the rain
fall on my skin
nor the howl of the winds
embracing me
thus i cower and shiver

but the memory
of your fingers tracing my back
as if writing a love letter
of your soft cheek pressed
against my left shoulder
like a first kiss
while your nose draws
to breathe and savor deep
my sweat and scent

that i miss
in your absence

i do not know
when my eyes will cease
witness the sun with her light fingers
caress my naked flesh warm and gentle
like when you first traced your lips
ripe and sweet against my own

flowers in full bloom
after the cold night
with the pregnant moon
what new blossoms  
will perfume the air?
will they even dare compare
to the rare harvest
savoured full and deep
in the valley of your breast

i do not know, love may be too short
yet i want no rest or seat with regret
nor wish the long and lonely road to forget

your eyes will cease without
kissing my shape and form
i know, yet allow these eyes
to be hunter, spy, and lover
seeking you and only you

until my lost sunrise

even father time could not measure
nor mother darkness swallow
my desire to meet the dawn
where i might find you again,

because with you;
sun rediscovers the secret kiss of light
winds birth a caress
of gentleness thought forgotten
stars and moon light embrace
with the warmth of the first fire

i open my eyes
to breathe your name.

i bear witness
to the birth of your smile

for each new day
i will bleed my eyes, sever
my soul as humble offerings
on the altar of hope
to see your smile
like a butterfly whose wings
carry away the pain and anguish
of wounds and the wounded,
as it is your passion.

soft and gentle
aflame and intimate
like our last kiss.

my eyelids kiss, seeking refuge
from the memories of you.

but you are the sun,
your light always cut me;
in the blanket of night
naked are my desires
under your moon and stars.

there is no denying
the passions rediscovered
unrequited and true

with you.

i have been having longer
conversations
with Silence

not lovers but we
will share the same bed
she will slip under the blanket
claims in the darkness her own pace
will talk while the moon outside
walks naked waiting for her lover
while stars burn their strange fires
the nocturnals with their nocturnes

even now, she is
a downward spiral vine
over my shoulder slithering
to my naked chest
that wears the cold like a cloak
until her kisses traces
the murmurs of my heart

she tells me i am alive
and so i smile before
she reminds me of what it means
to die.

she does not speak his name
for the syllables do not match
the rhythm in her heart

her tongue still to savour its shape
could not trace its outlines
even as a sacrifice into silence

unlike mares violently stomping
in the night while she sleeps
the memory of his name contain

no trace, promise, or fragment
for what she desires to possess
even if only in secret dreams

only in this new world
where ones and zeroes define
each word and color to take shape
can a farewell be born to remain
without touch, sight, or hearing.

for this reason perhaps i cling
to when the same light and sound
halved so they may join themselves
in full and equal new measure
between and within, for us.

passionate as i am, please

*let your distance and silence stay true
even as thought seeks to close its eyes
to the memory of you while each lung
stifle and choke the air so my tongue may
never again shape nor taste your name.

let me be the sole inheritor
to the memory of our last night
whose slivers i will feed  
to the mouths of forgetting
while i live on dying.

silence was a language
whose words we borrowed
to be whispered by our eyes
when we had to say goodbye.

fades in the distance to blink us a bridge
whose pillars, arc, and breadth,
each stone and each step designed
as inspired by our first night vow
to bind us more than by blood
across the garden of stars and night.

so that when the light finds us,
the words of silence will be spoken
again in our smiles before we shape
each other in each other’s arms
where our voices births a warmth
to rival that of dawn’s first rise.

now, in your absence that is bleak
as my sighs that even darkness denies,
has silence always been this barren?

when i breathe as if with dust and ashes
gathering so it may reshape my mortal heart.

because there is no forgetting,
there are certain days, like a roll
from a seven-sided dice
when i think of you
they happen less and less as you
became more fluent with silence

but today i woke up
from a fading dream where you
were as you were, and since then
under the eye of the sun and the stars
i have become as if prey
hounded by my thoughts
always straying to find you

i miss you and i have been thinking of you
until now at the very least
with the constancy as mortals
need to breathe and heart to beat

i wonder where and how you are, now
while i listen to this silent night sky
once the bridge we built together
to bind even our closed eyes

with the tired and aching memory of you

to discover that strain of silence
i avoid as if plague born and sworn
claim to take shape and root
like the pathways of my veins,
drinking from my mortal heart  
so now i gaze as if with eyes born  
with the light of unnamed stars,
wind trace forgotten sigils on my skin,
fingers touch and trace as if laced
with the kiss and embrace of desire.  

i would be grateful, and speak,  
as only love between pen and paper
fresh and wet with ink or with blood,
the name of the altar for this naked fire  

but there has only been silence
now i claim for my own, and all  
this silence seek is only silence,  
born to spawn to feed and breathe  
an infinity of itself and in between.

you could have chosen
exile or as a lone passenger
in the transport of time
across vast waters to an isle
uncharted in any map;
kept as a secret, like the poetry
you wrote and i read without
knowing it kissed and caressed
more than just my name and face.  

naked as we were even before  
the dark where we peeled  
from each other’s skin and touch
the cold and dust of yesterdays,
it must have been terrifying to dare
against a fate lonely and beautiful,
still, with an elemental force that raced
to bind wind and sky from north to south
you declared that i, a prisoner of wonder
to how it must be to be loved by you
be set free.  

for this reason, and perhaps only this  

my eyes will always seek and trap the light
for the harvest offered when to you again i gaze,
a pilgrim to the province of memory
where everything that persists: streets,
gardens, houses under the stars
breathes and whispers of you and only you,
as lips will move while my tongue trace  
each syllable of your known and secret name
until for last breathe this mortal heart.

it began with the fingers of day  

parting the dark and cold to reveal
fresh and green succulent cruelties  
arousing one’s appetite the desire:  

to be a blind witness
in how your absence  
bleach color and bleed form.  

to be deaf to wind fall fail  
find their morning melodies
for without your voice  
there can be no song.  

a brand new day in the season of waiting  
until you would arrive in sight or hearing.  

but now i no longer count the ways
i gather the body of each day  
to join the corpses of yesterday:  

there is only this, and every night,
among promises written with salt or in sand,
a cancer without end, or cure
eating me up while i endure.

from infernal tongues devouring
wood and concrete edifices,
to the brief yet joyful life spark
from a match lit as if to breathe
soft and tender so that a solitary candle
may flame a vigil against cold and night,
i have seen and endured those lips,
yet none proved to be a feast
more than the fires of friendship
like the one we named ours:

solitary embers fated to a lifetime of wait
until we allowed them to share names,
speak secrets and whispers desires,
fingers like the poles of stars
joined together as it peeled away the covers
wrapping our pains, tragedies, and shames.

yet even as i desired for each grain of sand
be allowed to trace the shape of our feet
while shore and sea lined each kiss,
i did not forget the fate of fires.

even now i can still feel the warmth
as if your hand was still pressed
against my own, ghost friction
from the fiction of our devotion
i now allow the wind to claim
for it flows into them, by their names,
to scatter these ashes away.