if i jot down the first syllable of your name,
think nothing of it.

if i convince myself with a startingly, dizzying
clarity and call it a victory
even if it means losing any semblance of my self-control around you,
think nothing of it.

if i conjure an image of you & i in my head
and pretend we are some depressed intellectuals,
self-hating provocateurs dressed up like some coltish,
out-of-place ivy leaguers waiting on death row,
think nothing of it.

if i'm not careful around you, and slip on the snow
that is the surface of your heart,
think nothing of it.

but if i tell you i love you,
know that it means more than everything that means nothing.

during my perfume obsession years,
your scent stung
not like a bee,
but a memory of her cherry-tinged lipstick on your collar.

desire on the precipice of morphing into the stink of a disappointment.
you're the hurricane inside my stomach-- and is this what it feels like?
not a heartbreak, rather
a collapse of an *****.
is this what it feels like?

you bewitched me
in all your wicked youth,
night-blooming lover with lips
curved like the moon.
we shiver,
tremble.
you shatter all my mirrors.
i shall love you like none other.

ocean, childlike eyes,
dreaming of a thirty nine-year old love song
with wine and roman antiques
in her boudoir.

her mouth tastes like salt
her cheeks, corroded,
russian red smeared on her chin like matisse's red studio.
twelve past ten.
she can't do this anymore.
a royal mess in blue velvet.
this is why you should always keep your heart in a cage
and secure its key from thieves
and heartbreak hotel managers.

because losing him dims all the lights,
losing him is like burning alexandria to the ground,
losing him tastes like an outdated blancmange.
her achilles' ****** heel.
and she can't lift her feet to move on.

we tried.
            i did.
                  you did.

dearest, our love was like the honeymoon
            and honeymoon is a cruel sea.

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.