floating like the planets
our mouths twitch and our teeth
shine like venus

the love goddess hangs alone in space
light screams in the skies

end this venusian nightmare

and we admire the beauty of her desperate plea
marveling at how bright she is
brighter than our smartphones and
the dim reflection of the limelight in our eyes

our own citrus dreams tangy
with the kisses born in tearducts
and lit up by the cries of venus

please

We're supposed to be better than all that.
And so my eyes brighten,
My mouth sings its usual overtures--render
Unto Caesar, as they say. But
Every time my eyes discover you (like the
Columbian trifecta--every time), or
Your voice sends the Weeping Willows scattering,
The glinting stars in my eyes burn with more than nitrogen and flashing teeth.
The hate staggers with newborn horse legs--a hand on the heart, the
Other shaking its rattle, sending the lovely chords of your laugh to strangle and bind my thoughts.
Its acrid taste stings my mouth, where
Your name sits like something foreign.

But it's the only thing that keeps me warm in the snow.

Hi (I love you)
(but)

the limelight is bitter like scurvy's cure
and yet I still reach for the plastic crown

the camera flash burns purple circles behind my eyelids
my finger twitches under the weight of the promises told with
crossed fingers in everyone's eyes

fishhooks tear my face and force the smile
skin taut and reaching for their arms
a touch an embrace
anything

why are computer screens so cold
the light bouncing off my crown
and into my eyes

so hungry

Mirror of "love in circadian rhythm" by Samantha Adams*

I wish I could have stayed asleep
The dream, filled with smiles, could have lived
And it'd be simple

But the truth silently snapped into the world like a twig
And laughter dimmed to silence
Except for the tears, brand new and salted with fear, shed each night
At the emotions chained up and left to die
A heart left out in the snow as your head turns and arms cross
Anything to forget the sin at the window
The lights from inside flicker in my eyes
And all I want is to be let in
And thaw my frostbitten love, the pain like pins and needles
Reminders of the dream that broke at a twigsnap

As soft as a window closing

Can these crimes live forever?

Let me go to Trinidad
And escape the sins that live in the cold
(Even computer screens can't thaw it)

Near two decades since they arrived
The two geminis that would change the world
Fumblestumbletumble to teenage dream (phone screens are like stars in the night)
Two sets of eyes long for the landscape beyond the foggy window they share

They are specters like all teenagers
Shadows floating down hallways with the echoes of laughs left behind
But magic lies in those lilting giggles
As if to mock Plato himself for ever dreaming of the shadows (and the caves and)
Heads tilt as eyes gleam
Hair puffed with the tempest of their heredity and half-remembered fears
(Assuming fears can be so)
Shakes with the head as the laughter begins
Self aware at the kabuki theater

While in the vibrations of the beat to their dance
The poet's heart throbs and the champion's digs into the ground
Roots to dig and battles to win
Love (they say it's all you need but) in each wrist-flick and hug
Defiant in its drive (to what end)

The air is warm inside when we sit on a couch
Unaskable questions flying like the teenage dreams
And even though the wind blowing freezes
Sometimes the only warmth to thaw the skin comes from a loosened tongue
Or a smile with the unfindable answers shining on each tooth
So they laugh

And I am forever grateful

She won't pick up a pen.
Words stand at the exit, shivering at the winter
Outside, unable to compare with the Elysium on the horizon.

So the story goes.

But the tapestries that sit at her fingertips are colossi,
Towering over the rest.
Those bottled-up words are dreams deferred,
Screaming and beating on the glass
To be recognized for what they are:
Prophets of the world that is,
Harbingers of the love that should be.
And still, she sits patiently with the world
Under her telescope, in her corner of the universe
While her heart beats, content to echo beauty onto others;
A Venus with the mirror to the world (brighter because of her).
She is Athena with a placid smile:
Inspiration at the snap of a finger,
Or a shoulder touch.
But she always hugs,
The brilliance in the eyes,
Happy to rest there.

I can only imagine if she wrote and freed her poet's eye.