1680

Sometimes with the Heart
Seldom with the Soul
Scarcer once with the Might
Few—love at all.

It was many and many a year ago,
  In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
  By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
  Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
  In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
  I and my ANNABEL LEE;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
  Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
  In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
  My beautiful ANNABEL LEE;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
  And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
  In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
  Went envying her and me—
Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,
  In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
  Chilling and killing my ANNABEL LEE.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
  Of those who were older than we—
  Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in heaven above,
  Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
  Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
  Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE;
And the stars never rise but I see the bright eyes
  Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride,
  In her sepulchre there by the sea—
  In her tomb by the side of the sea.

during my worst times
on the park benches
in the jails
or living with
******
I always had this certain
contentment-
I wouldn't call it
happiness-
it was more of an inner
balance
that settled for
whatever was occuring
and it helped in the
factories
and when relationships
went wrong
with the
girls.
it helped
through the
wars and the
hangovers
the backalley fights
the
hospitals.
to awaken in a cheap room
in a strange city and
pull up the shade-
this was the craziest kind of
contentment

and to walk across the floor
to an old dresser with a
cracked mirror-
see myself, ugly,
grinning at it all.
what matters most is
how well you
walk through the
fire.

There's been an ache
in my hands since
I left you, because
you always knew
the spots to touch
but not hold.

i want to tell you that I never think of you
and that my love for you has faded with the years,
but my head and my heart travel more than I do lately
and they're always going home to you.

The cold of the winter reminds me of your Arctic touch, your tundra heart.
It reminds me of nights spent on floors, with you or because of you, I was never sure.
Because even when you were by my side, you were somewhere else, always talking about someone else.
Left me always wishing I was someone else.
And ever since, I can't find a home in this skin.
I let your poison sink in and it weighs me down like anchors.

My life is a latent dream
controlled by
consciously
unconscious
emotions
recognizing but not absorbing.

I mimic the complex partial seizures.

In and out.

Fifty percent of the acceptable me can’t breathe
Twenty five percent of me functions for you.

I look down at my hands
and see my fingerprints

every night.

They're different

every night.

Something so familiar yet unfamiliar
traps what happens in microscopic ridges
every time I touch you, making them
unique to my thoughts
whenever they conform to your figure.

Not confident about our ever changing existence –
a demonstration of life.

i'm crazy in love,
like a jealous, stormy cloud,
in love with your love.