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 Feb 2014 Guss
bb
I once said I was on cloud nine, but who's counting, anyways? I would, but, you see, I have too many things to tell you at once, more than I can count one one or two or six thousand hands - even still, the sun in your hair is doing a pretty good job of saying the words that they haven't made up for you yet. In my mind, the world would be happier it they'd stop looking for heaven in the sky because the universe that exists where my fingertips stop and your skin starts is not clothed in all white and there are no pearly gates but in this small fraction of a moment, nobody is dying. In some way, something taught us to tilt our heads back and stare at the starry expanse of the celestial universe above us as though we were looking for the answers to every thing we've ever been to afraid to ask but, in my peripheral vision, something about you glittered and my neck was tired from staring and calling out to whatever existed beyond our world and getting a divine busy tone, it was nice to see something beautiful in these human realms, for once. So if there is room to buid even the smallest shelter in the spaces between the small spaces in your teeth, I promise to construct one out of gentle words; if there was a scripture to make the veins under your skin sing praises a little louder, then I would write and rewrite the Bible until my hands bled. Just let me be the reason you are hungry but do not starve, let me show you the way that a body can unfold without crumpling first; I will trace a pattern onto your skin without so much as a single sound, but still, it could, perhaps, be something close to music.
 Feb 2014 Guss
Austin Thomas Wood
There was this moment
and this moment was not like any other
In this moment, we became eternal

Like a stranger I fell upon this awakened feeling of longing
Longing to shake my feathers free and fly
But I clipped my wings long ago and the feathers sit at the bottom of the cage
Wasted delight in the stoppage of flight
So here I am, vulnerable and the cage within my cage, the bones
rattle out of place, finding refuge in the lost spaces of my soul

I believe in the blindness of fear, leading me into uncertainty
I placed my faith in the cathedral in my heart
Brick, stone, and stained glass, my frightful temple crumbled to dust

Let the rain flow and the mud sift through and I rebuilt that church of blood and bone to a finite state
There you came into this church a flower that has bloomed brighter than the rest
Your colors squeeze life from nothing and breathe into me

I'm a patchwork of failures and regret but there is a work of art that calls to me
Hammer the nails into the body and lift like a prayer to the sky
It's a terrible thing to waste the sunlight always breaks the day
And the past isn't going anywhere, but this moment is who we are

So let's live
Let's love
Let's fight
Let's fail
Let's fall
Let's wander
Let's forget
Let's remember

Let's live by the beauty that frees us
When this testament surrounds you, I'll be waiting in this church
Of wine and celebration
Because we have a life and let us bring it to the end and hand it to the next person and say, "I didn't waste mine, Now it's your turn."

So won't you dance in the mud with me and sing in the night,
I will cover you and never let go.
 Feb 2014 Guss
Charles Bukowski
the women of the past keep
phoning.
there was another yesterday
arrived from out of
state.
she wanted to see
me.
I told her
"no."

I don't want to see
them,
I won't see them.
it would be
awkward
gruesome and
useless.

I know some people who can
watch the same movie
more than
once.

not me.
once I know the
plot
once I know the
ending
whether it's happy or
unhappy or
just plain
dumb,
then

for me
that movie is
finished
forever
and that's why
I refuse
to let
any of my
old movies play
over and over again
for
years.
 Feb 2014 Guss
shiloh
Meeting
 Feb 2014 Guss
shiloh
Palms unite, a huddled crowd
And thumbs convene, as lips

A language native to the hands
This meeting of the fingertips

One by one (like stars) aligned
A congress of the quietest kind

For eyes it will unfold, unwind
Unheard, and yet, the word, defined
The word for "meeting" in American Sign Language is one of the simplest, and yet prettiest, signs, to me.
 Feb 2014 Guss
derelictmemory
I want that lampshade in the corner to cast away the ghosts by my side
I want your hand to be intertwined with mine at every possible point of time
I want to feel like the waves day and night with rising tides
I want to hold that photograph that captures you in the perfect light always
I want to have that imperfect love when everything is simply perfection
I want the winds to blow through my hair like I'm as carefree as it is
I want to expunge the tornados and hurricanes trapped under my skin
I want to be held like preserved fragile parchments from ancient oaks
I want to be taken like a possesion while being loved like an enthralled being
I want to feel the confidence of the flames in your eyes that still burn
I want to see the swirl of the myriad of colours labelled by digits undefined
I want to live and breathe like hummingbirds in the forest
I want to be wild and in danger; constantly threatened and protected
But most of all
I want you to find me
To cut through every hedge
that stands in between us
Find me

(m.e.)
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