Oh, his little bruises.
His little scrapes.
All his little stars in his pocket
or on his sleeve,
his hair tumbling around his face like rain,
like all his little tears.
There are little flecks of blood under his nails,
but he was blushing in the dark.

Warm breath against the shell of your ear,
     your violet-veined eyelids fluttering.
Palms cupped full of melted gold,
     spattered ink on the pages of the book of life.
Reading Shelley on gum-dotted sidewalks,
     an oxford shoe through the lens of your binoculars.
Familiar fingers knotted into yours,
     blue bows tied around your clavicle.

Grass-stained shirt hems,
     your mother's scrawl inside your collar, faded.
Scuffed knees,
     not quite bleeding.
Too far away from home,
     swimming in your reflection in your watery cup of tea.
Ripped up notebooks,
     a writer's love ignited.
Rough wine on the banks of the canal,
     crying, laughing, tumbling still.

The breath of the hesitant sun
     is cool against the nape of your neck.
Crimson red café fronts flutter in the breeze.
Your feet are bruised on cobblestones,
     your soles worn down.
The gentle murmur of the foreign students,
     the rhythm of the Hindu philosophers,
the hot smell of cinnamon thick in your head.

So then is this how it feels
     at the end of the world?
Everyone is nothing, we are nothing,
     nothing in the ground.
Is this how it feels
     to watch the statues of Rome crumble and
buckle at the knees?
Everything is nothing, it is nothing,
     nothing on the funeral pile.
Is this how it feels
     to have armageddon abandon you,
leave you screaming on cracked cathedral floors?
I am nothing, I am nowhere,
     nothing underground.

"You will never be what you were supposed to."