~wherever, whenever and forever for Sally B.~


"Don’t urge me to leave you.              "If I could, then I would
To turn back from you.                          I'll go wherever you will go
Wherever you go,                                   Way up high or down low
I will go,                                                   I'll go wherever you will go
And where you stay,                              Run away with my heart
I will stay.                                                 Run away with my hope
Your people will be                                Run away with my love
My people                                                I know now, just quite how
And your God                                         My life and love
my God.                                                   Might still go on
Where you die, I will die,                      In your heart, in your mind
There I will be buried."                          I'll stay with you for all of time"

(Book of Ruth 1:16)                                  (Charlene Soria Lyrics)


Let it be writ,
Let it be sung,
All should know,
This I swear,
Where you are,
So, I shall be too.
Your hope, my hope.
Your heart, my heart.
Life and love,
But one.

Where you run,
I'll shall follow.
Now, today,
Forever,
If our bodies apart,
If our hands cannot
Grasp each other,
Yet, still,
In your heart,
In your soul,
I will be,
I cannot leave.

Where you are,
So, I shall be too.

She reads
                                          And she sleeps
                                                      Way too much
                                                            ­           It's her coping defence
                                                                ­               When nothing else will suffice
                                                         ­               She needs to get away
                                                       Without actually leaving
                                             Because she's too scared
                                   And too tired
                                            To leave her bed
                                                      So she cracks open a book
                                                            ­     To escape somewhere far away
                                                            ­             And she'll sob for the characters
                                                      ­                       Whose brokenness resembles hers
                                                            ­                                   And then she'll sleep
                                                           ­                                   And have sweet dreams
                                                          ­              Of realities that are not her own
                                                       Because pretending is so much easier
                                                 Than facing reality
                             So she'll sleep and dream
          And secretly wish she won't wake up
So she can finally escape

My days ago
are piled
with excess.

My days ahead,
clouded
with letting
go.

This day today,
empty
as the bottle
laying next
to me.

And there's
no way
to grow
young
again.

I lose you
like I lose my mind-

effortlessly.

Your childish lies have nothing of a true meaning
because you never saw what truly went on inside my mind.
The cogs were turning, but the wheels got stuck in the muck
that you had left behind when you decided that it was time to bid me adieu.
That child inside me broke
Like the Bay Lake dam that came crashing and tumbling down,
the waters swirling into the ever after.
Leaving me behind, alone, with the lonely company of the silt and the sand.
And then, I wept.

How I adore your nerve
when you kissed me in your closet upon sheets made of legos
and all of your childhood dreams.
How easy I am for you to draw when you play on stage the song that you wrote me,
The one that feels like rock climbing by the river,
Like naps in the summer when I drool on your chest and you don't mind,
Like kissing you until the very last minute of my curfew,
only to break it for the miracle that is your lips.
How alluring is your breath on my neck,
Your voice in my ear when you told me that you loved me
and you didn't stop smiling,
even as the years went by and I did.
How I craved, longed, begged for time to be still
the time you took me to the highest hill you could drive to,
You called it my mountain.
"At first, you look at it and it's so small,
but once you notice it, it's all you can see," you said.
How my stomach floods with waves of nostalgia and a taste
of everything I've ever had to live without,
With complete and utter spell-binded devotion at the simple familiarity
of your smell.
How addicted I am to your laugh when you're happy and
the mastered impression you do of your mom.
How weak I am to your intellect and your appreciation of literature
and real music,
Your enthusiasm for art and the "name that note" game you force upon me
as you stumble onto the classical radio station.
How in love I am with your romance that is as childish as my attachment
to my baby blankie and my mother's childhood walrus that you never ceased to insult.
Our pajama day that we decided over our prom,
When we turned on John Mayer and slow danced in your room.
Your idea of a date consisted of fake wine and me.
How incredibly warm are the coldest of nights,
On the side of your dirt road as we lie in the snow that is too cold for comfort,
yet holds us there with the fear that one day will not look the same as this one
and I would bear any amount of cold winter to keep one more moment of yours.
How I cherish the way you latch my pinky with yours when we walk
And the face you don't know you make when you play guitar.
The rooftop where you kissed me for the very first time and the string rings
we wore to remind each other we were still there.
How incredibly and unfortunately devout I am to all that I remember of you.

Twenty-first. Night. Monday.
Silhouette of the capitol in darkness.
Some good-for-nothing -- who knows why --
made up the tale that love exists on earth.

People believe it, maybe from laziness
or boredom, and live accordingly:
they wait eagerly for meetings, fear parting,
and when they sing, they sing about love.

But the secret reveals itself to some,
and on them silence settles down...
I found this out by accident
and now it seems I'm sick all the time.

All these days, met with sighs let this finish with my goodbye.
Morning came, coiled then spent. Our greetings placed on stoves of hate.

If not today, then when my heart.
My time is yours to empty out.

It will wait for better days
Or better times
or better men.
I am none of them.

When surrounded by nothing permanent,
it amazes me
how engulfed in the finality of this anguish I am.