As I stroked gently the head of the sun-spun hair draped
softly across my chest, I couldn’t help but find myself
thinking, for what must have been the hundredth time,
what are you thinking, how are you feeling?
What have we done to each other?
Yet, as if on cue, as if reading my thoughts,
your head snapped up and your eyes met mine.
You looked at me half-lidded and while my first
two questions remained unanswered, I realized it
was merely a catchlight I saw in your eyes, and
what we had done to each other was ***** out the
starlight that had once dwelled there.


“When I think of my wife, I always think of her head. I picture cracking her lovely skull, unspooling her brains, trying to get answers. The primal questions of any marriage. What are you thinking? How are you feeling? What have we done to each other?” —Ben Affleck, Gone Girl

Found poem from the opening lines of the movie, Gone Girl.

The world has turned grey in your absence and feels as if I will remain blind to all of its brilliant hues for as long as we’re required to be apart—for the foreseeable future.

When this is all over—when I do see you again, I know this dormant fire coiled in my bones will set us ablaze.
When we reunite, our kisses will be sweeter than our first kiss.

When we get together, our love will be even more ravenous, even more demanding, even more essential than before, and we will desire and be desperate to become reacquainted.

When I see you again, it will be like my soul has returned to the water, and once again I have been made anew.

When I see you again, every part of me that came from
the dust of dead stars will be alive again.

“Unbind
Unclasp
Uncover
Uncurl
Unfurl
Undo
Unfasten
Unfold
Unhing­e
Unhook
Unleash
Unlink
Unmask
Unroll
Unveil
Unclip
Unlace
Unzip
­Untie
Unbutton
Unlock”

“Undress.”
“Understood.”

Unravel

Siren, sorcerer, seductress of my soul
Vampire of verve, temptress of thirst tantalizing,
captivating, enthralling me through craving
Wrenching away transmogrified desire exposing
a colossal and cavernous aching

Licentious liquors and provocative potions
Ethereal and corporeal hexthralling mixtures
Alluring, ensnaring, inviting concoctions  
Tempting with tinctures, enticing elixirs
Banquet of seduction and tonic of attraction
She is the enchanted device of my own unmaking

As I sit in porcelain canoe, submerged
in lukewarm bathwater, which grows
colder and colder each passing second
I take a long, longing look down at my
belly-bowl full of jelly-rolls and wonder,
am I worth more than the sum of my parts?

Am I more than *** and ****?
Am I more than the 206 from 270 bones,
give or take a few here and there,
without which, I would be entirely jelly?
Am I more than the lips, the teeth,
the tip of the tongue?
more than the skin and hair and
and miles of veins pumping
life in pulse after pulse as I sit doing
nothing but contemplating my worth?

if you took it all away,
if you cold-shouldered  
this body I have come to
love and hate and love again
in one lifetime,
if you held the meat,
would the milk be enough?


I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able [to bear it], neither yet now are ye able (1 Corinthians 3:2).

Barren—they call you and now
it is your badge of honor, one
you wear proudly on display.

They likened you to a desert for
a lack of children and lack of
desire for them.

Be Mojave—Gobi—Sahara—
because your glittering, glass sand dunes
are great
and bearing fruit and flowers
is your prerogative and yours alone.

Ice
Beautiful, yet beastly.
Creeping translucent tendrils of cold.
Frozen, frigid fingers pointing down.
Crystalline and gelid shivs poised to ****.
It is only day two of the ice storm and there is
expectedly, more to come.
The weight of the world rests upon delicate, weary boughs, and though they're strong, they were not made for this.
Limb after limb encased in ice, cracks and secedes from the once-great behemoths —remarkable evergreens, landing in a crashing heap, only to be collected once the thawing ends.
One tree, if not the most important of them all, is kept under careful surveillance—24/7 watch.
She is called Survivor—for weathering a different kind of storm— though now, 25 years later, will she survive this? She has already lost one great branch, and others now cannot bear the weight of frozen glaze on their spindly arms.
Electricity is yet another danger to many others of her kind.
Fire and ice alike threaten to claim them.