I promise, I swear I didn't,
I mean,
****.

What was I supposed to do?

I'm in the flood waters now.
There's no hazard that could dissuade me.
I remain convinced.
I remain self-possessed.
I remain stolen and broken.
I remain.

And where did you go?
Where have you been?
What happened?
How was that enough?
How does that make sense?
Where am I supposed to go now?

What was I supposed to do?

I didn't feel old or bent or faded.
I didn't feel a surge or a skip.
I felt content, immeasurably at peace
with one foot, two foot, three foot, turn,
turn, laugh, look, smile, turn.
I avoided the touch of gaze
and the strange, knowing smile
because we both saw how years and months
could compress into a few hours
as if they never happened at all
and neither of us wants to know
what that means.

I'm supposed to ignore it.
I'm supposed to not let it touch me.
If you don't irritate them, they leave you alone.
And you can't even touch it.
You're afraid it'll fall apart.
You weren't sure it was anything at all
and you weren't sure it mattered
and you weren't sure it counted
and you start to doubt yourself
and you start to see things
and wonder if they're real
if they're anything at all.

I remember that night,
slipping on Chicago ice and laughing out loud.
In a broken snow globe the glitter still shines,
though it's slowly slipping away.
I caught the drops in a tiny bowl
with lilac blooms and melodic metal double kicks.
I'm packaging it up, wrapping it in cellophane and tape
cellophane and tape
to deliver to your future home.
I'll pass it over our shared picket fence,
hold my fingers on your wrist for too long,
and you'll look blankly or you'll smile wide.
I'll close my eyes and turn around,
walking back to hand chimes and north arrows,
my invitation hanging in the damp air.

You do not know, my friend, you do not know
what life is, you who hold it in your hands.
You let it flow from you, you let it flow,
And youth is cruel, and has no remorse
And smiles at situations which it cannot see.

I will dance a borrowed dance
and walk a borrowed line
and sing a borrowed song
until the words return
and I can control my knees
and the squeaking butterflies shut up
and the ferns are cleared from the path
and I can move forward with grace and intention,
with an open hand
and tenuous direction
and a starry smile
and a space for you next to me.

Yellow plums with sweet
flesh and sour skin
bleed down chins and smell
of summer swims and sneezes.

Once upon a time, a girl.

The grass seed and tree pollen
and dust and pet dander
and prickly pinecones and banjo strings
and the transition between analog and synthetic,
between automatic and didactic.

Ears perk like dogs at impossible pitches
upon a hidden harmony, missed melodic movement
she stops mid-sentence to hear, listen not hear, listen
for the sounds buried under sounds
and other sounds
and tape distortion
and old speakers
and ambient noise
and the head voices
and the wind in the leaves.

Candle flames hiss on extinguishing breaths
sighing promises for future dividends
dancing in circles on hardwood floors
skirt breezes
hip shakes until it's too much
floor shakes until it's all fallen
borrowing thumbtacks and bringing it all
bringing it all down.

Far in the distance I can hear the bells tolling, ringing not tolling, ringing
in time with the sunrise blinking, winking
sharing a knowing promise for a better day tomorrow,
today not tomorrow, today.

It coasts on the dips and dives
along smooth muscle, contracting
pushing, friction absent
and lubrication self-perpetuating.

She called it a spiral, but
I don't see it that way.

It is funny how the little things --
orange and purple and white petals
strings of words together like beads
white-bordered photographs in sepia
-- are bigger than they should be
and shrinking into the smallest spaces
ubiquitous and permeating
reproducing
on and onward pulling.

How do you determine the area of a feeling
how you wipe it down like auto wax
all the crevices like jelly in the webbing
between your fingers
all the misplaced metaphor and you're assuming
I know what you're talking about
you're assuming I care.

I see them there in the bright lights.
I want to be with them.
I want to be a part of nothing.
I want something to be a part of me.

The circle is the mockingest of shapes
daring the others to find its edges
a noose for the mathematician
relying on impossible for truth discovery
the approximation to determine strength or mass or density.

A curve is inherently incorrect
and creates problems for the navigators
who trust cohesion and consistency
who trust each other in cohesion
and constant and consistent standard creation
who challenge the borders of the world
and braid together the loose ends
cruising on new planes.

I watched the wing fall into the water
into the lake, that's a lake, right?
It feels like it goes on forever.

Loud noise.
Open eyes.
Dart right and right.
Grab. Hold. Release.
Quiet.

In chalk on the floor, I drew one of those shapes.
I crawled inside of it, curled up into it.
I closed my eyes tight and held my knees together.

With heavy breath, I bring
pen to page and finger to string
and hold left hand over right, to steady
my shaking wrist as I tremble,
the echo of your voice resonating
permeating
bouncing off every sinewy fiber,
ankles and hips and lungs and heart
beating for you.

I try to write of other things—
of clouds and car crashes and
mysterious men in dark suits with trombone cases and silencers,
or big whaling ships off the coast of Japan,
cold lights singing through marine mist—
but the trains of thought all lead to your
"I love you,"
to your
"I want you,"
to your
"I'm all yours."

The lyrical cadence is tired,
reminiscent of the classics and
traversing paths well-traveled.
The major keys with clean sound—
no reverb, no filter, no distortion—
are boring and basic,
and the vocal sickly sweet
and the floor toms empty
and the ride cymbal whispering
shhhhhhhh
over a cavalcade of harmonics
in a complete circle of fifths.

You are the fairy tale,
the "once upon a time"
and the "happily ever after"
that feel fabricated passing through the lips of others,
but more lucid than taste and smell when
falling through yours
mine
ours
pressed
pushed
touch
close.

It all devolves
into tangled limbs
bright colors
and whispered, made up words.
The ones that exist simply won't do.

I write every song
every single ******* song
for you.

Think about it and you'll realize
that there is no better color than wine-stained teeth
on high school students' prom nights
and muffled giggles from the girls
bathroom in the banquet hall of some
community center or middle school
gymnasium or overgrown grange hall
tell the secrets of the universe
under rushing water and dripping mascara
and notes scrawled in the grout with hearts
and other embellishment

Damp palms on shoulders and waists
with batting lashes and shy smiles and
stomachs growling from a skipped dinner
toes turned outward, awkward
when the slow song moves to charging beat
and hands flex like an accidental graze on the hot stove
a hip shake to assuage and seem like they meant it all along
that moment guides the other movements
and other movements

Driving up the hills and back down into the canyon
up the fire trail and to the right, no, the second right
crap, you passed it, turn around
watch the glitter lights of neighborhoods and boats
know there really are no better photographs
than those from disposable cameras that are blurred and laughing
developed weeks later and comingled with images of her dog
and your mom
and the backyard with candles blown out

I wish to leave you with this—
the passionate preamble of a post-pubescent
rabble-rouser with red ringlet
curls, cascades of casual
looks looming through the locks
that hide her harrowed hands
gripping the sides of her face.

"You, young lover
you, angel in the dark stage
you, wanting woman
waiting while we wash
our hands of this mess
of living breathing beauty.
You are me
and I am falling asleep at the wheel."

She sheds, shines
careless crimson
over the outside door,
twisting the tight tendons
of her frustrated neck,
spine spinning, swindling,
trying to trick me into saying,
"I will, I do."
I don't. I wont.

Her hand holding hands
lays latent in loud laughs
dies in the demon drunk night.