Laughing,
Slow dancing
In bedrooms*

Problems drain away
Like kettle- water down the sink
From our last cups of tea

The smell on your neck
Our jokes and gestures
Like rituals

Teases of where, one day
We might end up.

We could be, on the sea
With the breeze buffeting our faces,
Making violent sails on blue-grey skies

There, you'd stand -
A silhouette on the deck
[Salt-wood & peeling paint]
- Absent minded.
Not understanding
How much
These moments

mean

to me.

Out on the sea
There's nothing but us
Laughing,
Slow dancing

Can't I stay the ugly duckling?
Life is so much quieter in the shadows
I don't want to be admired anymore
Growing tired of things has grown tiring
And I don't want to be that kind of beautiful
Her shoes could fill with blood
And she'd still have somebody to please
How can you please people
By being against everything?
You lie to gain illumination
You starve yourself
In hopes of satiation
Can't I be the ugly duckling?
At least I'd get to eat

There were steady streams
Inside the cave
I could live in there for days
Never tiring
Never wanting
Never wishing to go back

I dried up
Outside
When it closed I had no words
Not a syllable
Not a sound
Not a thought to express

I knew there were steady streams
Inside the cave
And that I could live in there
Always dive
Always swim
Always drown in my other self

Awakened by colour
Doused in light
And fantastic sensations
Of dreams
We escaped the night
Through shafts
Made by fluorescent stars
And to the sound
Of a majestic drum
Dictating dance

We sat on bubbles
And rode rainbow tigers
Holding each other’s hands
Linking fates
With cobweb chains
Dotted
With purple diamonds
We set the web on fire

She tried to escape
Reality
The sound of absence
Everywhere she turned
The walls were singing the same song
Letters from the faces
Of books
Reminders
Were staring at her
Shelves leaning in
As if they were wondering
Why she was not singing
With them
But she couldn’t
For the sound could not escape
The lump in her throat

We both existed on the same tuesday,
in the same area of space, I expected you in your striped shirt and smile
you expected me in my whole contrasting aura and existence
but on this day we switched roles
and it was because you weren’t looking well
so I asked why
and it was because your mother was in the hospital
I didn’t want to say I was sorry. Not because I didn’t mean it, but because how could you fall in love with someone who used such cliches.
I considered settling perfume on the nape of my neck and enveloping you in a sympathetic hug.
I meditated on the words “it’s really all okay”.
I wondered what your girlfriend had to say on the matter.
and what I could say that would mean more to you.
I never thought
infatuation
could make me less of a person
than I already was.

You were always tablets and talk
and I was always plaid and not so talk
but June taught that things exist between us and
red strings exist between us and
awkward gestures, slurred words and tired heels
all can heal us
and boy, your name is as common to me as my own
and just alone, an open sore
you dont know
you occupy the spaces between my
flesh
and blood
and bones
naked wounds, uneasy tones