Sometimes when you’re sleeping, you smash
your nightmares into my pillow with your head,
which is why I think your hair sticks up sideways
when you roll over to me in our mornings
and kiss the back of my neck until the sound
of my own laughter wakes me up. I know you’re colorblind,
but you color me like a book, ignoring all the lines. I glow
in the contour your eyes make of me when you’re listening
to me frame the story I’m spitting at you before 2a.m.
You admire the shape it takes above my head, suspsendig
over the two of us like a mobile that rocks us, safely,
back to sleep. I love thinking about how you take your coffee,
how you put your sweatpants on in the morning, or the feel
of your lips nibbling at my palm as I trace your cheekbones
with my fingers like you’re a charcoal drawing
I never finish because I just don’t want
us to end. And I know that sometimes I like to skip some pages,
but come on, I just like to get to the good part. And I know
I’ve bottled up your sweetness for whatever reason
I had back at the time, and I know that I drive slow,
that I kiss you too long at the door, that I never
let you fall asleep before midnight, but I’ve always been your biggest fan.
I’ve always sort of loved you, even if it was in pieces.
I just got stuck. I just couldn’t find my way there again.
But I drew the curtain a tiny bit this morning so the sun
could highlight your sleepy face before I woke you,
and I covered your belly with the blanket so you wouldn’t be cold,
and I know our chemistry is a little old, but
you’re my favorite thing to hold,
or so I’ve been told.

She was holding on to a man broken
every gesture made, every word spoken
was a desperate cry from a place so deep
that he can only reach it in his sleep

she holds him together so the pieces don’t fly away
keeping her balance as he kneels to pray
sometimes he sees her, sometimes he doesn’t
sometimes he lives in his past, sometimes his present

she implored, she beseeched
she tried action, she tried speech
‘if you cannot love me, let me know
if you will not love me, let me go’

But he holds on, as if holding on for dear life
as if he is drowning and every stroke is in strife
as if she is the only thing keeping him afloat
as if she was every single word he ever wrote

and his eye remains to the shore -
someplace clear but far
it seems within reach yet
more distant than a star

more and more it appears an exercise in futility
finally admitting it is beyond her ability
she drops to her knees, eyes up to the Master
trying to prevent her heart’s impending disaster

the weight is so heavy, so hard to bear
hope only comes in the form of a prayer
with hardship comes ease, promises the Beloved
but try as she might, she cannot rise above it

despairingly close to losing all hope, she implored
her tender hands bleeding from the double-edged sword
would letting go bring relief or a tortuous void?
would her heart remember the previously enjoyed?

♦

~ epilogue:

Then one quiet night upon an angel’s wing
she heard a voice that only an angel can bring
somewhere between a sigh and a scream
somewhere within  a half-awakened dream

She watched him float above the ocean waves
his  feathered wings skimming the waters surface
catching rays of sunlight into pristine prisms
a radiant reflection of blue-green and turquoise

From the edge of clouds,  he finally spoke
and his words became a poem
singing sweetly behind smiling eyes
gliding together over the ocean foam