as i lie i know its true
that aphrodite has sent me you
a queen to love, a queen to muse
a queen to tie me to cupids ruse
a bond to cherish
a face to ravish
you turn a pauper from the lavish
this ode's unfit
to catch your wit
but my heart, i swear, an endless flit
so let it be known
to queen from drone
from here unto, im never lone

her spine
lay lengthwise
speed bumps for my
fingers
to carefully explore—
tracing out tattoos of a
satisfied itch
i mustn’t get too eager
idyllic in my state
sunken into my bed
and head into pillow
and my chest for hers
her cheek rides like
rolling whitecaps of the
ocean
upon my rising breast
her head is here
but her mind soars elsewhere
anchored in clouds of sleep
while i lay grounded
stroking across her back
staring at my
ceiling
drinking in all i can
with my finger tips
etching a route through
her spine

under these ocean waves
sheltered from apollo’s rays
old neptune’s tower lays
with travertine and marbled glaze
and filled to brim with tiny faes
the twilight crawls with little haste
to bring a night that lasts for days

Before Old Charon
I now stand
A bushel of berries
for this ferryman

The guardsman of fate
expresses his guilt
For the broken promises
he has spilt

forget the italics
of my brash remark
ford the wide styx
sings the deathly lark

a limerick of longing
hollows my mind
the verbal flogging
hardens my heart from the kind

and in it she stood

awash with crescented chrysanthemums

with honeysuckle skin and wisteria eyelashes

and with it i said

if nights were like coins

id spend them all on you

and twinkle them between my fingers

shaking them up and admiring

the glint and value of

the night and its stars

and the coppery, nickel-y dusk

that stains my hand with

the bouquet of metal and flowers



goldenrod warmth

from nights and coins

invariably spent

alongside only you

with a perfume of

evening

and pressing summer heat

and my whispers and promises

that tell you

that if nights were like coins

id spend them all on you

She bore my soul

as the sun bears an orbit,

a volcano-skinned corona filling

My soul, caught by Sol

My satellite spirit

Tumbles just out of reach

You warm me and

suspend me in thine beauty

You arrest me and attract me

But I know to keep my distance

For one mis-teetered keeling

skins my delicate organs

and erupts me inside your

volcano lined furnace

As a star does

to it’s most foolish of followers

a ruddy thrush of experience

artifacts your chest

opal sheers of lineage

marred by remains

of precise and careful

additions to a calcium

body

accented by a

lightning storm quicksilver

river

coursing across neck

and chest

a mark to guide

breaths of life into you