that summer I tasted music for the first time
I loved a boy who said my knees knocked together like

commuters during rush hour
in his eyes were waves against Barceloneta
and

he slid lyrics in between my ribs at every traffic light

when we made love I saw sound
and

his breath coated me

like varnish

I dreamt I lost him between books at the Rylands;
sliding in and out between hardcovers
I found him soaking

in a clawfoot
masked in steam, coaxing me to slide in

there is a bustle of him in the square,
gradient beard and all

I visit it when we’re apart

despite the stone,
I feel his warmth

you look purest in blue light
I sway constantly between self-assured

and broken hearted

every question I’ve had covers my walls
your answers arrows
tied with affirmation

I’ll fill a room with photographs of us when I tell you I love you
catalog every expression
why am I calloused and you so smooth?

promise me you’ll fly me to the moon
I’ll hand paint golden flecks in your eyes

will you maneuver a tweezer through my pink matter –
**** out the burrs?

slide your hand on my thigh
while we drive into Brooklyn

I’ll push myself off screen when the fear takes over

pull me in
wrap me
I am yours

bubble up to

the surface.
your perforated skin swallows
my wayward tears
I sit in vivacious waters;
your eyes my captain.
your

beauty is kinetic – yet stillness becomes you.
I’ll read one more poem before you uncover the core
of my shriveled

skin
each time we step in, our waters are forgiving –
scorching only patches of us while I rub out the redness with ScarGuard
in our waters:

you grow three bubble beards
and I
submerge myself under running taps
and we coat our lips with soap to press against each other

your every angle catches light

I’ll swaddle you in terrycloth and carry you
to save you from the raging jets –
our former trysts swirling down the drain
kiss me so the heated water will go from you to me
I’ll disappear beneath the surface to guide you up

find my tender hands in this hollowed mould

if I could be any one of your body parts I’d

be your fingertips.
when you break my gaze on screen, I yearn for it like

a lost child.
keep pushing others out of the way at aquariums so I can
touch the stingrays

and nudge my calves with your nose when you
want to be brushed

I promise to always remember where your car is parked,

if you let me keep that photo of you as a young pilot
in my pocket

in public spaces, we fill the

air between us with supernovas.
you are Sirius
you are the lobster
you are the look across the room at a party;

feel my phantom hands on your shoulders
I’ll crawl into the nape of your neck and make a home

plaster myself across your skin so you can find me

in the grooves of your hands
I’ll sew my words into your sheets so you will never be without them

promise me you’ll comb out your tangled hair if it gets too much

and wait for me by the Whitney
as I walk 341 miles for you.

animal heads float above the surface

sheep’s matted wool and dead rats amongst the debris

worst rainfall since 1911, and

I am all alone.
the confines of this bucket dig into my lower back
and wet metal indents my calves

I hope you, too, have a bucket
my love

for although your legs are sturdy
you cannot hold yourself above the roofs
the plaster walls breaking off and sticking to your skin,
imprinting

memories of others onto you

but remember:
the crème brûlée at 3 a.m. after you returned from the docks
and the drunken dances in the kitchen to BB King’s voice

maybe my wedding dress is drifting

between the gardens and
I can wear it when our buckets meet somewhere along this natural disaster
-- the fragmented filled canal --
and you would immediately recognize its bell sleeves

amongst the damp wood
and loose shingles

gnawing

at my lapel, you beg for me to stay

you push me further onto the pavement on Lexington
and your hot breath

glistens on my neck.
“you’ve changed,” I say,
as your eyes lose colour and hair sprouts behind your eyes

I used to sit on your chest and
paint your body with my favourite

colour
and you would carry me on your back
so my feet wouldn’t be wet when it rained

but since the full moon
you hover above me while I sleep
and your hairy

hands feel foreign on my body

and here, on Lexington, my new silk dress is ruined

no more thrashing
no more howling
no more public indecency on 29th and 9th

“you’ve changed,” I say,
as I heave you off me
and grab my bag off the floor

two MTA

workers play invisible baseball across platforms at Union Square

the runs in my tights mimic the skyscrapers
whose marks I see across the black sky from the rear

window while he ***** me in the backseat of his Audi

an alley in Brooklyn,
the threat of a subway slasher,
the likelihood of getting lost,

but the questioning by tourists for direction

if I say “I am one of you”, it

discredits my memories here:

[pumpkins on 34th in July
kisses in bathtubs in Meatpacking
top of the Whitney]

but I am not (yet) one of you:

impatient drivers,
L train riders,
rainbow bagel obsessers

I still feel a hand grip my throat when walking down 5th
and throw my bones off the Chelsea Pier
before I spend 11 hours wondering why I haven’t yet committed myself to you.