I saw him for what he is and what he will be. Physically. I sat right there before him admiring the enlightenment he had already acquired. I noted the many hints of wisdom wrinkled into the skin of his face. I heard the drum of love beating. I was not sure of its origin but the song was melodic to my heart. Beat for beat, I cleaned my slate of insecurity. The past settled like the dust of a rough storm and suddenly I felt free and present all within his warmth. He shook me mentally.

I coughed up the blood of past lovers and froze it for days. I donated that frozen box before I thought to toss the giveaway. Maybe I am undeserving of sensational awakenings such as the gift of him. I blew too many chances with others willing to grant me unlimited wishes. The rest I threw into an ocean of young souls in need of lessons. He told me he loved me under a full moon in Sagittarius.

Speechless was I as the sun woke up; still drunk and sticky on the mouth with breath tasting of tequila and lime, barely hinting I bit into it recently. The same flavor of your weekend visit’s kiss: undeniably recognizable like a favorite Yankee candle. Careful to fall beneath layers of thoughts, I stretched my toes out as if they could touch the wall. Under my aching body the woolen rug felt too rough to have slept well at all. Dreams flooded and fled from my reach. You were there again, but this time I let you be.

Honeymoon: do you think about that word? The mention brings the mind to prasine palm fronds filled with bliss that shan’t ever again be captured in life. It seems the world has noticeably accepted this proposition. With refusal of conformity fringing the tips of my fingers, I dangle the tingly fabric across your solitude. Honey drips south around the craters of the moon and into your mouth. Sweet and warm and fresh of ***.

The sun rises higher to reflect light onto your shoulder. I admire the illumination. Your eyes peek open and pull me in under blankets with your hungry touch. It is morning and I want you.
-
I roll over onto a bed of my own scent: vacant. Threaded memories pulled out of their booklet and shredded. I shrug them away. Under the floorboard I find myself, scratching until my nails bleed blue. I scream until I grow tired. The air in here is nonexistent. I try to balance my breath but I am breathing so fast now I do not know how to slow it down why can’t I keep calm I think I’m going to pass out just calm down. I think I am going to die. I die until I am discovered under the floorboard. I breathe again.

Were your feet planted in
the same place i discovered you?
Once
our arms touched like it was nothing
skin rubbing lovingly and unaware of the ugliness coming
blue lips locking and
peeling off the plastic
covering the carton we courageously collected
our breath in

We see stars inflating,
baking and heaving
We feel floods rushing
around our ankles and
into our woolen socks
pushing too much and
cringing for the pop

Reluctant and rooted
Suited for a funeral
never scheduled
I search for you underground
only to find a chest
inked with a Japanese dragon
broken lock burnt off and open
the black lungs of a drag in
stained with golden tobacco
wooden bolts with roses
angled against me
I vine up the veins of your attention
and beg you to stay for breakfast

fast forward

into an album stored under the China we will never use
or look at
Twenty seven photos and twenty seven guests
and two hands to flip through the laminated past
and one hand to count the days that they’ll last

I’m giving birth to a kaleidoscope of baby blue hopes
she’s green gelatin under me
breathing cerulean clean like a newborn baby and
she’s free


to feed from fire and ice
her fingers find distant dips deeper than webbed ligaments
dripping pearlescent beads to be placed over her beating brain
too many aged grapes
the violet light tying her tongue from spilling
secrets held together by straw ribbon


Stuffed cheeks of fluffy pink confetti cake
the shuffling of young hips
lift the veil of cream to brand my face with
your bubbling lips


O, belittling eye
Beat me blind until I shy divine
let’s live within the interior of the tattling tulips
who shush each other sweetly
Poor petals
silk with their speckled sickness it’s
sickening to beckon forgiveness


Bronze with wooden eyes and apple cheekbones set high
she slips into the figments of my imagination’s creations of her and I
I and her humming low
damp breath decorating the faces with indigo
Her opal fingertip prints mock fossils on the window
whose fingertips once tossed rusted coins as a child
pennies from nineteen forty eight stained with wishes that
may or may not have been cast at all

I begged the marijuana to get me as high as heroine
Puffy pink clouds surround my head again
Peeling like paint your face fades from the walls of my brain
Down a rusted melting ladder and passed a white rabbit
who rushes like your heart in the midst of a panic

puff, puff, pass it

Reaching into my chest and opening
up my rib cage like a gate,
I fed the thick smoke to my lungs like iced lemonade
Snaking in and out of each broken rib
The townsmen drank the resin and black blood
before it dried up

sip sip, cough cough

Ghost, they’ll call you once you’ve drowned
under your own saliva screaming for help
No existence was the interest in a dress of rescue
Index flipping south with eyes forward north
scoffing down the brick road they built bare handed
within the same amount of time the mother
held her belly frantic

Flatten, fold, tuck the edge of the napkin
Place it on your lap and look presentable, please
The children won’t know if you don’t tell them
(about the alcohol problem)

shhh

Risky lips find their spot lights
with silly scouring mouths and proud egos
I’m chilly
But he won’t feed into her, since recently
discovering bruises blue as berries behind her knees
Cherry smooch on each
Get better soon, Honey, please

Honey, please
Honey, please

Her juicy heart’s held up with garden stalks
Ripe love threatening to fall off
Ripe love telling me to *******

Lips kiss carefully
leaving me craving for
the carvings dug deep
within your undeveloped brain

I found carnations
pink as your Italian cheeks
left on my dusty dashboard
in the midst of summer
when I climbed back in heels over head
after the jeep flipped over

There they lay
limp and lonely
telling me stories stuck within their thin throats
and warning with their petals pointed towards the sun

but I’m bleeding nostalgically from my nose
licking the beet red bath from my upper lip
speaking with no teeth left
salty says my tongue but
I see bubbled blotches of someone
I used to call “baby”

Maybe I taste the bittersweet bouquet of
stale rain after all,
Maybe I can hear the clouds gaining weight
when I listen close

Thousands of humans paint the empty air that
lives on the ***** surface of the subway floors

They wait impatiently
for a train to take them to their eventual destination
twiddling thumbs,
no hint of conversation

Mesmerized by hand devices
and every so often,
a book of pages

Careless children brag in their aura of innocence
creating circles of shimmies throughout strangers with
more laughter than the concern of danger

Polka dots dance with legs no longer than
half the height of the turnstile
filing memories while adults admire
and flash photos they’ll show forty years from now
yacking about young New York and the old times it holds

A cure to a question
which way do I turn I do not know this place I have no direction
two AM
I caught the attention of pedestrians and firemen because
I was swearing in the streets due to a fleeting aggravation
that drove me
nearly
senseless
Praying on my knees to a god I scarcely even believe in
to expose this unknown disease which gave
you every reason to be un
comfortable


But you never complained, except
when we were awake in the break of the night and your moans matured to that of a dog’s deep howl and I
had nothing more to do than to hold your skin tight as if it were to fall off of your bones within minutes


and your chilled limbs would diminish to
nothing more than a stone in the ground that I would visit every week or so and
leave flowers for your soul to smell


I will thread my dress from scratch with a spool of black stars and a new silver needle
The bottom will drag across the dead dirt because I made it too long for my petite body,
on purpose
so no one could gaze upon my swollen bare feet bruised from suede heels that squeezed my toes for too long when I dressed up for you in front of the dusty mirror on Wednesday’s dawn


My lips will curve words like bubbles blown from a child’s toy
do I look okay?
The left fragile strap slips off my shoulder as a breeze steals the right and a breath sighing yes trickles chills south on the ship of my spine


I will be wearing a whopping gray floppy hat,
the one with the violet sashay you gave me in the spring
It will fold over my quiet face and
cloak the wounds of my hazel flaw

Soft locks of dusty blonde ride silently on
the backbone of the wind
Where puffs of smoke play games with ghosts
and shield a mysterious face I’ve known

Steel blue eyes beam through this fog like headlights
lustily glaring through the windows of heavy lashes
stones rolling over his umbrella lids
almost closing but
delivering a daring stare
water to clay and I
instantly mold to his spirit like pottery

A slow sip of hot coffee awakens
the hypnotized creature hiding inside of me
My mind aware yet carelessly smothered in infatuation with
the way these tears drip over the rings in my nose
a salty tongue barely licking a topic
I could tip toe across yet
I decide to sprint through like a child in Summer’s sprinklers
and I couldn’t tell you why without apologizing

Their innocent hands grasp my dead grandfather’s face



like I once did when he lived



Little fingers crawl on his crumbling skin



and I wonder,



Who teaches kids that a corpse



is just a big doll to play with?