My love,
he's always there, even when he's not.
I feel his presence in every snowflake.
I taste his lips in every tear.
I hear his heartbeat with every crack
of frost upon my windowsill.
He tastes like
strawberries and sadness.
The Spring broke his heart
and now he's broken mine.
Encased it in ice to claim as his own
never knowing what would come later.
I've always fancied doomed love
but never
Fire and Ice.
Never something so
masochistic.
He thinks his chilled words
can soothe the painful flames engulfing my innards.
What does Winter know of
Summer?
There is always a season to keep them apart.
He cannot know he is breaking my heart,
threading lines of ice through a cracked and aching vessel.
The rains of Spring are only the tears of
Summer,
weeping as I watch the last of my love
melt away.

He sits in his cell
She in hers
He is praying
Somewhat futilely in her opinion
for forgiveness from his God.
He calls across the hallway to her
asking if she has begged for
repentance.
But she merely throws her head back
and laughs like she hasn't in weeks, perhaps even months.
"Then you shall go to Hell, friend,"
he calls, bitter tears choking his voice
as the time ticks slowly away and
a noose sways in his mind's eye.
She laughs again, and replies,
"For what? We are both here to die;
we will both have payed our price.
Here you are meant to be, while I am not.
I ask you this, brother, why is your God not here for me?
What reason have I to pray?"
He has committed
******
****** in the first degree
of the first-born brother who would not share his
money
land
or other birthright earnings.
Now half an hour is left
the priest has come and gone.
And from their ground-level windows they can see the
gathering crowd proclaiming,
"String them up!
Hang the murderer 'til his neck snaps!
Hang the ***** 'til her breath is gone!"
And he pokes his head out between the cell bars
and whispers down the hall.
"So, this is why you are here?"
She nods once, and then once more as a farewell,
as the executioner comes
to lead her
away.

A woman traipsed with the whole company of ballet;
She was but only a soloist, a mere sujet.
Her companions wore clothes for traveling hard,
But our sujet, she dressed in dancing shoes and leotard.
Her head was upturned and her nose pointed
High, as if by a great saint she had been anointed.
With ease she stretched into each dainty pose
But no other ballerina saw the bandages wrapped around her toes,
Which she had to replace every other hour;
Seeing her bleeding sores did often make her cower.
To the other ballerinas she was dismissive and ****
But her oft-clenched fists belied the faltering of her heart.
Her chestnut hair she had dyed golden like the rest
And her curves became thin so she would dance her very best;
She had hidden herself inside ‘till her olive skin turned pale,
Believing if she fit in, at her craft she never could fail.
Instead of breaking her fast or supping at night
She practiced her art and took nary a bite.
The ballet troupe sneered while the sujet put on her airs
Yet I know she wept at the ice hardened in their stares.

Tonight, I want to sleep with you.
I don't mean I want to have ***. I don't even mean I want to make love.
I just want to crawl into bed with you and sleep.
I want you to keep me cozy, and wake me if I have nightmares.
I often do.
In turn I'll whisper soft sweet fantasied promises into your ear, and then tickle you until you cry from laughter so the mood doesn't get too heavy.
I want to forget about yesterday, let today fade away, and ignore tomorrow. I just want you, your steady breathing, the beat of your heart, and the snowflakes out the window.
I want your cobalt eyes to be the last thing I see each night.
And I want to pretend we can last forever.

Above, the sun laughed.
It mocked us, the intensity of it
bore down on us
melting us
from the inside out.
I could feel it gaze into my soul,
and as it did,
I felt my soul begin to die.
It melted down to a sort of liquid gold,
and could it have been bottled I would have in an instant,
and then sold it for something
useful
or
worthy.
There is
no
place for a
soul
in this world.
My soul began to boil, then bubbled over
and began to flow out my
mouth and
eyes and
ears and
nose,
pouring out of any open spot in my body.
It dripped over my cheeks and
dribbled out my mouth, then
flowed like molasses down
my shoulders and
chest,
and like honey down
my legs and
over my feet.
Once it hit the ground I heard it sizzle out of existence,
and I looked up,
feeling a new and sickening weightlessness.
My companions were crouched on the ground,
howling like madmen
and trying to lap up with their tongues
the last little bubbles of their souls
as they were absorbed by the rough desert sand.
In the younger ones I could see their souls
fizzing
in their eyes, and they gulped anxiously
in a futile effort to keep them inside.
I stared up at the sun as it continued to
laugh,
and I wished for the moon, and
the ability to cry.