Roaming down my spine are shivers
Fingers, fear and dread
And films reels on a loop that trickle
Whispers through my head

Rising in their wake the goosebumps
Feather out and feel-
If only for an instant what's
Remembered then- is real

It's easier to leave to turn and go
To mark my footsteps heel to toe
Grasp the door and flee the frame
And keep my mouth shut around your name

Seven times we've danced around
That darkest mark of days,
Drifting past the gravity
From whence his path did stray.

Seven journeys round a sun
That no more knows the shade
Of eyes that witnessed 22
And barely more a day.

Seven trips and many moons
Spent staring at the sky,
Wishing I could raise my wrist
And grasp the reasons why

Seven's worth of dreams in which
The 'why' evades me still
And why I when I caress the skin
I feel naught but the chill.

Seven come and seven gone
And seven on my skin
And yet untouched by seven are
The memories of him.

Down where the water sprawl to touch,
The banks of where the wraiths of us
Cling beneath the half-mast moon
My memories must not exhume-

The path of fingers, hair and skin
Where one touch ends and one begins.
Or how the words, too high a cost
Curled in the wind- forever lost.

I live my life in metaphors,
In memories- and muse
Of different ways I can preserve
The echoes left of you.

The grass is greenest where it's watered,
Yet I know where it rains is broader
And here above-tipped gray- the weight
Informs me that my reach is great.

I saw goodbye in the green
And shuttered in the space between
The paces that would close the gap-
Where I would take my silence back.

Yet parted of lips bore nothing more
Then wisps of breath, just as before
And turning without tracing back
My march on forward stays the track.

With nothing more to fill the air
My feet sought miles far from there
And yet the shell marched forward when
My heart did circle back again.

And then the gap grew to contain
Seasons past, The wind and rain
Weeks to months, a year's refrain
Would never see us touch again.

My arms cut through the water in a
Bid to stay afloat,
And even as my muscles scream
And ocean chokes my throat-

I twist and dart between the waves
To steal another breath-
Dreaming of the moment when
The stormy seas will rest.

I'd seen the seam of wet and dry
Of Salt and Sea, of Earth and Sky
Yet, once upon a yesteryear
When five was close, and ten was near-

The navy stretch front side to side
Spanned far beyond where eyes could spy-
And all at once it rushed to me,
That first breath of eternity.

Then- at ten I once again
Meet the ocean, only when
A set of eyes cast down on low
Wandered up from down below.

And all at once home was here
A feeling that would persevere
With each footstep, my stride would swallow
The Ocean's path was mine to follow.

Walk out,
Ash and dust into the
Winter wind
Where your breath is nothing more
Than an echo to aging ears-

And I will follow
To find you in all breezes
Slipping a summer kiss
An autumn football game
Or a Spring car ride
Deftly into a place against my skin.

I paced the squares that mark the days;
Each footstep took me far away-
And yet the circle joined to touch
The echo of the ghost of us.

I watched the wind on summer days,
The way it plays havoc with the meadow grass
And wish the words
MY words-
Could be plucked and carried on that breeze
Like a seedling
To go where they need to
And where I cannot.

The breathing to the side of me
Fades into obscurity
I sink below the membrane then
To pierce the veil of time again

Muscles within flesh and bone
Unfurl into the scent of home,
And there beside my destiny
I stow my sight to rise and see-

The way it was, The way I want
The way that's rocky back to front.

It's not the end of everything
Just of what was left
And how to salvage nothing when
You walked out with the rest.

It was only one chance left
To shape the words with baited breath
And yet what slipped past gritted teeth
Plagues my waking memories.




I'm not the type to barter,
To plead for what's not mine.
But I would trade my everything
For just a touch of time.

I caught the tail of cigarette
In the parting peal of breath.
And even as he walked away
The shame washed all the words away.

I've written scads of nonsense, hence-
A futile need to recompense.
But all of this means nothing now
And nothing lends to reason how-

He may have strode those parting steps
To leave when there was nothing left.
But my words fed the final blow
The nail to coffin down below.

Beneath half-mast moonlight,
Above the night-dew grass,
Against the inky darkness of the
Shadows that They cast-
The pines stood tall like sentries
That barred the dark and wood.
The wind wove through the treetops
As it's fingers chilled my blood.
The gaps within the ranks of trunk
Bore whispers of the void
My hopes, my dreams, my nightmares
Had been tucked away and stored.
And there, I gazed for hours
Between the teeth of trees
To delve into the reasons why
His specter haunted me.

The mirror of the lake
Where herons hurried during day-
Hailed the hazy nighttime
Off a long forgotten way.

The billows of the water broken
By the cashmere wind,
Painted a mirage of which
The hemlocks dwelled within.

And up against the inky shore
Where dafodils did bloom,
Two bodies did embrace beneath
The new September moon.

The air was lilac on the day
The sunset touched the earth in grey.
The velvet breeze caressed the grass
Of meadows rooted in the past.

A ring of trees bore witness to
The blurr of light that cut on through
The dusky darkness of the way
Your silence stole my breath away.

We paced the clearing, fed our sight
With fireflies like Christmas lights-
And up above, the navy sky
Breathed starlight in a soft reply.

The words unsaid are wraiths, unspread
To ears they should collect in.
Unspoken speech, they do not reach
The ears they should reside in.
Instead they're bred within my head
To ripen forth and spoil.
Each carapace returns to this
The over-barren soil
And yet, alas, the words that pass
Take root and choke the landscape
From world around they do resound
In never ending earthquake

The cold night air is a blistering kiss
Touching images and memories that I'd rather not miss-
And yet my eyes trace roadsides as they buckle on by,
The moon's a silent siren in the aubergine sky.

I left my mind behind me in the whispering wind
As the tires drag down miles past the motels and sin.
The city bright and glowing lights slash colors down my face
And I find my mind's now in rewind to settle on in.

Oh the cruel air it does not care to spare me from the dream
Of lilac breeze, the swaying trees, the water's subtle gleam.
And the way your eyes sought cloudy skies - with your back against the earth,
You traced the lines above the pines and reveled in their worth

My weary feet, they hasten me; a foot down to the floor
And spinning tires, the cable wires are a steady blur once more
Yet, that hidden place, that sacred space, follows deftly behind
With the cruel wind- the city wind- that carries better times.

You will find me
Street-side,
Where the gazes of cars do nothing to
Name me;
Breathing in Silver and moon
Lilac and asphalt
While they sleep in lattice mortar.

You will find me.
Where the Earth slopes in a sea of stone
Face up, skimming the summer grass with my fingers
And searching for the voices of the dead
In the cotton-wisp sky.

You will find me
Weaving through a sea of trees
Tracing their ashen skin
Like the carapace of each lover I've
Discarded along the way
Drinking the air of the
Earth and leaves underfoot.

You will find me
Surrounded and
Alone.

I've tasted Infinity
Acrid on the back of my throat,
Twisting my tongue around the periphery
Of what was both forever and fleeting.

I've dined on the Divine-
A place between The Nether and Earth
Where the smallest of deaths brings
The biggest of discovery-
Sending me crashing
One way or the other.

I've slept with Reality
Felt him slip, cold and hard
Into a place that will remain forever
Desecrated with truth and injustice;
Felt ****** beyond belief.

I've grappled with time
Shoving against a pervasive advance
That colors the way I see
The new line from things I've
Done and said
Built and Broken.

I've breathed and walked
The routes of monster and man
Knowing naught between the taste of blood and chocolate on my tongue.
Savoring both with bitter abandon.
Yet somehow-
My feet continue.
The day dawns.

I've persisted.

I was fire set upon
A bed of wood to flicker on.
The steady feed of brush and bark
Kept me ablaze to stay the dark

And yet at once, a time before
An oil fueled my cobalt core.
So mindlessly, I did consume
All things before their buds could bloom.


Further back, beyond that burn
I reveled in to quell the yearn-
There was chill that eddied forth
That ushered in the wind from North.

My fires faltered needfully
And lapsed into a harmony,
That warmed us both without the threat
Of razing us with hot regret.

I skirt the line
Tread the edge
Of the 'maybe'
At the ledge.
See the eddies,
Traces the swirls
That coalesce
To join our worlds.

The taste of green's
A bitter bite
That's left me bleeding
Fled my sight.
The restful red
Sustaining me
Has fallen Grey
Unerringly.

In the dawn, I saw you there
With misty eyes and tousled hair
And with the sunlight flooding though,
I knew the summer scent of you.

You trickled yourself over me
The way the light pulsed through the trees.
And hand to hand we carried on
Across the dampened morning lawn.

Our pluming breath of spectored speech
Soared skyward towards the dancing leaves.
Gaze to gaze, brown to green
The morning lost it's sacred gleam.

My sight, sick
Slick- a brush
Spreads your face
Layer by layer before me.

Unpeeled, my eyes
Sell truths my mind
Cherry picks, kicks around
Until they crumple,
Fester, shrivel
Fade.

For one brief
Infinite moment
I'm there beneath
That single layer,
Flush against
Soil, earth,
Summer and rain-
And the precise shade of olive
I've only ever seen
In the double sphere
Of each iris.

Of all things I remember
I'll always recall the sunflowers;
Benevolent guardians that kept
Whimsical treasures from the wandering eye.

There was a slick magic they harbored
Bottled in their rich, sun darkened faces;
The surrendered seeds
We gathered against the wishes of the jays.

I grasped them, granted access to the castle on the creek
Lighthouse in the wood that beckoned back after
The last crawfish had wriggled free
The final apple was plucked,
And the birds had sought refuge.

CJ,

Another year past, with so much more unsaid.
We both had our fatal flaws:
I was afraid to fall too fast;
Wasn't ready yet-
And you wanted to dive into the unknown
Regardless of what happened.
I was too scared,
Too scared to have something so consuming and frightening.
I remember how kissing you was the most wonderful and horrifying things I'd ever done. I remember feeling the young, frail thing in my heart being changed permanently.
And it was just too soon for that.
I'm sorry I wasn't brave.
I'm sorry I hurt you by running, by pushing you away.
I'm sorry that our anger masked different kinds of hurt. There are words I said I wish I could recall, even if they were said in jest.

It's too late now,
Too late in the truest of ways
And I wonder all the time
If those two paths would have bissected again.
It would have been alright if they hadn't. Just the fact that you were still walking yours was enough for me at the time.
But now, there's an empty walk in the woods somewhere-
A place I stand, a crossways I look down, knowing the traveller I seek will never join me.
But if only.
If only, if only.

You would have been 26 this Friday.
When did we... I... get so old?
I wonder who you would have been with four more years under your belt? I wonder, but I know that you would have been just as miraculous to me now as you were then.
I'm shouting to the void, these words, knowing your eyes will never stroke each line I've typed. Penning a letter to ash- to masses of people who will read this and pluck a fragment of my grief like a shard of glass from the sand.

Embellishments aside, flowery language discarded: Happy early birthday, my love. With all of my heart and soul, know that I loved you then, and I'll love you past each year that your body is no more.

Always.

-Sarah

Move a little closer
Give me what you've
Planned to take.
We're both numb here
Blue lipped
And wanting around the
Flame
Taking what burns we can.

I know we need this
The way I need to
Lift away and dig around
In search of something
Redeemable
Though this act will only
Add another layer
He won't reach.
I shiver
Wasting away with the taste
Of fine whiskey
As a whisper on my tongue
Of a moment where we felt
Halfway human again.

Skim to search the airwaves seeking
To abandon you
I fill this empty silence with a
Useless song or two
In silence creeping, weeping, you fill
Up my nodding head.
And all the words you've spoken hence
Flood forth to fill my head.
The voices on the radio say
All I should have said-
I skip those haunting broken tunes
And search for more instead.
Though truthfully excuses fail to
Negate what is true:
I fill this car with music to
Escape my thoughts of you.

Four years
And the acrid proof still swells,
Drags down my face when I recall
The sweetness before the end.

Even angry
Hot metal hatred ready to
Scour a path to him
Something stronger finished first
Lept back and forth to show that
Words meant nothing in the face of
This.

I've worn a cranial path-
So trodden in the search for
How things go on between Two
When one ceases existing.

The why is evident,
The how has fallen to negation.

I will love you through
Bump and scrape,
Play and study,
Onward over each
Bite and kiss.

I will love you through
Innocence,
Through sweating hands and
Hopeful eyes,
Through long baby hair that
Hid our faces;
Kept our secrets.

I will love you through
Each forgone bedtime
Through this speaker that
Kept us in the same room-
Long after bells sent us
Our separate ways.

I will love you through
Needless others,
Through the ones that mattered
And the ones that don't,
Long after each
Hello and Goodbye

I will love you as I wave goodbye
As you stay behind, skim the other
Side of the delta where we
Came up through adolescence.

I will love you as you hide
The truth, the gentle ecstasy of
Pill shaped promises to
Forget, to leave.
I will love you past each
Untouched phone call
Each slanted gaze,
Each gentle sidestep.

I will love you even as
You choose goodbye
Never knowing I would have
Chosen you, given the chance.
I will love you past the silver fire in your veins
Past the blue-tinged lips
The sightless eyes.

When the love has no where to go
When you are gone
When I am here.
I will love you
Still.

I wonder when
Trapped inside
The dragonfly feels
Every inch of the walls
Curbing her from the sky.
Does her path know destination?
Or does she wait for a gap to the wild blue
That will never come?
I know her fatigue
The steadfast despiration of
Looking for an out
False windows grant
A glimpse of a simplistic freedom
Where carving the air has become
A fading dream.