When the lights go down
We look at each other
And you follow the curve of my face
Before your lips make one of their own

I wish i could meet everybody in the world.
I wish i could fix everyone's problems.
I love the world. Why can't i make it as wonderful to everybody else as it is in my eyes?

We were a little too formal
as I gave you the usual tour of the house
that my mother would not approve of
and we were a little awkward
as I laid down next to you because
I was ready to jump into whatever this was
but at the same time it made me hesitate
because this was the first time.

The first time:
we’d ever gotten this close
and
I’d gotten to really feel
the way your muscled arms clenched
a little when you put your arm around me
and
I looked into your eyes
and you were looking straight back at me
without telling a joke or jabbing my sides
and you were serious
and I was nervous
but I kissed you anyway.

We were still slightly sweat-glistened
from mopping the dingy
and eternally sticky floors at work
but I liked the way
that I breathed you in
and it was a mix
between your quick spritz of cologne
when you thought I wasn’t looking
and your natural musky scent
that was exactly how I imagined you would smell
when I sat just far enough away
in the passenger seat.

We were a little too eager
and
your hands were a little too fast
to throw my tank top to the floor
and unhook my favorite bra
and
you were a little too fast
to get me exposed
despite our hesitations initially
but
I was a little too fast
to kiss you harder
to let you know that
I didn’t give a ****
about the lipstick that lingered
on your slightly swollen lips
and I wanted more
than just to rub my clothed body
against yours.


*August 5, 2014
11:55:19 PM

The comic convention
has cardboard cutouts of
all of the main characters of
Harry Potter.

Harry,
Ron,
Hermione,
etc.
All motionless in a river of people,
glossy but worn down,
bathed in cold white halogen.

And one by one,
the cosplayers—
the Harrys
Rons
Hermiones,
etc.

Have their pictures taken
with the cutouts,
one cardboard cutout cut out
and replaced with a real human being.

Being human, we
crave companionship,
fear solitude,
crave solitude,
fear companionship.

We try to avoid becoming cardboard
cutouts of ourselves, but sometimes
a retreat into inanimacy
is what the animus needs.

The cosplayers continue to shuffle forward in line
each waiting to pose for a selfie.  Each
politely smiling at the living Harry Potter characters around them,

but not striking up a conversation.