Do you recall being stardust?
I don’t.
But, that’s what they say.
Elements forged in fusion’s crucible;
atoms born in the hearts of stars.
Do you recall being a comet’s tail?
Do you recall a time in space?
I don’t,
but then, it’s been a while.
Do you recall the lakes and streams;
swimming as fish,
or being water?
Do you recall the plains
when we roamed as beasts,
great and small?
Were you an antelope, a butterfly, a bird?
Were you a flower?
Were you Cleopatra?
Was I…Anthony, or just
some tea in Cleopatra’s cup?
(Did Cleopatra even drink tea?
I don’t know.)
Do you recall when you said
you loved me?
I do.
They told me,
“don’t fall in love with stardust.”
But then, what choice did I have?

You have to forget me .
the moment you met me.
Ages ago.
You have to forgive me
the moment you kissed me.
Months ago.
You have to escape me.
the moment you touched me.
Days ago.
You have to believe me.
the moment you lost me .
Tomorrow.
Today.
Yesterday.
Centuries ago...
Cleopatra

as her ladies paint
her blue blood on her lips
Cleopatra speaks:
“queens die like this:
with the theatrics
of the crowning ceremony
and the proud negligence
of the morning toilette:
the gods-awful magnificence
of a wrist-flick:
draw me my milk bath,
bring me my venom pills.”

Better to be Pyramus and Thisbe
than god Apollo and Daphne?
As love oft triumphed by envy.
Oh to be Abelard and Heloise
or Juliet you and Romeo me!
Cleopatra, Marc Antony,
Orpheus, and Eurydice!
Martyrs to Cupid, were you wary
of the price to pay? Did you find peace
from Plato’s coined mental disease
in Pluto’s long halls of Hades
or the self induced daily shade of trees?
What of love dooming kin to Achilles?
When Dido and Aeneas meet
is her suicide guaranteed?
Pray tell us, can true love ever be free!

I always look
my most beautiful
when I cry;

the bags under my eyes
burn as poignantly
as waning crescents,
lips plump as they quiver
with the same multitudes
of Artemis' bowstring,
chest heave-hoeing
against the tempered
vessel of my soul.

I wear sadness
remarkably well,
you know.

Like black lipstick.
or short hair.
or poetry.

(Cleopatra's got nothing on me, baby)

My reflection tessellates
against the swell of my tears,
evolves into
kaleidoscopic fractals
of smouldering thrones
and howling queens--
into images most
strange and terrible.

(But, oh, how I welcome them.)

A delicate curtsy of words
respires from my mouth,
forms upon my tongue
its homage--
hail thy shattered kingdom
hail thy shattered kingdom
hail thy shattered kingdom.

Cleopatra, like Caesar my heart concedes
And even though it is only one sided
The hardest quest would be to get you out of my head
Always dedicated to all your needs

Infamy I have bestowed upon myself
The fire burning the hearth of my soul, never dimming
I would give my self to you for your trimming
A romance that you would leave on a shelf

Cleopatra you are the most pure, the most precious
For your happiness I would play the vicious
To be your obsession I would be cottonweed

Wondering if I have truly spoke with you
Could it be that I mirrored myself unto you
Veritably it is not love but only greed

it reminds me of the mid August heat
of his old decaying teeth
it reminds me of the smell of paint
and music that makes me happy
of ukuleles
and faint bird chirps
of sumptuous velvet by my bare toes
and icing on cake
of cereal and sunday mornings
and mom’s freckles in the sun
of thunder and lightning
and mattresses pressed against my back
of the gold he embellishes me with
and old recordings on tape
of ee cummings and maya angelou
and a time were it was easier to live, but harder to survive
of Cleopatra and reigning women
of God and answered prayers.

yellow reminds me of elation and euphoria
and a field of sunflowers aching for me to dive in.

Cleopatra and
Patroclus reflect upon
the same cursed mirror