Longing for an intimate connection

But I don't have patience for emotional misconceptions

Hording what you call love

At the pinnacle is just numb

A mental blockage that needs a shove

To cooperate with the blind, deaf, and dumb

When you can see, listen, and communicate

Can darken what you're try to illuminate

Fickle misunderstandings dwell in physical connections

They oppose the facade of mental perceptions

Which lead the spirit to deceptions

If this is focusing because of the poetic logic

I only love you physical so you can put it mentally behind you

At times,
I become so lonely,
I start having conversations
With my loneliness.
We drink together
And drown together -
Sometimes in *****,
Sometimes in tears.
            - - -

If ‘realism’ was real
Speech marks would be full of ‘likes’ and ‘*****’
And empty of punctuation.
Sentences would extinguish themselves
And flaw themselves
And slip
Mid-way.
The characters wouldn’t take it in turns
They’d be yelling across the pages
On top and entangled in each other
Like lovers.

"What is it?"
"Sorry, it's just I haven't heard your voice in three months. It's going to take me a second to get used to it."

you: what isn't when there is
i: what is when it isn't


me: who left when there isn't any loss
you: who stayed when too much is lost


her: when will you leave
him: when will you stay


us: how will this end
we: how will it ever begin

*end of conversation

I craved soul searching literature
And words that stumbled off your tongue
I wanted conversation about society and worldly topics
I didn't care about pop culture
Or who was marrying whom
So I read Dickens, Shakespeare, and Seuss
And I understood
But my memory was cloudy
Names never stuck
And when conversation came
I couldn't tell what from what
I wasn't worldly or interesting
I knew no fascinating facts

This wind keeps snapping at our feet
through shoes unravelling.
Gales are hungry.
          Night's abandoned,
               streets have emptied.
Still, we own them--just keep talking.
           Winter's wailing.
           **** the old days.
Clutching coats closed,
                         tread nostalgia
past these sidewalk intersections.
Claimed by rambling conversations,
               often
               we're only
               rehashing
our worst mistakes
                                  and
                 shivering
                our way be-
             -neath stoplights
lit by good memories.

          I've got this notion tonight
          that we'll find our way
                                                  back
         ­ into the warmth found behind
          our locked front doorways.
Ways we've found to always hide
our faces from the cold outside
          have been running dry all night.
So drink down the cold street light
          and we'll make a blur of those green-white street signs.

This cold's still clawing at your face
through scarf unraveling.
Chapped lips smiling.
          Nights like this have
               kept on piling.
Winter owns us. Just keep walking.
           Winter's crying,
           "**** the old days!"
Frostbit footsteps
           slip nostalgia
past these frowning checkpoint questions.
Retouch same old observations.
                Sometimes
                we're only
                 retracing
the same missteps
                                but
                    ­frigid
             friends like us
                are melting
into old habits

          I've got this notion tonight
          that we'll take this route
                                                     for
          one more familiar cold flight
          from here to daybreak.
Say, "let fly those bomb bay doors!"
We've bombed these frozen streets before,
                    and I've got a couple more
          so keep moving 'til we find our front doors.

first date conversation: research
on lemurs and taxis without floors
because the city is too poor
for upscale renovation

and we exchange backgrounds and
drug stories and some-day-soon
kind of musings

/a southern peach and a sour
stiletto; the man in corner singing
slowly Nobody's Child/

and eventually we write our names in chalk
on the ceiling (and the wall because
I'm tired of places appearing as if I'd
never been there at all)

and later still we write our names in heat
against the cloudy window (twice
because the steam keeps swallowing up
our evidence of existence)

but it's easy to write again and
again because our names are the same
and I'm starting to believe in this idea
of genuine permanence

Say you and I go home tonight,
what details will you share?

Do you brush your teeth
in the shower, or
sleep in underwear?

Do you study well with music,
or prefer the silence
of a hallowed and lonely library?

Do you forget your dreams
while waking, or do they wake you
and leave you reeling?

Do you ache for someone
you can't replace, or have you gone numb
from all these shallow dates?

*You know it pays to engage in
genuine conversation, so tell me,
are you willing take off
more than the clothes you came in?