The moon the stars and the whole galaxy
A few hours,  A million years, A billion
it warps and changes
it all happens at one
expecting to see the yellow at night
a reflection of irises
A brightness of soul beneath shadows of night

Wondering eyes for stars 
connecting to find strands 
Leo, Lepus, Lynx, Lupus, 
No sextant will find the hue of jade
No eyes will see the forest 
No hands will run through the foliage 

A deathbed shared with a sibling 
and a constellation yet to be discovered

a stranger walked past me today  
and I smelled you slivering  
through the air like incense  

then she walked on  

oblivious that you had been  
conjured from vapor and  
pushed into all my senses  

traipsing through me like  
dragons fire and spring lilac  
our beginnings and endings
in the span of my lungs  
dissolved back into  
breath and wind

I’ve been collecting you  
gathering up all your inkbled trinkets  
as if they were mine to collect  
as if you were whispering to me again  
the secrets of your blue-green skies  
like electric pillowtalk  
  
my soul slips like broken  
sand shards  
back  
into you  
into hazy eyed illuminations  
heartbeats rhythming through  
our pressed palms  
and you almost feel real  
  
until my eyes unsquint  
until all your splayed treasure  
has been treasured and  
I am love-lost all over

stone rolls between my fingers like I am the earth
tumbling it beneath my soil rumbling an invocation
of shape and purpose to this tiny prayer of rock

hard dimpled-smooth skin like wings
It knows the bird dream steps of water dance
winks sideways at the sheen surface mirroring
against the wriggle of nature and fate so
that nothing snakes between shores

I whisper my opus in granite and
defy it against gravity

mountain-seed kissing across water’s horizon
aria in flight slick whizz smack of hope skimming depth
then spent sinks to rest in new shallows

impetuous ripples ring along your shore like
sapphire mischief to ebb the sand gritting
between your toes and I wait for you to
ripple through the rhythm back to me

depression feels like heartbreak at sixteen  
perhaps that’s why I always think of you  
when that unyielding squeeze starts to roll  
around my stomach like a rotting stone  

it's strange to think that of all my stories  
yours is the one that always wants to be read  
we were just sketches and outlines and isn’t  
time supposed to be the great physician

it seems timing is everything Once Love and  
ours was always perfect in the worst way  
just right to wedge you between my newborn
ribs like a thistle that sticks to my bones  
  
so I chase you like salvation  
knowing you have none to give  
and I’m always running  
in dreams

did I love you first, or best or most  
only the wind knows  
  
can I track love’s course, measure  
its comings and goings in  
charts and pin marks or  
  
turn back my rotations to weigh  
all my heart’s prized indiscretions  
as if my balances weren't  
strewn with kissed fingerprints  

all I really know is that in  
those hazy dream days  
my answer was yes-  
the best youth knew how  

and when the wind tastes  
like summer honey sweat  
I still miss you

Was it love or desperation?
I can't remember the distinction.  

When you're starved
each crumb feels like grace.

Each small affection
a fervent offering
to a broken beggar.  

But at this point,  
I'll take what little
I can get.

you always made it look easy  
to pry back your corners,  
carve out a piece of your heart  
and transform it into soulsong  
Your words and rhymes laying perfectly over your intentions  

snapshots of your soul  
painted in love and pain and blood,  
whispers in your synonyms and syllables.  
I saw your soul laid bare, and in my heart it was just for me  
each of your tomes a secret glimpse to savor  
so brash to see myself in some  
and cowardly to hope absent from others  

so I wrote.  
stumbling after your eloquence,  
fumbling and unpracticed  
without any of your skill or precision,  
clawing at myself for something  
I could offer, to speak to you  
in your own language  
as if some small piece of you still belonged to me  

which makes you my muse  
of a sort I suppose  
For truly every time that I wrote  
I wrote for you.  
not for you, but to you  
to read me and know me  
my heart pressed between the pages of a book  

and we communed  
as close as 1’s and 0’s would permit  
through lines on a screen  
never able to reach past our fingertips  
a call and response  
in codes and comment boxes.  
A secret conversation between us,  
that not even we spoke about  
until we didn’t speak at all  
but I can still find you in the lines  
and imagine you are talking to me

I cannot love you but I do.  

I cannot hold you or feel you under my fingertips  

I cannot run my hand from your shoulder down your arm,  
slip my fingers into yours and clasp hands  

I cannot quench my lips with yours  
or taste you on my tongue  

I cannot feel your warmth under the sheets on winter nights  
or the cool of your breath on my neck in summer  

I cannot see you in the morning, hair tousled and sleep in your eyes  
or when you walk around the house so casually  
scant, pretending you don't know that it drives me wild  

I cannot find my world in you at the end of the day  
or quicken my heart when I hear your keys in the door  

I cannot wipe your tears or hold you when the world is broken  

I cannot share the joy and sadness in us both, as one  
who understands the scars on your arms and  
on your soul  

I cannot call your name in passion  
or for comfort in the middle of the night  
or see the promise in your eyes as the syllables tumble over my lips

I cannot hear your voice with its bubbly and sultry intonations  
whispering songs and secrets to me  
or get lost in it's sound for hours  

I cannot love you in my arms,  
So I will love you in poems and memories and dreams  
and sing a song for you in the silence