Open palm of your hand,
the fruit of a ripened plum pressed cool against your skin.
Placing the young flesh against your lips, with a sweet perfume scent.
A lovely summer afternoon spent loving you.

Will it weigh on your mind,
will it weigh on mine,
what happens when unfaithfulness goes unpunished,
it happens when you love from a distance,
couple that with time,
do feelings remain?
probably will fade,
you'll love another,
forget about me,
don't lie,
I've seen it happen,
multiple times.

snap back to reality
where we sneak out of windows
and bike down the midnight streets
with weary hearts and unsteady feet
to meet each other
in the middle of the night
the only time we can hold each other
without being burdened by judging eyes

a cardboard closet just for you and me
in the corner of the universe
where we hide silently, waiting
for the planets to align, waiting
for the stars to align, waiting
for some kind of sign
simply just waiting while
we are lost in each other's eyes

and after a long time
i finally realized
that the constellations in the sky
have always aligned
with lines of your hands
and the curve of your waist
and even the glow of dying stars
reflected the warmth of your skin

but snap back to reality,
with cameras in the corners
and sneaking out is like escaping hell
and with a window comes freedom
but free-falling fifteen feet down
and landing myself in the hospital
with a broken leg or a bruised ego
would just make things worse

so this becomes the reason why
i am choking on my breath under a dark sky
with a heart that has forgotten how to beat
a mouth that has forgotten how to speak
and lungs that have forgotten how to breathe
because i am trapped within a false reality
of what could have been and should have been
of what we were and what we could never be

Poet after poet
written July 10th, 2021

Day by day, and poem by poem
my home and my life
fill with friends and lovers
who took the time to write to me
through the years and distances.

Jane Kenyon sits
on the corner of
my dining room table
a pool of calm
for me to dip into
anytime I need.

113 poets (I counted)
from Copper Canyon Press
are in residence between the covers
of The Gift of Tongues.
They enliven the desk where I write
always falling into respectable order
when I peak in before writing.

Mary Oliver, Pablo Neruda
Olga Broumas, W S Merwin
and other dear friends
sit on my shelves
sometimes amiably discussing
other times heatedly debating
each other's sock choices.

George Bilgere, Ellen Bass
and Gregory Orr
have seduced me
filling me with awe
as they stimulate my mind
my lovers far away
who talk to me in chapbooks.

Poet after poet
I wonder how many
I have not met
because I have not found them yet
or they were not preserved or published.

I bow my head
in a moment of grateful silence
to those known and unknown
who make my world
a more lively place.

i write out the letters and
i send them without shaky hands
is this it? is this growth?

hyacinthus, i am selfish
everyone already knows that
i would sacrifice the world for you
and not once consider turning back

the flowers you weaved into wreaths when
we were two boys in love with each other
they sat like crowns upon our heads
we were just two kings in a field of flowers

aphrodite warned me what was written in stone
that my father had given only one throne
she warned me that it could never fit two kings
but when my gaze landed on you, i disagreed

for you, i would have offered my throne
for you, i would have traded my crown
for you, i would have sacrificed the world
for you by my side, i would have let it all burn down

but for you, hyacinthus,
i will also learn to be selfless
i will listen to your soft, dying words
and upon river styx, i will promise:

i will not tear the world apart
to have you by my side again
i will be bitter, i will be vengeful
but i will not act upon my vengeance

for the sake of this undeserving world
for my love towards you, i will be selfless
for the sake of your dying wish, hyacinthus,
i will swear, i will promise:

i will let you go softly,
i will not be selfish,
i will let you go gently, my love—
gently, but not unnoticed

Baby, it's me who taught you how to love
Out by the docks. On the Puget, where we found Sound
For all our secret thoughts.
               Deep into the night, slurring silence, sipping wine
               We let our feelings talk. A disheveled bed
               Was heaven then
The door was hell, comin' round the bend. Baby,
It was me who taught you how to love,
And it was you who taught me how to stop.

Now you read my title,
it isn't what it seems,
but I love him.

I love his color, the way he shines so bright,
The way he let's me put my legs around him tight.
When I turn him on, he fires up strong, then I think of my favorite song.

My legs begin to shake, as I pull towards the tank,
Clutch in, gear down, throttle up and let's go to town
then off we go riding through the sun, fire strong like a love so long.

I love him,
My black velvet.

i will keep skipping stones in the dark until
my feet grow wet and my ears become filled
with the pitter-patters echoing across the pond

will these whispers reach your daffodils that sway so far away?
will your flowers feel the warmth that i offer to the breeze?
will the winds lay mercy on the hope that i hold so close?

so for selfish reasons, i ask you to look away, narcissus:
your love for that reflection has already dug you
a grave deep enough to smother apollo's sun

and i, painted forever as foolish, naive echo—
and i, who have already lost my voice and home—
my love, i cannot bear to lose you, too

The sunset awakens the lonely dreamer,
Who gives no deference to the day.
Early mornings meet late nights on a one-way street and,
A late June crescent moon
Becomes a suitable seat,
To watch the world spin below my feet.  
I cast a kiss from way on high and,
Watch the wind carry my intentions
To the window of her bedroom.
It doesn’t stop and stare, it changes its shape.
The bluest of birds; perched, sings for her to wake
From the silence of her sleep, where somewhere down deep
I imagine that,
She was thinking of me. The lake through the trees
Where we waded waist deep, skipping our stones, together alone.
River of souls, to wither we go.