I can’t lose your taste
Wistful in defeat
Like April blooms
Wilting in hazy noons

~

I have stood on aging avenues
watching walls crumble
while destiny’s debris
collects
at my feet

pieces of the past?

I have heard the laughter of babies
and the wail of the homeless,
opposites in a
straight line of
what is
and what might be

voices of the future?

I have stared into the portals of
left over meanings,
methodically
laid out to rest
on long tables
of bad intents

visions cast of shadows?

I have knelt before a dream,
clutching my chest
with indecision,
the pain
a reminder of my
fragile heart-
opened

memories of lost love?

I have cried
without a witness,
empty streams of
dense forgiveness,
requested of no one
and answered by the same

and nothing remains?

beware when you fall in love
with an artist
be it a painter, a singer, or poet

for the artist will
paint you
with strokes and hues
in shapes of every kind

sing about you
with heartbreak lyrics
and feelings which rhyme

write about you
with the simplest words
and a secret message she wants to say

beware of the artist,
and her love
one wrong move
and you're an artwork in her display