fine sliver of dawn crawls
through cloud, through boughs;
here, a punctuation by curtain-
hole. song in seven beaked
tongue, held tender in
imperfection. notes carved of
century's trickle. dreams swell
down to quick: dilate through
signatures of some familiar
reality. diluting in the
effervescence of waking
thought. only ever dreamt in
colours of you, out under fields
of stars. oh!, to lay down fresh
tracks; on& ahead to meadows,
to sleep.

made a fool in case,
jest in case the tide
turns i can't say
anything& it's slowly
eroding cliff faces. caught
run on to shiver under
swathes of light i
desert the anxious encompassing
my own grip on this spinning
confusion
and oh,
how light hangs about you in
motion i am too deep here i
am too gone the
desk lamp goes cold my own world follows
this chaos in breach
this pattern to fold
under

got caught in this small, fine-crafted world:

with half-moon indents below flittering
eyelids, with new rotation about iris,
embers under cloud sprawl, bloodshot from
  later
on in the night. with reveries hung out,
with sharp fog covering the evening: i
misplaced most sensibilities, i
clambered down from
this ridgeline, hope,
for god knows
whatever
reason. i
stood still, continually incapable of translation,
scrambling for word-count, the inside of my chest.

with new broken bones,
some impossible heaviness,
some insurmountable hopelessness:
soft poison, self-administrated;
i'll still climb back up, though,
given any fractional semblance of luck.

we've all been burnt, yeah,
but if you'd take this
half-exhausted charcoal splintering
heart in flax-woven basket up,
i will do my best, to
nurture your own back to
meadowlark wings your
breath takes flight upon, in
interstitial moments, as
your quiet lips
  turn to smile& glow.

forgot to say everything or
anything. forgot to tell you
how often the stars rotate
whilst you spin twinkling
patterns out in footsteps, two
moments ahead. been so
**** down& out but
still still still still cascading
on this feeling, lingering out
of nights traversed. 'sometimes'
weighs down on me. sleeping
slow, to stay alive. to see you,
shimmering, lithe.

maybe there's nothing else,
these waves crashing
foreign chaotic tongue at
fingertips we held at rend,
this unhollowing ghost
is all yours.
this only moment.

deep breath, filling out,
this empty universe glimmering
between collected palms.
all else forgotten. just
you, just i.

long breath raked out, length of
day. thought pattern diffusing;
shadows cast on a broadening strip,
wallpaper hung close. stolen breath,
an orbit about you. consistent
glow. hinging on ripples, cut around
this field by clear breeze. branches
stretch, churning in the swept
air. held aloft, in their self-arrest.

i do not echo. this frictionless glimmer.
the vanishing extent to which i
can stop falling.

oh, but i do not want to. not
this time, sweet. each day reaches
out with tender hands, to pull
me up& out of this cavernous maze;
undoing meaningless shovelwork.

i find myself, under boughs, amidst
flowers. it's only slightly difficult to admit
this smile was smeared over
my freckling jaw, for nothing,
save for you.

even birdsong seems pale in comparison,
distant bells, ocean mist; undertow
beneath soft waves rolling
from your lungs to lips.