The great thing about being married
to my alone is how she is everywhere,

she is in the bathroom stall and
the never dialed midnight calls,

she sits under layers of conversation
when relation has left the dialogue,

nestled in my car rides where I
can truly soak into her aroma,

and sing her songs that sound
better only when she's around.

She's the same as she ever was,
and she hasn't aged a day,

open and expansive,
molecular and cool.

She knows herself so well,
and takes up space as if

she created it herself.
I envy her sometimes

when I am all places at once and
empty vessels are nowhere to be found.

But she finds herself back to me
so often I believe she never really left.

I dare to say we might be soulmates,
is what hits me as I take my walk to the kitchen

and leave you comfortable in my bed,
in your unhappy marriage to your alone.

As quiet as the dancer lost in her own grace,
I was being replaced that afternoon.
I could feel it coming on like some seasonal flu,
or attack of the locusts

A new mindset or way of relation was
swarming around me and ready to land
into the day's equation.
I was being replaced

by another step in the ladder,
another shed of what didn't matter,
in favor of bigger fish to fry.
I was being replaced

by the thought of my 80-year-old self,
crinkled and ragged under the canopy of my past
wishing I had better surfed the terrain of emotion,
like the ballerina who can pirouette in silence,

making grand movements without a single ripple,
daring to be small within the large halls of my own world  
was something I was inching toward as I
looked at myself swarming into myself,

and crossing the rubicon of what I was yet to become.
It looked small where I was meant to go
and I was okay with that since these halls were
becoming too large for my next dance anyways.

I tried to imagine a city
without a cause.
Was it just the country?
Was it just James Dean
stuck in Indiana,
slinging shots of
espresso along
the main strip?

Imagining this city
without her cause,
felt like taking the
song away from the
opera singer,
or making butter
without the churn.

The city always needed
friction to run properly,
a soundtrack of gossip and
tire screeches making
their way to the surface,
an invitation for
us to step into
the womb of its
mortal coil.

We climb in,
with our desperation
and seek answers
to the meaning of
what is human,
adjusting smiles to
carry the weight
of what's expected of us.

While the birds remain
in their trees,
light as wind,
unbothered,
next to their babies
crying out,
look at the
mess you've made,
be still, already.

I awoke this morning and
wondered if I was even sentient.
The curtains failed to close
over my lids once more,
forcing my mind's actors to
repeat their tired monologues.

They wax on about regrets,
and the lovers who failed
to pass the test of time,  
friends too for that matter,
recipes that will be born
in the upcoming week,
and the subtle noises
emanating from the
dark corners of my room.

Try as I might to pull
the rope of my velvet curtain,
there remains my lead actor
once more trying to
prove her point that
the road to success is
in the wee hours
of the morning,
right here and now.
The entrance on my desk,
where the muses like to offer
me cement for my tired bricks,

even though I have been
harping on about how they
have been doing their
timeless work of threading
inspiration into my flesh
in the afternoons as of late,  
amidst the heatwave when
the citizens of the world
recoil inside their homes
to escape the sweat and
throngs of people who
leave me weary during
the early hours of
the morning.

I can't remember when
I started to see color,
maybe it was when
I chose you as
my lover.

Or when the delicate hum
of conspiracy wrapped its
violent claws around my waist,
and I learned how to speak her tune.

The grey landscape turned blue
when I chose to see my lens through you.

Your mouth is a piano,
and I want to play her
is what I thought when
the candlelight flickered
across your words.

I hadn't heard such a
symphony of statements
arrange themselves so
well since my first love
introduced me to
awareness.

I know you were just
searching for ways
to not be a beginner,
stumbling left and right
into the cushioned walls
of your straightjacket mind.

Oh, don't tell me I have confused
a stone for a diamond once again,
for it is close that a mad genius
and clever man sit to each other.

And tonight I can't tell the difference,
or if I should merely jot down your song
like the birdwatcher to his bird
to recall it again at some later date,
or join you in your fanciful flight.

It is striking to believe how
little applause the morning
bird gets after her daily song,
as she sits perched on
her branch marking
her territory like
the dog and
his lifted leg.

But then again,
I dont believe birds
undersand the
nature of applause,
inasmuch as the
worm wiggling
his way out
of the dirt or
the cat's eyes
darting into
their direction.

These are thoughts
that overtook my
mind as I wrestled
with my coffee to
turn the key to my
mind’s engine already,
feeling as if I was
once again but
a fingernail
floating
inside my
mothers
womb.