There are no blinds
                   To draw
              Everything’s open

Make of me what you will
Take what you want
There’s always more to give
           Always more to come

A small room
                       Austere
A sepia image
Retains a slender figure
                     In Silver frame

It rests
Upon a circular table
Where within fallen petals
A single barbed rose
Lays beside a Gillows chair
                   There is no vase

A newspaper
               Outdated
Placed with intent
On a chaise longue
Awaits a reply from
         An underlined entry
         That’s buried
         Within the lost and found

I ask
You say
                              “I’m not sure”
Like the moment
Before it snows
Or nights spent
Searching for Venus
Without clarity
Through naked eyes

You knew she lay secluded
In a room unused
But still said
                                "I’m not sure”

There she wore a pendant
Engraved   “keep out” in braille
I didn’t feel it
We never touched
Venus dims
You won’t speak
Words from within
I ask
You say
                                “Are you sure”

When submersed  
In each other’s warmth
We were too hot to handle
Cold showers
                 Became therapy
Testing our endurance
                    Cooling beads
That ran down our spines

We were alive
Wrapped in towelling
Infused with lavender
That dried us
           From the outside in

Now the beads
                            Of sweat
That run down my spine
Are cold
Never dried
Until I think I’m dry
Then
I realise
       From the inside out
No matter how the sun
Warms my back
                    The horizon
Remains wearing a veil

Being this way
They say
Is a natural occurrence
                               Certain
                               Predictable

     As when the path of
Worldly planets collide
              A shadow cast
              Upon the other
The dark eclipse
                                Inevitable

How does one soften
Such emotion
When its surface
             Is taught
Like the spine of an open book
                       Placed face down
For ease of remembrance

Above the horizon
A canopy      
          So dark
Words cannot separate

Even when in
      Negative image

The single full stop
                              Of a moon
             Gives nothing away

When I awaken
When I hear the weave
Of Egyptian cotton
Rise and fall
                       Around your torso
When you wrap yourself
                       As an Ibis
                       Offer yourself
                       Become eternal
Whilst we worship each other
                       As Pharaohs
             The sun will continue to burn

Feathers fill an earthenware vase
                                         Tall quills  
Suiting ink wells
Scribing words beneath candle
Signing treaty’s  
                           Secured with wax
The Magna Carta
The Declaration of Independence
                         Momentous things

But these are simple feathers
Collected for aesthetics
For smudging
For connection
   For reasons other than to write

I repeat a mantra in a language
I cannot read
Listening  
                  From right to left
Writing each sound
              Repeating syllables
Until each link
As all in nature effects
                                 Another
Forty two letters
Seven sentences
           Each with six words 
Encoded
Born from the book
                           Of Genisis

I remember you
Holding both my hands
                                In your palm
Raised above my head
You bathed me
                 Sang nursery rhymes
With eyes that outshone surroundings

Now it is I
That holds both your hands
                       Talking of love
                       Reassurance
With eyes that outshine reality

Pulled happiness towards myself
                                       Held tight
                                       Grips loosen
                                       It sways away

Pushed sadness back
                             Beyond reach
                             Kept pushing
                             It recoiled

       Emotion is best left
           As an untouched pendulum
           Moving freely within my experience

Sliding of beads
So therapeutic
To see how this became that
What makes up the whole
                           Touch each fraction

No need for equation of form
To find value of one emotion
                               Against a known
Or
Tangents
Or
Ometries
When the only calculus of interest
                                    Is sum of self

Somewhere between
          Blue and violet
Somewhere between
Someone I never knew
And
Someone I thought
I’d never met
Stood Indigo
Not an Indy
           That’s just too vague

You made sure of that
From beneath a wide brim
            Summer of love hat

That acted like a sundial
But tracked the moon
The sea of tranquility
The place Were you
                         And I
And
The elephants on your bracelet
Can look back upon the world
And consider it as
           Lapis Lazuli in our eyes

It suits you
             And me
That's all that matters  
It suits
The mirror not to reflect less of you
It suits
Your clothes to lie that they've grown

To use fountain pens
                             Write left handed
            Smudge words with wrists
           Before meaning can be seen

It suits us to know
                           Without telling each other

Each time I think of you
It is as if

               I call down the moon
               To frame your silhouette
               Embraced by another

It is as if

               The four winds
               Shall burn us both
               With the jealously
               Born from my nature

It is as if

               Each composition of
               Scented dialogue
               Withheld from my eyes
               Became a letter
               Of indiscretion
                              Unleashed upon the world

I’ve worn doubt
In monochrome
As striped pyjamas
It had to be pyjamas
                  Of this I was sure
Reliving days
Each night in thoughts
                    Black and white

Doubting days
You were not by my side
Doubting
                  You felt them too

Doubting my name
Could contain us both
Doubting
                 Each letter within

If love had been frozen
Slowed life to a
Heartbeat of hibernation
                 We could have trodden time
                 We could have become Swans

We were always more
                 Than the sum of ourselves
We were never two that became one
Or one plus one
                         Equates two
We were beyond relativity
More than carbon
More than water
More multi dimensional
        
There is no other explanation
As to why we still connect
                     Through portals of time

I’ve walked beside you
Behind you
Broke your fall
     And never told you
      
Sliced my tongue on the words of others
To cut them off before they reach you

Picked thorns
                     Before embedded
Opened your eyes before you notice
                     What you can’t see

Hoped for a reaction
                     A gasp
                     A stumble
                     A something
Anything

Even if you said I was nothing
I could walk away
Owning a presence
              That may have been worthy
              Of a second glance

I Put a hand behind my head
Pull myself up
By the collar of a shirt
                       That doesn’t fit
Throw myself against a wall
Breaking parts inside
That were reassembled
                                    In haste
Gathered
From remnants designed
                                   For two

I circle a bed in canine fashion
Tread it for comfort
                         Sleep elsewhere
All is a loop
A bowl retaining a fish
A halo worn by a sinner
A voicemail
                   That’s undeletable

Polka dots tumbled from your dress
Settled
To mirror                           
Constellation Andromeda
                                     Far from home
Your attire
Changed character
Became lost in surroundings
              That didn't ask you to leave  
Gravity changed
Clouds were contained
       Moon was outpaced by the sun

When water stands still
And energy flows
The crest of a wave
                                Stays silent

I've drawn a big square
Then another
In each corner
Inside the big one
                   I have a house

  Just the same as the one
    I drew when I was five
       With a little stick dog
                                  A tree
         And a winding path

       All out of perspective 

Little's changed
                 I still can't draw
A dog now barks
The tree is deciduous
                 And the path’s still winding

I don’t know why
But I know
Because I feel

Because something pulls me
               To become inverted
                              
                   Motionless
                   Within salt water

To surrender myself
To absorb song
                      Unknown language
                      Through saline