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 Mar 2015 vamsi sai mohan
Onoma
Heartened by the
merest of motions...
that set the
eyes for inflow...
outflow.
Whose standstill's
in the Heart
of All.
I am the first page of a well-loved novel,
But often the first one ignored,
Dog-eared and transparent at the corners
From the touch of one too many hands
And witness to the enterprising twist of a smile
As my readers are privileged to only pieces of me.

You, like the binding that surrounds me,
Enclose and encircle all that I am. Write a novel
Under my skin. I’ve falsified too many smiles,
Sacrificed even the best of myself for ignorant
Delusions of caressing hands
That take and abuse my corners.

The used bookstore on the corner
Of Middlebury Marbleworks, Otter Creek and window-origami —
My salvation and river-penance. Seek my story with hands
That feel to comprehend, with novel
Softness and a tenderness that ignores
My pleading glances and indecisive smiles

As you speak in hush-whispers. Smile
With your eyes as you touch my spine — corner
Me at the exit. I want you to ignore
Faults, make peace with flaws that inhabit me
Like poetry misplaced within a novel,
Or willow branches falling too low, tired hands.

I memorized the shape of your hands
The first time we danced to Chaplin’s “Smile,”
And wrote on the broadness of your shoulders a novel
Of my sins, apologies stretching to your corners
In villanelles — repeating refrains. It took all of me
To tell you what I could no longer ignore.

Because once you start to ignore
Conflictions that exist in the nerve-endings of your hands,
What you feel becomes a burden. For me,
Sand ran out of the hourglass when our smiles
Stopped touching — and at the corner
Of Maple Street and Printer’s Alley, I said goodbye, our novelty

Gone. Still, I find it hard to ignore what used to be when you smile
As you look at her, your hands on her back in the corner
Of the room. You remain my unfinished novel.
I place my heart inside a jar
and shove it to the side.
If I said it did not hurt, well, I guess
I must have lied.
The moon shines a cool blue tonight
as we entwine our fingers, laying on the baseball field
beneath diamond heavens. We lie
in silence, in the moments when the Universe reveals
itself, and contemplate the distances between one celestial body to
another, the space between
us growing as I turn south
to find Orion while you seek Cassiopeia in the north.

Shooting stars cross the sky, and we wish separately on dead
stars and dead dreams, lights already grown red and extinguished
as we whisper in the dark, passing
between phases.

And in the end we're all left searching.
We shared coffee on the porch
As we awoke to our timeless summer romance
A world free of commitments
Coupled with unforeseen circumstance

Music filled those long summer days
Magic ruled those starlit nights
Our hearts beat to the rhythm of love
Lost in pure intimate delight

I remember how it felt
Holding you naked in my arms
You were only seventeen
And life could do us no harm

We tripped and fell yet never landed
In our wonderland of dreams
You cried for more and behind the door
You were my gypsy acid queen

A hundred years it seems has passed
But in my mind you’ll always be
Once upon a time
In my wildest dreams...
References to the following:
Yes, Moody Blues and Tina Turner's role in The Rock Opera Tommy.
 Mar 2015 vamsi sai mohan
bones
I've been watching
the band for
so long
I can dance
like I almost
belong
and I've learned
every word of
the song
but I'm ******
if I'm singing
along...
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