I find
             Myself
      Among common folk
              Amidst the real deal
                            Throwing beers back
                   Gulping shots
                Admitting false guilts
      Believing hateful ideals
   Bad things
                       Happen when not
     In the right mind
                 You can't remember
     What went wrong
Or
                 What went perfectly right
But                   she remains
Beautiful in my memories
           Absolutely breathtaking
              In my
                                 Lucid dreams
          As gorgeous as
                             a Leonid Afremov painting
            Like a hailstorm in august
Unexpected              but
             Gorgeous
Like you
                               My dear

Hold on.
I have to clean this up.
I don't want your soles to get cut up by my lack of ambidexterity.
I'm right-handed but I thought I'd try this out with my left
And I'm not as deft with it, especially in the moment, but I thought I'd give it a shot anyway.

It's my fault... I don't know how to juggle.

I'm usually good with rotation but
between the dilation of my eyes and the inflation of my ego,
the sensation of being flippant left me in a painted tuxedo

And it's raining...It's been raining.

I'm not complaining but the paint
is running and bleeding; An apotheosis of Leonid Afremov
needing emotional content to prove I exist.

*I don't mean to be like this. I don't want to be like this.

I have never seen such sad confetti,
A burst of melancholia, no hint of pain,
A drizzle, an arrow to the soul.
     What tragedy!

At night, alone, looking
At Afremov's First Snow,
I grin. I smirk it hard
And the forced laughter comes.
I imagine what hers would sound like,
     And colors, extravagant colors.
It makes me wonder when we'll be foolish together.
What smile would color me
     And color it back?

Below her nostrils,
Below her air, her breath,
The smoke, her oxygen,
Are my mouth, her mouth,
Her lips and some more breath—
All too tangible—
     A machinery.

But there's some spirit there, I know,
A kiss that need not press on,
A smaller infinity, a found virginity.
And the light would shed its dark elsewhere
     Revealing her shadow, her true.

I know there would be love, love,
Somehow, for her,
     In her.*

© 2015 J.S.P.