You tasted like starbursts
My hand holding me up in the tall scratchy tree
Your arm around my waist
I kissed you soft so as not to break the moment
You tasted like starbursts
I could see my friends
I wanted them to see us
See me
Kissing you in the tree
As I tried not to fall, but I know it was
Too late because
on your chapped pink lips
You tasted like starbursts

stars and radio master
intercloud motion—1000 light
years in most directions. However,
I am still blind to anything
but you. This

dark matter aloha steps
off my mind’s plane
into the muggy air. A string
of flowers is placed around
my neck, and I look up—
starbursts
spit their rings violent and
central—your body
in music. Now, tropical
space—population

one. A tear rolls down
my face onto the
runway—I can’t remember
the sound of

your voice.

I am Bear Lady
and you are Toucan Man —
Fur and feathered backs
against a striped tent.
Cut-off like tickets,
crowds melting Dali-like
in the distance
from crystalline eyes,
frozen in time…

Wings graze skin and
fur can’t compete.
The electricity of
our eccentricity
is freakish,
yet with every touch,
I feel less like a freak.
My history
of hoop jumping
tightrope walking,
and captivity
dissolve transparently
as I search deep,
                deep,
            deep,
into supernova eyes —
they outshine
this circus life,
this love for applause,
the performance inside.

As I gaze into
frozen pools,
the broken chords
of carny music
da da da-da-da-da drown.
The morning quiet,
muddled coffee grinds
are sensitive and silent,
chilling me to the soul.
Earth, a peripheral,
to pupils that absorb
mine full-force,
until I can’t see
this galaxy anymore,
save green starbursts,
my light source.

i know we haven’t talked
i know it’s been a while
i know that it’s kinda my fault
but i still miss you
i miss your fast talking and crazy stories
i miss your dyed hair and red arms
i really, really miss you
i miss our hangouts before class
i miss our planned birthday parties
i miss our ranting about how mean our friends were
i really, really, really miss you
i miss your old car with the cupcake sticker
i miss your loft bed and starbursts from math class
but most of all
i miss us

- a.g.

your hair smells like brimstone
in my memories that swirl under the pale streetlight
and in the reflective shards fogged over by our words

swollen overripe sicksweet mangoes

colors are more than the sway of hips
or a glint in the eyes laced with starbursts
and a face contains no infinites

i remember the smoky silence

drowned in fiction

She came into our lives as quickly as she left
We urged her not to forget us
Snapchatting all our fears away
We begged the others, of her same cloth
Not to abandon our fruitless group facebook message
The thread, she
Created
But we forgot all of those pieces of truth.

She dreamed of our existence
And titled it "Hobble Cage"
Because she couldn't think of a better name
At the time
But she will never forget the morning she awoke in her
Philadelphia sunshine, next to a best friend
Wrote it all down turned it into a thing
As to not forget
We cat called one another in her mind
Men catcalling men
And the women, they ran around in nothing but their underwear
We stuffed one of them into a trash can.

Starbursts at last
She bought them to share with the doggest of dogs of us
And for months she would not go to open up the package
Because she meant to share
But tonight she eats them all.

Young feet dancing and stomping the yellow starbursts down
Into a thin crust
On the Indian themed coffee table
In the deep south.

One of us sketched her in our notebook
When she first arrived
"I can't spend my life worryin' about the police"
She would tell the dog
He loved it.
It was so new
He flew back to the bar on his longboard
Sat next to her and bought shots all night
He wanted so badly to be the right one
Put on a big show, schematics and magic tricks
To appear
Like the warrior sun king
He knew she needed
And he so desperately and like
The dead bird she passed on the sidewalk today
Its face buried in the ground
Upturned
He failed
And will have to live with that fact
For the rest of his days.

She carries on
Its a vulnerable thing
The last starburst
Red
Some, many
Try to barricade her with rope and steel
But she always flies and leads the coop.

i am trying

to explain

your kisses

to myself

but

your kisses

are like

tiny bits

of strawberry candy

to me

& even after the point

of finding out

how many licks it takes

I could still **** on them

all

day

long

I want nothing more than to be the half hearted scribbles, on the right hand of your math work sheet. The box of cheese its, you keep behind the passenger seat. You'd eat them after to school on your way to work. I wonder if I ever crossed your mind, on those busy back roads.
           *I wouldn't want you to crash

as the stars trickle down from the sky
they take the form of raindrops
every time they splatter down on me
i feel every shattered aspiration
in those little splashes of starbursts
i feel them stab into me demanding to be set free

crushing a dream
is like ripping the wings from a butterfly
and then asking it why it can not fly

If I decided to peal paint off the upside-down radiator
for eternity,
I wonder if you would sit beside me  
reading Wallace Stevens.

If I decided to nurse the convent garden bursts of peonies
for eternity,
I wonder if you would smuggle me some
David Bowie tracks.

If I decided to eat only fudge brownies and cherry Starbursts
for eternity,
I wonder if you would google gourmet
recipes for me.

If I decided to paint my own Walden in the Washington wild
for eternity,
I wonder if you would build a nightclub
next to my cabin.

If I decided to leap out airplane hatches and steal rodeo saddles and read my poetry out-loud
for eternity,
I wonder if you would be happily
married in Norway.

my thoughts, so potent just before--
like fresh-pressed olive drops
that lingered, lipping from the fragrant spout--
now pass, diffuse atop an ocean vast.

i imagine willing it to be a pond,
not for its lesser size alone
but mostly for its calm,
reflective height; yet
these waves are
distort ruthlessness
of liquid dust
by slapping, tower-high
the central ocean rip-whirl tide:
and gone--
as Homer's heroes screaming as they drown,
deaf as oars but for their final gasps
of yearned-for clarity:
of nameless pride's Ithacan king
abrading lustful wrists
restrained to blind a god's son's single eye
by tentacles of twisting, tactful fate.

by threaded loom rethreaded
soon i see my salty self in suit
of sameness, tricking time
by indolence or theft--
from truth, from others' hearths--
the difference winks in bubbles on the cosmic shore...
foam so clean i grin to call it spume,
grin to brace the seabed to my algaed chest
in salinating crush of sand, of blood-sharp shell and rock,
in sungreen warmth of blue and life
in crashing sinus wince
i grit aegean nereids in my sneeze,
splay their formless sexing into pelvic scrapes
of quickened starbursts anciently reborn,
squeezed in pleasure tears and laughing drops--
as all pelagic ***** must
within the pressure of a world,
its breathing darkness spotted with transmuted sun,
expel itself in sensate gusts--
as octopodal spurting flings
in liquid ****** of purpose forth,
(or backwards, sideways, in and out)--
so too i think
and thinking, drown my ink
instead of drowning thinking in my ink














.

Watched you walk
Down the aisle last night
Shiny, bright and white
Starbursts trailing

Turned away, no one saw
Wiped on a smile
Clapped and laughed
At the right times

Faded out the door
Before the last 'I do'
No one saw me
No one needed to

Copyright © 2018 by Zane Safrit. All rights reserved.

Nights like this
Nights like shining starbursts in black abyss

When sweaty palms arise not from fear
But butterflies ten thousandfold

And the taste of her lips
on yours
on a lamplit January road
Still lingers come daybreak

Those are the nights I stick around for

1.)    I don’t want you to think I’m crazy

2.)    People see your pain and they see an opportunity to play the good guy. The hero in your twisted little fairytale. The public finds out you’re chemically imbalanced and the magic spell is cast! Like Cinderella’s dress, their contempt for you transforms into love and admiration. They now feel the need to let you know they are there, they care, they pray for you. When they can’t even remember your name.

3.)    Expression of my depression is not a cry for attention. You asked me how I was and I’m really tired of using the word “fine”.

4.)     “Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem” **** THAT and all the same psychobabble ******* that’s recycled over and over again. If you want to help me tell me what you think. Tell me how you feel. Don’t google mental illness and memorize the wiki page I already did.

5.)    Self-harm gets enough publicity already. If you want this trend to go away stop drawing hearts on your wrists, wearing orange ribbons on your chest, and telling people you love them but only if they hate themselves first.

6.)    And while we’re on the subject what’s this obsession with kissing scars? You're not the lead singer of some punk band you’re my boyfriend. Kiss my lips or kiss my ***

7.)    If I wanted another therapist I’d buy one

8.)    What if you think I’m weak 8) What if I am weak 8) You’ll know I’m weak

9.)    How am I to explain to you what’s wrong with me when I can barely admit it I have a problem in the first place.

10.)  I want you to know my favorite songs, Why I hate my name or how I once ate 50 starbursts in one sitting. I want you to know the good things. I want you to know me. I don’t want you to think I’m crazy.

Sharing yellow starbursts,
artificial color stains our saliva
what feels like years later,
as I have aged quite a bit by this point,
I repeat the motion in my mouth
reminiscent of you
instant messages of gentle reminders
to resentment
anger saturated print
seeks to disfigure my skin
insides twist in response
to the configuration of a screen
energy signals lost in translation

When will I see you again?

I watch the sun see through the trees
through the glass,
see through me.

This great star
saturates my window
brightly warms my hand,
as if in proposition.

My smile concedes like a girl
that has just been asked to dance.
An unstoppable smile.

I belong out there, in the trees
At the source
Eating sunshine and
sipping starbursts
Filter free.

I roll down the window
as if to shout
"Stop!
Drop me off here".

But all I have are excuses:
"Bad timing," I say.
And the sun may see,
but it does not hear.

I never stood tall at five foot two
but I was proud and I was pretty enough
that I didn't think I'd have to try.

One day I fell
bruised and bleeding words
metaphors and metonymys and
"i love you too"s.

I was never one for running, but I
I could glide on the back of starbursts
and I sailed on the north winds
like they were all I had for a home.

I was never one for running, but I
I realized how much I needed to move
how freedom meant I had to leave
the footprints I'd embedded beside my sandcastles
meant I had to run into the water
and swim through storms.

My legs were broken one day
and my wings were ripped apart;
I could no longer hold sunsets in my eyes -
they leaked far too often and too much.

I decided you deserved somebody
who could dance
like mermaids in the old world
so I stood and I smiled and I
I let the skies be my music -
but I'm still healing,
so forgive me my baby steps -
I am walking to you.

This was us,
Back before the world turned to ****,
Before high school invaded and told us
We probably wouldn't ever be happy,
Back before that long cold November,
In the days we were sure she'd come home,
When we thought everything would be fine;
Before the sickness claimed another
To come and take her place in the ranks of the dead.

No. This was the day when
We placed chains of daisies on our heads
And declared ourselves the kings and queens over everything,
Said we would rove the world over,
Then raced, screaming, into the Puget Sound,
And laughed as the freezing salt flooded our lungs;
The day we lay in the firelight and toasted Starbursts
And let our laughter loose to join with the smoke and float
Up through the hole in the roof of the longhouse to mingle forever
With the naked San Juan summer.

This was us.
Back then, we could've lived forever.

I want you
    to curl up on me,
nestle yourself snugly
between my arms and
move around until you find
the perfect places
for all your angles and creases,
your folds and ridges -

to let your eyes seek
the starbursts of the Dreaming,
to breathe in surrender and
breathe out all your demons -

to rest your shoulders
from the weight of the world
    and smoothen
the dents the sky has made upon your back
as your hands
remember how it feels
not to be climbing up cliffs
that placed themselves between
what you want and what you have -

I want you to slow down,
so maybe sleep
    can remind your smile
    how lovely it feels to be
         upon you.

Do not look back he said,
into the starbursts of your lover's eyes
into the dark pits of what you left behind
into the burning sun that traces your tiny figure
into the drowning need that will wrap you home
into the drowning need that will suffocate you home
into the drowning need that will take you home.

Do not go home he said,
where the windows whine
the doors creak in warning
the footsteps echo like gunshots
the gunshots echo like footsteps
her words echo like gunshots
the gunshots do not echo.

Do not hold me he said,
like he was ghostly
pale as the moon
face pulled taught like a rubber band
eyes dark with warning.

Do not hold me he said,
for he feared the arms would choke him
the arms would pull at his hair until
he was
falling
into the arms
and he cannot handle the warmth
the buzz of conflict
the fight in their veins
knuckled up fighting fists.

Do not let her he said,
as if he could say that
as if she had not hurt him too
as if he was real.

Do not look back he said,
as if I had left at all
as if someone was telling me to leave

as if he knew.

Every single kiss
between us
was combustible.

Starvation.

We were
driven by our need
to explode,
and we did.

In each other's arms
we trembled
with multiple
starbursts.

We were unable to speak,
and as we hit our peak,
you screamed
above the fray,
true lover's play.

Our intertwined bodies
were mad with lust,
rising and falling
in a glorious
sacred-rhythm
we succumbed,
I melted
in your furnace.

Tempest.

I filled you up
with meteor showers
and breathless
we lay
timelessly
panting,
bathed in the sweat
of gods.

A sheen
of
immortal love
dripped
from your tender,
heaving *******
against mine.

And yet darling
I remain intoxicated
forever
by your splendid
vision.

Her voice that becomes melody to my ears
Her voice that becomes a song that will forever be on repeat
Will always stay In my playlist.

Her lips, a sweet delight, that holds a magic spell
That leaves me wanting more.
It's sweeter than a pack of jolly ranchers and starbursts

Her body is so elegant so graceful the way she moves Is better than any dancer, the way she sways her hips side to side makes me want to grab her, hold her close, look into her very eyes, fall deep into her mind, give her all of what she dreams, fulfill all her fantasies. Fulfill her every need.

Her skin so smooth, I wish to be apart of it, I wish to be the water that hits your body when you shower, feeling every inch of your skin,

I wish to be the lotion that you rub gently & on your skin, to fully appreciate God's creation....( to be continued)

I still miss you
Even though I know I shouldn't
Your smile haunts me
Every time I turn the radio on

My brother asked me why
Some hours late after work
I sit in the cooling car, stars scattered like starbursts above
and let soft notes
Drift out from the cracks in the
Frame and I do not tell him
It is because I find you
In late night songs played dull and lonely
I find you in the drifting melodies
That hold my heavy head
And heart space where the beats echo
Faintly because there is only
Emptiness left
I find you in lyrics written by artists who have been broken in the same way
Only into different pieces.
I do not tell him it is my moment of weakness
Of loss
Of anger
Of hurt

I do not tell him
It is my way of letting you go
Each tear a memory released
Each note a whispered kiss blown
To the autumn wind
Each verse the broken promises turned to dust for the shadows to eat
Each song my way of moving on

I do not tell him
I just listen until dawn

atop the glistened mirror top
where the sky projects on this mirrored  surface
clouds and limitless
floats a small girl almost flower like
lotus pearl white arms pirouette
a flowered world on a
polished pond a vision
of graphene serenity
stronger than anything
like looking at melting suns
starbursts and signatures
of Greek gods acclaim
la fleur so small
grandiose
beauty stemmed
perfectionist
floating proud
independent
an image
glowing
sincere
just there

I gaze into the eternity beyond pupils dilation
Where soul has lost sole control of the spirit
And the darkness that grips twists the mind
Warping memories into incoherent phantoms
Wailing in anguish as I brush them aside

Gazing deeper,
Beyond the pale of of my mortal coil
Searching for an answer that nature neglects
Written not in emerald green starbursts,
Shrouded by grey washed blue skys,
But further, beyond the heavens
Where night stretches beyond Terra Firma
And empty space reigns in perpetual waltz
Aging as my eye progresses towards the birth
When light was given life and purity was pure
Before the infection of the question
That has no answer

Nor did it need,
For there I found looking back as if a mirror
My reflection staring at itself in amazement
For I had solved the theory of everything
By knowing thyself… beyond myself

We're vagrant hearts and bruised souls.
Our veins are woven
into discolored skin,
pale and iridescent
in the sunlight.
The starbursts of the twinkling sky
smile with white fire,
and they singe their own vicinity,
burning for a thousand years.
We're tattered limbs
and vanquished hope
sinking gasping, grasping
each other with desperate hands.
And drowning.
We're drowning in mist,
unraveling into shreds.
Our satin blue eyes
are losing their fluorescence
fading into transparency.
Our stitches snip
and we're tearing down into ribbons,
our fragile bones
breaking into glass fragments.
We're scarring each other
with our broken edges.
And shattered.
We're lying shattered
on sunburnt snow,
lit on ice,
reflecting a frost
that reverberates us with frigidity
I refuse to seep through.
We're broken nuummite hands,
desperately trying to touch someone
with numb fingers.
And opaque.
We're opaque and slashed
with unknown colors.
We're almost alive in their hues.
We're ghosts lingering without eyes
because we lost our destination
in last millennium's landslide.
And crying.
We're crying with tears
that seem so much like anguish.
We're blasting through emptiness,
dropping upon nightmares.
Losing the light in an indestructible tornado.
And torn.
We're torn with ripped capillaries,
with dead stars sewed into my lungs
and they're full of ash
and I swear,
I swear I can't breathe.
I can't breathe.  
I don't know about you
but you seem so much like lifeless.
A lost piece of you
sunk to the bottom
and buried in dust,
a lost piece that was your heart.
And how could you be alive
without a heart?
I wonder if I'm scattered
across this ocean floor
seeing you through fissured irises,
A distorted ray of sunlight
I can no longer touch.
A numb frame I can no longer
call my own.
I'm no longer alive.