"streetlamp" poems
The girl with purple hair is sitting at my bar again.
I think she is beautiful. And not in a way that I wanna have awesome *** with her but in a way that I want to drink chocolate martinis with her
and go shopping for christmas vests that have tinkly bells and possibly polar bears with hats on them.
She is having a full-body cry. I am the worst bartender, simply
because I don't know how to counsel people without crying back at them.
She is crying about the state of women.
I know that we come from the same rotting wood, so all I do is nod.
"How is it that three quarters of the women I know have been ***** or molested?
What does that say about the men that I know?
**** is not a man behind a bush with a knife, she laughs
It's kissing you on the mouth like whiskey at a nice bar."
The girl with purple hair and I are holding hands now,
"I only wanted an apology,
an acknowledgement of what occurred."
Grappling as artists, as girls, as ships in bottles,
how do we change any of it?
I tell her I am going to write a poem.
She says no one wants to hear a **** poem.
And I know she's right.
Have you ever seen a stampede of horses?
Do you wonder what the hooves look like from underneath?
Have you ever tasted the blood from biting your own lips because you couldn't say no enough?
"I never fought back. I kept my thighs tight and
closed, but once he's inside you, you wish you were the streetlamp, the
store clerk, a street lamp, a bed of calla lilies-
anything but a woman.
In that moment, our eyes glaze over, and they stay that way for years.
That's when you've lost.
Apr 6, 2014
Apr 6, 2014 at 5:45 PM UTC
What reason do we have to be angry.
What reason do we have to curse the stars
and all the threads that bind them.
Who's fault apart from ours is it,
that this is the hell that we have placed ourselves amidst.
Every point in our lives,
lying like a checkpoint,
glowing like a streetlamp in the dead of night.
At the feet of these golden warm, welcoming lights there lay a crossroad.
And we foolish children feeble in heart and mind fumble without a further thought.
We follow our hearts and we follow them into deep into the disguising dark.
-
Adventure was the death of us, antagonizing.
Adventure was heartache,
agony as evil wizards warped our worlds until we were weaning.
It wasn't too late before the brazen beasts had burdened our lives with ever more brutality.
Wolves hungry for the hearts of men, walking on hind legs to better hinder us with horrors.
This world is beautiful with wonder,
but it's wonders are like lights
upon the Lophiiformes head.
Bright, beautiful and inviting
But lead with haste into the jaws of oblivion,
well hidden amongst the dark.
N.H.
Nov 23, 2013
Nov 23, 2013 at 10:15 AM UTC
When you kiss me,
I don't think you realise,
but my lips turn into an explosion of electricity
on your dead circuit board mouth.
Let me revive you.
Let me shock you into submission.
Let me make your hair stand on end,
your knees tremble.
Either that, or just smash my bulb.
My light flickers when I see you with somebody else,
and what use is a dim light to anybody?
Apart from the little extra illumination it shines on you.
Maybe I could rewire you.
Maybe I could flip a switch.
Maybe I could turn on your lips and you could kiss me,
kiss
me,
under a streetlamp.
Maybe you could be my light in the dark.
I think there's been a power cut.
I can't see.
My eyes are under a blanket of darkness,
and your light has gone out.
I guess I'll just have to switch on mine
whilst you smoulder for another
brighter,
more beautiful light.
Time to pull the plug.
Dec 3, 2013
Dec 3, 2013 at 9:04 AM UTC
the bottle twists
glass falls in drifts
and air parts like flesh
there’s a terror beneath this city
trucks enter from out of town and shake the power lines
passing without pause
sometimes birds gather for days
chirps grow exponentially
before tailing into silence;
heather and brimstone
little bodies roll to the edges
and burst on the streets in red regalia
a somnolence keeps the city forgetful
time flows in fits
a streetlamp; a raven; ten gravestones
it all runs without moving
vessels dilate
hands hold themselves
there’s nothing to breathe with
an empty chalice, turned on the hour grants
heaving clenching writhing
an ocean of rust
bulb shatters, blood spills out her
mouth cave head turn faith
the world remakes itself
**********
the colour of sunflowers
bicycle chains
thirst
colonialism
wet paint
emptiness over emptiness
act without agent
lack lack lack lack lack lack lack lack lack lack lack
peel the flesh and find flesh
always more flesh
don’t stop they know better
chirp chirp chirp
turn
exit
substance
purpose
nothing
May 1, 2016
May 1, 2016 at 12:51 AM UTC
He was the epitome of a loveless boy, and he knew it. In fact, that was what kept him restlessly awake most nights, especially on this particular evening. He glanced down at the dark mess of hair that was laid across his chest and listened to the soft emission of peaceful breathing slipping from the lips of the girl whose name he did not remember. For a second, he debated on searching the dark corners of his mind in an attempt to remember it, but he soon realized he never even bothered to ask. This disappointed him for one reason - it was another question mark that he had to add to the list of names that he kept pinned to the front of his brain. At the thought of this particular list, he felt sick, as though an ounce of regret had seeped into his stomach and spread like an infection and now threatened to rise like bile. He knew he needed to keep it down, so he leaned over his bed and wrapped his fingers around the neck of the glass bottle he kept hidden in the bed springs. He sat back up and slowly unscrewed the cap, his eyes mesmerized by the amber liquid that swirled around the bottom half like a whirlpool of gold. He brought the top to his lips and tipped it back, filling his mouth with the warmth of forgetfulness and feeling as it burned his throat like fire the entire way down. It instantly washed him clean of every bad memory he had done his best to forget for the past week. Every tear that every girl had shed on their knees in front of him, begging him to love them; every cigarette that he had chain-smoked on the rooftop of his apartment building in an effort to cloud these very memories (unsuccessfully); every streetlamp that he had found solace in as he walked the streets mindlessly at three am, searching for answers that never came to him. He closed his eyes and imagined the whiskey rising inside of him until it leaked into his lungs and filled them, drowning him. He held his breath, pondering how long it would take for him to go lifeless in this position. But the sudden stop in the rise and fall of his chest caused the female lying on it to stir in her sleep, draping her arm around him and pulling him even closer. He felt sick again so he took another sip. He knew that when he looked back on this evening, he wouldn't remember it, which was becoming a classic move on his part. In fact, his life had become nothing more than disconnected nights with nameless and faceless females and fire whiskey that filled all the empty space within him. And he wasn't sure how that had come to be, but he no longer cared enough to even attempt to figure it out.
Jul 19, 2013
Jul 19, 2013 at 9:38 PM UTC
Ghost Relics
Downtown,
where Main intersects Main
you'll see the last living tissue
of a breathing bazaar.
They weighed down her chest with bricks and girders.
It's a wonder she breathes at all.
-
Wander too far in any direction
and you're sure to see the husks
of once proud and bustling businesses.
Abandoned sanctums of mortar and majesty.
Scars of the Midwest etched as constants in our mind.
Dusty and silent since the cradle.
-
The theaters are bedeviled with dolled up haunts
who just wandered over from Greenwood to catch the matinee.
Management still leaves the lights on for kicks after hours
to throw off their sleep schedules while they wait for the feature to start.
Up all night, sleep all day; they read by neon and slumber under Sol.
Here I am, left lounging in The Devil's Chair. Crickets keep quavering.
-
Underneath the Franklin Street overpass sleeps a family bound by naught.
They watch in dawn's light as the few pedestrian that traverse Cerro Gordo
advert their eyes as some sort of silent symbol of respect for their situation.
It's as if the very stare of a privileged man could drain 'til depleted.
They never ask for anything, they just wade it out and listen to
the cars overhead, the train-clock's trumpet, and the heartbeats in between.
-
Leaks are patched, potholes filled, and yet
we're still loosing blood; becoming beguiled.
So many stray cats in the civilian savanna,
aimlessly seeking names and second chances.
"This premises is under police video surveillance" -
hanging like ornaments from streetlamp poles.
-
Guarding the gates
of a dwindling dominion,
as the armies of Union and Grand
wait in their camps
for the rust to take hold
of her iron veins.
Jun 14, 2014
Jun 14, 2014 at 12:52 AM UTC
even teddy said i got the sickest tricks brah.
like my abilities source from some kinda legendary liquid
/ praise the lord /
monster energy should sponsor me.
a kickflip over the king’s *** hole
& a halfcab for the looky-loos.
i feel so tall when i climb that heap of asphalt trimmings
& see clear from the water tower to the bluffs.
gimme a good day, any day at the bluffs,
bottlerockets & girly birds.
her body brings a swarm of worms.
decomp,
said the f.b.i. men one by one with tweezers.
not quite the homecoming queen, still
wrapped in plastic.
look up.
see that great mess of wires, nest of powerlines and owl bones?
it crackles and croons its electro-spectral purr
all night and day.
new neck tat &
cody spends his paycheck on a crossbow.
we target practice on a bull skull.
wet cigarettes and turpentine-soaked socks for a good huff
in the dry of the roofline as it dumps.
there’s that little boy in a ghost mask again, tap-dancing
in puddles below the streetlamp,
& oversized shoes.
his grandmoms always be watchin’ from the window.
[whispers] she’s teaching him magic.
lucky unit 19: where our young dead damsel once dolled
herself up, you see
men and headlights would roll thru thrice nightly,
maybe more.
& i remember her punch red lips &
big whicker hat; while she weeded and watered her garden of begonias.
the sheriff’s deputy, hart? hicks? hogan? well he loved her a bunch.
stole her clothes in the middle of the night,
& sat beside the river sobbing into clumped fists
of bra and blouse.
i bought ******* from that guy once or twice.
harold? howard?
guess who showed his face today?
josiah, from unit 08.
since the incident with molly’s beagle, he’s been rarely seen.
took a bee line straight for the mailbox.
a package. a prize. a decoder ring/secret map sweepstakes
to be seen and deciphered.
Nov 5, 2015
Nov 5, 2015 at 1:44 AM UTC
After the fireworks faded away,
And the lights in people's houses went out,
The streetlamp gazed on.
In your raggedy clothes or your fine hall,
Beware! The streetlamp sees all.
Jan 2, 2014
Jan 2, 2014 at 9:42 PM UTC
this is a reminder. sweet one,
your heart does not beat too loudly in your chest.
does not take up too much space,
does not mistake the moonlight for a streetlamp
when you hold your lover's hand
soft and intertwined
drunk and kissing your way home.
this is a reminder.
your heart is not a machine, is not
a second-class citizen, is not
the color of a bullet hole, a gunshot wound
against a rainbow flag;
this is a reminder. sweet one,
your heart is too big for your body
too tremendous to be
encapsulated within two arms and two legs and
ten fingers and ten toes and
when you kiss, sweet,
carry your hurt like the orange lillies
in front of my childhood home
planted by my mother and
the way she gave more
than she could give. give.
this is a reminder:
the only time
your heart should feel too loud in your chest
is when your fingers are finding her's
or his, or their's,
intoxicated by that moonlight,
a will to live against every clenched fist
finding harmony in disharmony
finding your way
to your orange lillies.
Oct 4, 2017
Oct 4, 2017 at 5:10 PM UTC
For Sam Cook and Michael Lee
While standing at Marshall and 140th
the lightning over the horizon begs me to come to it
it's like the flickering streetlights, seeming like silent firefights,
simply asking to be looked for.
When I still elementary,
I used to watch the sky as the bolts shocked the earth
and I'd count:
one
two
three
Until I heard the boom and crack of thunder
three miles away, at least, the fourth graders said each second was a mile
it could have been true, it could have not, yet still I watch the light.
The flickering of the fading streetlamp tells me that this moment is not going to last forever
that it will not be heavenly or touchable, but it is there
and it wants you to touch the light as it flickers like a strobe light
like kids playing with the tabs of flashlights
and like the first discovery of light switches
and I'm reaching out so far.
Trying to grab hold of a piece of simplicity,
of normal,
of what I can always find:
Mistakes and wounds
and trying to hold on
Because lately, it seems like the only places we want to flicker are in the clubs.
Standing on a planet where illness and difference are cause enough to torch cities.
We like to light the fires and we like to watch them burn,
but we could care less about what their burning
and it seems like the dark ages came and stayed,
But like tributes to Guy Fawkes say:
*A man can be killed and forgotten,
but four hundred years later an idea can still change the world*
So I think as I stand at that intersection
watching the streetlights and the night's light bulbs flicker on and off like the light in my head
I can feel my fingertips prickle and I seize that moment to reach for the lamppost and final destination
those kids are flipping tabs faster and faster
my hair is at attention
and I can feel the race.
For a second,
everything slows down.
The streetlight stops flickering as my fingertips come upon it
and the lightning illuminates the sky
I can feel the breeze push my hair to this minutes path
and for a second,
I have something.
I pull my fingers away from the light and it returns to its flicker
the lightning fades away
and the boom comes in.
And here, standing at what once for me was Marshall and 140th
I realize,
that all I have
is all
I'll ever claim to know
Oct 21, 2012
Oct 21, 2012 at 6:48 AM UTC
To you
I was never really fond of surprises
Then you came
The day I met you
I was glad to have found someone I get along with
That wasn’t the surprise
The surprise was when you first cheered my name
And how I wanted you to cheer me all the way
I wasn’t surprised when you walked me home
What surprised me was when I didn’t feel home when you walked away
So for many weeks or months
My heart jumps because of the surprise of you in everyday
So for many weeks or months
I wasn’t sure
And that’s not knew
I think I was never really certain of anything
Wait
I was never really certain of anything until there was you
And it’s funny how one I’m very sure of
Still surprises me
Like the night you tucked my hair behind my ear
Underneath the streetlamp
No brighter than you who have given light
In the past few months of chaos
Your eyes shined like they wanted to stay
It wasn’t surprising when you asked me if I like you, the next day
But I was surprised because, “I like you,” was all you wanted to say
The first time you said you love me
I wish I’ve said it before you did
I was pretty sure I’ve felt that way a long time ago
And it has been a while since those times
I couldn’t say it was a surprise when we ended
Neither was the fact that I didn’t want it too
It was amazing
How I waited for shooting stars and 11:11s
How I wanted to go back in time and make things better
How I tried to tell you and show you
That some things didn’t change
I still love you
I still love you
I couldn’t say it was a surprise when I stopped hearing that
But I was sure of what a surprise it is when you came back
You showed me what love is
In colors
Wrapped in silver and gold
When you looked at me
I saw what those stories told
In winks and glances
I am not letting go of any more chances
It was not a surprise that my heart still beats the same track
And I will replay over and over
That time you told me, “You’re not alone anymore,”
What a surprise that was right after all this time
When you hugged me
You picked up the pieces I thought were lost forever
You
Yes, you
I am not really fond of surprises
But you were the best yet.
Jul 15, 2018
Jul 15, 2018 at 1:02 PM UTC
The four of us wrote each other fortune cookies
And the sad part was that even though
The cookies we baked together were sugary and warm
None of the little squares of paper inside
Made much indication of one another.
You remarked that it had been exactly a year since
You were where we were:
Lying in a snowy field and watching the grey clouds rush
From the horizon to the moon
Illuminated by city lights too.
You protested those lights, throwing doorknobs
For the darkness but you couldn't break that streetlamp
Until the sun had already risen and the LSD
Had already worn off
Such that there was nothing to do
But read our fortunes quietly and sadly reminisce
About that night we'd spent
Melting the snow beneath our bodies.
Jan 18, 2014
Jan 18, 2014 at 7:07 PM UTC
There is a void outside my window.
Pitch cascading into itself.
No. I am mistaken.
It is just night.
Someone was knocking on my door at some point.
Nipah. Nipah.
Nevermind.
A curious hollow groan runs through the house.
Perhaps a tap is being turned.
Hiss.
A moth catches in a stream. Wet dust clambers for existence, affirmed in the moment of death.
Sometimes it escapes.
There is a glow.
A streetlamp lights up the void, strong enough to reveal a small part of the world, but too weak to remove the grain. The noise of existence.
Blood rushes through vessels. Neurons fire.
Silence is merely the body experiencing itself. The self subverted into the other.
Oh. I have slept through the day.
A train rumbles in the distance, sonorous and bleak.
A bird cries out into the void.
Nothing responds.
A miasma blankets the city.
The choke of lack.
Jan 23, 2016
Jan 23, 2016 at 12:15 PM UTC
Everything is sad.
Like how a flickering streetlamp is sad.
Like how hands that brush but don't hold is sad.
Like how a page ripping in your favourite book is sad.
Like how the flowers wilting after two days is sad.
Like how finishing the cereal but not filling your bowl is sad.
Like how waving to a stranger who doesn't see it is sad.
Like how the blanket doesn't quite cover all of your toes is sad.
Like how this cup of tea is too cold is sad.
Like how the clock hand can't quite get past 20 seconds is sad.
Like how my glow-in-the-dark stars always fade too soon is sad.
Like how the most important words always go unsaid is sad.
Like how the lengthening silence between us is sad.
Like how this broken, shaking whisper that isn't heard is sad.
Like how the closing of the car door is sad.
Like how this kiss blown from my lips can only travel so far is sad.
Like how my heart slams itself into my empty rib cage is sad.
My whole world is just sad
Weeping through these raindrops that won't seem to ever stop sliding down my window pane.
Aug 21, 2013
Aug 21, 2013 at 1:24 AM UTC
The flicker of a bulb lights the rearview mirror.
A car stands motionless behind the laundromat.
The occupants make hollow love,
Searching for what is lost in the sea of humanity
And the localized cloud of buildings.
Their bodies curl in the back seat
And the streetlamp continues,
A silent metronome, blinking on
And off.
Oct 17, 2011
Oct 17, 2011 at 9:27 PM UTC
In the amber-smog flicker of the streetlamp
raindrops stick
like molten copper ticks,
and gnaw away at the wrists
of the wrought iron railings.
Boy stares down through corroded metal steps,
takes a breath
of midnight mass crystal ****
parts his hair with his fingers,
and spits into summer’s face.
Down below a cat hisses in a dumpster,
rats scamper,
and a trash can orchestra
churns out a ****** rhythm
to the tune of traffic jams.
A shiver as Boy feels street corners looming—
one more fix,
then, on legs like tinder sticks,
down the spiral staircase
to where chanceful delights await.
Feb 7, 2011
Feb 7, 2011 at 3:50 PM UTC
Decorations are up
hung from fishing wire,
fishing for good luck.
There’s Christmas on her neck
and as she stretches out in front of me
a wake of cinnamon decks the halls.
It remains and lingers,
falls away past nostrils and
turns to festive well-wishes.
The market is in full swing
wrapped up tight in large scarves,
like a low cut sling cradling the cold.
Winter has the streets in its hold,
the wind is sour, bitter to taste,
and punters, commuters, Asian lost-tourists walk in haste.
Shop floors are warmed by radiators
hung above their wide open doors:
let the heat out, let the customers in.
And when the mid-November light dims
and the council gets past the
everlasting electrical admin,
streetlamp sticks will light and spark,
sending effulgent embers down onto
the Cambridge cobbles.
Children will peer wide eyed into windows
remembering names for their lists,
hoping to unwrap them as gifts later on down the line.
Adults, some probable parents and others newly-wed together,
enjoy the festivities, the weather, the bespoke crafts
bought from Argos sold as Handmade Swedish Chairs
And do they care? No.
It’s Christmas in Cambridge and
winter is settling in.
Dec 25, 2013
Dec 25, 2013 at 7:38 AM UTC
I was mistaken
And alone
Even before my dreams murdered my past.
They had stolen my dog, my stars and my streetlamp.
The neighbor’s dog
Who shared my tears--
My screams no longer reach his ears.
The stars
That anchored me
Now drown in the depths.
The streetlamp
That every night illumined my dreams
Leaves me sleepless and alone.
And after those nights
I wake up again, a dark day for me.
A few withered trees, a ***** sea.
May 2, 2018
May 2, 2018 at 11:52 AM UTC
the telephone rings at eleven on a weeknight
and i can see you
huddling over a stranger's phone in the streetlamp glare
your skeletal fingers slow and stained with nicotine
pupils shrunken
deer in the headlights
what do you need
the telephone rings at eleven on a weeknight
and i can see you
plucking pills from carpet fibers
scraping your hands through the couch cushions
snatching my allowance from beneath my mattress
prince of thieves
what do you need
the telephone rings at eleven on a weeknight
and i can see you
smiling for the kodak
cooing sonatas against her cold pretty ear
nervous fingers tying the corsage
casanova
what do you need
the telephone rings at eleven on a weeknight
and i can see you
peeking out behind worn fort walls
sketching monsters over saturday morning cartoons
fishing pole in hand
sweet thing
what do you need
the telephone rings at eleven on a weeknight
and i can see you
rewind the tape
first tottering steps
gummy smile
child of love
what do you need
the telephone rings at eleven on a weeknight
and i can hear you
hello
yes
what do you need
Feb 24, 2014
Feb 24, 2014 at 5:48 PM UTC
All’s quiet and
still,
sky’s pregnant with
snow;
every flake, a lake
of ice—
every footstep, a false
echo;
the moon
beamed
upon the frozen
few,
the streetlamp
schemed,
and begged me
to kiss you.
Oct 6, 2018
Oct 6, 2018 at 12:11 AM UTC
i'll let you be recluse & writer
you can describe how strange horrible
it feels to suddenly realize that one of us will someday die
the other left standing in the dark middle of a railroad
silhouette illuminated by a single streetlamp
mouth open with a granite rock wobbling in hand
i pray that it's me who falls first
after our parents so they won't have to bury a child
& you my only brother can remove my name from
the lyrics of every song you wrote for me
i can't give you the words to write
but find them & add them to your own memories
of me on a spring afternoon standing in shorts
on a softball field or rooftop with
hands on my knees & two wisps of hair in my face like
moths orbiting shafts of remembered yellow light
stick out your tongue & i'll teach you to whistle
without your fingers if you teach me to scowl & squirm
**** with my armpit & spit melon seeds at lowing cows
we'll dangle from plebian treebranches upside down together
& when i fall off the monkey bars you laugh
but when you're on your head in a heap of kinetic energy
i pick you up & brush ***** tear spirals off your chin
i'll drift away first into sleepland with a smile plastered on my
strawberry cheeks squirming legs & my body
coiled tight like a bedspring with laughter stomach cramps
from the stories & jokes you whisper on the floor in the half-lit gloom
i will be your darling sister forever lying to mom
about the time you burned a hole in the linoleum
& you will throw rocks at the back of my head
from a young persimmon tree like a noisy bird gargling bug juice
pretending to skip them across a pristine lake in the
blue grayness of the churchyard before dawn
Oct 23, 2015
Oct 23, 2015 at 7:37 PM UTC
My Apologies, Sona
by Gulzar
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
My apologies, Sona,
if traversing my verse's terrain
in these torrential rains
inconvenienced you.
The monsoons are unseasonal here.
My poems' pitfalls are sometimes sodden.
Water often overflows these ditches.
If you stumble and fall here, you run the risk
of spraining an ankle.
My apologies, however,
if you were inconvenienced
because my dismal verse lacks light,
or because my threshold's stones
interfered as you passed.
I have often cracked toenails against them!
As for the streetlamp at the intersection,
it remains unlit ... endlessly indecisive.
If you were inconvenienced,
you have my heartfelt apologies!
Come!
by Gulzar
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Come, let us construct night
over the monumental edifice of silence.
Come, let us clothe ourselves in the winding sheets of darkness,
where we'll ignite our bodies' incandescent wax.
As the midnight dew dances its delicate ballet,
let us not disclose the slightest whispers of our breath!
Lost in night's mists,
let us lie immersed in love's fragrance,
absorbing the musky aromas of our bodies!
Let us rise like rustling spirits ...
Old Habits Die Hard
by Gulzar
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
The habit of breathing
is an odd tradition.
Why struggle so to keep on living?
The body shudders,
the eyes veil,
yet the feet somehow keep moving.
Why this journey, this restless, relentless flowing?
For how many weeks, months, years, centuries
shall we struggle to keep on living, keep on living?
Habits are such strange things, such hard things to break!
Inconclusive
by Gulzar
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
A body lies on a white bed—
dead, abandoned,
a forsaken corpse they forgot to bury.
They concluded its death was not their concern.
I hope they return and recognize me,
then bury me so I can breathe.
Keywords/Tags: Gulzar, Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, Triveni, translation, life, death, love, ghazal, couplet, mrburdu
May 1, 2020
May 1, 2020 at 6:18 AM UTC
I'm just here
Standing on a street
Staring into the gaslights
Trying their hardest, like me
To push back the grim.
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 3:33 PM UTC
life has never been held within the ( parentheses ) of breathing and
the periods of sentences. see syntax holds no
importance in terms of the soul and beating hearts, and ( like ee cummings ) i have
never held enough worth in the personal to capitalize myself
but that was before i met You and realized that i have never felt life
(like being alive in your kiss) before that moment that You
turned me into I
and now
with all of my well-formed syllables and crafted lines
can’t seem to draw the image of this fate and the music of our
breath dripping across each others skin; no
rhythm of words could ever manifest within the capitalization of
We or the Beauty of Us.
but tonight, as we crawl beneath covers my blood will
approve of this garden between our curves and holding hands.
I will grow the sun to cast an eternal summer
within your smile
(streetlamp halos have never been enough)
but this poem will always say less than the tangible moments of
glances grazes and the heart I carry with Me (carrying it in my heart)
so it can grow like our family trees, reaching (higher than the atmosphere lifting her skirt
to hold in the immensity) their branches into tributaries that flow into being Alive while
the roots of your spirit sprout spores across my skin,
an addiction to slowly sharpen the moment into
our mouths
rising to breathe in the others breath
our tongues
folding into the song of each others taste
thighs and hands that grip
at the stepping stones you laid across your
stomach,
while a phrase more powerful than ( I Love You)
is carried within the gesture of your hips
and the lifelines of your palm
because i’ve never liked the way my
soul lumped beneath the confines of my skin or the way
the muscles of my body fell limp stretched over bones
until I met You. because You make me see
Beauty and emulate the existence of love and
when I try to remember a past without you, it’s less real than
every played out future held in your eyes
and our holding hands
Jan 20, 2011
Jan 20, 2011 at 7:26 AM UTC