.
The moon undresses you, little bird,
Your eyes are indigo skies without stars,
Your breath is summer grass after shower.
How you hold your arms before the night,
A lance of milky sheen and flailing bliss,
Your arms arrest as they softly surrender
And your ******* overflow in moist shores
Of white sand and shells, little ears to kiss,
I am drowning in your curves on the waves
From the sea, delirious with eye of moon,
Drunk with wild ocean as it consumes me,
Your hair is new grassland to run through,
Windy as a child breaking for the beach,
I latch my fingers to yours like driftwood
Tangled in kelp, the salt we share, steeps,
Is **** and deep and our lips are shucked
Oysters, blind, iridescent, sliding with eyes
Into the famished throat of ***** heavens.
.

.
The moon undresses you, little bird,
Your eyes are indigo skies without stars,
Your breath is summer grass after shower.
How you hold your arms before the night,
A lance of milky sheen and flailing bliss,
Your arms arrest as they softly surrender
And your ******* overflow in moist shores
Of white sand and shells, little ears to kiss,
I am drowning in your curves on the waves
From the sea, delirious with eye of moon,
Drunk with wild ocean as it consumes me,
Your hair is new grassland to run through,
Windy as a child breaking for the beach,
I latch my fingers to yours like driftwood
Tangled in kelp, the salt we share, steeps,
Is **** and deep and our lips are shucked
Oysters, blind, iridescent, sliding with eyes
Into the famished throat of ***** heavens.
.

The moon undresses you, little bird,
Your eyes are indigo skies without stars,
Your breath is summer grass after shower.
How you hold your arms before the night,
A lance of milky sheen and flailing bliss,
Your arms arrest as they softly surrender
And your ******* overflow in moist shores
Of white sand and shells, little ears to kiss,
I am drowning in your curves on the waves
From the sea, delirious with eye of moon,
Drunk with wild ocean as it consumes me,
Your hair is new grassland to run through,
Windy as a child breaking for the beach,
I latch my fingers to yours like driftwood
Tangled in kelp, the salt we share, steeps,
Is **** and deep and our lips are shucked
Oysters, blind, iridescent, sliding with eyes
Into the famished throat of ***** heavens.

.
The moon undresses you, little bird,
Your eyes are indigo skies without stars,
Your breath is summer grass after shower.
How you hold your arms before the night,
A lance of milky sheen and flailing bliss,
Your arms arrest as they softly surrender
And your ******* overflow in moist shores
Of white sand and shells, little ears to kiss,
I am drowning in your curves on the waves
From the sea, delirious with eye of moon,
Drunk with wild ocean as it consumes me,
Your hair is new grassland to run through,
Windy as a child breaking for the beach,
I latch my fingers to yours like driftwood
Tangled in kelp, the salt we share, steeps,
Is **** and deep and our lips are shucked
Oysters, blind, iridescent, sliding with eyes
Into the famished throat of ***** heavens.

the everyday
should not seep
through the walls

it is behind these walls
that truth undresses
then lies

Candle lit room
Illuminated by moon light
A faint smile from the unknown lady of the night

I found her wandering in the boulevard
She's smiling for a person with unsatisfied carnal desires

She undresses and starts spreading sheets above us
Faint scent of her hair
A beauty, no doubt

I listened to her stories with a lit cigarette
How she used to be an honor student

She undresses me and kisses me
She knows where to lead her mouth and hands
She moves- making me quiver with her damp thighs

I will never know your name.
Only the shared cigarette and your story

She slides it in- Moaning, scraping, pulling, tugging.
I lost myself in ecstasy falling in my vivid dreams in the hedonist dimension of the universe.

*She grabbed my wallet and ran.
She opened it; and saw a picture of herself in my arms as a toddler.

i fall in love with melancholy—
it undresses my mind and ushers out words
i didn’t know i had in me

there are some things that i can only say
when i am swimming in loneliness,
but not drowning

but sometimes it’s too much;
sad songs don’t caress the wound anymore

they poke at them,
make them bleed,
worsen it

i guess they were right, after all

when you feel darkness
knocking on your door,
don’t let it in—
it is not your friend

you deserve more than this sadness.

I am fully clothed,
Yet he undresses me with his thoughts.
Intoxicating thoughts.
I am drunk in it.
He is haunted by my seductive fragrance.
Silence.
Speaking would be too simple.

THE BANSHEE*

Late at night, whilst lying in bed,
two sisters hear a sound of dread.
Mixed in with the beating hail,
is the dreaded Banshee’s wail.

The storm is directly overhead,
and the thunder so loud, no word is said
Because the sisters cannot hear
anything spoken, even shouted in ear.

However, over the storm’s great row,
they hear the Banshee even now,
Howling around the chimney top,
Oh, will that screaming never stop?

Fiona and Caitlín look at each other,
with fingers in ears, the noise to smother.
The Banshee, a dire harbinger of death,
is wailing louder with every breath.

Who will die in that house tonight?
It really doesn’t seem to be right.
Only the two girls live there now,
for either to die would be a blow.

Eventually, after a couple of hours,
the storm decreases to merely showers.
Quieter now calls the Banshee,
it seems to pleading, “Please help me!”

Fiona and Caitlín become afraid.
Why is the Banshee begging for aid?
It only cries, a death to foretell,
is it predicting its own death as well?

Finally the storm blows out,
and Fiona and Caitlín think about
The Banshee, is it still around?
Then they hear a moaning sound.

It abates, then rises again,
like some creature suffering pain.
The two sisters decide they should
try to help if they could.

With dawn’s approach it is getting light,
and so the sisters think they might
Go outside and try to see
if they can find the groaning Banshee.

The sisters live on a little croft,
in a cottage that’s got a goodly loft
With a sloping ceiling overhead,
in which they’d placed a double bed.

A few outbuildings dotted around,
a meagre crop grows in the ground.
A pig, some sheep and one milk-cow.
that has sustained them both ere now.

A donkey, more a pet than use,
and fattening for Christmas, one grey goose.
A flock of hens and one old duck,
the sisters haven’t had much luck.

The cottage, a mere but-and-ben,
the but, a parlour, the ben, a kitchen.
This hovel is heated by one hearth,
and chinks in the walls are stopped with earth.

The roof is only thatched with turf,
there’s a constant background noise of surf,
And though their homestead looks forlorn,
they have lived there since they were born.

The croft is quite close to the sea,
and seaweed, obtainable for free,
Is often collected by the sisters,
carried in buckets which gives them blisters.

They use it to fertilise their crop,
and work all day until ready to drop.
Their father had been lost at sea,
their mother, heartbroken, soon after died she.

The sisters dress and go outside,
to find the Banshee where’er it may hide.
They can no longer hear its moan,
and wonder if by now it’s flown.

They slowly walk around to try,
the importunate Banshee to spy.
It isn’t now on the roof at all,
it is lying huddled by the wall.

No longer seeming a creature of dread,
only a shivering person, nearly dead.
The sisters kneel down by her side,
they cannot just let her there bide.

“What can we to to help?” asks Fi.
“Nothing, please just let me die.”
“Not an option,” then declares Cait,
“I’ll fetch a blanket, you two wait.”

The Banshee turns her face away,
“I thought to be gone ere break of day.
I was flying across your croft
when the lightning struck down from aloft.”

“I’ve never been hit like that before,
I couldn’t then fly any more.
I tumbled down from out of the sky
in terrible pain. I thought I’d die.”

“And in my agony I screamed out,
not knowing you would hear me shout.
I am not here, your deaths to foretell,
I would for you that fear dispel.”

Then Caitlín does soon return,
Fiona says, “Our help she’d spurn.”
“Oh no she shan't,” Caitlín said,
“we’ll just to carry her to bed.”

To the girls the Banshee appears light,
extremely pale, albino white.
She hardly seems to have any weight,
and looks as though she rarely ate.

On her shoulders two white wings,
tiny little vestigial things.
Her only clothes, a vestment white,
ripped to shreds by the storm in the night.

Cait carefully lays the blanket down flat,
and they place the Banshee onto that.
Then lifting the blanket between them both,
they carry her in, though the Banshee’s loath.

They go into the but, through the ben,
noticing as they do so, when
The Banshee is shaken around,
she bites her lip hard to prevent any sound.

They lay the Banshee down on their settle,
realising she is full of mettle.
She obviously is still in great pain,
though will not show it, that is plain.

Fiona back into the kitchen goes,
intending to heat up some brose.
Caitlín with the Banshee does stay,
determined to help as best she may.

Beneath the Banshee’s head she lays
a pillow then to the Banshee says,
“You should get out of your wet clothes,
you could catch you death from wearing those.”

Caitlín realised as soon as she spoke,
to the Banshee that would be no joke.
“I’m sorry if I’ve offended you,
that’s the last thing I would want to do.”

“It is just that when *we were wet,
these words from our mother we would get.”
The Banshee replies, “I don’t mind,
I know you’re trying to be kind.”

“And there’s something you should know,
no-one’s seen my body ere now.
However, although shy I may be,
I will try to let you undress me.”

Fiona at that moment comes in,
carrying on a tray of tin,
A bowl of brose with slices of bread,
then seeming surprised, to her sister said,

“Haven’t you yet the wight undressed
and warmed her up to help her rest?
If she stays in that dress, cold and wet,
she might catch her death from cold, yet!”

The Banshee and Caitlín glance at each other,
and then both snirt, which they try to smother
By each pretending to need to cough
while Fiona snaps, “Let’s get them off.”

Fiona places the tray on a table,
then kindly says, “I think I’ll be able,
If you sit up, to remove your gown,”
then worries, hearing the Banshee groan.

“I’m sorry, I am still in pain,
it came on when I moved again
As the result of having to cough.
Please do your best to get my robe off.”

Caitlín sits by the Banshee’s side,
and across her back her arm does slide.
She helps the Banshee to sit up straight,
who winces and then smiles at Cait.

Fiona manages to ease the robe down
to the Banshee’s waist then gives a frown.
“No wonder so much pain you’ve had,
the lightning seems to have burnt you bad.”

The Banshee’s skin is bleeding and raw,
the robe stuck in places making it sore.
Caitlín asks, “Why didn’t you say?
You don’t need to suffer this way.”

The Banshee begs, “Please don’t be mad,
until now my life’s been bad.
You’re the first mortals I have known,
until now I’ve been alone.”

Overcome with emotion, she cries,
the tears, in rivulets, fall from her eyes.
Caitlín hugs her close to her breast,
saying, “Soon you will be able to rest.”

“Fi, get some scissors and cut her robe free,
then bring some Aloe Vera to me.
I’ll use the sap to coat each wound,
and with strips of cloth they can be bound.”

So Fiona with scissors cuts the cloth,
while the Banshee closes her eyes, both
To avoid watching the scissors being used,
and not see the cloth to her body fused.

After cutting through as much cloth as she may,
Fiona picks the pieces away.
And then Caitlín does tenderly use,
to soothe the wounds, Aloe juice.

Fiona cuts the Banshee’s dress
into strips, which, more or less,
Provide enough cloth, the wounds to cover,
which they hope will soon heal over.

Fiona then goes to the bedroom to get,
to cover the Banshee, a dry blanket.
Caitlín stays sitting with her on the settle,
hoping the Banshee’ll soon be in fine fettle.

The blanket warms her up a treat,
then the sisters help the Banshee to eat.
Caitlín supports the Banshee’s head,
while Fiona feeds her brose and bread.

They leave her sleeping on the settee,
and go to the kitchen to brew some tea,
Then sitting down, they discuss what to do,
it’s new to them, they haven’t a clue.

Cait says, “I thought her a creature of myth,
a fable, though mentioned long sith.”
Fiona remarks, “And I thought as well,
she only appeared, a death to foretell.”

“This, she has said, is not why she’s here,
and also her life’s bad, so I fear
If we don’t help her to try to mend,
she might think her own life to end.”

At that the sisters feel so sad,
how can the Banshee’s life be so bad?
Since she’s a poor creature in so much need,
they’ll try to help and not ask for meed.

Into the parlour they quietly peep,
the Banshee still seems to be asleep.
So Fiona and Caitlín each start on a chore,
Fi feeds the hens, Cait goes to the shore.

On the beach Cait harvests seaweed,
collecting only as much as they need,
Then carries it back to the croft, up the lane,
trying to ignore, caused by blisters, the pain.

Cait leaves the buckets and enters the ben,
and sees the Banshee is awake, then
She goes to her and sitting down,
asks, “Why’ve you always been on your own?”

The Banshee replies, “That’s just how it is.
There’s never been a time ywis,
That I’ve ever met another like me.
Mayhap I’m the only one to be.”

At that the Banshee seems so sad,
and continues, “And what else is bad
Is that I feel Death draw near
to mortals. That’s the time I fear.”

“I cannot stop that ‘sergeant fell,’
however, I feel his pull too well.
I feel so sad at what he does,
and try to help by being close.”

“That is why when he is present,
I always try not to be absent.
I give warning as best I might,
by screaming loudly in the night.”

“People hear me and suppose,
I am there, a life to foreclose.
Then I feel the awful hate,
which from the mortals does emanate.”

Caitlín then goes back outside,
leaving the Banshee safe inside.
Fiona and Cait continue the work
that they must do and should not shirk.

Fiona finally milks the cow,
and hoping the Banshee’s feeling less low,
Pours some warm milk into a cup,
and carries it in for the Banshee to sup.

The Banshee wakes as Fiona comes in,
Fi says to her, giving a grin,
“I can’t believe you’re really here,
I must say, you are quite a dear!”

The Banshee gratefully takes the cup,
and with Fi’s help drinks the milk up.
Then back down on the couch she does lie,
and Fiona, embarrassed, again sees her cry.

Fiona sits down by her side,
while the Banshee tries, her face to hide.
Fiona, silent, her hand does hold,
noticing it’s very cold.

She strokes the Banshee’s silvery hair,
and waits for the tears to disappear.
The Banshee, eventually, does her eyes dry,
and then gives out a heartfelt sigh.

“I am so happy here with you,
without you I’d not know what to do.
Please forgive my moody tears,
I haven’t cried like this for years.”

“The first time was when I experienced Death.
I was drawn to a blasted heath,
Where a woman had a babe, stillborn,
and was gazing at it so forlorn.”

“She’d been constuprated in a wood,
by a man who’d left as soon as he could.
She was overcome with shame,
she hadn’t even known his name.”

“The babe was born before its time,
the ground was cold and hard with rime.
The woman did not even have
a ***** to dig the baby’s grave.”

“She opened the clothes across her chest,
and wrapped it tightly to her breast,
Then untied the cincture from her waist,
moving slowly not in haste.”

“When, going to a nearby tree,
not knowing I was there to see,
Around a branch she did it thread,
and hanged herself. She soon was dead.”

“Death knew what there would occur,
and therefore, to lay claim to her,
Had gone to the heath to watch her die,
and I’d been drawn, by Death, nearby.”

“I could feel the woman’s pain.
It came in waves again and again.
I didn’t know what it did mean,
and in my anguish I did keen.”

“My voice grew louder, I did scream,
Death looked at me and it did seem
At that moment, in pity, said,
‘She really is now better off dead.’”

They then hear the back door open
as Caitlín enters into the ben.
She shuts it close and locks it tight,
as she comes inside for the night.

“The animals are safely put away,
and now it’s time to hit the hay.
I’ll make supper and a *** of tea,
then it’s off to bed for me.”

Fiona says, “I’ll give you a hand.”
Then slowly stretches and up does stand.
She goes with Cait to make the tea,
leaving behind the poor Banshee.

Fiona tells Cait of the Banshee’s plight,
though they cannot think how to make it right.
They place three bowls and cups on a tray,
and back to the parlour make their way.

The Banshee sits up, with her feet on the ground,
it seems as though some strength she’s found.
She takes a bowl and says, “I suppose
it’s another delicious helping of brose.”

She beams at the sisters, who feel a glow
deep inside them slowly grow.
They realise that perhaps this is how
the Banshee is able, her feelings to show.

The Banshee asks, “Will it be all right
if I go outside for a stroll tonight?
I’ll only take a turn round the croft,
I will not try to fly aloft.”

“I am a denizen of the night,
which is why I thought I might
Have a walk by the light of the moon.
I promise I will be back soon.”
  
Round the Banshee’s waist Cait ties some rope
so that the blanket will not ope,
Then walks with her across the floor,
to help her get to the back door.
  
Caitlín unlocks it and opens it out,
though, for the Banshee, has some doubt.
Suppose the effort is too great?
She can only watch and wait.

Meanwhile Fi does the washing up,
and then she shouts, “I’m going up
To make our bed, don’t be late!”
Caitlín replies, “All right, don’t wait.”

Fiona goes to the top of the stair,
she makes up the bed then brushes her hair.
She quickly undresses and gets into bed,
and on the pillow rests her head.

Caitlín’s still standing at the door,
she’s not anxious any more.
The Banshee seems to be doing fine,
walking slowly in the bright moonshine.

As she walks she seems to get stronger,
so Caitlín, waiting for her for longer
Than she’d thought that she might do,
steps outside to have a walk too.

She takes the Banshee by the hand,
For a time they slowly walk round and
Then the Banshee asks to stop,
to rest before she’s likely to drop.

Still on her feet the Banshee sways,
and seems to be in a sort of daze.
So Caitlín holds her in her arms tight,
and thus they stand in the bright moonlight.

Hugging the Banshee close to her breast,
she’s aware of her nearness to their guest.
Caitlín feels her heart start to pound,
and in some confusion stands stilly and stound.

Then she pulls herself together,
at the same time wondering whether
She has experienced her first love,
or if this feeling false will prove.

So fragile and helpless the Banshee appears,
Caitlín can’t help but be moved to tears.
She lifts her up, and carries her inside,
and places her onto the sofa to bide.

Caitlín then stumbles up the stairs,
Fiona is shocked to see her in tears,
And asks her if she is all right,
and if anything’s happened out there in the night.

Caitlín, crying, lies down on the bed,
then Fiona, on her *****, pillows Caits head.
She gently wipes Caitlín’s tears away,
and waits to hear what she might say.

Caitlín then cuddles up to Fi,
saying, “Thank you for looking after me.
Really, I am quite all right,
nothing bad happened out there in the night.”

“It’s just that the Banshee is still frail,
she appeared to be getting a little more hale,
And then she seemed to become weak again,
so I carried her in, on the sofa she’s lain.”

Cait then stands and doffs her dress,
and gets into bed, still feeling a mess.
Fiona holds Cait as to sleep they go,
and they stay like that the whole night through.

Fiona and Caitlín wake up together,
and happily smile at one another.
It’s the start of a brand new day
which they’ll face together, come what may.

Fiona dresses and downstairs goes she,
into the kitchen to make some tea.
Caitlín shortly comes down too,
entering the parlour, the Banshee to view.

The Banshee wakes as Caitlín goes in,
still looking pale and painfully thin.
Caitlín sits on the sofa with care,
saying, “Last night you gave me quite a scare.”

“You seemed to get stronger in the moonlight,
so I thought everything was going all right.
Then I feared that you might fall down,
and so I carried you back here on my own.”

The Banshee responded, “I’m ever so sorry.
I didn’t mean to cause you worry.
I also felt I was getting str

A metaphor… love is a metaphor to everything of beauty. I found my metaphor in her arms. Her not a he and this is the things that we as human beings don’t comprehend. Love owns no gender, love owns no rules. We’ve been taught through life that there are certain kinds of people who shouldn’t be accepted when in reality we all are the same. Who I have sleeping in my bed in my arms at night owns the right to be who they are not who the world expects them to be. I found my metaphor my love. She opened a door to my heart that I thought only I had the key to when in all truth… I owned the spare she has the original. I was placed in a world where so many told me I had no place in being because my he was a she. My love owns no gender only a one person deal her name slips off of my tongue onto my pillow at night as I dream of the day I can kiss her in public and the stares will melt into a standing ovation… a day that I soon hope will come. Her heart owns mine, nothing in this world could take that from us. Only father time. We don’t know when or how we will die but I do know that I will find my peace by her side. When she dies it will be the most beautiful thing because nobody has ever died with their heart still beating… but this girl when she dies she will be alive within my chest, within this thing she calls hers. I am a girl and she is a girl but together we are the world. Society puts a warrant on the heads of the innocent who only try to find themselves in a way that they’re too simple to understand. Love is too complex these days… said nobody ever. Love is love no matter the gender no matter the *** recognition. You are who you are you love who your heart tells you to love. Changing to fit someone else’s perception of love or to be who they expect you to be is something I’ll never be able to do. I as a human being own the right to fight for something I love and believe in and that is her. I believe in her I love her I am a part of her as she is a part of me. Not even surgery could remove her from myself. We are merely two bodies with one soul and two separate minds. The problem with that is she constantly runs through mine. The world tells us that we are wrong… but something this wrong has never been so right. I’ll fight till the day I die to show the world our love through our eyes. Our love… something that no guy could supply. I have fallen for her, and fallen is a term used so loosely. This girl shoved me off the edge of a cliff only to jump as soon as she did, grabbing me by the arm rolling her sweet body underneath mine as we fell to our fate… she is my fate. It’s way too late for society to tell me that who I am who I love is something so wrong. They dispute our feelings for one another as if it’s debatable. My life is not a political meeting you cannot tell me who I can and cannot be with. Society sees it as just another “phase” I’m only here to show them that yes throughout our life’s we go through stages and phases that soon we grow out of only to find our final phase who defines us as who we are… I have found my final phase and society here is the big ******* to you because she’s the one who my final phase shall be spent with. Her touch is like no other, the way her hands slide over my body purely out of love. How she sees me in ways that I couldn’t possibly dream of seeing myself. Not only does she touch my body and make love to my body she undresses my thoughts as she watches them walk throughout my heart. She kisses the scars I’ve left on myself inside and out. The way I let society tell me who I was supposed to be, how listening to them almost destroyed me… took me to the point of no return no turning back now I have to take this wonderful weapon with a bullet in the chamber engraved with Katlyn the one who never came to know who she was in this cruel world… instead she was the gun and her heart was the bullet piercing through my mind and my soul creating the only thing that I’ve ever known. I found my metaphor in her eyes, the ones that shine so bright as they stare back into mine. I swear I can see the future through her beautiful deep brown eyes. I lose myself in them and pretend that I don’t know where I am going just to be able to stay a little longer. I long for the day when we’ll be united as one by the state and how we can declare our love to this world on paper… although it’s just a paper stating something we’ve known all along. I was born to find this girl in my life at a time where life was no longer my dreams where I had fallen to my knees begging for someone to take the knife away from me before I ended something so precious to someone I hadn’t had the chance to meet. In the same day I had taken that gun and placed it to my brains she sent me a message saying… I fell for you the first time I saw you. You tell me what you’d do… a girl you’ve had your eyes upon for so long and in your mind knowing you’d never be able to love the way that she so deserves messages you telling you that you are her future in this world… Society can let me bend over so they can press their lips to my sweet *** and kiss it firmly because this girl… this girl was born for me as I was for her. Kimberly is her name… and soon she’ll be my everlasting metaphor

─illustrations on the ceiling

i love the way
the sunlight ripples along his skin
with no complaints

"messiah"* the shadow talks
"of course he is"* i reply
and i resume to orchestrating my love

─little phobias

i wander aimlessly along his windows,
his eyes;
they are gates to afterlives unloved;
they are oceanic shrapnel
sky imprisoned infinities
a lapis point of view-
that i treasure

his heart is drenched
in my soul-
in a sweeter sickness-
in the liquid measure of my steps-
he mentions i'm contagious

i tell him he is my favorite way
to bleed

"september prodigy" the shadow babbles
"why?" i rasp
"sun at long last
kisses away
all the ghosts
harvesting from
the heart of the moon"
and i broke out into stars

─my serendipity

i love the raw
music of our conversations,
and how his voice
undresses me
and my monsters
so delicately
in fabrics of the dark

i love how his laugh
makes all the other planets
look dull;
how his smile
is the first step
to curing the blind

so the blind may know
what i know

"the symphony of seams"

i love how he is the shocking
philosophy
of turning suicide notes
into paper cranes

of picking fights with death
so i may remain

i love the phoenix tucked in his soul
how it defines-
the altitudes-
the limits-
our existence he describes to me

"reincarnation?" the shadow asks
"every morning he wonders" i answer
and the fever invests it's time in me

"what is he to you?" the shadow murmurs

"besides broken flowers,
and ink blots shaped like rain
he is my favorite stairway to heaven."

I would tell her that this is how you die by distance even being so close.
I would tell her "Hey lover, do you remember me? Maybe you don't, but let me introduce myself and we'll see...".
I would tell her that it's the third time I try to quit smoking, but this is another addiction that will remain. We all need something to prevent us from going insane.
I would tell her that "You can leave, you can always leave, come with me and let's catch a train". I would tell her that "You can come back, you can always come back, that's what a house is, a shelter from pain".
I would tell her that the memory of her rough voice undresses my memories.
I would tell her that her laugh sounds like those perfectly designed sweet melodies.
I would tell her that we are always afraid of each other even when we're not. We are more afraid of being together than of being apart.
I would tell her she doesn't have to believe in her every single thought.
I would tell her that I tried to stop writing about her but everything that comes out of me are love poems and death sighs.
I would tell her that I know everytime that she cries, I can feel it in me, when she lays at night choking in all her lies.
I would tell her that being empty comes with a big price.
I would tell her that I'm mad at her for making it so hard to leave.
I would tell her that I know what she hides behind that sleeve, many scars from all the people that still can make her grieve.
I would tell her that I love her through music, through literature, through nature, through everything my eyes touch...because everything reminds me of her, because I will always love her so so much.
I would tell her that I think she's the most majestic creature.
I would tell her that connections like this are rare so there's no need to be afraid. And maybe I'll need her to tell me the same.
I would tell her that after all this time, I wish she stayed. Or do I wish I stayed?
I would tell her that I never want to say goodbye because everytime she smiles I feel like she cracks open the sky.
I would tell her that this is for her and everyone else who reads this is just a stranger looking through a window at us.
I would tell her...
If I ever met her.

Benedict
thinks of her
Christina

the girlfriend
at high school
as he now

undresses
preparing
for bedtime

she far off
in her house
in her town

her parents
probably
below stairs

watching their
dull programmes
on TV

while she in
her bedroom
undresses

or so he
imagines
(in his head)

watching her
removing
each piece of

clothing
as he too
undresses

in his room
a coloured
centrefold

of a fast
racing car
on the wall

and her small
photograph
by his bed

she gave him
he'd seen her
on the field

at high school
during their
lunch recess

she sitting
with her friends
giggling

then walking
together
off alone

high smell of
lavender
her soft hand

lips kissing
now in bed
lying there

lights all out
just moonlight
reflecting

her image
he pretends
she is there

next to him
not speaking
not laughing

both watching
the moon move
and stars shine

hands touching
fingers entwined
each having

the same thoughts
in shared mind.

Sophia sorts through
her parents' room;
they're out for the day,
some Polish old comrades

meeting of her father's,
old war pals. She opens up
the old wardrobe, sorts
through things, takes out

her mother's old dresses
and some new ones, puts
them on the bed. She likes
a red one, old but well kept.

She ponders, she decides
to try it on. She undresses
from her own jeans and top
and puts on the old red dress

and looks at herself in the
wardrobe mirror. Her mother
must have been her size back
then, it fits like it was made

for her. She does a twirl, looks
back at her ***, her thighs,
turns to the front and stares
at her *******. She doesn't

remember her mother wearing
the dress, not a dress she recalls
her mother wearing at all. She
looks down, it comes just below

the knees, although she's taller
than her mother, so it would
come lower on her mother.
She embraces herself as if

Benedict were there behind her
putting his arms around her
and breathing on her neck.
She stares at herself in the mirror;

stares at her full length. She
smells the material. It smells
of stale perfume, but not horrible
or clammy. She walks around

the room in it; looks at herself
in the mirror across the room.
She'd ask her mother if she could
borrow it, but then she'd have to

say she'd been in her mother's wardrobe
and that would cause hell with her
father and she didn't want that. She
take off the dress and stands there

in her bra and *******, and puts the
dress back on the hanger, and puts
it back with the other dresses where
she found it the wardrobe, in the right

place, and pushes the clothes back as
far as shes can recall in the order they
were, and closes the wardrobe door.
She dresses back in her jeans and top.

She pauses by the bed. The crucifix over
the bed. The Crucified staring down
pityingly. She touches the bed with her
fingers. She'd like to bring Benedict here;

make love here. But not after last time
in her room and her parents came back
after and that was too close. And some
neighbour had split on her and said

they'd seen young man and her come
here while her parents were out and her
father gave her the third degree over it.
Her father said she can only bring the

boy when they were home. Couldn't bring
Benedict back for *** while they were
downstairs sitting watching TV and
drinking their wine and such, and not

in her parent's bed, not beneath the
Crucified, except in her blonde haired head.

Did I ever tell you of the day I cleansed my Saturday?
Saturday kept kissing me goodbye, telling me 'I need to be free, please let me be free,'
And I said,
"Acceptance,
Acceptance."

Once upon a time, Saturday weeped upon departure
But now I know that Saturday is fine
Doing a loop around the world
Tasting, touching, talking, taking,
And listening to tales from the Cascades to the Pyrenees
And every Saturday,
Saturday returns to tell me all she's seen.

And she tells me as I bathe her affectionately
Until she stops mid-sentence and we fall into a soft embrace, our essences dipping intimately into one another to recreate the world from those silver square circles suspended in a sunbeam

Saturday undresses me slowly
As if unrobing a long-dead Egyptian pharaoh
Gazing upon my naked body like shes the first in a thousand years
Each time a grand discovery of the New World

And we sink further into one another
As the silver square circles of the sunbeam imprint themselves beneath our eyes like diamond tattoos

And every Sunday I awake alone in bed,
With a note on the pillow.

"I am free,
And you understand
That this must be true love."

O my God
the ride down here
to this base camp
in those converted
army trucks
wasnt that something?
Miriam says

my face felt frozen
and my hair
looked as if
Id been in front
of a massive
hair-dryer
for hours

I sip my coke
and watch her
sitting at the bar stool
thinking
her jaw sure must
have unfroze
since shed not
stopped speaking
for a good five minutes

and guess who
Im sharing
a tent with?  
she informs

I dont know
I say

that hippy girl
you know the one
whose boyfriend
looks like Jesus

o yes
I know the one
yes so whats
she like
to share with?

o you dont
want to know
she says

then dont tell me

o but I must
so she does

and as she rabbits on
I study her hair
a mass of curls
tight and red
which reminded me
of a guy
I worked for once
who said
I took a red head
out last night
no hair
just a red head
and I laughed
because he was
my employer
but it was a kind
of put on laugh

and o
she says
and thats not all
when she undresses
at night in the tent

I am brought back
to the present
and am all ears
hanging on to
her every word
about the dame
*******
like a penitent
awaiting
a priests blessing.

She likes the lights in my room
They highlight everything I love about
Her.
The lights highlight where my lips
Have pressed & my teeth have marked.
She circumvents and understands
The lights when they come to hush.
The way that I touch her.
The way she lays back & enjoys
The thought of my hands
Revealing the parts of her that I cannot
See.
The ridges of her back my tongue
Walks & drowns in slowly.
Soft the way her body
Stretches & yawns (in ecstasy.)
She likes the lights in my room
But more so the way they cut off
When she walks in.
The light gives way the hint of attention.
Shadows fleet before my hand reaches
Hers
Becoming one with the way she yearns.
Her thigh gap at perfect ease
This craving a friend we both welcome
She wears this light for me
Until the switch undresses this yearning
She spreads & undresses for me
Everything I love about her

The Nakedness of Execution*

~for Balanchine~*

the empty page possesses the perfect clarity of nothingness,
making it perfectly clear nothingness has no business here

come, execute,
clothe thy nakedness,
be a carpenter and build
a shelter for your cover  

be a carpenter

construct the art that dresses thy body
yet, undresses the glowing glory spirited nakedness
we desire,
let us see the visibility of your naked invisibility

execute
unmasked unadulterated unasked unmodulated

pick the wood, select the tools, carve the words
on your forehead, Carpenter Cain
that we may copy them onto our eyes

ask then what can I make of my perfect clarity
and execute
disclose yourself, clothe ourselves

I’m testing my mental because I know once I’m caught up with someone or something I’ll lose it. It took time for me to be here, to speak out about my ****** up life. Took a lot of withdrawals and telling myself I’ll talk about it only for me to cower away. Oh but I love infatuation, it keeps me going. Like how I was infatuated by the way writing remedied wounds I couldn’t possibly fathom. Those pages were what I spilled my secrets to, I smeared my blood on every page to remind myself that everything beautiful has a consequence. But the pain had toned down and creativity found a new abode. Just like the word indecisive implies I still can’t make a decision on what to write about. I’d like to call it indecisive insanity cause I still can’t figure out what’s wrong with me. I had journals filled to the brim with criticism but by 16 I had confined in those four walls in my mind that said I’m not worthy enough . Writing became a short lived passion, I can feel the words ricochet off the walls in my mind. I start perspiring all of my rhymes. Sometimes you just hope and dream that they’ll see the light you’ve secretly placed into those poems  the endless stalking of dictionaries and finding out new strands of knowledge distracts me from myself. It dresses my bare mind I just hope that no man will come and undresses my mentality.

Running from a demented Ex,
Several kilometers to a lone cabin,
She travelled.
She was feeling comfortable
Although lonely in this forest world.
A glass of juice in hand,
She steps out on the porch.

Halting in shock,
For on the edge of the foot path,
Waits a big grey wolf,
With intense gaze fixed on her.
"Shoo!" She tells it.
But flinch, it doesn't.
Retreats into the cabin she does,
To bolt all windows and doors.

Soon, the wolf loses interest and leaves.
Come night, she undresses to bath.
But in her bedroom doorway,
Appears the grey wolf.
Caught in surprise, she gasps and falls.
And in her shock, she watches it
Morph into a man.
Not just any man, a breathtaking one.

She's hypnotized by the sight of him.
He approaches, carries her,
In his arms to the shower
Where he makes passionate love
To her against the wall.
His fangs sinking into her shoulder
In the ****** of the ****** passion,
Until after a mind-blowing ******, she blacks out into unconsciousness.

Several hours later,
Her consciousness she regains.
On her bed she wakes.
She remembers. But perhaps,
It was all a dream.
But the soiled paw-print on her rug,
And the aching pain on her shoulder
Revealed otherwise,
Until the distant howl of her new
Lover, reaches her from the forest,
Making her shudder with a new craving need to be made love to-

**Again!

Lady adjacent waiter,
ruler of the medulla,
give me a certain angle
that'll make her want to maneuver,

make her want to consider
in the absence of his figure,
that maybe not the whole gender
is full of secret agendas,

with her left over right leg,
glass in her right hand,
a tribute to her innocence
ever since she walked in,

assembled it's, white wine
Krispy Kreme eyes,
glazed look,
lips glossed like her oil thighs,

it's finally off time
her sorority cross line,
it's happy hour,
she wasn't,

his whole crime has been a cover up
since she wants him,
this whole scene has been taped off
by her girlfriends,

it's often I see it,
alcoholic rehab,
a culprit — a demon
making contracts with my open tab,

broken bad in the bathroom,
clad woman,
For all the attention
such good first impressions,

but not you,
I feel a different aura,
I feel I'll get exposed
so I call a different offense,

Semper Fi
within my eyes
this energy —
I quiet the restaurant,

Can you hear me?
Proceed to throwing signals
Tom Brady couldn't throw,
the ball's in my court so I'm finally on the move,

crushing on you while the sky undresses,
you catch a glimpse
as the clouds bare witness,
Excuse me Miss Unfortunate,

I know I'm at a disadvantage
but I had to call it
head or tails
I'm still offering,

a chance to be your man? No
a chance to be your author?
a chance to be your narrator now or later
call me,

a chance to say “there she is”
her piercing eyes, fixes her finger on my lips
be quiet, “I saw this in a movie once”
she told me as I spy and I grab onto her truths,

excuse me thats selfish, pardon me
apart of me just wants to see that movie,
a father daughter dance,
a chance to be your groupie,

a chance to see that smile
that you flashed
like a lunar star,
meteor crash

and its back to reality,
eye connection broken
and it’s back to the irony,
a word barely spoken

and I’m back to asking:
Check Please.

lovers

dreamt you said forever yours your lips opened and I was here now

perfectly still she listens to falling cherry blossom music the mournful sky and I envious a witness to evening in her hair

midnight thighs talk wine song dance dawn on railroad earth laughter lovely tears lovely

the stained glass of her mouth my soul gladdened by the rosary of her body

awake pray to the Almighty or roll over and kiss her

roadside she squats ****** I love listening to her the stars

a headring of dead posies on the pillow after all night dancing at first light she picks tea roses

behind kind walls we make love sleep then dream of each other

I wake still inside you rose petals fallen around the porcelain vase by our bed

night hiking with friends thinking about her ***** I forget about the full moon

she arranges roses she speaks with pain about her art God me

sometimes I can't tell if I'm you like last night I you bathing my your feet

I think about it then cut one and another all my roses for her

she eats what I don't I finish her sentences people despise us for laughing her parents don't approve friends whine I neglect them

she inhales the yang in me undresses her soul so I belong to no one else

she pulled my pants down while I ironed said it turned her on

skin to skin and the blossom of your whisper closer come closer my darling we're on our way to where we've never been before

when you hurt my love turns soldier against all biblical stones I'd even marry death if hurled toward you

full of the world I retreat sighing dark between her thighs I know I'm fooling myself
night wraps us in darkness we dream drift long for our cage of light to rise

**** tears poems kids with you feverish with you broke what more do you want

******* and hurt I let the phone ring

for weeks my lover ******* about money kids the house getting free last night she ****** my brains out

sad wildflowers lovely braided in the graying hair of my once and only love

Pfeiffer's waterfall the rocky waves at sunset better when we held hands here

once I decided poetry is it she never came back

wake alone with night inside me your perfume still on the pillow how long 'til morning?

I wait all night outside your house the wind blowing through me

dancing in cities quiet in the redwoods I wander worry wish and unwish carry on with a lock of her hair

hope woke when the door creaked open but it was the cat come in  from a night of love making

up all night writing my better gone kids asleep knowing it's only paper song

I was okay until morning doves started cooing at each other

she's long gone even so thought I saw her today

no longer a ring on her hand a song in her sorrow I am gone

years of wind whistle about gravestones one by one carries away her favorite violets

They punch me in the face
Until it is apparently asymmetrical
They call me human waste
And tell me not to be sentimental
When they're insistent
On our difference
I begin to see asymmetry
In the way they're treating me

Does anybody remember or even care
About what happened in Nisour Square?
A Blackwater slaughter
Killing sons and daughters
An unprovoked
Macabre joke
The militants were convicted
The victims remained deceased
The locals were livid
When the problem would repeat
We don't mind taking innocent lives intentionally
When we see their value asymmetrically

Does anyone remember when the city of Fallujah
Smoked like a hookah?
Thermobaric rocket launchers
That used depleted uranium
To melt insurgent craniums
Left behind waste
That is radioactive
The citizens could taste
The shame of being passive
When they couldn't reject
The spike in birth defects
A child is born with its heart protruding from its chest
So we can more easily grab it
That child was born with an asymmetrical breast
Because of our capitalist habit

Contractor corpses hang from a bridge
While we stand on a ridge
Separating chaos and order
A symmetrical border
Order oppresses
Chaos undresses
Both cause messes

We need to see each other equally
Or we'll continue seeing sequel sprees
We need to stop seeing asymmetrically
And adopt a completely loving creed

Jamie wakes up
A gunshot from within
Eyelids crash into the cage

Jamie gets up
The heavy shadow also rises
The unwanted, only company

Jamie takes a shower
Water pouring hot and clean as angry man's blood
The bars cannot be washed nor melted

Jamie, the golden child
Jamie's gold is turning into stone

Jamie takes a bus ride
Circumventing the forever nameless faces
Are their shields up too?

Jamie gets to school
Nails buried deep within the palms
A secret buried deep within it's ugliest of kingdoms

Jamie laughs much too loudly
For it takes an earthquake to cover the storm
It's relentless shivers just won't die

Jamie, the martyr
The crown of thorns restlessly resting on Jamie's head

Jamie walks back
Way back
Yesterday's sun - today's dark cloud

Jamie listens to a song
Swimming in the pool of ease
A pool much too shallow for Jamie's big fat shadow

Jamie stops to smell the flowers
But finds none
Only a concrete meadow swallows Jamie's feet

Nobody ever considers Jamie
But this evening Jamie is considering

Jamie comes back home
And finds all hopes lay fast asleep
Or is it the reek of death?

Jamie undresses, and then some more
The essence without thick skin collapses
It's tortured and it tortures
It's weak and it weakens
It's broken and it brakes

The menacing trigger
The blood flow
The bare images of hot white pain
It all drifts away
As Jamie drifts into sleep

Jamie, the divine soul tainted
Much too used to taking bullets

Jamie, the heart that bravely fought

Jamie, for who would have thought so many demons
could live within an angel?

The carpenter in one glance
undresses the house
with his eyes.
She, a Victorian dame
of voluptuous frame
in faded, ragged dress
seems to blush
at his appraisal.

He yearns to explore
intimate spaces,
strip her pretension,
commit filthy acts
hammering skillfully
with strange pleasure,
the work of hands,
attention to detail,
rubbing sweet oils
her inner beauty revealed.

It will end in soft strokes
a thoughtful cleanup
leaving an afterglow
of rejuvenation.
Her timbers moan
with anticipation.

Cosmic serpent
Flies in circles
Orbits earths
Visits vessels
Stings and wrestles

Prowls the plain
The desert arrangements
Faces fire no fear
Takes one look at the spider

Sees through the fire
Undresses the only envy
The necessity plenty
Of spiraling ascent

To meaning manifest
A plunge into the nest of the fortune cookie prophecies

Fate pulled from a hat
In the terraforming visions of the seven breasted harpy speech devours itself
The visioneer’s ouroboros precludes ovals of assimilation clinging tight to the exoteric
The vessel rejects the half digested
An ammonia laden upheaval

Dispelling folderol with blinding reverence
Inviting tragedy with nostalgic foresight
Wet nightmares
Logic abandons the visioneer ****** into the opposite of static

Whimsical roses and uttered rhetorics
spare the disgrace of the grieved afflictions
pebbled roads of restraints and constraints
laughter and compressed redundancy
the tone changes and emptiness nest
the tongue races and eventuality sets
such a season of unknown unrest
undresses one to a bare *****
where the ****** peaks, unsure of the leak
offended in the reign of unnamed seeds
with evocative sprouts that germinate
to the unlocked mysteries of happenstance
such a season of bearable tests
caress one to a bare bottom
where even shame never turn or press
oppressed in the fields of unmarked borders
with seductive crowns that culminates
to the unlocked mysteries of happenstance

He captains the ship
with a grin
You’re all in
Hoist the sail
Climb the rigging
Settle down in the cabin
Close that door in behind,
You want to go live in
His life, your life, his wife
You say

He scoffs at the crew
But not you
You’re the maiden
He’ll find treasure to hide
In you he’ll confide
And provide
The answers you desired
He knows best
You say

When seas are rough
And he’s had enough
Surrounding ships wreck
All are affected
Once important neglected
It can’t go undetected, surely,
As he undresses you
with his insults
Addresses all your faults
He’s just stressed
You say.

Your attempts to rekindle
Throw you overboard
His words
undercurrents,
that drag you beneath.
Used to swim
Now amongst the weeds
Can’t help but concede
He needs me
You say

You struggle
You had learnt to blow bubbles
But now you’re in trouble
A muddle
Confuddled
That’s typical for you
He says

You plead to be rescued
Lock eyes with the crew
But they’re through
So washed ashore
Bedraggled and torn
He picks you up
Keeps you safe,
Loved
And warm
You say

It is not
The sweet, far thing
But that wretched, near
Temptation.

That in shame
Follows my heart
To the safety
Of my soul's chamber.

Temptation
That undresses
My guilty conscious
And makes love
To my dreams.

Temptation
With blue eyes
And the voice of a gypsy,
Speaking only
In lullabies.

Temptation
Bartering my love
For those limpid pools of ocean,

Upon which I sail
When drifting to sleep.

Here the sun

Then a continent forms in the ripples of hot bed sheet. The sun undresses again while a tide ripples. hot bed sheet rolls back thinly. .
The sun undresses again a tide. lake, ripples  andundressed river of her matress . A  the continent lakes It undressed again into beige, the hot lake on the bed sheet  as  they both exhaled the last of sun. Sure enough, the hour that marked when lamps blunk inside one-by-one began. Their bulbs let out invasions of artificial light.
Everything laminated in.
Into the retinas;
the hair,
skin,
the curtains--
the moths;  
in the *****, blonde synthetic light
waited patiently for the dusk to swash.
the black rivers of night;
she lay there,
on the bed,
with charcoal
and a sketchbook.
He was on his way to her.
Midnight had come. Midnight was a breath of tired darkness.  Midnight was inhaled by the moon. Midnight filled the lungs of the day. Midnight had come.