Asleep on your Shoulder
I fell asleep on your shoulder
Window shut out all the light and the clouds
I would've watched the sun fall
But I guess I'll fall instead
We have tea and little marbles
Rolling like fate's dice through outstretched fingers
Interlocking puzzle pieces
Over and over again
Sugar water and vanilla sticks
Sun burns across our necks
I wish I could fold you up like a love note
And bring you with me in my pocket
Sluggish thoughts in the middle of the night
But I know the shape of your face
Colorless dreams and creaking silence
Let's fall asleep again,
My head on your shoulder
Just like it should be
sleeping in the middle of the day
stand in line,
one after the other. Chase a butterfly
and watch the grass grow
the sun's watching us from behind the trees.
it's a California christmas,
salt on the walkways and split desserts.
save the weather for another day
and scare the Crows off the roof - they
pray and moan
fire boards in between our floors,
smells like smoke. Crisp weeds and
cockroach air.
you're holding my heart and I'm Clutching yours like a rope
tied to a tiny boat in the middle of the storming waters,
so afraid it'll split between my teeth,
break my molars and leave me with
Crooked teeth.
crows in the tall grasses,
weather like springtime,
glassy water sunshine.
we're alright.
Metallic Bones
The calendar looks like a dart board, covered in holes. Empty days and meaningless numbers, circles that don't mean a thing.
I used to mark the days, be able to count the hours since my fingertips last hit the keys, last strung together a slew of words that were possibly profound but more often than not just ramblings. He's gone now, no looking back, and I'm better for it. Everything happens for a reason, or at least that's what they say.
I'm like a swimmer out of practice, nose waterlogged and I keep stopping to catch my breath. God, this used to be so easy, but we're getting back into the swing of things. You and me, old pal. This rusty old machine is still good for something. Oh, and this typewriter's still here, too. How nice.
In some ways it was bound to happen, you know a human's nature must be stronger than the delicate bond between slightly-less-than-strangers. I'd gotten caught up in a messy web of sinewy connections, and I'm sure it'll happen again. But for now, we release. We relive. We write:
He'd been not too close but not too far away either, that's how I liked them, anyway. Enough to tell me I'm pretty--with his eyes--but didn't dare say anything. Just shy enough.
His fingertips were like paper cranes, careful and artful. Swan dances across my knuckles. Something about his smile, too, you know the way they pull you in. A laugh, a look. He hadn't been my type. Until he was.
We counted the hours using each others' eyes, found some sort of constellations right behind the iris. A ticking clock back there built for us and ignorant to all others. We thought it ticked forward, at least at first. And the longer I looked the more convinced I saw that it was a countdown. More I saw that the paper cranes were unfolding, and the stars were never with us anyway.
It fell around us like wallpaper without enough glue. Strips of rolled up paper, still sticky but not quite enough, whispering at our feet. A room of destruction but not enough to hold it together. Built to fail. Perhaps.
And in that room, no words. It was the one thing I always had on me, words. And I'd lost them somewhere, shoved them deep into your chest where I couldn't find them until you tore yourself apart and left all the words in the world pulsing on the floorboards, your flesh split on either side.
I broke you, I know. But I needed those words back. They fuel my ticking clock, no matter the direction. They're my sun and moon and everything in between. I wear them like prize furs, douse them in flame and scream them from the silence of my notebook pages.
You stole everything from me, and I stole even more. So here's all of it back again, the story of us. What you always wanted, no? I never did show you my writing. I never could. But my fingers are made of ink, made of metallic bones in the shape of typewriter arms. I can press my finger to the page and make a letter. This soul is bound in ink and wrapped in leather. Words become I.
Words could never become we.
So this is it, then. And my soul can breathe.
days until
window smears the world outside,
no matter if we're in here together.
it's
simple, giving in to simple things.
a line of toy soldiers hidden behind a wall,
guess again.
chocolate cups and crumbly cakes,
mirrors where nobody's watching.
murals of the city on the bathroom wall.
infinite light bouncing back and forth,
like your eyes to mine to yours.
a little bit of rain doesn't scare us,
and there's a cat on the corner that we see sometimes.
it's become a ritual now, looking for it.
how many more rituals will we have?
i think infinite stretch - the mind goes on forever.
arms reaching so far around, springing back.
the lids of your eyes when you look at me.
simple, giving in to simple things.
makes me wonder how many days until i mess it up
or
how many days until i see you again?
4.10.24
never happens
gaslamp endless corridors
(you know the end never happens, never happens)
left i know and right never happens
just the other day i thought it was all mistakes and
i cant trust my brain i guess, when its making maps of endless buildings
with no doors
surround the mind with bees, sounds like my hands digging in
to the dirt
god its something i want
or not
light window but its clasped closed with hands shaped like claws
bird wings in the back, useless
sun's setting again, and drive me drive me
home
universally snake corridors like
something at the edge of my vision all the time
(maybe the end never happens, never happens)
we’ll chase that light somewhere anyway
you know that it can't be undone
can't spin the wheel backwards
take
you back to the place I used to breathe every day
and it only makes it more real
that the clouds are forming shapes above me
wisps of light curling on my skin
lettering and warning and soft secret promising
things I never said
I'm afraid now
I think, properly.
that this car spins out of control
that you don't see it coming
that I'm still learning and you forget that
I don't know what a heart is
that in the moments before the air and the crash I'll choose to keep on reeling you in
because of the dark parts of my soul
because I don't know myself
skidding wheels
we taste like lightning and
spell out our names one last time in whispers
and
maybe
we don't crash
screams cackles smokes
in the winter the sun goes down
and traps fire-lines in between the tire tracks in the snow.
weaves orange light through the tree branches
like garland, like leftover string.
we stand in a circle,
squinting into the glare.
playing chicken, seeing who will remain.
not everyone makes it out.
boots and jean hems turn black with melted snow,
noses fade from pink to red, eyebrows twitch.
the sky breathes a few more times.
we know what we've done.
everyone realizes that the wet logs in the center shouldn't burn,
but they do.
they always do. a million sparks and flames chomping like teeth.
we're watching each other's faces
bloom in the shadows. sink back into dark.
cyclical as day and night.
fire bleeds light bleeds fire.
we bask under the sun but fear the pyre.
it's time.
each of us have something broken inside,
something that barks and thrashes against common wisdom.
an unseemly piece of soul.
that's what we feed to the fire -
the ropes from our wrists and the tears collecting on our cheeks.
weights on our shoulders and slices of our broken hearts.
ego from our bellies and the greed gathered underneath our fingernails.
the fire consumes all, screams and cackles and smokes.
we bleed into the snow and scrape at our eyes.
summertime never arrived so slowly;
the sun abandons us and the wind kicks up soot.
stains our mouths and hands.
snow glimmers against the firelight.
painted patterns, everchanging, like an unreadable language.
we lie in the snow, bare. empty. without.
then,
the sun rises again, the fire hisses and pops.
we are clean once more.
i dont know if you like poems
if my hands were stardust,
would you still sort through them -
find the good amongst the bad -
make constellations with the brightest stars
while i lie down and watch?
would you twist the world around your finger
like a ball on a string?
i swam through a thousand oceans just to get here,
and my limbs just need a rest.
i tuck my face against your neck.
breathe in the night sky.
i cant forget this, not when your
pulse flashes under my skin.
become something with me.
god, i dont think youd get it
so
join me in the sky, trap yourself between the earth and the moon.
you're so good.
I'm afraid I'll break you.
3.20.24
dust and butterfly wings
hollow out my body
make more room for butterflies
if i could catch them i would but they keep
on flying out of my mouth, wings getting
trapped in the air.
dissolving, but i dont mind
when they turn to shimmering dust instead
little bug legs crawling inside
up and down the veins near my heart
wings flapping against my lungs like its hard to breathe
stuttering
their wings could rip holes through the flesh
letting them out and watching
them all fly back to you
theyre so beautiful i can barely see
swarming my skin, shimmering, stuttering,
rebuilding my insides with their delicate bodies
until im nothing but dust and fluttering wings
exactly as its meant to be
3.7.24