Has it been a month or a year?

You would know better than I.

You know me better than I know myself, onlooker.

You are the voyeur I seduce so invitingly.

Am I an open book because I am chaste or

Because I am self-righteous?

Can one be both of these things?

Who would know.

Not I.

Perhaps you, onlooker.

What I'm getting at is: this is not directed at just anyone

(though it is laid bare for all to peer),

This is for you.

You know who you are.

You, she, her, but never mine;

(though I am yours).

I feel no shame in being yours.

But why do I feel shame in calling you mine?

For I could never capture you,

Couldn't dare.

You, the sparrow I sometimes hold in my palms,

Quivering, inhaling, releasing,

Blinking a selective palette of shades,

Balancing so uneasily, on my palms,

Wings ruffling,

Preparing to fly.

The window is open of course,

It always will be.

I tell myself you wouldn't dare,

Wouldn't even attempt,

But life has taught me that I often try to be optimistic.

Though greater optimism is watching you diminish in the horizon,

Believing you will someday return.

But I have only ever had this one fear.

Perhaps I am the only one

To be so childish,

Or to have only one fear.

But when we're together,

Your form in my grasp,

Or my form in yours,

Your beak imparts a semblance of sound.

Does anyone else hear that?

Perhaps they are fortunate too.

I thought I was the only one

(childish I know).

It pitches high but not gratingly so,

And then it falls,

Always B minor.

And then it holds,

Enduring for a time,

And then it stops.

I quiver, inhale, release,

Ruffle wingspan but do not fly,

Click beak but know no song.

This is fear.

Living in this silence;

The aftermath of you.

A man with two useless palms,

Holding nothing

But a memory.

To be that which creeps not by night but beneath a shade of awareness. She is openly displayed; her charms, physical, emotional, intellectual, pieces of the person who is whole, sum of the person who is empty. She does not appear in dreams for there is nothing more objective than her vision of reality.

Perhaps I should remind you that she does not flit in shadow for thieves are there, murderers are there, criminals who enact unimaginative sins. She despises these for at least two reasons. Her movements are lofty and proud and unrepentant. In fact, her actions are so subtle, so insidious, that even she is unaware of her motives. She must have moments of lucidity surely but I wouldn't know for sure.

She drains the loins but only to administer a steady dose of poison upon the spirits of men. The nearest emotion to joy she possesses is to observe a brokenhearted man, how he fumbles for words, how he lowers his eyes, how he drinks until he forgets himself. Her arteries grow bulbous as the venomous flow of satisfaction travels from head to toe.

She is not shy but she may act so. She is not vindictive, at first. Many an unsuspecting male has staggered to her charms like mice to a scorpion. She will smile, she will openly do so, but she will not cry without witnesses for her greatest cloak is the virtue of other women. This is her armour, her perfect alibi to remain loved but unlovable.

Her skin is pale but it is not for wont of the sun, she basks in the rays of her beauty, however, her vanity is not that she's beautiful (for all women are beautiful) but that she knows it's precise value and what can be obtained with it.

Upon the crackling shells of men she treads with feet as bare and smooth as the sea, her hair aligned with the whispering winds, her eyes afire with disingenuous passion, her thighs as deeply rooted in earth. She is all elements, for she is woman, but not all women are her.

Would I enjoy being her? Does she enjoy it?

Monstrosity knows neither choice nor joy.

Could I be her?

We all could be her.

We've met before. You with your wandering eyes, intent on piecing this all together. Those lashes bat so hesitantly, those lips part a bit, why so? You follow the words as I impart them for who's to say we're strangers? We've traveled this road before, word-to-eye with others, but now, we share this moment, at last. This moment, ethereal, an operation in limited dimensions. You do all the work, I know.

Heart on sleeve, I'll tell you, this wasn't easy. It wasn't an easy realisation for me, certainly not. To be bound, shackled to a page, within a space too small to be representative. Where do I start? To describe oneself so succinctly must surely be missing the point, right? What do you say when meeting someone for the first and last time with only a short time to spare? But time is not the problem, not as problematic as space.

What represents me? Where I was born? The circumstances of my birth are quite unique from embryonic idea to matured form, but really, this happens every day all over. I developed rather suddenly but less by metamorphosis than as a construct of chiseled marble, to relate proverbially. My parent was singular but also bipartisan for creators are sexless. Did you know that? How many children have you had by the way?

Where was I raised, you ask? Well, here of course, this page. My history is inferred for there isn't space here to include everything is there? I may not choose my words wisely (or do I choose them at all?) but they all symbolise meaning. Because words are like that, like lives, they embody the context infused upon them by others, like you. Encased in glass, if you will, waiting to be shattered to life. Otherwise, we dream of being noticed, gaze at ourselves in a sphere of water, crack under pressure.

I could tell you all about myself but then that would only be a part of me. That would be disingenuous. Perhaps, what would be best is, if I acted as vessel for your projection. Sound fair? That way we're both satisfied. That's what love is I've been told. Well, I haven't actually been told this but I feel it through the medium, you know, that fabric between parent and child? It's similar to that I think. To give, to receive, to return the reception, to accept the reflection. The first two parts are simple, the latter two dependent on the parties involved.

With me though, I'm entirely yours. You read me and I bask here, this sky the colour of a pale maiden's bitten thigh, warmed, dreamy, reluctant to leave, immortalised in page. We won't meet again but you can revisit this capsule, it will not fade like memory but it can only be as vivid as you make it. Do you love me? Don't answer that.

One red block sat atop blue and one yellow beside them. There was violent then blue again, then orange atop blue. The construct towered with miniature possibility, a conduit, a channel, a limb enabling a broadcast of influence. Two pairs of hands tiny and pale with fingers like caterpillars but bald and smooth.

The basement walls of stone seeped earth agate as the void. The twins turned their heads of similar hue to the window above. They gazed beyond window to the night behind it, through denser velvet of darker shade. Sedan on highway hurtling through black glinting the grin of the crescent moon. The vehicle colourless yet black then white in curious tandem, not flashing, never flashing, but shifting like water, like conversation. The sky was archaic, the moon most tilted.

And the sedan hurtled still. The driver, his hands gripping the steering wheel at a certain time, was not drowsy but deadened by the monotony of the landscape. The crooked trees which painted the horizon like Stygian stencils, the forest thick, impenetrable, a world apart, within, without.

The driver felt the passenger to his right stir and whimper. He glanced over at her and, as if in response, she languidly opened her eyes and blinked. She blinked again. Yawned. Extended her limbs as far as possible and stretched them. The radio skittered in and out of frequency, out of phase, back again, and the wailing strains of steel guitars resumed.

"It was the strangest dream," she said softly to no one in particular.

"Oh?"

She nodded blearily. "You were in it."

He said nothing, continued to watch the licorice night.

"You were standing in the kitchen at home, it was midday." She rubbed her eyes. "It was like I was watching but you never acknowledged my presence."

He adjusted the temperature of the air conditioning.

"The doorbell sounds, you set down your coffee mug and go to the door. I follow you but cannot discern who it is because you're blocking the doorway. You return to the kitchen with a moderately sized cardboard box and set it on the counter."

He glances at her then just out of habit and her eyes are on him, fully awake. He smiles anxiously but she does not return it. Her fingertips massage her neck but this does not seem to ease her.

"I'm glad you woke me," she confessed.

"I didn't."

She frowned at this and looked away, sat straighter in her seat. She flicked the radio off with fingers dipped in scarlet polish and observed the darkness around them. The death of steel guitars reverberated in memory for a time until that too faded.

"So what was in the box?" he inquired at last.

She regarded him with confusion. "I don't know. You never opened it."

He smirked and looked at her with amusement. "A bit anticlimactic wouldn't you say?"

She returned a smile but the smile was forced. "You received a call on your mobile and moved to the patio outside. It was suddenly night and the neighborhood was alight with multi-coloured lights like it was Christmas but it wasn't Christmas. You end your phone call without saying goodbye and return to the kitchen but there is a presence in the room and only I can sense it. You wander the rooms of the house in darkness oblivious to the shadows and finally you turn to me..."

Neither of them saw it. The blur of brownish white, the explosion of hooves, the silent creature of taut muscle and modest coat. The sedan buckled, compressed, spewed glass and fur, metal and crimson, and halted in quiet. The vacuum of sound to mark an anomaly perhaps, a considerate pause in the machinery of consequence. Nothing moved but the sedan's engine sputtered.

The conclusion a palette of bleeding colours, mixed and entwined, fate and chance and foreign will alike. Red atop blue and yellow beside. Violent then blue, then orange atop blue. The sedan was fire, the moon was grinning, tree stenciled sky, and two pairs of eyes cloaked by feathery night.

Apparently I exist to please.

I am partially at fault for this.

Professional proclivity, occupational hazard;

I am available for all to pour their experiences, their histories -

And what does this cost?

Can the non-artistic guess? Do much of the artistic even know?

I am not one life but all life, that is the practicing artist, everyday, not just when convenient.

My struggle is to not allow my life to interfere with everyone else's -

I know my story, but what of theirs? This is the purpose, my life is not my purpose.

I work to please therefore it is assumed I exist to please;

I work to please myself just long enough to be receptive to exist and please others -

This blend of necessary selfishness and self-destructive selflessness.

I am here for you but not as you will ever be for me.

If this is love then it is a one-sided love which you could never repay.

I do not expect you to repay for this is price which gives me pleasure to pay.

This is my existence, this is my depression,

For this is nobody's fault but mine.

There is another part where I am not at fault.

Perhaps you can aid my understanding;

Three decades have passed and the reason eludes me.

Is it these wide eyes? Eyes which meet yours, eyes which embolden to ascertain meaning?

Is it these ears which note every lilt of voice, every hesitation, every slur, implication, desire, and prejudice?

Is it my refusal to judge as others judge? Do you call this love?

Is it because I, instead of emphasizing occasional ignorance, attempt to explore the conception of the ignorant mind?

Is it because I smile at many things; irony, futility, absurdity, contradiction, and sometimes, happiness? Does a smile broadcast love?

Do any of these things express love? Is this what love is? Or do I love all, in my own way?

Do I empathise too greatly? Do I reflect too little?

Do I exchange this world for the kaleidoscope of perception?

Does this world even concern me?

Do I always give the wrong impression?

Am I reluctant to give the proper expression?

Do I wish to thoroughly experience a moment because the past has taught me that moments are fleeting?

Perhaps you can aid my understanding.

Perhaps there is nothing to understand.

Perhaps you're right.

Seek not sight but blame within.

Eyegas flountin'

Batterloomed lashes then

Striped mauvetender,

Brushed brideheavy.

Lipslip forgivenlorn

Nearly amassive;

Apassive, anatural,

Omnisexual antigression.

Wards to liveout in, withoutin,

Trust my mouth then

Meekagain,

Blame not sight but seek within.

Crimson rivers trace whiter shade,

Drops of crimson borne of blade,

The grinning moon sharp as blade,

Silhouette cast encased in shade.

This face reflective in moonlight glow,

These veins which purge the living flow,

Those eyes like bulbs of nightshade hue,

Their light is drawn not cast anew,

Not blown of glass but softer still,

Torn from grasp of seer's will,

Their gaze eternal, their lids uncurled,

To long forever in space unfurled.

Unfurled to fault and withered joy,

To call a man, to cull a boy,

Joined with grass amidst the dew,

One breath at last to join the few.

And moonlight grin for sharp reveal

The reddened hand which signed the deal

With flourish spun corpulent signature

To bribe the end and bow calligrapher.

The silhouette cast encased in shade,

This palm of fingers wrapped to blade,

Its edge which shivers crimson bade,

No motive known, no shape to lathe.

A

Bilious

Cough

Dawns

Every

Fortnight,

Giving

Happenstance

In

Just

Knowing.

Learning

Movements,

Notwithstanding

Our

Perfect,

Quaint,

Resistant

Stare-

Transforming

Unfortunate

Vices

With

Xenophilic,

Youthful

Zeal.