you must be a cosmic energy . made out of a handful of suns

.

I am crying without reason,

again. I am teapotting all over the place.

Every breath is a mess. There is no melody,

or rhythm. Just fusses of hair and tufts of rain.

And the birds are howling.

And the dogs are chirping.

I start to write poems backwards,

beginning with the end. Closure comes

and opens the door, carries the eyes

over the threshold like a bride.

And the trees are cracking.

And the sky is rooting.

No one can justify their chaos,

except science. Disorder means things are working.

I suppose that’s a reason for living.

I suppose it’s alright to drop a glass.

Think about it: who would we be

if it weren’t for our weaknesses?

Our bodies would be so dry.

You’re living in my stomach

Right in the pit of me

Encumbered

Pounding the walls

Disrupting sleep

Gorging

Feasting veins

Fingers, clawing

Desperation, scraping rib cage-prison

Kindling riots, licking heated discord

Peel my husk

Eat me down to pulp

Pull the ache from my mouth

Lift the shadows out my throat

Your hands, oil spills

My skin, toy-soldier alert

My heart, hummingbird wings

My breath, phantom spasms

My breath, provoked

My breath, exacerbate

Heightened

Unending

Interminate

My mind is a cesspool

I like you

wet and heavy

Defining Calm

When the quiet of the universe,

the stillness of nature,

quiet breathing from twin lovers;

and the loudest sound heard are heartbeats.

a memory lasts longer than one single existence

traveling through time and space

its fibers twisting, expanding and ever-changing

coming back to you in a whisper

a silent reminder that you are loved

déjà vu? perhaps

Let

go of

me in all

the ways that

help you

to land

&

hold

on to

me in all

the ways that

help you

to stand.

he said, you light them up.

you dream about touching

him. crumpling his sleeves like

sandpaper. sand

falls across the bed like

his body. which is folding, folding;

you love it unbelievably.

coming home and finding

the door unlocked. you press

into the latch, heart like

shoreline. pounding, pounding;

the rain that is his mouth, his hands

under this night-black

sweater that is too small.

he pulls it up over your head and

breathes more. a little more

than you know he meant to.

what else you know — you never

left home after all.

white noise, sunlight

at the edge of the windowframe,

shrinking back when he

rounds the corner from

halls that also recoil, refrain.

and do not stop him

as he comes to pull your

heaving heart out from in between

your thighs. shaking, shaking;

like being birthed again.

you hold back the evening tide

which is gripping the coast,

struggling against a desire

to rush back out to sea, where all

there is of heartbreak

is waiting, collecting like

silt. of all the windows you might

have touched your tongue to,

this is what opened.

he parts you, parses you, never

locks the door as he leaves.

you came back with roses

and he was holding a pillowcase,

fluttering against the

fan’s oscillating face.

he turns, a little like domesticity,

starts talking about the sun,

how it rose

when you walked in. he takes

the roses. breathes.

And I know it’s not really fair of me, but there’s some deep down part of me that hopes that with your face buried in my neck that the only thing you could think was that this was the right one. That nothing else would ever match that feeling of your thumb running across the small of my back. That I had broke you for everyone else. And I know it’s not fair, so I’ll probably never tell you. But I still think it. And I still hope I’m your one and only enough. I still hope you can’t forget your skin on my skin.

"And why is it that you write?"

I didn't know how to answer really.

I looked up at the tree in front of us, at the gravel trail, at the boats on the water and the people in the streets, flowing in and out of shops like air.

Perhaps I wrote to be able to see all of this.

A version of blindness where you were able to see more with your eyes closed.