stay still someday, just a minute, just a moment
slipping to a stop so I can stop clinging
and not lose days to time
we raised it from the barest seed and root
and now our precious tree is bearing fruit
so bright and biting, lemons for our pies
and lemonade—our words lapse into sighs
until at last my lover turns to me
"how long now since we last looked at our tree?"
behold! to take the fruit we've waited for
she's come, the brazen lemon-stealing whore!
like a mirror, close enough to reach for
but the contact never comes. the distance never closes
never connects. rippling the reflection laughs
teeth bared. eyes cold.
looking not at you.
for every smile a sunny day
for every touch a gentle breeze
for every sigh a winding way
of shadows spilled out by the trees
for the lonely twigs of rowan
for the sick a crown of ash
wonder you where I am going?
end your breathless wait and ask.
once or twice a deep december
darkened down the dust-decked door
bringing years anew and gaily
meeting ceiling to the floor
break thou with thy wretched kin!
kneel thou to thy doom!
play the weaver's poisoned loom
and let the echo in.
take thou one more sweet kiss sour
cry thou for the burning page
drink the river's frozen rage
and sing the silent hour.
here the swollen heart of summer
spills out on the asphalt black
glutting on the space that simmers
in each yawning ice-carved crack
paint over the difference; it cannot be theft
if we do not take, but cover what's left
it cannot be wrong, to simply add more
and just never give what should have come before
it's like this: the quiet spread of water
through your hands. the forgetting of the autumn
and the wild dance.
and like so: the weight of moving holds you down
and the holding weighs you down
and the down holds its weight on you
eyelids. fingers. shoulders. down.
not of shatterglass, and yet
for fear of shards I blunt my edges
waiting for impacts. I wait.
should you find me in the reeds
strike light for me and I will guide
stay true and you need fear no tide
walk soft and land no sound on ear
walk underneath my fingers, dear
and wake in shiver-beds of weeds
to crave again my kiss and call,
the crumbs of love to which you crawl
I'm thankful that the leather cord was weak
and snapped
and freed me without digging through my skin.
I'm thankful for the locks on bathroom doors,
and every morsel in the night, the food that did not feed,
and lies that cloyed to coughing when you called.
I'm thankful that you spat back out my name
and accused me with the one a stranger left
and saw a stranger's eyes instead of mine.
I'm thankful that I thought you meant no harm;
I did not brand myself with threats that should have burned.
I was sand and I was water in the sieve.
I never learned to stay above the holes
and in the cracks I saw your love and cried.
I'm grateful that the necklace forged with trust was weak
and snapped
and did not choose to break me from within.
a solemn solitude it was,
once you had had your fun
and tossed your broken toy aside,
to turn dark thoughts to day.
and craving, choosing desperately,
when in the dark to stay,
to look at but a lightning bug
and treat it as a sun.
it's slow and quiet, the ending, the snow
the autumn of a blink and then an instant stretched past tautness, a line
hanging yours and mine in frozen wind.
rain is coming. I gather and gather the folds and the folly.
the silence keeps its clothes-pinned bounty.
rain is coming.
that's all it is. the saltwater drying on your skin
legs trembling but there.
freezing but I'm fine
dragging lines across the map
free, freezing, fleetly
the quiet hush of snowfall,
emptier than void,
no sound but that of breathing,
no warmth but that inside.
some projected lie, perhaps
a dream of roads that never were
paths unpaved and streets unswept
a sweet and bitterless farewell
a leap to lands unchartable.
and I don't have to wake from this and go home.
I am here. I am home.
I am awake, my own, and end my rebellion
by not having to lift a blade.
do you see now?
now I am strong, I sow peace.
these my eyes and this my hair—
was I of hope or of despair?
was I of pity or of pain?
was I a joy or but a stain?
did I start on the ground or did I since fall?
was the cause of this anything I did at all?
strange to start a life so late, sweet and fresh and full
to shed the heavy alibis, aliases and lies
to be, at ease, and far from fear
strange to be a person here.
I'm done. fuck five more days, fuck january me, fuck looking forward or back at ten thousand words, any words, words more torn than given more given than torn more peeled apart than anything else. fuck midnight idealism. fuck descending noon. fuck the wheels turning and the stars burning and the winterspring half-life that comes.
let me sleep.
wake ghost weary walk the world
graveless wonder wandering
going nowhere, never gone
time is a lie and a circle and line
time is a pocket that's tethered by twice
time is a spell and the curve of the moon
time is the space between never and soon
carry my stride a little still yet
cover my eyes and feed me regret
collar me with my delusions of pain
come and collect what thought fragments remain
sing out the night with the voice that you built;
with it in your chest there is no room for guilt
or mirror-shards frosted with lies made of ice.
this song will have to suffice.
ring in the harvest and pour from the sun;
make light a sweet toast to the year you have run.
serve out the moon to the world slice by slice.
this song will have to suffice.
string through your fingers the lights of the north;
hold your head high when you carry them forth.
the world is the canvas and time the device.
this song will have to suffice.
bring to the morning your uncertain call:
the rising is only as sure as the fall
so when you count landings be sure to count twice.
this song will have to suffice.