my feet had finally touched
the soil I had been longing
for, these past two years, and
yet – this didn’t quite feel like
home anymore. after all the
planning, reminiscing, and the
bribing past love and devotion,
this wasn’t the landscape of
my dreams anymore, for my
only true home, is with you.
It was a wave of uncertainty
flooding my thoughts and my
desires past the blue ink stains
littering the page in repetition
to a beat I’d only heard when I
laid my head against your chest;
it was only an idea, catapulted
into reasoning as I placed every
effort into twisting and bending
the contours of the words, losing
their voice as I transformed them
into lyrics of a song, sung only by
the two of us, as it forgot the only
question that it had belonged to.
It was one of those lazy
Sunday afternoons, with
the reflections of the sun
glistening off the ripples
of the bay, showcasing
all of the answers to the
questions I never thought
to ask, with the laughter
of the children echoing past
my daydreams, when I saw
the first butterfly of this lost
season floating by me – it
was innocent and endearing;
promising to the new one
ahead. I tried to grab hold,
but like change it was quite
unpredictable, yet always
eager for us to take notice.
I’m living three lies
short of a promise with
no helpful home in sight.
My survival reliant on
caffeine, nicotine, lack
of dreams, with no in
between, and I’ve never
been more friendly than
with the mask of night.
I dare not open my mouth
anymore, for I haven’t an
idea on which version of
the truth will come out;
I know only black lies,
white lies, and how to
swallow my pride – none
of which gets you back
on my side, so why try?
At the intersection of the busy and
very infrequent, where bike riders
would pass without helmets and
walkers would leisurely enjoy the
day amidst the hubble and bubble
of the downtown city; a place near
small commerce and residential with
patches of snow scattered on the
ground, and where I asked if I could
kiss you, on the corner of centennial
mall in the early hours of a morning
in late February. A corner for business
folk to pass by as they venture out of
the office for lunch to stop and gather
their favorite greasy delight, and where
drunks are stumbling to their cars or
someone’s car or just plain stumbling
around but with a purpose they are
telling themselves; where you said
yes, and I hadn’t even a moment to
gather a blush on my cheeks as I
kissed you, and thank goodness
I was leaning into you because my
knees gave way, and I would have
been kissing the ground instead. It is
a place scattered in the butts of lone
cigarettes, and pop cans, beer cans,
beer bottles, wrappers, gum and debris;
a place where most walk by and fail to
notice the sun, the breeze, the call of
the birds hovering in the distance, or
the laughter of the pedestrians as they
continue moving, never quite stopping
until they can whisper a complaint of
their busy lives in the comfort of their
own home. It’s an intersection of the
busy and the intermittent, and I can no
longer tell which one we are anymore.
Four a.m. comes
roaring through
my dreams, waking
up the sounds and
feeding on the
silence, spouting
promises and lies
on endless repeat
until I can’t
decipher in which
direction the sun
will come up; I
am in a trance on
autopilot, with
my heart in the
heavens, waiting
for my clearance
to come down.
The arrival of the storm
clouds, harboring darkness
in previous defeat, was my
only inclination that an
enemy of current state,
yet friend from long ago,
was making their way back
into my presence with a
stroke of hand and only
egos and lies following
in their wake – I was so
certain escaping the past
was easy, but only when it
no longer wants to be found.
how will you decipher when
my words have shifted from
you to another? will you notice
when I stop mentioning your
eyelashes and how free they
make your spirit, or the rosy
tint of your cheeks as you
laugh to the heavens while
sipping on Jameson rocks?
I suppose it shouldn’t matter;
if you can continue seeing
yourself in my words, then at
least you still see yourself in
my heart, thinking of us too.
I always thought you the lily,
with innocence and such
sweet desire, blossoming
with only my touch of hand.
I never imagined you as the
rose, until I pricked myself,
trying to hold you – with every
drop of blood, memories are
catching fire two fold and I
find myself back in the lull
of the meadows, searching
for my lily to love again.
I struck a match to call
in a favor, watching and
waiting as the smoke
billowed from the tips of
my fingers, heightening
in ashes and the cherry –
patience was never my
friend, as I longed for
time to escape me in
silence as I struck one
more match, hoping for
my luck to finally change.
Storylines in Verse 