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.
Remember how we used to
make fun of those lovers
bidding on their happily
ever after only two weeks
in? We’d laugh and gawk,
swearing that compassion
grew only with time and
understanding, and no one
else would ever compare
to what we had anyway.
But look at you now…
bidding your heart away
on another, two seconds in,
with only a lifetime of
happiness up for stake.
So there I stood on the
slope of dating someone
else, but not quite ready
to leave the sunset behind;
looking westwards towards
beauty yet silence, while
hearing voices of moving on
at my back – I heard it all,
I just wasn’t listening as
I stood still, baiting the
sun to move without my
noticing, hoping without
hope it’d see and shine
light on me once again.
Others called her by a three
letter name, I only ever knew
her as love personified – as
my muse dancing on the moon
between laughs of whiskey and
unreported jazz, sweet in a
rain of temptation yet sour
in a defeat of whispers and in
an attempt at people pleasing.
Still missing from my arms,
it was hard to let her go –
watching as she danced down
the aisles with two songs in
her heart, but only listening
to the one I couldn’t sing.
I still call out to her, but
she’s no longer listening to
my words, my cries in the night;
even as three in the morning
approaches and I’m lying in
bed with one ear on the phone
because I’m certain she’ll call.
No, I’m lost in the night sky,
trying to come up with some
other name to call her – but
nothing else can replace love.
I am at my saddest knowing
that listening to others opinion
is still ruled in favor of following
your own heart; not being able to
love or laugh beyond memories
cast twice in words and written
in the shadows of the moon.
We have nothing left but time to
fix, yet unless these words are
whispered by another they are no
longer truth, but rapid successions
of a lonely, still beating heart.
With six words to my
name I have a voice
to fill the silence,
befriending echoes
and calling tomorrow
my new home;
with shades of
pleasures to pain,
imagining stale
lifetimes recanted
in words, I have new
daydreams to roam.
my heart beats
so loudly when
you’re near that
I almost didn’t
hear you say
that for me,
there’ll never
be a second
chance; it was
like trying to
revitalize the
butterflies, only
to let them drown.
For months I was carrying a
gram of hope around my heart,
telling myself that I was
patient enough to wait for you
to realize where your home
truly lay, between comfort and
complexity, growing rustic at
the edges with time and wild
fires blazing up in passion –
but those are not realizations
forming on your lips as we
finally take that dive and
converse back like we used to.
I am kept at a distance, with
two smiles and a half shrug,
for your words are telling me
never again, or ever truly was.
Believe me sweets, this isn’t
the truth that I was hoping
would become our end, but I
have listened to your sonnets
growing out beyond the waters;
I shall drop all hope the
next time that it rains.
Storylines in Verse 