133

I return to the cage

to describe the ragged time

the rejected better doubt

at least a little clearer 

than the screaming numbers

the road ahead and behind

and beside

the deadly wonder

the damage I rendered

you only fall apart when you let yourself

132

I can't think

the words don't come

as they used to

unbidden

clawing their way out

before they burnt me up

131

I can't conduct myself 

in meter or rhyme

I sprawl 

crooked across the page

fingers brushing fragments 

of words

knees scraping through lines 

my unruly curls 

scrawling truths I glean

from passing glances

and that song 

you always sing

loops  haphazardly

tattooed upon my flesh

(130)

she thought

she knew the sky

until she began

questing

the rough edges

undisturbed

in the darkness

grasping at

the savage stars

desperate

to understand

the dousing peace

in the in-between

the brutal

tender caress

of her lover's hands

the weight of the shadows

(129)

we two devoured eternity
(ferocious with naked trust)

(128)

turn closed eyes
toward the distant future
blind to the starlight
of a shamless heart
never meant to be
whethered by the questions
of the elliptical past

(127)

2
instinctively we yearn for the exquisite blueshift
the enticing gravity of the soul
an opportunity to burn within the enveloping starlight
of some seemingly distant otherself
demonstrating not a fear of the frigid obscure
but a haunting compulsion to reach out and warm it

(126)

my words do not flow with the ease with which I wish they would. i  am lost in my own mind. i can't make out what is truth enough to tell and what is the fantasy of one politely named a dreamer. it cannot come as a surprise to you that i am lost. we're all lost. we're all confused and insecure and waiting. yet this knowledge does nothing to calm the the anxiety that clouds my existence. i'm cold to the core with a need i cannot describe. it aches like the shrapnel they left behind. the advancing infection.