You say “kiss me”

With more fervor that I can ignore.

Our hands are shaking,

Pawing for handholds in wrinkled fabric.

Curled fingers grasping at strands of hair

Like lifelines from a sinking ship.

Our lungs gasping for air

As teeth part to breathe each other in.

Lips misplaced in speaking

Love between syllables,

With tongues too tied up

To muster understanding.

I lean back to take you in

Eyes shining at all you are,

All we are,

All we have been.

I smile at your floofy hair,

Your reddened cheeks,

Those eyes staring back at mine,

Like nothing else could matter.

I cup your face in my hand

Running my thumb against your cheek.

You turn and smile into my hand

And kiss my palm.

I close my eyes;

This is home,

Not some arbitrary place to leave my coat,

But a place to rest…

More than my body,

But my soul–

Our soul…

One.

Silence in Speaking

There is no silence like speaking…

Half-truths make a better fence,

Than stone walls could ever be.

Cover up the wounds with smiles

And laugh memories into a corner.

If you have to paint your lips

And pin them in place to fit in,

At least you have a chance. 

There is no silence like speaking…

Keep it up and you might believe

These pillars more than prison bars

Around your teeth

To sift your speech

And train a once idle tongue.

There is no silence like speaking,

Except each breath is like breathing lead

And your lungs and heart grow heavy still..

Inhale.

Exhale.

Stop.

.

.

.

Begin again.

Empty words are broken bridges

Charred from unkept promises

And truths too inconvenient to maintain

Ropes of stifled smiles held down by gravity

And lips accustom to falling

Too fast to hold on for too long

Every plank is repetition

Hastily scribbled replies on cheap parchment

Spaced out haphazardly

Tied absentmindedly

By hands too busy to meddle

In hearts unfit for second-guessing

Even the sure-footed are ensnared

By aged wood rotted through with deceit

Plunging into waters too rapid

Too deep

I balance words on my tongue

Rolling letters against teeth

Scraping sentences built up

And waters stale with grief.

As eyes marked with luggage

Heavier than sleep

Are carried away

Blinking dust and counting sheep.

For what is peace

When sounds are cheap

And fingers lie awake

Intertwined and steep;

They rest on cheeks

And breathe.

For what is peace

When all we see

Are enslaved hearts

Told they’re free?

What can we say

When home

Is why they’re refugees?

And now all is a whisper…

Not the roar of yesteryear,

Of tides pulling heartstrings like bubblegum

Half-chewed,

Forgotten memories

Stuck underneath a table for two,

Hardened,

Flavorless,

And used. 

Miscalculated Trajectory

I don’t even know what to type;

Words are less than ink,

No longer real,

Just 1′s and 0′s

Dotting the expanse between

What once was

And what can never be.

Code caught in a cyclic redundancy error

Infinitely checking and rechecking

For corruption

Where once was etched,

Like stone,

A promise

Of something more than convenience.

But here we are,

Fragments of dreams

Sifting through fingers

Laced with crisscrossing scars

Threaded through stars

Like freckles

Kissed in the noonday sun.

We’ve reset.

Restarted.

Rebooted.

Begun afresh.

And yet,

We crash,

Fail the basic memory tests…

Simply cannot recall,

Retain,

Retrain ourselves to speak better,

Louder.

At all…

Until even the humming goes silent,

And our world spins no more. 

Another Comforter

“Let me be your comfort”, he proposes

With words like sunflowers,

Riddled with seeds of something more

And arms outstretched like clouds.

She rests against his chest,

Breathing evenly for once,

Fingers testing the cotton between them,

Kneading with pointer and thumb.

He embraces her cheek

And traces lightly beneath her chin

Humming softly

Watching a smile pull at her lips.

It tugs on the right

Then to the left

She wiggles her nose,

But not in protest.

He feels her sigh,

Tension leaving her soul

Like an overstayed guest

When dawn is much too near.

Lightly nudging his palm,

She kisses his hand

With lavender lips

And a vanilla aftertaste.

His hand continues tracing

Sketching words of love and peace

Like calligraphy on her face

Caressing her lips

As if to refill an empty pen.

She nuzzles against his breast

Like home was never anywhere else

And pillows were a foreign concept.

He kisses her hair

Pressing a smile into her thoughts

Like joy could be shared

And exchanged with a touch.

His head relaxes

Her breathing slows

And all is still

Til morning glows.

The Whole Within

With the whole within us

We learn to act in parts

To mute our rainy days

To still our beating hearts

With the hole within us

We learn to shovel in

To cover up our scars

With papier-mâché skin

We tie our tongues with silver bows

And bow before our dead

We single out as voices grow

The lies our hearts have said

And in the mind of son and daughter

Lead ourselves into the slaughter

T’was the night before Christmas

And all through the streets

Fires were burning

The homes of elites

Brimstone and ashes

And charred skulls aplenty

The smell of fresh flesh

At only 9:20

The taste of sweet cookies

Mingled with smoke

Had even the elders

Starting to choke

And yet protests lingered

With cocktails through glasses

Razor wire on streets

Causing car crashes

While clouds gathered above

Drenching rooftops with blood

And footfalls of troops

Were heard squishing through mud

The innocent children

Stared on in awe

Without any context

For the horrors they saw

And all through the city

Not a present was given

Because at the end

Nobody was livin’