Evanescent Portents

My heart flinches at the thought

That you might exist

Beyond the smoke and ashes

Of burnt out hope

And kerosene soaked desires.

My breath catches in my chest

As I gasp for a name I may never know

Or have said so often

It is etched within my lungs.

Perhaps I have seen you in vision

With eyes unaccustomed to brilliance

Stricken with mere shadows

And only an aftereffect

To blink at and remember you by.

I worry you are trapped in my mind

As once I was as well

Shouting some plea for recognition

Hoping to be heard

Above the screeching of lesser musings.

Sleep, as each hour crawls

Fighting back to promises of life

Tangled in breaths not taken.

Struggle against the warm sheets of silence

Filled in with spaces unmeasured

Unmarked with remarkable left undone.

Sigh deeply with words unspoken

Drawn from lines and depths unplumbed

Scrapped together quickly in guilt. 

Awaken in frustrated surrender,

Unable to accept

Having not…

To lose yourself in someone else

May seem a sweet relief

Sighing grief

Between their teeth

While tracing soft pale cheeks.

Gathered heat and tangled sheets

Paper, silk and ink

Vestiges of memories

Scattered on the floor

Stained with spots of bright green shots

Held in forevermore. 

Till stars appear before our eyes

In breathing’s labored grasp

Held closely in between the words

Our hands so tightly clasp.

Crumpled sheets of silk and wood

Discarded on the ground

Words too much to even speak

Too much to make a sound.

Sighing gently

Silently

Almost like a thought

Whispered.