I so badly wanted it
to be you.
It was temporary.
We were, that is.
That made it
no less real.
I sure did
like to pretend,
though.
I held on
just in case
i was proven
wrong.
Tag: short poetry
Hands
I left you in July, started again in August. I’ll spend September wondering how you are. You sat there holding my hands, “I don’t want to let you go,” You implored, as if you could not see that I no longer knew the hands in my own. I knew you no more or no less than I had the July before or the one before that. “I miss that special bond,” He said to me, a week after. What bond is silent, I wanted to ask. What bond exists only in two laptop screens and a tv monitor a late night cuddle, a quick- paced walk. Perhaps you did know me more than I knew you. Maybe I let you know me. The me that left and rose from your bedroom floor knows not of how or why two years from the day I asked for promises changed everything I thought I wanted.
Split
“Stay present,”
He advises.
Lovingly;
Selflessly
“I don’t want
you split between
two places.”
I want to laugh
You see,
you’ve been with
me, in the
mountains of
West Virginia.
Along the shores
of the
Great Lakes.
I saw you in
the mouth of
Mammoth Cave.
When the fireworks
reflected in
the D.C. waters.
I haven’t left
your hometown
in weeks.
“I’ll do my best,”
I assure him.
I’ve been trying
to untangle my
feet
wrestle them into
one place
For over a year.
Choice
Does it always
come to this?
fire and ice
Blue springs or
Rainy canals
the dancing flames
blue reflections
they revel in
their changing
views
Let the answer exist
in the ampersand.
Until then
I’ll find my
joy
in long walks
coffee after dinner
I’ll pick
mulberries
and
listen to his
singing
I’ll run, steady
until the answer
reveals itself.
You see -
Both
forces
have the capacity
to burn.
loves
and in the end
or the beginning
which ever end
you start to
untangle or
string together
it's in loving them
both
that will
restore
or
renew
which ever
frame you
choose
it’ll be the
same picture
It’s not one
or the other
I keep trying to
picture either
course
and they begin
with loose ends
and finish
in tight knots
I’d rather hold
both
if they let me.
Seashell
There is
something
to the idea
of riding the wind
instead of stubbornly
trying to change its direction.
I walk to the ocean's edge
find a seashell in the sand
I toss it back to the water.
It doesn’t belong to me anyway.
comforter
It says a lot about
someone
if they help to
make the bed
the next morning.
someone like you
I feel small
even contemplating the idea
that eyes like yours
hands like yours
kindness like yours
could consider me.
Eyes that linger
like they want to see.
Like they want to remember.
Gentle hands,
intentional.
You remember details.
You ask questions.
I wonder
if someone like me,
flawed and spontaneous,
direct,
could attract someone
subtle and
tender
like you.
washed away
I open the drawer
where I keep the lingerie
I wore that night.
I look to
the bottoms you took off
to enter
without foreplay or affection.
Without protection.
I asked you to wear a condom.
I stand alone in my bedroom.
I hold the shorts to my nose
the satin smells like your cologne.
I'm reminded of the blind hope
the unfulfilling physical touch.
I feel mixed sadness
as I place
the satin shorts
in the washing machine,
reverently.
I wore them to feel
sexy,
desirable.
Like an object,
you take,
you play,
and return me
once you’ve finished.
I shut the lid
turn away from the wreckage,
wishing desperately to redo
the night you came inside
looking for a way out.
Basket case
“Don’t put all your eggs in one basket,”
her mind instructs.
“But it’s such a nice basket!”
the heart pleads.
The Restless Crescent 