delusions

If I write of his appearance, I will undoubtedly dissolve into either

 hysterics or clichés – hysterics, because he makes me stupid, and

 clichés because everything about him has, in some way, been done

 before. Irony is,  not near, and when he was near, I could not

 breathe.

(My dreams, much like my hands, are desperate; a constant, aching

 reach: in them, we are present, nothing more, and I am just as

 besotted as I am now, but my words reached his ears – bring a smile to

 his face – and that is enough.)

 He liked my words; like the way they float off the page – I am melodic

 to a fault, and my laughter, whilst falling occasionally flat, going

 sharp, is entirely for him.

 It is behind compartmentalization that I hide, pieces all that stand

 between us two: I could have duck my head and shut my eyes against the

 blinding brilliance of your smile, and the fragments of your laughter

 – sharp as they are – (whilst lodging themselves inescapably in my

 side) – are ignorable, but you as an entity encompass me .

 An open book, I gulp down words like I am dying of thirst – I mean

 what I say, but I do not always say what I mean, and it is in this

 contradiction that I seek refuge. If asked, I answer; if pressed, I

 recoil; if questioned, I crumble: yes, I do; uncertainty is a strong

 word; no, no,  but I just –

 (Here, then, is my dilemma: despite all evidence to the contrary –

 ignoring all reason, logic, and common sense –  that every time he

 spoke, I pocket words like spare change until I cannot move without

 borrowed sounds spilling from my mouth – pretending that your joy has

 a direct correlation to my own.)

  Words are deceptive, it’s true, but I am not in the mood for lies

 tonight, at least not to myself., not tonight, not any time.

 (He reminded me of things I do not have the words for, nostalgia a

 bitter pill when it is for things I barely remember: one warm, summer

 eve, I might say,, and that is how he made me feel, like a child on

 the edge of a pier.

 I dangled my feet  above the water, and thought that I might fall in.

 I didn’t, of course – fall, that is – but I thought I might)

eyes like saucers and a smile so wide

it split me in two; cracked me right down

the middle and filed my jagged edges smooth:

will me up with promises and joy so bright

it stings, until these words spill from my

mouth like birds, and i am alone

again

I complain that the heat is sucking me dry;

that the sun is burning me alive and i am

on fire – i say all this and more,

with my silence and the flush high on my

cheeks; the back of my neck where our laughter hangs, loud and shining and

right

A thousand dreams slick as heartache against

the back of my knees, as i collapse

to the ground; press my forehead to this

chain-link fence and count the stitches

in my side

red as dust, red as blood, red as fire's

fickle kiss – red as the lipstick smeared

across my lips –

I breathe in smoke and

exhale love;

pull sonnets from my lungs as I

choke on all the words I have  never had

the breath to say, and i am falling

again the first time we met,

I opened my mouth and swallowed you down:

the hollows of your eyes and the warmth of your smile; the air

around your ears and the loss between your fingers and your

every distant word.

the first time we met, our words crashed into each other

with all the grace of an addle-pated ballerina,

bones cracking and hopes sliding past until everything slid into place, like the pieces

of some puzzle I had never bothered to complete before then.

of this they assure me, time and time again –

when you are here, they say, the silence falls away

like time through the fingers of one determined

to make it stop

if I could stop time, I would – I would freeze

your smile and tape it to the inside of all the books

I haven't opened yet, so when I pulled the cover aside

I would feel you anew.

if i could stop time, i would – I would take

your hands and press them to my chest;

steal the words

from under your tongue and hide then under mine,

so you would have to touch me to get them back.

(if ever I would have the fortune to catch the aftertaste

of love before it was gone, it would be now)

if I could stop time, I would – I would rip

every piece of you you gave away from the hands of those

far more deserving than me and hold them close, until

it started to rain and all my edges began to blur as I melted

into you

you assure me that I shine; that I stand out

in this ocean of gray, blank faces lost

amidst a sea of all the things they're

not allowed to say –

you promise me I glow; faint but there –

my edges are ragged, scraped dry by a

thousand dreamer's songs. (your smile

is like rainwater on my tongue.)

(i am faint with the effort of trying

to forget your name – your laughter is

broken, it's true, but our stories are

the same.