you were in my dream last night
the foggy light a silver sheen
you lifted up
your amber glass
said I’ll confess to everything
beyond your eyes i saw a look
i’ve only seen it once before
you did enough,
i dare not ask
i lay my heart out on the floor
“it’s best to be direct in love,” you said
with just a hint of fear
i memorized the whole exchange
i have to say i want you here
i have to say i need your strength
i have to say i hold you dear
not half the way i used to shrink
i’ve chosen now to persevere
so take your time, and take this down:
life has been strange, but i‘ve got you now
as long as you want me, i will be around
will you still feel the same in a year or ten?
tell me, what will you think of my actions then?
i wish i could express the canard in my chest
it’s so hard to convey
but so hard to repress
and i can only dream of days
where things have changed,
we’re rearranged
you’re hesitant to share with me
but that’s okay, i feel the same
“it’s best to be direct in love,” you said
with just a hint of fear
i know what you were asking me
i have to say i want you here
so
fourteen inches separates
that i would glance into your
and you know that, right?
we have become notorious for unfinished sentences
what trickles out of mouths
is the stuttering stream of consciousness
down which
affection swims
and bubbles to the surface
i don’t know the name of this
but i’d like to buy in
to see you shine so pure
i surely would never worry about it again
and it’s not my first time playing
still luck is my unreliable friend
oh and i
i do think they’re listening in
i do know they’d
never understand
but
i see it written in my eyes and my mouth
golden light blinding
when the riddles come out
it’s not that I have anyone to talk to,
it’s just quiet at 4 am
And if your mind was like mine
(which is to say
a butter churn
exhausting
all the endurance I could muster
turning these complicated memories
to something sweet
or even worth bearing)
you’d also stop caring
and grate color into it
just to keep from despairing
you’re supposed to get over things.
so that’s exactly what I do.
it’s not something special that I did for you.
and when it stops mattering
who thinks that you matter
the chatter goes flatter
your senses get sharper
and sure enough,
you shore things up
and stand staring in the sun
in the stunned wake of the disaster
they couldn’t share it faster
but you don’t care
because you’re
the only
one
who was there
and you’re still here to hear it after
So maybe I do have someone to talk to
who knew
breaking bones of trees
speckled aspens come to taunt me
put me back in the evergreens
born in the northern wind
made in the coastal breeze
slow but steady sunrise
the desert turning warm
it takes one billion years
for a diamond to form