My toes, the front half of my feet hang off the edge of the lonely dock, out in the center of the lake. I do not know how I got here, but the horizon, the horizon is aglow through the shadowy mountains, casting a soft loving light in the direction of Pluto, up. Up. And down, down. This alluring, sensual light floats down; down into the glassy water. The water is not glassy in a placid, sleepy manner. Rather, the glass is movement itself. And if I look down carefully, I can see all the way to its beating heart in the pulling and quenching of lyrical waves.
Now I am awake in the most subconscious of ways, on the coldest of September mornings, with the calloused soles of my feet frozen against the slick icy darkwood. And they are hanging off the edge; I am always hanging off the edge.
I’m thinking to myself, that if I rock softly on my heels, I could work up just the right amount of momentum to quietly shift and hover, the only point of contact between my body and the universe be the toes of my right foot and the sharp edge of the dock as I point my body spacebound. And as always, I am in love with the edge.
The dawn glow is starting to leave the atmosphere and the sky has lightened to a lovely shade of ultramarine. Specks of light dot the shoreline and I am afraid that early morning cottagers’ collective voices will shatter my imaginary stillness. I want to line up the curves of my body against the last of the morning stars, have their dying breaths manifest themselves into a fine watery mist so I can stitch the air into a cloth to drape around my numb shoulders.
I stand for one fifth of eternity, staring south at crisp, cold black. Through the false strength of my stiff, clenched jaw, is the rocking of the dock, fiercely, in the wind, an ever wavering breath; inhale. I wish the rippling waves of the broken bay seeking permanent sleep could rejuvenate my stolen heartbeat.
So what else could I do with the light shining through with feather stroke hues, but to slowly pull the clinging shirt from my skin, up, over my head and from my gleaming arms?
A strong kick, from bruised ankles. Thighs, calves, extending, sore muscles screaming. I rotate those numb shoulders, swing my arms skyward; exhale.
Cutting into outerspace, the water never stops its violent rushing past my eardrums. I do not drown. I do not resurface.
04/23/11
I watch your fingers tighten, jawlines taut, lips pulling into a smirk as you contemplate the poetry you carve into my spine with your antique hunting knife and I wince, the lines of my mouth twisting slightly with a twinge of pain as a hard gust of wind whips through the pines lying jagged against the sky and the atmosphere shudders and drops with a scream.
08/31/11
We are on the boardwalk and the world is blue. Leaning our elbows against chipped teal railings, we quietly watch the seagulls circle in and hover in the air, eyes swooping for morsels of food. You grin and toss a bread crust into the air, arcing it into the blinding sunlight and it becomes a momentary silhouette as I turn to look at your cheekbones. A shadow flashes across your goofy smile and I swear the sound of the waves combing through the shoreside rocks comes from your black eyes flecked with the teal of the lake. We are still. Your fingers loosen around the bottle of soda dangling over the precipice. I hear glass shatter against nothingness as your fingertips press against the curve of my hips.
09/04/11
The evening sky is deep violet, with golden streaks painting the emptiness above the surface of the water. Looming treetops create a bubble of sound, the rustling of the careless forest surrounding our bodies. Distant voices periodically break the humid pressure, and the dim glow of wasted sunlight shines through velvet leaves, across the lake, casting a sage glow floating up from the horizon and casting a shimmer across the calm lake. From the corner of my eyes, I see your hazy figure make its way down the forested slope and along the break of the darkness. I am sitting alone in the middle of the beach, the heaviness of summer settling in, fighting the chill of an autumn night sky. I trace circles in the sand with my toes as you find my silence and match my heartbeat. We just sit there, filling our emptiness with the rhythm of running water, feeling the breeze against our eyelids until the coldness of night seeps into our bodies. We never make a sound.
spring green fresh lawns,
mowed, ruler straight checkerboard square,
fine dew mist,
slowly sprinkling over organic floorboards,
clockwork suns burning grapefruit shadows
into the well worn sneakers
and faded t-shirts of grey faced teenagers,
all silent spin,
dreamy cloudless whim,
silk skin thread spun
into stillness;
while our dusty shadows
hurtle into the great perhaps
with windy vortexes screaming
against our eardrums
and supernovas too slow to stay.
Nothing is the same. We will never be able to be the same again. We are sitting on the dock with our feet dangling, submerged in the cool lake water of another humid afternoon. Your eyes are flecked with jet black poppy seeds, fading from grassy hills into the beryl summer skies, where they used to be a pure, unbroken lilac.
Have I ever told you about the way I stood in the doorway of your cottage that chilly day at the end of last summer? That was the last time we were up north, in the woods, together. I embraced the wind, one hand on the door frame you had built with your father when you were little and it was a beautiful mahogany texture, with fierce carvings of every kind of predator of the air that flew regularly over the area. My thin shirt rippled with the lake-shore wind, the fireplace warmth sending warm shivers down my spine.
You didn’t notice my gaze, but I noticed the wonder in your eyes, accentuated by the rising sun. Autumn had you chasing after her auburn hair, her teasing fingers streaming wind through your boyish locks and into your eyes, the frigid atmosphere raking your cheeks. I watched your figure dance with the ribbons of sunrise, shadows playing down your angular cheekbones, your silhouette boldly moving to nature’s heartbeat.
I could never forget the colours mingling against the tinted edges of your face, hard jawline stained a soft peach, slender fingers lined with the precise shade of violets. I couldn’t help but to wonder just how many blinks it would take until the colours faded, until the misted air would alter into bitter transparency, with landscape boldly defined. You were always eager to lose our evasive love to reality. Summer had not yet gone; but autumn already loomed, dark and foreboding over our heads.
We were but the touch of a crow’s claw against the sunlight kissed twig in one breathless dying dawn and I find myself hopelessly lost in the rough folds of your forgotten memory.
I am in a white bright room, dark shirt, dark shoes; with a crimson wine glass catching the light strewn though the wide open window pane, tracing the circular edge of the black matte coffee table.
Jaded, faded photographs of a jaded, faded lover lie flat on the smooth surface. Each one is a single pale coloured piece of sewing thread, connecting me to you. I am tied around my spine to your tongue, the tips of your index fingers, your wrists and your unforgettable robin’s egg blue eyes.
I am your marionette, dancing to the golden fire hidden within your collarbones, following the flames as they mesmerize my senses; flickering wildly as they gallop with the wind in my memories.
I see you in the air. In the gossamer clouds. In the dying embers of a campfire at midnight on the first evening of a long weekend. I see you in the lined up orange peels catching the sunlight on my kitchen counter.
I called you last night, the night before that and the night before that one, with that old fashioned telephone you used to admire. I’ll call you tonight, just to listen to the resonance of your voice in your recorded voicemail message, as I have since the night of our first and last goodbyes. I have every shade seared into my tears, trailing my eyelashes. I cannot smudge the memory of your angle cheekbones and dusky eyes anymore than I can unblur my vision under the moonlight under identical skies as one year ago. We swore to weave our fates together for the first time and spent the night viewing the world through the breaks in the pine trees, lying on a bed of autumn leaves, when our stars were perfectly aligned. I miss you.
you sat on the curb with those dangerous eyes,
those liquor scented sighs and
countless fevered midnights residing in malicious twisted lips.
i lay with bruised battered hips and
shaken shattered lies tracing the fireflies’ plight
burning against city skies and dirty neon lights.
& the pavement was slick with a dew of moonlight rain and i thought of all the pain you used to spin into lullabies as we sat on the hood of your classic car, barely silhouettes against the head lights. & sometimes you’d pull your guitar out of its leather case and our nights spent together would mingle the lyrical embers of your voice and your soft guitar strumming with the wolves’ howls just beyond the visible limits of the parking lot we used to meet up at.
somehow your turquoise eyes would burn the night away & i always found that sinister; but sexy and so alluring that my breaths would catch along the jagged edges of my windpipe and saw at my heartstrings like a knife.
i remembered your shadow, burnt darkly into the outer edges of my retina but the most beautiful part my my memory, like the rings around jupiter.
in the rainshine i blink as the night bus full of teenagers slicks by and the moon flicks off for an instant and the violet dew jumps off the pavement into a chromatic display & the last of the faces flash by and the bus is gone and so are you.
i fear your breaths,
fancied in wisps of cold smoke
tangling, tearing, tightly entwined
within our clasped lips, expelled
with the slightest, platinum
intentions of lusting stars;
our glass blown hearts
clink against wine rimmed crystal glasses,
knocking geometric lemon slices,
dropping, diving, dripping to the hardwood,
splash desire against my red heels
and you, your stained black tie;
taste steak and
vietnamese spring rolls pressing
against my taste buds, i am wondering
where the dancing chandeliers
and smeared white roses are
flying, falling, feeling,
a warm heart beat broken with
transparent vases, shatters are splintering
and it’s all the same, all the pain,
of matches striking scorched skin,
you embrace our smolders,
our candle explodes.
Before I met you, you were already the wind combing through the cosmos, the passion ripping my joints into motion; the fire burning behind every sheet of glass and the void in my heart.
You were my cardinal, and still are; an unconscious presence manifesting itself into my every thought, metaphorically represented in every poem, idealistically portrayed in every word of praise sought forth from my lips. You are my cardinal.
I am flighty today, with the west wind tossing me eastward. I’ve always had a thing for birds, always admired their blazing gliding highways cut across the sky with wings which catch just the right number of air particles. You have always filled me with wonder with the way you knew me prior to my discovery of the concept of existence; knew me intimately, as if you had traced the contours of my ribcage the moment before dawn, in the darkest of nights, as if you had known to moisten my lips the instant before they became cracked and dry.
Today you are the sole reason I put pen to paper, in hopes that the dark ink will bleed thick, dark blood through the paper; but your energy, your light will bleed sunrises through my bones. I will spill my heart out to you in the form of tear soaked sheets and jagged heartbeats, today, tomorrow and forever.
I am lost. I am broken, washed ashore by violent churning thoughts, imprisoned by the steel jail-bars of my conscience. The only meaning I can seem to find in this chaotic universe is you.
You are my breaths now. You are my atmosphere. You are the only lighted silhouette in my pounding, desperate soul. Hold me. Keep my eyes above the devouring flames, please. You are the reason for everything now.
Teach my to fly.
I love you.
J.
I could never shake the image of your figure framed in the doorway of the trailer after a long shift we both worked, your bold, dark silhouette traced with the faintest outlines of our dying moon. I couldn’t forget the energy in your swift movements as you yanked off your ski goggles and shook the January snow from your hair.
At the end of the day, it was always dark outside and even the most stifled conversations washed placidly over my ears as I closed my eyes and just sat with a steaming thermos of soup cupped between my hands. But you - you were crisp in my memory, etched by fire ripping into my retina; your tangled and windblown hair with the frosted tips hanging into your aqua toned eyes; your crooked smile matching your awkward ski boot gait before you slipped into your well worn sneakers; the firm cut of your shoulders and the drape of your shirt flowing over your shoulder blades.
Night after night, we would quietly slip into the starlight full of sleepy wonder and ride the chairlift just to fall in love with the mountain peaks. You appreciated silence just as I did, saw the beauty of stillness, so we could lose ourselves particle by particle to the biting wind. And maybe we lost a little bit of ourselves to each other too, as we brushed hips and elbows pointing at endless constellations and wisps of stardust, jagged crescent moons and the perfectly dark blackened night sky, because we were alone in our frigid wonder, terribly in love with the darkness.
gentle tempo drumming
against the wooden carved roof
throbs heartbeats against a guitar’s mellow strumming,
then fades out softly
against drifting snowflake melodies
amidst biting truth, comforting lies
which frame the lilting shade upon the evergreen glade;
a young boy with pale blue ice for eyes
and dark dark locks
of glinting ebony ribbon pauses by the windowsill
to trace shapes against the fog smeared, wet glass
with a slender scarred, broken, mangled and marred finger;
his gaze betrays the slightest flickers of purity,
or flames, transparency, a mask.
another face for the rain.
another silhouette for the spring snowfall,
with the death of one nightfall’s dew,
breath for one last plunge into reality.
