Borrowed Shampoo

I wake to the pull of your blinking eyes

From behind your soft, tousled, and troubled hair.

You are right; I don’t belong here either.

We have an echoed conversation

My last words tumble from my mouth, a helpless “I don’t know.”

Maybe you didn’t hear the despair in my voice

Because we’ll let another month slip by before we speak again.

I feign sleep until the draft carries you out of the room.

Once you have gone, I take a careful shower

But I put on the same dirty clothes I wore yesterday

Like how the baptized still stumble around in marrow frames.

With the unique pain of abandoned friendship and cold wet hair

I limp into the blinding newborn snow. 

Gills

Don’t be frightened by my fits of inspiration,

The dark currents of thought that pull me under.

I’ve been living here,

The slits in my throat send me faithful bursts of air.

It hurts to breathe this way, but I’m not drowning.

My seaweed eyes follow the dance of sunlight on the water’s surface

Obscured by reeds and algae.

I will feel the warmth of sunlight again,

But the gills may never close.

The Final Warning

Don’t gaze into the vastness of my eyes, you won’t make it out.

Like a child you extend your hand to the tantalizing glow of the stove,

Don’t follow me.

For both of our sakes, don’t look at me.

Your affection offends me, and mine is not to be found.

Drop the razorblade and count your fingers.

As it is told, beauty deceives with untold rigor.

Pay me nothing but my due wage of spite for my merciless work.

Leave me cold and thrashing in the waters you cannot wade.

We’ll both see silence soon enough either way. 

Ready, Set, Wait

We both have our running shoes on

Our sights are locked, our muscles spring loaded,

But be careful not to start before the sound of the gun.

Between us we already have too many penalties.

Take heart, the present is nearly past.

These aching days of waiting

Will creep out of our memories, silver strands in our hair

And we’ll hold the moments of destination between our palms.

Until our clock starts, take a deep breath.

Ready, set, wait.

Hands

Your hands move

Like they are underwater:

Wrists first, fingers follow.

The motion leaves bubbles in the air.

I can see through your skin

To the work of your heart in your veins.

Translucent skin is easily torn.

Patches of blood rest in your nail beds.

You are careful with your fingerprints,

And you let each one catch its breath against me.

I’ll hold these hands until the skin sighs its last.

Rest here Clever, you are mine.

Curtain Call

Scripts dangle over our heads as we dance circles inside circles

The stage, a dusty ribcage of moth ridden cloth and cracking planks.

Blood velvet curtains layer over the heart, stifling the beat

meant to conduct the rhythmless motion of circles and strangers.

The audience has disappeared in the blinding light

If they were ever seated at all.

Am I the only one dizzy on stage?

Have mercy, close the curtain. 

Contrast

From here I could let the weight pull me down

Walk with swift digging feet until a headstone met my temple.

Life will take me before I could ever take my life

For that there is no discussion.

Contrast of cobwebs and sunlight

Cause the silent lines we’ve drawn to glisten.

These woven worlds are fragile,

But that knowledge has never halted a storm.

With bracing eyes I watch the foaming clouds on an unsettled horizon.