at matt's request

the storm sighed;
propped its head up on the broken windowsill
and exhaled cathartic rain from its lungs

breathed in the highs from our lives
that reached apex of maelstroms so blue
they blew the desire for audacity into your eyes

broken flowers

you've always cradled me
like I was something much more delicate
than my composition actually is; gently
fondled my notes as if you could coax melodies
out of my throat into sing-song ears
that fall deaf on synesthesic eyes like senses

slow dancing with your ghost

I want to tip toe
around your calves;
spin you around in candlelight
as if our intertwined souls
painted a dance floor
in the reflections of our gazes

and I just want to cradle you
like you are something tangible
one more time

---

Your kisses
are more placid
in my dreams

but reality jolts me awake
when you lie next to me

because I can hear
your breath sighing
in your lungs

---

I held you as tightly as I could
48 hours ago. I still wonder
if you noticed,
but your eyes
were glazed over
with optimism's reflection

elspeth

I keep your lucid poetry
like memories my synapses
fire between my fingertips, because
I cannot forget that your middle name
is the Irish version of my namesake
and all I can keep are your words
that strayed from your fingertips
to blank screens that flash in a pan like sincerity
while I paint our reality with metonymy

because you are nothing
but the world to me

a fine whine

I want to crush
raspberries
on my forehead like teenage
hormones developing in our abdomens
and press my soaked eyelashes
against your mouth;
ferment rubies between our lips
like hallucinations

spring cleaning

I nuzzled your jasmine fields
and exhaled eternity while your winds
sighed as they ran your fingers
through my hair. He woke up
abruptly, stopping our breathing
like a sudden line break in a poem

but your scent still lingers
like an aftertaste on the tip of my tongue

fml i am sick this is not a title fml

I watched your sensuality blossom
after being steeped in experimentation,
fermented with mentholated gasps
that tasted like cherry-chapstick moans
in the back of my throat

because baby, you objectified me
like a katy perry song

synesthesia

I watched your fingers
slam down on the piano keys;
Pygmalion sculpting Aphrodite
out of sound waves

and the mellifluous
taste of your notes lingered
on my tongue
as if I were a polyglot

but the cloying aftermath
of your symphony lingered
long after you left

macarthur

I walked in with wings
and you were dressed as a gangster,
but I didn't hold it against you

because I could stop bullets
with your bravado; that swagger
of a champion that channeled
a modern day demigod

but I fell through the cracks of reality
when dawn kissed away the butterflies
in my stomach

the morning after pill

I woke up
with your scent curled around me

while your the taste of your whispers
surreptitiously danced on my lips
and told me,
"baby, beggars can't be choosers"

solipsistic

I want to nibble
on your shoulderblades
'til your wings sprout out

cause I have been waiting
for you to take flight
ever since I laid eyes
on you

olga

I said, baby, your neck tastes like poetry
because the last time I tasted your rhymes
running down your thighs

I memorized the rest of your verses
and sang you sonnets in the morning
when dawn broke over your face like beauty

porch talk

She sighed, the dust teasing
the dew forming on the side of her glass. We
sat on the front porch, discussing
redemption, forgiveness, and atheism.
She exclaimed,
"God, I wish could quit infidelity"
like an empty prayer to a God she did not believe in
So I just nuzzled her cheek
and sang her lullabies to sleep

(Dear Siobhan,
Do you still haunt me?)

truths I will someday realize

I could make this
easier on her,
gently slipping euphemisms
into her pelvic region

the way honesty
can never penetrate


and I watched her cry--
from the sidelines;

your eyes lit on fire
by the burning embers of optimism
between her fingertips

but I held no sympathy because her cheeks
are filled with Shakespearean malapropisms

uncertainty

I want to run my tongue
across your pomegranate-laced eyelashes
because I've heard

that your insecurities
sidle shyly
past people

and that your optimism
tastes like
opportunity

Michael

you

kissed my backbone with stair-step lips
that made my spine tingle with the scars you left

and you

made out with alcoholism
and my Messiah complex

so I
move on
to create my present like a gift

cam(eras) on pins and needles

I want to taste your curiosity
as an afterthought on my lips;

run my fingers
through your insecurities

bar talk

I remember inhaling your smoke at the bars;
sitting under gauzy lighting that cautiously filtered
itself through secondhand carcinogens

we tossed back shots together
like tomorrow's hangover
was too scholarly for us ivory tower proles

but somewhere between nuclear proliferation and programming
I lost myself in you

and sometimes I worry
that this is not enough poetry
and too much soul baring
but I trust you enough to never read between my lines