He who doesnt

Don’t you know me

I am the sound

that small fleeting sound

that echo’s in your ear

as you stretch out

in the morning,

in the moment between dreams

the one you live

and the one you sleep

I am the hands

that flutter through air

like feathers

like a hacksaw cutting through metal

call me tornado

I can not decide what I am

beautiful or horrible

but always trying

to be known, to be understood

I would rather be the breath

that passes from your lips

into another’s

giving life to love

or something like it

who am I to judge

I imagine myself

as the sound that echoes in your ear

in the instance of creation

that joy filled prideful noise

that begins as nothing,

requires you to hone it down

If I were that happy noise

I would be so pleased to belong to you

I would wrap myself first

around your arms

so that you could not forget to play me

eyelids closed and feeling all the lashes

the fine bones that surround them

cheeks and jawline

I would sweep down the curve

of your clavicle

paying careful attention

to the column of your neck

and I would rest in the hollow

above your heart

Keep me there

like a locket

and when you need to remember

that you are loved

open me up

You know me

I am the sound

of palms finding, of fingertips

and forearms, pale as a swans long neck

of bones moving under the skin

of sweat that turns to sugar on the tongue

and callouses, most beautiful accoutrement

it was you who taught me

to imagine the lives between the layers

memories, of all the strings touched

or caressed or pulled and plucked

into new life

if you’re quiet you can hear me

I am a whisper of skin

a song sung between bodies

I am a beat

bombom bombom

I am the blood

and the bone and the flesh

of something certain

You will never hear me

from someone else.

Africa or the moon

There are times

when I feel I might burst

with needing to expel my thoughts

to effect something

I’m hesitant to disturb silence,
the dust that forms on our existence     

when we remain the same

stillness is effortless

usually I am afraid of being heard

because it is synonymous with being seen

and options become so finite

when Im being perceived by you

your mind, it is almost unbearable

that I exist inside you

I feel the pressure

to be in action, to acknowledge

that I am alive

I rush to the drain

and force my abdomen

until my organs agonize

empty they scream

you are they whine and always have been

a revelation I can not comprehend
  

oh the ache of my moral plight

how laughable

if I were an insect

I would be called conundrum

and I would fly by your senses

and rejoice at my inability to be seen

as anything other than

what I am

and least of all I would miss

my burgeoning empathy

Sensorium

Put me on dear, like that long cotton shirt
the one starched white and ready to wear around
with the lovely straight lines and the pearl buttons
make a mess of me before you lay me down,
love is nothing but memories piled high
some forgotten and I know I wrinkle easily
but the comparisons unkind, the waste too much
someone was supposed to

fill me up

and sometimes my chest does swell, wonder flows in
but the tide tends to be unpredictable
there is no organized system of celestial bodies to move me
just questions inside of questions, uncertainty
and the sensation of ghosts using my mouth to breathe
making me a stranger
always new lines, alien scars on alien hands
where did you come from reflection
make your home with someone else

your eyes are infinity, they open and speak
but say nothing, remarkable but void, vast but meaningless
it is with blind faith that I believe there is someone behind them
where do you go when they close
is it as the creatures that line the shore
do you spiral back into some beautiful small space
will you expand one day and leave it behind for me
I have a dire need to feel for myself whats inside

fingertips remember everything

the rub of skin, uneven texture of life
we press and press never thinking of the cells we leave behind
the amount of ourselves left on lovers,
the grittiness of dirt, the softness when combined with water
that I were a tortoise to burrow down
I too would share my secret home
if only I could surround myself with the substance that sustains us,
smooth down the brightly patterned cloth of a blouse
it tells me it exists because of someone else's hands
fingertips that have felt the salt of another continent
do they retain a memory of these dyes,
caress a box of wood inlaid with yellowing ivory
wonder how the elephant was mourned
an epitaph written across the land in the language of foot prints
the animals the carcass fed
small consolation for the cruelty of men
we will never comprehend the level with which they love

callouses hold testament to the length of memories
how long have I allowed myself to love
only paper people and alphabets
strange things for a young woman to marry
in the name of avoidance
friction can not exist where there is only one.