Misty Morns of Autumn

I woke to the fog that lingers still
hanging breathlessly ‘tween earth and sky
a blanket ‘round every leaf and twig
nestling in white-grey as I wish I could into you.

I remember those days and nights.
They haunt me, seep into my skin like this cool, damp air,
clouding my thoughts, moistening my eyes
and I beg for some kind, warm embrace.

“Look nowhere else, but inside of you
for all your heart’s desire”?
I find a flame growing, a raging heat
still and silent as the tangerine leaves.

I remember you; I remember us.
I can feel you still, embracing me
I can feel your blue-white flickering flame
Aching to burn hotter with me.

And still the coolness of now slips round my calves;
still the chilled reality of now sings its resonance.
There is no you in this mulled existence;
there is only this languid persistence.

When, in the night or day, I slip into your mind
Do you yearn, or turn away?
Do you yet slip silently into desire, coach its movements
into regretful, agonized explicatives?

Are we tied, now, by nothing but this creative imagining?
Are we yet tied by nothing but this type of love?
I miss the ripples of your tender skin,
the agonized sensitivity to my energies.

Lift this cloud; help me blow it away
with heat or rain, with tears or love;
or, mind, let me accept this uncomfortable space,
sip it like chilled water on a winter’s day.

-Prologue-

…And then the sun shines through the mist
alighting mist and leaves, alike;
and then, the world is a mystery;
our fantasy begins again.

A way

How many ways can I tell you
I’m missing you?

How many times must I say the words
To make them real for you,

Real enough to feel me
Real enough to see me
Real enough to hear me
Real enough to be with me?

How many days must I be alone
Before you come to take my hand

Not for forever,
Not for a day,
Not for a moment,
But for always?

How can I be away from you
When being with you feels like being with me…?

Lost Love and The End of The World

I can’t ask to see you, anymore; I’ve taken away that possibility.  

I mean: I could write an email to you, as I still have your address… or I could send you a message on Facebook, and hope that you respond…

But I won’t.  At least, not yet.  

It’s not as easy, now, without your phone number.  

…My head still aches, like your spirit is still calling me, is still pulling at me, is still trying to get in, to speak those words you refuse to speak, to let me into the dark crevices you refuse to admit exist, but that I see, that I feel so easily.  I wonder if it will stop, or if I will somehow become linked to you through some spiritual-psychic means.  I wonder if I will be able to forget that you have meant so much to me, except in quiet, bidden moments – like with the other men I’ve loved and lost.  I wonder how long it will take…

…Or if you’ll come back to me, as you did this year; if you’ll hunt me down – or I, you – and we’ll run into each other somewhere in my hometown or amongst our mutual friends and haunts.

It was too good to be true, someone might say.  Or, it was a fairytale romance, and this great angst is the demon we must face before the obligatory storybook ending.  

All I knew is that I loved you.  All I know is that I love you… and that you’re the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen, so perfect in your lithe movements, in your arrogant stance, in your handsome demeanor, with your penetrating stare from your captivating eyes.  All I know is that you’ve owned me, and I am still yours… and somehow thrown through the looking-glass into a world where I may not touch you, where I may not speak to you, where I may not hear from you… where love is silent and distant, where true lovers never make love.

All I know is that you love me, and that your words will never speak that truth; and your protection haunts me, stalks me, would save and murder me in the same second…

And all I have left are memories.

I miss your skin.  I miss the way the light shone on it, and the way the clouds and sky looked behind you as you stood and paced nervously, restlessly in front of me.  I miss the way your hair falls upon your brow, and its silkiness between my fingers as I stroked it.  I miss your gorgeous, gaunt cheeks and jaw… your slender neck and jagged Adam’s apple, and the rough stubble on your chin beneath my lips as I so often drew them over your features like a blind woman, memorizing your face with my most sensitive skin.

I miss your eyes, when you would look at me with quiet, surprised vulnerability; when I would look at you with the same openness, and we would take in each other with so much startled love, like two beasts unfamiliar with each other, yet sensing nothing innately harmful….

I miss the way you’d lay your head on my shoulder, near my neck, like a boy burdened with so many thoughts and responsibilities, asking silently that I take some of it away, taking my love in unhurried draughts as I held you, gave to you my strength.

I miss the way you’d react so deeply to my caresses, aching to return to me the power of my touch with your own capable fingertips.

I miss our kisses, all of which were fumbling and afraid – despite our respective skill.  I miss the questions that would pass hurriedly through my mind as your lips found mine, as your heart sought out mine, as your mind hunted mine, as mine hurried away in terrified desire for you, for your hands, for your lips….

And, most of all, I miss your heart.  I miss being your Sugar, and I hate myself for ever being otherwise.  I want to pound myself back into a pulp, to squeeze myself until I cry sweet tears, to boil in my own rage until I am again refined and clear and sweet… and acceptable, again, to your palate.

For I am lonely for myself, and I am lonely for you, who loved me enough to see me; who saw me for long enough to acknowledge, to ask for me.  And I am lonely for us, for that unspeakable love that passes always between us, that is so hard to grasp and so strongly uncontrollable.

May I never be fool enough to forget you; may you never be fool enough not to forgive me; may we never be fool enough not to return, one day and always, to each other.