We gazed upon the thin threads passing
Down. we swept away the chafing
clothes that veiled our eyes from fate, flashing
smiles like lightning, the love that thundered on.
We danced and twirled and spun, hands clasping
Firm. we twined ourselves and unraveled.
that red thread, bled white, still ties
the clouds to earth, as they roam the wandering sky.
When was the last time I played with you
Under elm’s shade, summer’s tainted hues?
When we stood in twain and named no names
Trod soft on the slippery moss, filled ourselves
With the scent of berries grown on the unpainted walls
And I held your hand as if our shared red fingerprints
Made us accomplices in these blindfolded games.
I wanted to create so many dreams, so many scenes
Where you and I were meant to be, and together forever
Wasn’t just another cheesy phrase, where none of the things
That I had wounded you with ever left traces or scars, the way
The water that fell on your face simply trailed away along your cheeks.
The way home
looked nothing like the way out.
All the once-familiar scenes were
covered by a shroud. The blank
whiteness, the sharp and acrid stillness
scared me.
The shivers
running through my spine as if
you had reached out spindly hands
and touched me again. It was
the same world, the same road, still
the same song we used to sing, but
I couldn’t recognize anything.
I wished
Upon the first star of the night
that once more, I would find you.
but it was
The full and silver moon that caught
My gaze. It was unreachable.
The stars blinked like rocks
Thrown in the face of my glass house
And shattered me.
I knew
Mocked, stained, crying that same
refrain: I couldn’t find you.
When the
truth hit, it was too hard to bear, as if
all the things that we had ever dreamed
had come and dissipated
in the moment we blinked.
When the
snow fell, it danced around us, as if
to cloak us in soft and numbing dreams
of that cold world and the
piercing warmth of your hand.
Thinly veiled as if a wandering wisp
You roamed the shallow shores, the
days and nights stilled and never ended.
Like a ghost, my bride, the
Pale laughing lady in white
has waltzed on to other dreams.
And I, lonely like the bird with
feet frozen to the branches
Only watch, only breath in
the dust that you left.
Your veil settles on me.
It was a story that none of us heard
It was a lesson none of us learned.
It was the myths of the light in your eyes
The yearning, the burning tempting sweet lies.
It was the last night our secrets were blurred
It was in that moment before we were burned.
It was all that I wished for beneath your disguise—
That last sad sweetly stirring reprise.
We once flew like a song,
free on the wind. It was the
merest slight touch of the breeze
that set us off
We flew like paper,
took to the skies and
criss-crossed our tracks
over the heavens.
If only,
we had not been caught
by these branches, piercing
our bodies in lieu of the sky.
I have walked alone for so long
that the voices of the wind have stilled
and the dreams of which it sang
have faded and muted, like
so much sun-bleached neon.
I have walked alone for so long
that I have forgotten how it felt
to be warm, to be held, to be
led, your hand grasped in mine,
an unwound thread that pulled…
I have walked alone for so long
that I think my heart has stilled.
and its faint thrumming only
a mere echo— a refrain
of the ways we were innocent.
I closed my eyes and fell away
Listening to your voice.
