until kingdoms come

Tainted dreamscapes and

the letters you never sent

dissipate upon awakening

Your silence has been the loudest;

the echoes of what was left unsaid

Hurt the most in the spaces

I was holding for you

We were both lost when we met

We were both unlovable when we fell

Afraid and screaming as the day we were born

We were both lost when we parted ways

about to close the distance

Between the wounds

that kept us separate

And hiding from each other

To begin with

I am still sitting across from you

In a den of gypsies

some elusive unknowable clan

known for wandering

and not growing roots

for hosting circuses and being loyal

to cursed families

with their magnetic inexplicable

spells entire

I’m there rubbing my head

Trying to think

of something clever to say

to get you to love me

again

It’s a dream and when I wake up

nothing’s changed

you are whispering for me

to wake up but

I don’t’ want to

I don’t want to wake up

Will you wake me up?

Will you

Will you please

Not much has changed,

here I am, there I was

always pining and praying

still fidgeting with a napkin

stomach growling and muttering aloud

How I want a burger

How our names were writ by you

in crayon on butcher paper

impaled with arrows

encircle in a bruised heartshape

With us

smiling against the waves

the storm and

the odds.

That time we slow danced

On an ocean precipice

Near a midnight shore

Like the guy in the movie

afflicted with neurological deficits

stuttering and stammering

ridden with tics and hopelessly slipping

back into the void familiar

the one that swallowed him

when he was a child

and on the eve of the rest

of his life

that sweet girl he met amidst

the upheaval and uncertainty

she pulls him toward her in the elevator

his tics subside

and tremors quell

he can stammer no more

he can’t tell her to

go away

And the sway is their rhythm

she can read him

because no one else

sees what he wrote

in the movie he’s slipping backwards

lacks the words anymore

She holds him and he surrenders

burrows his face in the nape of her neck

the tremors subside and the terror dissipates

the way I felt that day

at the gardens

as “Memories of Alhambra”

poured mellifluous

It was the last day on earth

I remember smiling

The first day of my life

I knew what it meant

to be still

And doubt

nothing

 

Not much has changed,

I’m still flawed and swimming

my secrets are yours

they are just under the surface

I am waiting for something to happen

wishing that I was enough

They decline and say,

you’re a bit much

I don’t’ say anything

I go back home and roll

around on the floor

and tell him the story and sometimes

I write

Sometimes

I bleed

Most times

I fall back asleep

Where I can see you

again.

In my dreams I won the war for your heart

They’re all secretly jealous

That wild horses couldn’t drag us apart

how we loved

how we were a way

They could never be

When I wake up, the dream falls

Your silence my enemy

nightmare and echo

You’re still racing home

To your laundry

what a shame, what a waste

what time is it

I think I have to go

meet someone

are you

going to be there?

I’ll be waiting, I’ll be wanting

I’ll be wishing

until kingdoms come

I’m tired and it’s raining

I want you to hold me

tell me the story

of how we came to be

how someone rescued me

the way you did me

how I never found someone to love

because it couldn’t be you

about how they woke us up

to tell us

it wasn’t true.

-2019