red string.

if I died today
my love 
unexpressed
would bloom
from my chest
and sow seeds
of a thousand 
new worlds
and in them
we are whole
together
hand in hand
the red string
that binds us
twisting between
stars and planets
our soles have
never trod
we wander in
unknowing
of the little Love
which bid us
grow

home.

any house could be a home,
they said, but
you made me believe it.

all my other tenants,
“ah but the windows don’t catch the
evening light the way i like it,”
“the floorboards creak and
cry in protest when i walk,
“don’t you just wish the walls
were painted some lovely color?”

you waltzed into the front door,
drew back the curtains,
peeked beneath the soft carpets,
ran gentle fingers over dusty walls,
“what a beautiful home,
might i stay?”

tired.

if my weary bones could rest,
they would sink deep,
deep into the soil where
my young feet ran barefoot,
quiet in the moisture of the
earth, the cool weight
of moss and leaves and
heavy nighttime air.

if a place existed for me,
a home to beckon me return,
it would be in the deep
woods and the still lakes,
sunshine dancing in green
patterns, a song sighing
with the wind.

pollen.

how much I want,
most days,
to find a safe hole
to crawl into.
find a comfortable
position
and stay there until
the snow traps me in
and I awake in the Spring
reborn, unfurling,
like a flower whose
existence has only
quiet, graceful joy
to offer.

little house.

what am I?
but that which is made
of parts, and parts,
and parts,

which even in a whole
cannot define for itself
the space it occupies,
nor purpose therein.

assembled as
may be the plans,
which laid down the
architecture of my soul,

I could not scale the walls,
but only dream of floors
and the vague idea
of ceilings.

structure of wit, and
senseless being,
of lofty thoughts and
unmet ideals.

the foundation
did crumble upon itself
and somehow
sustain throughout wreckage,

the silhouette of home,
undefined and wavering,
through flood and
assaulting winds.

inside.

I want to be a singing ghost inside your whispered dream,
unremembered and unrepentant in the bright light of morning.
I want to be a sighing monster in your darkened closet,
rustling through old clothes and old memories you’ve packed silent.
I want to be a reflection in your fogging bathroom mirror,
where you write a message in the water and wait for a response,
I want to be the closing statement to your last eulogy,
the final sentiment imparted upon the world you’ve loved.
I want to be the opening to your always, always closing,
I don’t want to be the thing you left behind.

sing-a-long.

you but merely smiled,
and I tripped over the curve of your cheek,
fell into the breath you exhaled,
sighing your sweetness onto my gracelessness.
your laughter like a song,
I danced my clumsy feet along its rhythm,
tried to find the tempo in my racing heart,
to worship you in movement.
you became a lullaby,
and I, a suckling babe,
staring upward into your heavens,
my heart begging to join your dreams.

bloom.

with your fingers,
you sowed seeds in my skin,
and like that, I became a garden
from which flowers grew
under summer rain.

now, though it is winter,
and I wither, and I sleep,
I know your palms hold safe
the sun which you give
each day to me in silence.

wilderness.

how I would have followed you with quilted roses
to the secret hidden spaces where we lied

under thick blankets of darkness
chilled and frenzied, dreamland of icy fire

how I would have hung your name about the stars
wrapped in willow branches and children’s hymns

swaying sweetly in the sighing breeze of thunder
quiet and crashing, solace in my heart of ire

how I would have found you in the mountains
crouched and creeping daisies in your hair

whispering faerie tales to the dead trees of winter
still and dancing, a tune on lovers’ lyre

how I would have handed you forever
could I just have found the time

slipping past the seconds, and the moments, all the miles
forgotten silken hours, threadbare hanging from the walls of memory

how I could have loved your tameness, had I been not wild and free