-The Canvas and the Bay-

Like a canopy he shaded my aura and contained its growth around himself.

The cradle I was lain in rocked softly by the touch of 

Paintbrush strokes down the spine of a porcelain canvas

Flames flickered at the edges of the masterpiece harboring

A painful roll of lovely fire

His breath made circles towards the bay as he gazed into darkness

Only adding spark to flame; then lips brushed

The brightest of color the canvas became

The bay rolled in silent surrender to his mouth on my name

And under the canopy we shared sleep.

…

-Bedtime at Daylight-

An agitated twitch

Scaling my nails across my forearms

A cool hand to my forehead

A tiredness of sorts

Stripping down to a bra and shorts

Falling asleep to Sun Ray

Groggy awakening to night play

Hair up, hair down

An agitated twitch

A tiredness of sorts

…

-Morning Coffee-

I need kisses on the lips 

Your hands on my hips

I want sugar in my coffee

Let’s make morning love; don’t stop me

I need a taste of attention

Your movement is perfection

I want smiles on the side

Just a thing to get me by

…

-Murmur Ray-

Let the sun wake our breathing

Let the sun leaving bring us down

Maybe in circles we run cursed

This is bad but it could be worse

You tuck disarray behind my ear

The first I’ve felt of you in a time

The murmur of your name barely passes my lips

This is bad but it could be worse

I crept to your side

And our weary eyes met

Screaming our silent words

This is bad but it could be worse

Let the sun wake our breathing

You’re the only one I’ve woken beside

Let the sun bring us down

In a tangle of sheets and broken sighs

Perhaps we should just be

I won’t let you go and you won’t let me leave

Let’s lie content in a bed unmade

This is bad but it could be worse

…

part one

and in our rage I find

your mouth suddenly on mine

gentler than your words before

giving in, our hands explore

delirious, we don’t care

breathlessly parting our lips for air

…

Your kisses hover and fold into me

Like velvet taken from the dryer

What a clean warmth you radiate

Cradling your face in my hands, whisper

Whisper between kisses

I love you, I love you,

love you, 

love

Terrified and reckless but secure

Hovercrafts in a purr from the stars come down

In a blur of lights I am blinded, seeing sound

Bringing you close, slow

Whisper between kisses

I love you, I love you,

love you, 

love

…

Don’t play that song

Don’t let your hands caress the strings

Don’t allow the notes to sing

Don’t let them hum or ring

But, still, maybe, except

For a second let sound travel

For a moment let it speak

Force yourself to listen

For instinct will come after

Then, still, maybe, certainly

Words tumble from a trembling voice

An instrument of the body

Sing like breathing the song you’ve known

Music like that takes you home

…

-microphone-

your lyrics like a poisoning

they catch my breath, in silence glistening

and everything is shattered by your voice

your syllables are intimate

each movement of the mouth I won’t forget

they kiss the microphone and fall away

…

anger and frustration is blinding and

all at once

I can see the clarity of it all

I’ll show him 

what a fucking hookup is

to prove I’m more 

I’ll do what he expects and 

blow it out of proportion

all at once

rage and hilarity of the stupidity

how obscene the filth

I’ll show him 

what a fucking hookup is

…

breathe in, a surprised catch of breath

from dull to sparkling and oh!

the happy lull that pushes out in silence

and comes back as a laugh that bubbles up 

fingers to the bridge of the nose

tilt forward and smirk to hide

some uncertainty inside

and press my lips to yours

…

rest my head in my hands

falling into that place again

not because I’m sad

but to feel my own skin

the electricity and static within

stepping between barriers

a world of mirrors that show who I am

they slice at my flesh and prick points of tension

floating up my back is bent

hold breath

pressure of the energy

brings blood from my nose

I close my eyes and start to let go

nothing holds me here but my elastic fear 

calm in this state of nothingness

still

vibrant orbs of buzzing life fill my fingertips

a wave of hot and cold passes over me

part my lips

bend my back

raise my hips

there again is the presence

tapping into my world

a stranger feeling of curiosity

something is here that is not my own

suddenly I find my feet on the ground

level with you

with a breath, pushing my palms into yours

mirrors shatter with a silent roar 

clearly this haziness is something more

…

Why is paradise commonly portrayed as a beach?

Fuck that shit.

Paradise is being curled up in your arms

at one in the morning

and knowing I have two hours of you

before I have to go home.

Paradise is being in sync with your breathing

at two in the morning

and knowing subconsciously

that you’re there.

…

Tapping into the below, etching across the exterior

Splinter thin fractures, crossing confused against one another

The letdown begins, signaling the cave of structure

Broken wide, in turn it sings

Feeling all at once, what is this thing

Devious laughter at the questions

Yearns to leave, removing better judgement in the resulting stillness

Of all calamities, spiderweb feelings constrict and implode

Struck and stinging

Addicted to the feeling

Devious laughter at the reaction

Poisonous petal of attraction

Tapping into the below, etching deeper to test the strength

How far will this go

…

Disasters forming like tsunamis drawing in my breath

Worrisome eyes look out on the world, taking it in

Gets lost in the fabric shield showing itself 

Through the normality of our regular reality

Standing so still, feeling the vibrations soft against

Everything that’s broken down and overwhelming

Already having pulled in breath, then forgetting to breathe out

Catching air in the back of the throat and 

What a choked sensation it forces on the chest

An emotion for the future that is already present

Sitting much like lead at the bottom of the ocean

Suffocation to a point, and tears.

Tears at the seams, ripples in the current.

…

It will be so easy, easier than you believe it to be, to pack up everything you have with your instrument against your back, a lightly packed suitcase grasped in one hand  and my hand grasping yours in the other. The unknown will be incredible and overwhelming and breathtaking all at once and, oh, how we’ll feel as the sun goes down and we’ll wander rugged streets made of various earthen textures when eventually but all at once we’ll find bed and from under the blanket of natural shadow I will finally be able to trace your lips with my fingertip and speak to you without using any words at all.  In this tornado of people and laughter and tears, I discovered you or you discovered me or perhaps we simply found one another, but all I know in this moment with you under a new sky once again, that it’s possible for the world to spin and for everything to shift but to have two solitary figures stand, in the middle of the wreckage we call home, being together like each new day is truly a new start to things and that meeting your eyes is like catching the light. 

…

Falling into an uncomfortable pace

Rumblings of the Earth and machine form about me

The freedom and prison they are

I rest my cheek on cold window pane

Everything I long to see passing by

My eyes shift from the sight

At the sound of your voice forming my name

Don’t say more, I know what’s to come

Settle into me, close your eyes, let it be

Miles from love we rely on each other

Held together as the world rocks and clicks

Hazy with sleep, your wrist brushed by my lips

Emptiness overwhelms at times

Regardless of how loud our unknown stars shine

Roaming has claimed parts of us

Stolen sleep, worn down our wandering feet

I’m pulled back by the rock click, rock click

To find you’ve awoken, not spoken, and taking in

All of my restless form

Upon meeting your eyes in this moment

I know I had harbored this worry only to find

That with me is the part of home I needed

And thought I had left behind 

…

the reality about me is fluid and soft like a velvet kiss breathing in the warmth of motionless perfumed air. silky questions float like saturn’s rings about my mind as I type with rhythm and time, flawless in a state that is not generally my own. sounds are cushioned and blessed with a barrier, casting a cocoon about my little life, my world in this wild. slow down, peacefully wander with me in my simplicity. 

…

I am like glass.

Or milky and blue china placed precariously on an edge

Or the curve of a shape concealed in a dream

It’s all a matter of time and perception.

I am like a chandelier.

Or quartz strung like wind chimes talking back to the wind

Or the arc of sound as someone breathes

It’s all an explosion of fragile things.

I am like a menagerie.

Or the steel of a knife against a cheetah’s speed

Or the confinement of bruises tender to touch

It’s all a misunderstanding.

…

I would scream if I could open my mouth

Lips zipped, shake no

I would cry if my eyes would open

Sleep on, shake no

Endlessly apologetic to cover emptiness

I was out earlier, I’ll make something later

Excuses that fool them, and me

I would hit a wall if I had energy

Heavy bones, shake no

Busy in mind, over thinking something small

Small

I would bite the bullet if I was hungry

Trembling hands, shake clenched

Folded in my lap

Delicate and pinched

I would accomplish a lot if I tried to care

Too much, shake no

…

Please stay…kiss my mind with your breath of opinion, tangle me up in the sheets and folds of your dreams and aspirations, rest my head on your chest and I’ll listen to  the beating of everything you’ve said, wanted to say, and will say in the future.  Let me trace the lines on your hands and feel the places you’ve been, wanted to go, and will go with me and without me.  Perhaps you’ll let your eyes drift to mine and let them rest within the magnet gaze we share at those times when everyone is sleeping and the night is ours for discovering worlds and opening doors. Intermingle your energy with me…feel the softness of my affection and obvious care that spills from the rim of the glass that beats like a heart and possesses the care of a soul.  Please stay…pay no mind to things I’ve done, wanted to do, or might do again. Listen to the  hum between us, those strings that sing with no conductor.  You fill my mind and empty my being into everything and nothing and all that remains is a little breath of air that escapes my lips when I see behind your eyes for all of a moment.  May I please marry into your beautiful thoughts? 

…

-Untitled, One- 

I get drunk on you

High off your words

Tripping from your gaze

I’m craving you

Images - shoving you against a wall

Feel softness with rage from my lips

You make me want to let go and fall

Filling my lungs

There is peace with you

And intense fear, too

I’m fucking senseless

Drugged, delirious, mmm…my dear

Pull you near

My breath on your ear

Giggling from giddy madness

I want you

…

-torpor -

many empty mornings I would walk

padding on dew kissed grass

barefoot and brushing sticks and stones

mist chilling through cotton to the bone

a raw white fracture filters my vision

and yet it can’t be the sun, for it has not risen

my breath is calm but my chest constricts

it’s been three years and your name still finds my lips

…

-30 minutes -

stop by, darling

breathe deep as mundane conversations grow

follow me and we’ll steal a moment alone

hardly hidden, we whisper, we melt

I’ve been awake all day and you’re the only thing I’ve felt

my goodness, sometimes

breathe deep as we sustain one breath

follow my thoughts and read my lips

hardly here, we swim, we surface

let me stay in your arms, let it be my purpose

…

-concerning you- 

you taste like summer in winter

you float in stars with your feet on the ground

you find within innocence a sinner

you resonate an echo of delicious sound

…

-when I’m sad- 

I like to drive out, far away from homes and motels and restaurants, far away from anywhere that contains and entertains people, and I like to drive until my woozy saddened mind won’t let my foot press the pedal anymore.  Then I stop.  I almost always find myself at a beach, sometimes the east coast, sometimes the west coast, it all depends on what I want to see.  Then I stop again.  I am heart-wrenchingly sad but unmoving in my shell, then I witness the sun set or the sun rise, it all depends on what I want to see.  This movement of the sun, the caramel liquor that it spills across the canvas of the heavens, reminds me that I am but one small girl hopelessly addicted to something much larger than myself and with this realization comes either further longing or an inner peace, it all depends on what I want to feel.  

I can honestly say that I am almost always comforted by the waves and their rhythm.  It reminds me of you sometimes, how a single wave falls back and is lost into the rest of the sea water, but at some point I know, that the same wave will return to brush lips with the shore once again, maybe carrying new things within the curl of its rugged shape but it is still the same nevertheless.  This is why when I’m sad I drive and drive and let myself be driven to the ocean much like you drove me to madness and stormy weather and still, like a magic dream, upon the arrival of really knowing you, you drove me to peace and reflection and breathless dimensions in worlds we formed and placed into photo books with our writings. 

When I’m sad, I let the ocean speak my mind.  I let the wind caress and tangle my hair like your fingers used to; I let the sand cling to my skin like your scent, and I let the gulls cry louder than I will ever allow myself.

…

-I wish to do everything with you-

With whatever time we both have, come, interlock your fingers with mine and allow my smile to meet yours and we’re so very young darling…lets fly across the ocean and sail in the desert and marry the mountains and dine in caves and unearth gems within one another. 

I have you.

You’re no more mine than the sky or the sea but maybe this romance is something more for you like it is for me.  I only hope that I can capture your heart and steal you away and be the one who has the privilege of kissing you awake every morning.  I’m hooked on you…you and the trees and the birds in Peru, how they soar from the leaves and how I revel in their sudden beauty.  They form a place in my mind alongside the space you claim for yourself; you are nestled into my thoughts just as I am curled into your arms…see how we interlock like a key in a lock or a piece into a puzzle or a train on its tracks, we meld into one another and life will look upon us with an aching sigh of jealousy but wouldn’t dare have us apart for long.  

I could easily spend a lifetime sinking in your velvet voice; it brushes my eyes in the dawn of the sun, kisses my lips as the misty morning fades to clarity, wrestles with my laughter and vocabulary when I’m suddenly too caught up to speak…that’s when you pull me to my feet and smooth down my hair and tell me to get dressed and with hint of a smile you say I wish to do everything with you. 

…

-Table- 

Sometimes silently beckoning with my eyes

You’ll join me - across the table or by my side

This will be how we settle

Our discussions, fears, excitements, or minds

Comfortable with our energy here

Whatever it may be

Oh! Familiarity

We hold hands over the table cloth

Harboring roughness but softness that we possess

Here is the anchor

Our love is the wind

Scattering as we leave

Upon coming home, reeling in

The water murmurs and laps at my heart

A fire, this water could start

Overwhelming fear with this realization

Then you brush my hand

My eyes lift to meet yours

I wish I had the strength to stand

But why leave this table

When my heart already soars 

…

-hello you- 

You, the light that brushes its golden glow over the corners of this quiet little home, the silence that hums and runs its fingers over the living and bedroom walls, the scent of rain and earth and spice lying over the furniture and the bed sheets…you are the light footsteps down the hall, you are the presence on the front porch beckoning company, you are the crickets on nights their wings are a symphony, the honey on my lips and the bitter in my coffee…you are my dream.

Last night, tonight, and tomorrow - whispering your shades across my skin, the dusting of colors radiate from within, fiercely prominent, still gently your fingertips kiss mine.  Stunning and subdued, you capture and contain the light and the darkness that hugs you like all of the joy and sorrow in the world.  You are the catch of breath at a falling meteor, the relaxed motion of striking a match to bless a candle, you are the oceans and the lakes and the voice the water makes, the sound of the strings that echo in the canyons, the salt in my tears and rain on my hair, the cat on my lap and the hands on my back…you are my dream. 

…

-Talisman- 

I like the man

through the eyes of

the clouds, rain, stars

mostly the sun

I like the smile

through the days of

the hopeless, tired, weary

but mostly pleasant

mornings on the porch

I like how the smoke

from cigars and kisses

intermingle with the morning mist

mostly how they make love

to the chirp of birds

and in the dew of roses

I like the man 

who worries not of

silly things.

He is the morning sun. 

…

-Cosmic Love-

play piano down my spine
as my breath trips and climbs
we’re shadows moving s l o w l y
one beating moment at a time

hey dear
dream of clouds on my pillow
woozy eyes as your breath slows
still I feel you listen c l o s e l y
to my humming melody vibrato

hey you
kiss death and feel divine
see how our love patterns rhyme
shudder flutter feelings q u i c k l y
find steadiness with your hand in mine

…

-smooth jazz- 

sway to the sax singing

circle my hips with a turn of your wrist

look how we breathe in the sound

slowly the room turns round

love your rhythm with my step

everything about your breath on my kneck

feel the song and arch to your hands

dance with me, cancel your plans

…

-Home- 

At times I would worry at the thought of leaving my little home behind.  I admit to being a creature of routine, a human of many silly habits.  How I hang my keys on the desk peg, how I kick away my shoes and sling up my bag.  This is the only world I’ve known, the only life I’ve had.

And you came along and it all went to hell, I spent my nights in your arms and dreams and just like this, oh!  How I fell.  On the mornings I found myself in my own bed I would wake up with your music in my head, crazy in love and dissociated from where I was content.  Drowning in the constant ebb of displacement, I struggled with where I would be happy and where I could call home.  

So many times I would dreams of the open world, so many spaces to call and claim my heart.  How would the air feel in my wanderstruck lungs in Italy or Spain, Germany or Austria…and with these thoughts came the sinking feeling that a part of me was indeed missing from each place.  

For what would home be without you?  You and your kisses and your smiles and your laughs.  You and your dreams and your music and your energy.  

You are home to me.  

…

-Resurfacing- 

Fluid and soft, filling the lungs, our warped shadows brush our still bodies with surreal reluctancy, a weighted human exhaustion claims our whispers and contends to flood our drowsy eyes with firefly visions.

Clockwork heartbeats carry on with familiarity, a lick of bubbling warmth in the bloodstream forces your sigh and I revel in its taste on my parched skin.

Electricity contained with your hand in mine is delicate and severe, a hypnosis made with gentle movements and a sigh from the moon.

You are a gentle surrender, my sweet resurfacing from the earth to space, a heliotropic movement from being alone to being home. 

…

-Butterflies- 

Yes, being away from him made me furious.  Furious I couldn’t hold his hand or kiss him; furious I couldn’t make him laugh or sing him to sleep.  I wanted to throw miscellaneous objects at my bedroom walls from the irritation.  I wanted to cry and be angry, to take out my pent up frustrations on something, anything, to get it out of me.

And all I had were my fucking pen and paper to try to explain how I felt.  To try to convey such a feeling within my simple writing would be futile.  There was never truly an escape for me, not in my guitar or my books or my tv shows at 2AM when I couldn’t sleep because the bed was too empty and his scent was too present and his shadow of a memory too clear.

Yes, being away from him made me furious.  Furious because with my wishing for his happiness I was oftentimes condemning my own.  Furious that I never minded, that his smile was the only form of happiness I really wanted. 

All I could do was silently reprimand myself for being that way, still deep down knowing I was the luckiest girl in the world to be held in his gaze, his arms, his love.  Because no one really knows what to do in love anyway.  Because besides being furious and restless with myself and with him, it all went away the moment he returned home.  

And all I had were butterflies. 

…

-The Dream- 

My heart is about to fly out of my chest with longing.

It flutters as a caged bird would - trying to escape this cage of limbs and hollow sighs and rocket to your side.

Like rain you sleep - the pattern of your dreams as soothing of a rhythm as water on a pane, or running delicately down ones skin. 

I find my heart beating like yours - this drowsiness pulling me under where I mingle freely with your aura, claiming finally what was surviving so far away.  The taste of pleasure is pinned to my mouth as curves brush the walls and make Picasso shapes in the darkness.

Comforting I find this all to be, too

Only two more nights away from you. 

…

-Cats and Callings- 

Called to tap upon your door, knuckles rap softly and then

you.

A lightbulb turns on and I begin to take all of you in, all of your face - eyes, smile, lips, hair - along with how you stand and the clothes you’ve chosen to wear and amidst this hyperdrive of attraction I must try to reel back and take one thing in at a time.  What comes from this is how quickly my eyes lock with yours and 

click.

Like being kicked in the back of the knees I’m down in black space, delirious and drinking in the colors that adorn your eyes in the light from your gaze.  Two seconds - undressed and in your arms - time flies when you stop breathing and drown in one another.  Awakening.  Planting my lips to your ear and with a purr kiss you there in my sleepy stupor, high on your scent and you skin warm on my glowing body.  

What a hum we encompass when dying together.

…

“Everything will be okay.” You told me gently, and with a single hand reaching to me, your fingers cupped around my neck, your thumb resting reassuringly in front of my ear.  I only gazed onward into your paused face; surely you were waiting for my nodding smile.  Intensely I felt in that moment a flash of sadness to your sincerity; perhaps I felt as though you were lying in order to console me, either that or everything would really be okay.  This feeling passed through me as quickly as I realized it was there and then my world collapsed into an atmosphere that contained only you and I.  My hands came to rest on either side of your neck, fingers brushing and tangling in your curls, inhaling the softness of your intentions and the electricity you emit when loving me.  Then a smile tugged at my thoughts, whether or not it was mine rising up or yours trying to get to me I won’t know, but I moved into your kiss with a sweetness that is meant only for you.  Then like a bird I nestled into your shoulder after pressing my lips your neck, and like this I found solace in your heartbeat.

Everything will be okay.

…

The swell, a heaving motion and maternal in its ways, hugs sound beneath its curve and wraps bystanders in a shell of suffocating lust.

From high to low the keys sing with color and sporadic precision, contradicting tracks of thought and peeling from its depths a cry as soft as a child woken from sleep. 

Its voice is heard from streets down and from across the coast; it’s strung with relentless undertones that emerge from a tidal sadness for being played wrongly, neglected in the bustle of distracted lives.

This is an island made from bittersweet emotions.   This is a song lifted up on waves of venomous rage, conveying sounds of heartbreak and renewal. 

This is a piano, and these are the keys.

…

-The Sea- 

His breath on my ear was an ocean, a cupping made to the ear in order to hear the waves when drowning in the heartbeat of a city.  

His whispering lips on my ear were a gale, a summer gust of salt air and crying gulls lusting after the clouds. 

His drowsy breathing was my hypnosis, a spell woven like the trance of the moon on turtle hatchlings, spun from my innocent gift of self and held by trust much like a ship is held by the water. 

His back was my treasure map; I traced a path of constellations through his smooth sky and my fingers rose and fell with every breath from his floating dream.  

I lift shells to my ear to hear his life, I ponder the ocean’s faithfulness to the sand to understand his love, I reluctantly leave his bed so I can again relish the feeling of crawling back in.  He is my ship of mystery, he is my lighthouse when I’m lost, he is my lullaby, my wave maker when I can’t sleep. 

He is the sea.

…