i.
I live in constant awareness of
their eyes.
No matter the number of men I embrace,
the amount of time I am absent,
the times I re-cast myself,
they remain,
silent until evoked
and primal in their forceful claim upon my
limbs and tendons and cartilage;
they course past my defenses and escapes,
ignoring experience and change,
soundlessly pooling,
stilling,
making their presence known.
They are a pantheon faceted with different lives,
yet in laughter they become, descendently,
one.
ii. gemini
if I whisper names to flowing streams
I know that you will come with beauty
fresh like the burst of a cold grape's skin
gushing like blood from a pierced vein
and growing with tidal insistence
you whom I wait to age, so you know the sweet flutter
of Autumn and long mossy roads
and the scent of the dead gardenias in the Bible
high on a shelf,
will bring pleasure and memories of
mother's untended garden
rather than discontent and straining fingers.
no men in your life -
keep them to yourself and private memories,
as I keep the thoughts of throats tensed beneath
my kiss away from your mind,
for our love is one of jealousy and stolen
moments, and letters in wooden boxes
and laughter and silent talks.
know the severe comfort of isolation after anger;
it will make you so strong,
prepared for
chilled Chardonnay and green apples on
porches and the long loss of home.
I want us to age together, to wander for
sand-dollars on Ghoul's Inlet,
link arms in the silence of Episcopal graveyards
strewn with live oaks and Spanish moss
and close our eyes against the
strong marsh breezes which our grandparents
gave us forever,
where sandpipers and gray-backed porpoise
and deep-fried shrimp on white plates
taught us
before I left and you became
lovely as the tidal plain.
when I go farther
to cities and hardship and joy
a part of me will remain
whispering to blonding streams,
waiting to walk with you,
away from all the undefined, unforeseen,
unforgiveable, unalterable, unbound
wonder of all
which keeps us apart.
iii. gaea
she
waited with me, stroking
my arm until I faded into sleep, taking
her smell and presence with me into dreams,
quilted in the white walls and turning fans
of her home
where the lizards with their yellow throats
were allowed indoors,
and every Christmas was balmy with the call
of the honey bird in the bouganvelia.
her
face is like the sea around her coastal home,
bonding the beauty of youth and the troubles of life
in a plane rippled by thought, laughter, and the twists of honesty,
reflecting the light of day,
whispering in the moonlight,
luring onward.
she
would hum as I lay
my head upon her breast;
a sound low and wandering,
some tune that was never and ever the same,
as if the tolling of bells and the drone of wings
washed through her lungs
and drew me into comfort.
her
burdens seemed enormous, though
self-imposed, some unquenched need
to satisfy those whom she called her own, those
she created, those who carried her
clear blue eyes and staggering devotion in
every breathing moment,
and I wonder how insignificant
our loyalty seems beside hers,
how can I be swarmed by this woman,
who gave pulse to a lineage,
and birthed in me
an emotion so evasive of definition?
iv. gabriel
space
you fill the distances I make for myself,
reaching from your seasonal lawns,
from the wild roses outside my first window in Houston,
from the poolside gardenias on Taylorcrest Court,
from the calla-lilies in our swamp,
from the hibiscus of your mother's home,
reaching past the Asian orchids I put in glass bowls,
not with memory, or guilt, or right,
but our blessed bond,
our genetic similarity
which lets me live your thoughts as you dream
my realities.
As I swam that Saturday, as the rain
battered the pool and thunder shook the gazebo,
and the sun lit the lawn,
As you stood on the porch in the southern storm,
and watched me,
but refused to join me, I
knew how we would always understand
yet never reach our deserved equilibrium.
"remember," you said,
and the January dawning was humid,
"because this is a new decade"
and I stared at the brown grasses,
and my eyes were lifted by the red
of the ribbons
your hands had tied to the the iron lamps
beside which your friends would linger
with champagne and chimes from the
tall wooden clock,
and ten years of life would unfurl from those
memorized red ribbons.
you brought the animals to us,
summoning the hamsters who vanished into our walls
and lop-eared hares,
gray as overcast skies, named for Francis, the saint,
and our dark cherubs,
your lolling, gorgeous, canine angels,
who guarded our home and hearts,
bringing you the companionship that
my leaving denied you.
they taught me the possibility of man envying dog.
even our tales are intangible,
shifting pieces of two lives commingled,
where one and one make one,
and the word
is immutable in time and
v.
all I can do is welcome them.
they will bring gifts: plastic shorts
seashells
stained glass panes
country music
sun-strewn marshes
copper pots
Russian icons
and perfect fruit pies topped with light meringue or apricot glazes,
these intravenous sustenances for their favored one,
their gradual wanderer,
who grasps at crucifixes and southern accents,
at the exotic and the insane,
knowing the tidal quality of blood;
but fearing the shores
it may wash away.
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