No fear, McLaughlin-

At times,
conversations are measured not by words,
those uttered strung vowels,
but by the pauses in sound, tensile silences.
These are the harmonies of our attraction;
exquisite, pristine, balanced.

In the smell of your sweater as I lift it,
beaded by late summer fog,
damp cotton, woven blonde
where I pressed my head to your breast,
these speeches of you billow in my inner ear
with the inflection of sheets and snap of your slight accent.

I am frustrated by your abstract designs,
not drawn, but walked through my life with details:
signs on notebook covers,
a Walkman with no volume control,
a copy of “The Rainbow”
with no cover,
your constant, gentle, humming,
no lyrics, and much denial.
I fascinate you with inherent shock value,
rumbling your conventions until you must laugh,
or submit to the need to touch me.

Will either prove that I am real?

You watch my fingers reaching for a branch,
or my lips moving over a Franciscan prayer,
my legs curled around a barstool,
simple indulgences that remind you
of your still rooms
devoid of my voice and the warmth of my skin.

When you draw breath,
I need strength to resist you, John.
Don't you see the rapture you bring
when you descend upon me from your silent plane?
I am responding to imagined arms, almost drawn skyward,
when your breath moves through my name.



GLS
8.3.91