A Tan

Good Morning, Love
The perfect morning greeting is,
When cold water hits warm skin, when
Your warm lips meet my cool face; maybe
When I breathe in deep and you
do the same. I smile,
and the day begins.

I can never forget you; all your feelings for me (I'm not sure if it was love, but it was certainly an affection of some kind) are written in every page of all the books you made me read. Made me read with a vengeance, to keep up with your vociferous knowledge. I wanted to be like you, to be you, devouring, ingesting, nibbling on old paper and new books. I can never ever forget you, because every thing you said to me is inscribed in those books. They are worse than memories, because memories I can bury under dirt, shovel under deep dirty snow and forget that you asked me to read this or that. They stand there, proudly - almost smugly - on my shelves with only a layer of dust sneaking into the crusty old pages, or turning crisp new ones into yellowed history. I cannot forget because these, no matter what, are my favourites, and every time (every single time) I pick them up I feel you, pulsing through the one millimeter lines, threatening to stain my fingertips. As I read and reread, I do not want to, but am forced to, hear your voice reciting out my favourite lines. It's unfair. Why must my most treasured pastime be filled with so much hate, so much regret, so much love?

I continue to read these tortured receptacles of old love. I read them again, and again, and again because I want to believe that with every new reading, I forget yours, and then finally, these books will become me.

COPY CAT, CHASE THE RAT
GO HOME LET YOUR MOTHER SLAP.
FATHER SAY NEVER MIND
BROTHER/SISTER SAY GO AND DIE

For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And Love itself have rest.

-Lord Byron

Holy Sonnets: Death, be not proud


Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

-John Donne

Excerpt from Darkness

A fearful hope was all the world contain'd;
Forests were set on fire--but hour by hour
They fell and faded--and the crackling trunks
Extinguish'd with a crash--and all was black.

-Lord Byron

Remember
That to have the eyes of an artist,
That can be enough,
The ear of a poet,
That can be enough.
The soul of a human
just pointed
in the direction of the divine,
that can be more than enough.
I tell you this to remind myself.
Every gesture is an act of creation.
Even empty spaces and silence
can be the wings and voices of angels.
- Michele Linfante

stop        en
trap        ping
our         souls
in between four
walls      letting
words    force
us          into
small     spaces.
let         me, and
my        world, overflo
w.

ideal ideal

What I look for in a man: brown
nearly black eyes that only
look at me and those quaint
bits of knick-knacks by the window.
Buy them for me: magnetic milkcartons,
petulant pins; take pleasure in
presenting me with precious things and
enjoy receiving them in return. glow, when you
see sturdy wooden shelves, weathered through
love and aged with use. smile, when you
notice that small rocking lamb with frayed tail
edges.
You take delight in the study of light, the musty eeriness of the
darkroom; you bathe in the yellowed pages of
leatherbound books, words are your soap and you lather them
they rise up as bubbles, and I gather them one by
one by one by one. The rhythm of drums and bass, we revel in
the songs of tomorrow, lounging like lizards (i do hate them so) and you
sing soft verses that only I can hear.
You will, you would, you could find me waiting here as I walk slowly,
catching glimpses of you in everyone, but still not finding any one. Will you,
your books, your music, your eye for the serene and beautiful,
catch me before I fall off the
edge?

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, Lady, were no crime...
But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near,
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.

- Andrew Marvell, 1621 – 1678

But how should I avoid to be her slave,
Whose subtle art invisibly can wreath
My fetters of the very air I breath?

- Andrew Marvell, 1621 – 1678

HAPPY BIRTHDAY phrotus!!!

a conditioner of air, which drips
water to the steady beat of background beats (drums, syncopation)
a lustrous, velveteen voice singing over the frantic
clip-clops of keys being pressed into crevices.
i am, deaf to the world, ears cupped in softness,
before me is only light. light jumping out from screens,
creeping behind shaded plastic, peeking shyly out from under
curtains.

because i want to feel something tac-tile beneath my fingers,
to see something materialize out of otherwise blank (sometimes lined) space,
to hear something other than loneliness skipping towards me with its
moonsmile, to taste air that is cold and piercing, to smell
burnt radiator fluids, churning in an labyrinth of wires and electric pulses.

somebody told me;;
that life was spread out in a million miles of paper
trails from one end to the next, in a flash of bygone texts
mses, messages that spring forth from an wavering river
of flickering data packets.

if this is life, would i want to hold it (hold you) in my hand?
soft, hardened, feint veins of being, all encompassing,
four walls of flesh
on bzztbzztbzztbarely there feelings and intonations.

if this is life, pull the plug, i no
longer want to be surrounded by reams,
tightened at the seams, it is
suffocating, undulating.
wrap in a fantasy, me, i long for no
multiple meanings, duly constructed readings.

give me something not made from LED light,
(please pull the plug, drain me off my battery)
it, five centimeters per second. (just like the amount of time, to read this line)