amber

i'm too tired to be brave
let me wrap myself in you

cradled in the dip of your collar bone
sitting on the bow of your lips

theatre memories

futon

(7:00 am, thursday morning)

pressed:

you into me
a leg here, an arm there, my foot
shoved into some gap
in the metal detailing of the armrest
we are both
blankets, well-worn and tangled
i am tucked so deep into your chest
i am only your heartbeat
i am only your breath

me into the curve
where seat meets support
where it sags a little
where fabric forms awkward
folds along my side
but a body so weary doesn’t mind
a bunker to bury me in
and you to cover me
till summer comes

tuesday

i.

i crave feathered kisses:
my crown, the back of my neck,
traced along my shoulder blades
be barely there
let your eyes draw lines through
hallways, out over the yard,
along the bottom of a river
before they find me
seek me, and i'll seek you
rather than pressing down
and into each other

ii.

all day on the water, browning
my shoulders, silent patience,
electricity of the slightest touch;
maybe we're reading.

this summer i'll read the awakening.
kate chopin. she writes freedom in
off-white sand, her stories snap and spill
like sweet green grapes on my eager tongue.

i may drift, between her words
and the sun and water on water.
will you see me, unfolding myself, blending
into the scene, becoming less and becoming more?

will you reach, wrap around the tendrils
of my mind, bundle me together again and hold me in?
or will you allow me to dissolve and lose myself
to things that matter more?

love

today i am electric

I.

Today I am electric. I woke up at the end of a dream, and you were there. I saw the morning, the earlier light that dresses everything in the need to be known: quietly, deliberately, in time. Warm shower, cool air, wild hair. My voice is airy, it is snagging on sickness-- good enough to croon but not for what I need to do. I am nervous, fidgeting but I am telling myself-- keep your arms open, pretend the stage is three times this size, these faces are unfamiliar and far. Sing like you did before. You are the morning. You are electric.

II.

Loose live wire. Sparks on the floor, the walls; my angles and curves, my walk, the turn of my head, all shooting off agitated light. I am escaping, in spurts. Reserve so shocked it dissolves and soon all I'll be is glowing. Turn myself inside out: I am better this way. Radiation you can touch, or it will reach to you. I will reflect and bend and when I break I'll make beauty.

I hold the morning in my belly; I swallow it like a flood and it fills me. Precious low light, more golden, intimate-- I can emerge in your protective shade, and lay myself out, calm and bare.

I have so much to give, so long as I let light be light-- then he will hold me like he does, warm me through and draw me out and all I'll be is glowing.