my lover is a woman of the breeze
and she breathes the smoke beneath the trees
that echoes between the looming buildings
of sandstone and memories traversed long ago
i found myself focused on the space
between the lips
where word escapes
with the traces of my kiss
oh don’t let me love you
i’m too afraid to depart
from the comfortable numbness
of a faltering heart
scattered in scars and torn apart
i forgot how I used to love you
like I did at the start
some strange thing I thought that I knew
withering between the words that were spat
with a vile ineptitude or curtailing naivety
to those calculated words that stung
even as they crossed my tongue
can i say you made a monster of me
that prevents this woman thus?
and though she may not know it
she flirts with a foreclosed heart
can i say you tore your piece of me
and made me like yourself?
the ivy skin and fiery teeth
a pretty and poisonous shell
can i say you loved me
and i couldn’t love you back?
or would i say you loved the claws
you dug into my back
so sweetly, woman in the street
witnessed within the flames
free me from this furrowing fall
that curls me to a ball
i yearn to proceed without resent
and tread not on the past
but follow with laughter a shivering present
that’s warmed within your arms