The Consequences of Suffocation.
He never left for long,
his footprints left marks all across my kitchen floor
and I slipped over the waning of November, sometimes,
as my hands scarred themselves, the empty callouses
the left over burns that scalded the sides of dingy porcelain bathtubs
when nighttime reaches out shadows that never resemble
me.
Doors are left ajar when the singing stops for the moments that silence invades,
alabaster handles that scream of fingers that fumble for too long against locks
and reason,
but I love him, you see, and I drowned my heartbeat...
softer, still...
to hear him
b l i n k
butterfly wings that recreated May all over my December lips
and we lost lashes, wishes fell to nowhere, I never blew my secrets through the air we
breathed...
but he was back before too long, you know,
erasing the chill from all our floors.
I lay my head on his chest when nighttime refused to leave me,
his skin a map to places I would never discover, the mystery of perfection lay beneath my
fingerprints
a secret I could never grasp,
my hair fell to everywhere all over him and he never felt the teardrops
that seasons bring
so I curled and breathed myself exactly above him in the hopes
that sunrise may shadow me...
but he was there, you see,
softer, even...
than the kisses that rewrite themselves in the fear of losing
spring...
he was there...
but I had dreamed our wishes with my silence, never breathing,
for
far too long.
Copyright © Jeanmarie Marchese | Year Posted 2007
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