Last Words

"I love her and when I'm not screwing things up with her, we can be very happy. I don't want to risk that happiness in any way."
"Then don't do anything to risk it."
"But I can't always control how I feel."
"You can feel the same things even if we never speak again."
"But you forget most of the time that there's something else and in that ignorance, you're happy."

If I was honest about it

I will disregard passion propaganda
renounce rolling crests of sentimentality
that easily drag me under and trap me
so I will no longer have to claw my way up
through water, through amber, through history--
soporific reveries kept barely afloat

it no longer matters whether I’m adrift
because when your lips burn my skin, I see
midnight sky spangled with stuttering fireworks
and your fingertips drawing me past
the meridian create seismic disturbances
that ripple through every cell in my body

and perhaps I am not so alone when I feel
your arms enveloping me, like the sea
ready to birth dreams I didn’t dare dream before
with wave after wave pulsing fantasies
pushing me up and pulling me down
forcing me to dive deep for your affection

and I do again and again and again
often forgetting to come up for air
because I’ve been distracted by your depth
your commitments and convictions
dedication and devotion embodied by
your favorite Chinese character

yet once in a while, when I raise myself above
the height of each coming current, I panic
on the brink of sanity in danger of plunging
and plummeting but your knack for calming me
(so I can make a few not-so narrow escapes
from death, drowning) keeps me buoyant

of course this hope of earth-shaking intensity
has not capsized to the sometimes stormy
sometimes treacherous, always unpredictable waters
but if you need to know, you could toss me towards
the rocky shore, splintering my vessel into fragments
so how can I say you cannot shatter my world

Villanelle II

Let us lie beneath our own gilded shell
In silent darkness hallucinate night
This could be heaven or this could be hell.

Inside this fissure our eidolons dwell
Engage discourses of sweetness and light
Let us live beneath our own gilded shell

Where satin embraces and senses swell
A pair of silken tongues dance in delight
This could be heaven or this could be hell

Perhaps to escape from devotion's cell
Unleashed a tempest of lunacy and spite
Let us die beneath our own gilded shell

When did the dome fall I could never tell
Collapsing under fractures split during fights
This could be heaven or this could be hell

When dawn waltzes towards us and breaks the spell
You shall have to depart but for tonight
Let us lie beneath our own gilded shell
This is our heaven and this is our hell

Mommy

I want to scream and shriek at you
instead and not write passively.
I should be damning your weak weak soul,
should be giving into my anger
and devour your delusions whole.
I want to take your fatal flaw and shove

it deep down low into my throat.
Digest your insecurities, neediness,
meekness, weakness. You do not have to
suffer all the betrayals of the world.
There are other people to know,
plenty of promising places to roam
but you shake your head, you shake it

no. There is nothing for you to atone
but you continue to atrophy, let your body
waste in misery. You lie and smile
and say you have forgotten all your woes,
you are content now, but you have never
been so tired, your eyes were never so red.

You continue to let the rain and snow
storm and blizzard pelt you and throw
absolutely everything they have at you.
You sigh and declare you are at peace,
you whisper, “Love can break my bones.”
But I don’t want to come back home

find you on the kitchen floor again,
don’t want to find your spirit or your back
broken, your fantasies exploded all over
the granite countertop. There is so much
in this world, so much besides him.
Don’t you see, you have me? I will never go.

Note to Self II

I cannot save the world
despite my Mother Teresa
  complex.
I shouldn't be counted on to salvage
anything, even the dying
plumeria plant
sitting on the kitchen
window sill.

I must forgive myself sometimes
because I will continue to make mistakes
I will keep on using too many
nested “ifs” or access
  indexer of objects
too often. I will accidentally
hurt you even
when I don't mean to.

There are things I am bound to forget:
dates of various World War I
  battles, our battles,
what size shoes you wear,
your favorite dish at Russ & Daughters
on Houston.

But I remember
watching Persepolis at Angelika,
the smell of snow, Jenny Lake
and the way your hair
  curls to the left
right in front of your eyes.

I say things I'd like to
lasso back
because careless
  arrangement of the alphabet
makes a mess of things,
too much lost in translation
from thoughts to words.

I fall and stumble
most likely when the ground
is smooth and there is very little
  change in the terrain
and sometimes, in love,
but always, into life

I will not lie
catatonic in front of Scrubs reruns
while you wash the dinner plates
(because you know I hate
  the smell of dish detergent)
and on that note, I will never lie.