I’m sick of being sick
tired of being tired
anguished by anguish
burdened by burdens
fed up with this emptiness.
i pray to god
for something real,
yet i don a mask.
how many candles
have i blown
how many pennies
have i thrown
wishing for love
in a heart
that’s closed?
i plead,
i beg,
to eat,
be fed
…
but i purse
my lips.
don’t
do that
don’t
look at me like that.
don’t
make me hope.
nothing
more cruel.
i won’t
let you in,
though the warmth
in that gaze
threatens to melt
the ice on my heart.
things
that i love,
they tend
to hurt me.
i fail
to see the barbs
till I’m
in their arms.
..
i saw
the garden
from afar:
lush. green. alive.
you
welcomed me in.
as soon as i stepped foot,
green
became black.
all
that was alive
wilted.
what was gold, in my hand,
became ash.
stay away
i signed my life away
when i met
your gaze
one blink:
never the same.
i have a special affinity
with dead things.
they understand me,
i understand them.
there was a time
when i
was alive.
i dislike
thinking about it.
remembering:
it’s like
the past’s warmth
seeps through the now’s
cracks,
like god’s knife
cut a gash
through the dark.
it bleeds light.
it burns my eyes.
i’m a qubit
whatever you want
to see
that’s
what i’ll be
i wish
i could be
a transistor
wish
i could be
one or the other
if that’s
what you need,
go love another.
how can you say
you love
Me
when i
don’t have
a self
to be loved?
you love
your own
reflection.
you
are narcissus,
i
am water.
i will play
this role for you
so convincingly.
i’ll be clay for you
shape Me
however.
oh,
what a privilege,
to be made
in your image!
how can you say
you love
Me
when i
am nothing?
the fuller this love makes you,
the emptier
i grow.
my veins are your spouts:
drink.
it isn’t self harm
if i can’t feel a thing
Love Mercury,
Let us weave our personal myth:
What is a life,
If not mythologized?
Epic tales spun
from threads of mundanity,
Fairy castles built
from bricks of banality —
Gaze of Midas! one touch,
symphonies sprout in technicolor
from muddy monochrome monotony—
Observation, breath of life,
Color returning to your cheeks—
What is life
but a series of strings,
waiting for deft hands,
nimble fingers?
And love: the greatest weaver of them all!
before my thread
converged with yours
I felt you,
on the way the wind blew on my face,
the way my first sip of water tasted—
I knew something was different,
I felt you.
never knew what it meant
to live
till i met the one for whom
i would die
how funny.
the touch of fate
is a strange thing:
she grazes your lover
with the tip of her finger
then suddenly:
she is sand
through your arms,
dust in the wind.
yet your lover’s ivy
does not leave too–
no, it sprawls
through the chambers
of your heart and mind
the ones you thought
were well and truly locked.
love, love, love:
its illusion is this:
seeing eternity,
where your love
is a heart drawn,
initials enclosed,
by the sea shore
with your fingertip
in the sand.
One wave:
all it takes.
but i will fall
for this ruse
every time.
i will fall
eagerly.
yea.
i will fall.
i’ve longed for so long,
i yearn to not yearn.
what is love:
does it need
to be earned?
again i ask:
when will it be
my turn?
…
Those old thoughts
came knocking on my door tonight.
Unwelcome houseguests.
They checked every window,
They checked my back door.
I don’t know if I locked up well enough.
I don’t think they entered,
but I heard them.
They shouted, I heard them.
From outside, banging on the door
I put all my weight against the door
praying they wouldn’t enter.
They didn’t, they didn’t,
but by God,
I almost let them in.
By God,
they almost
got in my head.
A trembling hand,
reached—
I don’t think faith
is a good feeling.
No, sometimes it’s your only option,
there’s a certain desperation in faith
a certain desperation-like taste.
sometimes faith
has nothing to do with the future.
Sometimes, faith has
everything
to do with the past.
I’ve been here before.
I made it out before.
They can stay at the door.
My time will come,
of that, I’m sure.
no, faith,
like love,
it is a choice.
sometimes
a hard one.
What is it?
It’s the same old story:
longing, and yearning.
I want someone’s breath tracing my collarbone,
I want to be the reason someone feels safe.
Something human.
That’s all.
these love poems
make me a fool—
supposedly.
you, the scientist
you don a white coat
but that laboratory:
isn’t it cold?
you,
your controls—
me,
no choice
but to let go.
who is the fool?
this love of ours—
its flame
burns textbooks.
i’ll set fire to every library.
for without this love:
there’s no knowing.
yeah, without this love
i know nothing.
no love, no truth—
know love, know truth.
THE CLOSET MYSTIC 