“beneath those stars, is a universe
of gliding monsters”. remember
when you saw it in their eyes?
when the love vanished? she,
if i’m to be vaguely specific, used to talk
about “air going out of her sails”.
did i misunderstand this, or
was i a possessor of the willful
ignorance i accuse others of?
sallow sail and a wandering,
a sigh. let that sigh out
and watch flames flicker. a flame,
like love expressed in eyes. lovely
as they leave.
what did he look like
when he left you?
this could be said in a mirror,
of course. what did you do
to encourage her to vacate?
it is for forgiveness that i am still
living, shame rinses me
in its perfumed narcotic hypnosis.
we addict ourselves to sorrow
just as we fantasize about bleeding
violence while silent. monstrous,
i supplicate to the memory
of those no longer in my life. i was
once in my life, and now no longer
am. in the excited morning
there is a soft palming of mourning;
once i was a monster.
i cooled ember’d eyes
with my late-Fall raining
words. in my infrequent inhales,
i watched sails go slack.
the pilots of these vessels leaving
under motorized power, insistent
in their desire for escape. i am still
blind, though not from darkness.
it is the gathering light and
my infant eyes that cause me
a tear’d shielding.
all these monsters, gliding
in front of mirrors, sighing
into solitary slumber. oh sorrow,
to feel the naked exposure of shame.
oh kind joy, that we slowly learn
to forgive. ourselves and our others,
always one and the same.
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