Four Poems

I WISH I COULD PAINT WITH YOUR TEARS

if you cry, i’ll mix your saltiness
into the perfect shade of blue,
to calm the sea in you

a phosphorescent green
pallet philosophic—
to wash over,
yet absorb

i’d mix in my own to dull the storm,
turn walls of millennial grey
into a perfect morning,
bright and effervescent

is it love—
the prettiest of pinks
my ever-blinding flower,
and if you ever
stopped your smile,
i’d paint with the world’s blood

 

 

How I Think He Tastes While Drinking Grape Soda

like the fluid
in the mound on my foot,
disintegrating, regenerating.

the dirt beneath my fingernails,
slimy like a grass-covered
green speckled frog,
tracing down my spine, clinging,
breathless, brambles of cobwebs
around old decayed limbs.

the scars from childhood
cat claws that litter my arms,
the veins that run under my skin like rivers of
mold and water damage, constellations
like a billion-year-old sky—
the heels I never wore
because they never fit right,

unlike you, from the highest branch
saliva on my tongue,
foaming—
come, with me

precious, let the juices
run down your chin and
stain your linen dress
peach.

 

 

did you think

when you found your mother on the couch
still awake
her bloodshot eyes wide and her breaths shallow
and deep, staring at the dark ceiling, thinking-unmoving,
needing to sleep.
cooled sweat dripping from the deepened creases
on her forehead.
awake for hours, until the sun starts to peak

in the window. a slow glide of dread,
the moment the light caresses her blooming skin,
to clean the blood spilled on the floor, and dried again in the grain.
but, when you found
your mother on the couch did you ever think to ask
if she needed help cleaning up the body?

 

 

The Lines We Never Cross

He moved closer to me,
the sides of our hands brushed.
“Sorry,” He said,
jumpy as a cat,
He’ll return again,
hazed eyes and a slurred voice.
I wouldn’t bite.
Any sudden movement caused him to react.
A small laugh bubbled in my throat,
the corners of my lips
pulled upwards.

Not a thought through
our inebriated heads.
Pain, I thought too little,
now I know it’s not enough.

I wanted to touch him,
run my fingers along
his jawline, dig my thumb into his bottom lip
to feel the warmth of his tongue,
tiny stings of sticky spit
stretching thin, wispy,
wiggling in the air
like a broken spider web
or finding its way
down the curve of his neck.

I wanted to know what he sounds like.

“You alright?”

He hummed.