do you remember the first time?
the grey skies? the gentle morning light?
do you remember the first time you
held my hand or the first time we kissed?
do you remember the rush of the airport
around us yet how time seemed to slow
between us? the softness, the sweetness?
the tender tension?

it is not you I miss, don't misunderstand,
but that feeling. the crossing of oceans, the
constant newness, the always evolving
landscapes. I miss the permanence of
destination and the impermanent swarm
of airports. I miss the anticipation, the
adrenaline; the longing, and the opposite
of longing.

I miss the time before the violence and the
blood. it's like we, the us, began to die, but it
was slow and corrosive, an awful heaviness,
an eternal decay. I was too scared of a mercy
killing, and you were far too selfish. when
we finally... finally let go, we let go of a
mangled unrecognizable corpse.

I didn't think to grieve the loss. I didn't think
to honor the grey skies or the gentle morning
light. didn't think to say goodbye to the
anticipation or the longing. I cursed your name,
your demons. I smashed us to bits. swallowed
the demons. it was so much easier than feeling
anything else, but what a brutal cocktail. no
wonder I haven't really let you go. no wonder
you haunt me. I never laid you to rest.

I never laid us to rest.

I have walked through cities like a cat slinking through streets
quaking bones of ice and blood: bitter wine spilling over the pavement.
Streets that reimagine paradise with the twist of a singing blade.
Paws to upturned earth, searching prices to be paid.

I have walked through cities towing along a golden thread
linking city to city and idea to truth. Love to love.
Thread, like a promise. Thread, bright and unbound.
But bound to bound and bear what may
A fracture in my heart to say
I have walked through cities by this line
Through memorials thick and music undefined
And by and by I have learned to speak so soft
A child’s collar where our words all fly aloft
I have walked through cities along a golden thread.

I have walked through cities where there was refuge
In bums that lined the streets
Trash that gleamed and glimmered like a crown on a king’s head
whose promises, worth more than a those men’s, who left the dead
I have walked through cities.
Two that warned and waned.
A war of times and a burden’s whisper
A tale of mountainous discrepancies
those morals, thrown and lost and gained.

I have walked through cities that once seemed far away.
But closer than I ever knew and nearer than my eyes could see.
A tale of time and triumph, yet of pain and prudence all the same.
The fish still swim the alleyways
The wolves still feast in light
There is a wonder to the kindnesses
And a question of what is right.

Those cities’ stars are still unclear
Their shining beams– less bright.
Sometimes, my treading feet slow, my eyes lock on the stars
Those dusty, white, and distant things that keep me up at night,
I have walked through warring cities
Those that kept me at a stall
Forever trenched in agony, still devoted to what cause.

My cities have been people whose pasts all intertwined
my soul has held the notion that their wrongs must be my rights.
Sometimes that golden thread has pulled me back to home,
a faction in the center of the worlds I cease to roam.
I have walked through cities that held tight to my hands,
But today, I will let go of passion in those lands.

I have walked through cities, but I have made it home again.
I have walked through cities and taught my lips to say amen.

I never was one to swim
And now I am an Olympic diver
Ready to splash into your skin
And collide with you

I never was one to sing
But I find myself belting out tunes
Because they remind me of you
And your voice is the sexiest thing I've ever heard

I never was one to swallow my pride
Yet the embellishment of your words
Entangle me in humility

I never was one to stop to smell the roses
But the fragrance of you stops me in my tracks
Like a lion on the prowl

I never was one to feel good about myself
Yet you show me everything I am
And everything I could be

I never was one to love
Yet you make it so easy
You make it so effortless
That now I can say
I can't help but love you