Praise the spells and bless the charms,
I found April in my arms.
April golden, April cloudy,
Gracious, cruel, tender, rowdy;
April soft in flowered languor,
April cold with sudden anger,
Ever changing, ever true --
I love April, I love you.

love came like a storm
and
love went like a flash flood

love came like the spring flowers
and
love went like the dead winter trees

love came like an old friend
and
love went like a new stranger

love came like the latest newspaper issue
and
love went like the oldest encyclopedia volume

love came fast
and
love went slow

he wasn’t expecting my lips to be so warm

nor my heart to be so cold

he wanted to go by what he felt

and not believe what he was told

her olive eyes swam with desire
as she gazed at this boy
this simple boy
whom she never expected she'd fall for
but who'd worked his way into parts of her
so concealed, so guarded
not even she knew they were there

love was a foreign concept to her
her past conquests were only that:
conquests
simple boys who flitted in and out of her life
and proven themselves to be just as they appeared:
simple

she was told that when you kiss someone
you feel sparks
the earth moves beneath your feet
and you feel as if you can fly

but she had never felt this power
she was told a simple kiss could hold,
dismissed these stories as fairy tales,
and went about kissing for the fun of it
and out of her desperation to become whole



he saw the desire swimming through her olive eyes
and gently stroked her cheek
he felt so drawn to this
enigma of a girl
and oh how tirelessly he strove to solve
the puzzles she created with her glances

"Kiss me"

she loved him
and she hated that she did
for giving into desire is not as simple as it appears
in the romantic comedies
from which she'd learned everything she knew about love

giving into desire means quieting your logical mind
and logic was the only thing she knew

"Kiss me"

he looked at her with tender curiosity
observed the conflict raging in her olive eyes
and wondered why she was so hesitant to let herself go
wondered why she seemed so full of desire
yet was unable to allow it to consume her

she leaned closer to him
the simple boy who had wormed his way into her heart
and he looked at her intently
tried to solve the puzzles she laid before him

she saw her own desire echoed in the green foam of his ocean eyes

"Kiss me"


she felt sparks
the earth moved beneath her
she flew
all those fairy tales proved themselves to be true

and oh, how certain she was she loved him

I am stubborn as a seashell.
With persistence,
I keep washing up on your shores,
begging you to keep me
and hold my hollow bones like precious stones.

would you be ashamed
to wear my lipstick
like secondhand smoke
a mark made monumental
on the collar of your shirt
on the rim of your coffee cup
on the sharpest cheek bone
i have ever kissed?

would you be angry
to wear my lipstick
on your bony shoulders
on the mirror of your room
on the pillowcase where you
sleep and never think about me?

I would be honored
to wear your scent
on my sheets
on my neck
and under my skirt
but most importantly
on the skin above my heart.

she was silent
on the other line.
and i thought,
if i cant hear her
anymore,
then i must not
be listening
hard enough.
and if i'm not
listening
than it must be
.

it's like we are a family
of pressed flowers
slid between glass casings
or dried butterfly wings
pinned on a cork board.
something to be studied
observed
fragility that disperses
between finger and thumb
sorrowfully turning into dust that
coats the surfaces of tables or
writing desks.
i'll always love the colors
always love their hues
shaping me-
they made me the golden shadows
of things, like during sunsets.
but i feel blue
at the bottom
and it's because they are sad
and i know so much
about flowers
that are truly people
and nothing more//