All day, I turned you over
in my mind.
Consulted my essence
and found nothing wanting.

Eight hours,
full to bursting -
but telling myself
"don't get hooked".

You, being the truest of men,
have cut me to the marrow.
Where, transparent in your presence,
all pretension expires.

All day,
I felt your sapphires upon me.
Eyes sent to watch over,
and guard every move.

I said this wasn't gonna be
a Greek tragedy.
No sit-com of labours
or dramatic show.

Your voice
turned every little red fibre
of my central nervous system
to trembling coral.

Underwater, captured in the swell
I'm breathing you again.
As though I were born to it,
and have lived every moment
with you... with you...

I wrote your name on a cigarette.
And smoked it on my balcony.
Each lungful, thus ingested,
lets you reside in me.

Across the water
Allhallows gleams, unknowing.
Where, at some previous point
we were separated by simple geography.

If cigarettes were wishes
I'd have died soon death,
in rattling, emphysemic pursuit
of long-lost love.

Simple geography
can never trump
the complicated, honest reality
of time and place.

The cigarette glows in my hand
reminding me that, as love,
time veils promises
however potent.

There are only eight cigarettes left
in the whole world.
Perhaps I'll leave them, growing stale
in their hidden box.

Or, maybe, I'll smoke them all
today.
Then forget
what I ought to have forgot.

For sake of placid honesty
and goodwill, told in truth.
Time is a lying healer
and I'm on a liar's oath.

I went to bed last night
and true
closed down the day
with thoughts of you.

Regret is not
what fills my head
I wonder at the words
unsaid.

For years gone by
are lost to truth
that part of me
remains in youth.

And though in all
my lightened soul
there is a corner
black as coal.

Where no sun touches
less your embrace
you were my loss
my fall from grace.

I miss you now
as ever more
my heart, the apple
you, the core.

I pick a pebble
from our beach
and keep it safe
beyond harm's reach.

Now in fate
by turn of tide
regret dwells here
not by your side.

Place your eyes upon me, love
for all that time has taken.
I am, in constant truth, your girl
who never was forsaken.

Two decades and the quad of years
has twisted not your sweetness,
and I must sit upon my hands
lest I reach for your completeness.

Come, stay close, take my life
it's yours in every breath.
Side-by-side, beneath this tree
in tableaux unto death.

There starts a flutter in my heart
where I know my future stands
within the solace of your love
and held in your two hands.

I have held you
This morning, that second
And infinitely,
Outside of time and space.

The intervention of years
Has melted
To leave me scrubbed
And honest.

As the ocean cleans
Each pebble on our beach,
I am as exposed to you, now,
As the ****** I was back then.

I wonder at my reserve
Of not running to wherever you are
For I am full of you
And if crushed would not
Shed my own blood.

A priest passes by the window
Slow and quiet
you, not being a religious man,
Would no doubt laugh.

Growing my love for you
Once more letting it bloom
I am endangering all that is safe and true
For something equally so.

Why am I crushing myself
to death and beyond?
Feeling bereft
for that which I haven't
touched in years.

Leadening my heart,
and dragging my feet
because each step
is a step further
from lightness and youth.

I bore myself with this weight.
Loathe the tyranny,
and mighty pressure
inside my head
which threatens incapacity
of reason every ten seconds.

Why did he come back at all?
If only to suffuse me
with the promise of nothing,
and the intangibility
of all ****** lovers?

And, forgive me,
for ****** is how I feel.
Self-pity, you old devil!
I shall have this out of me,
or pick over it
'til my heart lays waste
all good intent.

I wish to be suspended,
as the crystallised air,
inside the strange house.
Where, this morning,
I chanced upon myself in mercury,
and tumbled through the ages.

As rose-heads wither on the stem,
my head shall fall
upon my chest with piquant,
silent longing.
And so, unto history
a dream shall die.

Should I die with it?
Or resurrect a steely charm?
Neither, sweet prince,
for your fleeting
and unseen visit
has taken my soul.

And, thus protected
from the whimsy of flattery
I stand, without notion,
of which way to turn
upon a once-clear pathway.

Should I chance you in my dreams,
I would but falter at your beauty,
though fail to recognise you -
for I no longer trust
what my eyes alight upon.  

I am torn -
lamenting and tidal -
with hands that were always empty.
So what have I lost?
Nothing, that is all.
Nothing at all.

I never asked forgiveness
nor sought a willing shrink
but maybe I should do so now
it even hurts to think.

For love's almighty glory
has shredded me once more
and left my heart in pieces
shattered on the floor.

I'm given to dramatics
of this I gladly know
so safe to say, my darlin'
my pain is on full show.

But what of real misfortune?
Of those who have no hope
who scavenge in the gutter
then swing unto the rope?

I am far less noble
and have no cause to moan
so why, pray tell me someone
am cut right to the bone?

So, I'm pulling up my bootstraps
and putting on a smile
'cos love will come back for me
in a little while.

Of this I am quite certain
'cos it rarely leaves forever
and when I see its winsome face again
an artery I'll sever.

To start the tiresome process
on my own and rightful terms
and while facing certain death
I shall enjoy the burn.

Of a lover's retribution
to put me to the stake.
So here's some flesh and bone, my love,
take what you must take.

Guess 'til then I'll just keep livin'
***** my mental health!
I've got a life of poetry
to get the **** over myself.