Unclasp your fingers
Your clenched fists
And know the release of
Giving in

Let him drift away
Let the ocean stand between you
As a testament
To the vast expanse
That exists there now.

Stop fighting the waves.
Stop braving the icy waters
Arm over arm
To reach him on the other side.

The water will always win.
And you never were much of a swimmer.
He's just a distant island now
Shrouded in fog
Somewhere over the horizon.

Rest now,
The fight is over.
Your mangled, frantic heart
Can slow
And begin another tempo
When it's no longer bleeding over
An unreachable coastline.

Fighting gravity always seemed futile
But hand over hand, I gripped each fissure
Ignoring the natural patterns
Denying the pull towards the inevitable end.
And you're an ever surging mountain
That scrapes the sky
Like the sun personified
And I- a wingless Icarus
Long to stray close enough
To burn the tips of my reaching fingers once more.

Planted firmly on the ground
My feet would wander aimlessly anyway
Always circling the base
Always coming back to the place where I could tilt my head back
See you shining there, perched atop your shrine
Like the most beautiful treasure
Like the unattainable cookie jar on the refrigerator
Only no amount of crying will ever place you in my eager hands
No amount of sweetness could quell my need for you.

No, hand over hand
I push against what should be,
What is,
And what will never be.
Struggling against
The necessity of
Letting go.

I think to be thoughtful
I speak to be heard
I write to decipher
The truth in my words.

I smiled to ensnare you
I laughed to secure
You slipped through the trap
That I built to procure

I kissed to consume you
I hugged to enfold
My arms close on nothing
You're no where to hold

I writhed to entrance you
I clutched you to keep*
Now the place where I hold you
Resides in my dreams.

I write so you'll read this
My hand pens the truth
All that I've written,
I've written for you.

Twist my gaze to the side
Through the copper-and chocolate curtain of my hair
Through the sea of faces
And one amongst hundreds
I could pluck you, like the ripest apple
From the lowest branch.

And in this ocean of bobbing heads
Of flapping lips and empty eyes
I'm just floating
Just alone, drifting
Hoping you'll throw me an emerald glance
A lingering lifeline
To reel me in from this
Crowded loneliness.

Bring to me infinity
From where it dwells in lore
Or return with empty, wounded hands
And speak of it no more.
For if we are eternity
As one, when brought together
Why then do our faulty lips
Find pause upon "forever?"

Morpheus has never been
A kindly lover, nor precious friend
Yet in this stead, he strives to be
Replacement for reality.

Sominiferous ways that heat my blood;
Make my wilting spirits bud
Leave me wanting, never free
There on the cusp of reality.

Like morning mist, not half so pleasant
His remedies are evanescent
From where he lives behind my eyes
And plagues my shattered paradise.

He wears the exquisite carapace
For whom I yearn upon his face
And therein's where my torment lies
From golden skin and forest eyes-

From false reunions, makeshift bliss
From joining eyes and parting lips
Like cannon fire, the sound's refrain
Draw parallels to this cruel pain.

That Grecian Sandman, Morpheus
Lothario, for whom exists
To overchage the soul with hope
So poisonous, I gasp and choke-

Yet bodies, minds, and souls alike
Find inspiration from the strife
And haunted persons, like myself
Endure his falsehoods where we're held.

He haunts the dreamless, lucid world
Upon the cusp, the conscious swirl
His narrowed eyes, his blunted sight
Despise waking world of light.

Morpheus has never been kind to me
His somniferous ways leave me wanting
Grasping at the cusp of a reality
As evanescent as the morning mist
That greets this reluctant gaze.

He exists to these sheathed
Bourbon eyes
Within the veiled carapace
Of the only form I've ever wanted more
Than necessity and air.
His torment lies
In false reunions, in joining and parting lips
In forest eyes that linger behind in my thoughts
Like the echo of a cannon
Long after it's wrought its own havoc.

Yes, that twisted Lothario
That Grecian sandman
Exists to overcharge the soul with
Hope so poisonous
Bodies and minds are wracked with it
Inspired by it
Haunted on into the waking world
Where he waits on the periphery
Eyes narrowed in the light
Of the waking world that renders him useless.