don’t you remember
the night we made love
in the seat of my car
piano music moving
from ears to loins?
when it all began
her lips on my lips
your lips on my lips
the ache you stored somewhere
deep, deeper than
you’d put in me for years?
in four days
four
no music moving us
to a new version of ourselves
please take this version
let me slip out of myself
and be
the me you made love to that night
flower within heart
Colorado remembrance
like jewels in your eyes
there are marriages like this
the one in the movie
with the racial slurs and violence
then there are marriages like mine
where moments of frustration
turn into passion in the shower
you will never see this
only the kindness
the polite words
that bleed through every moment
you spend with him
you will never have
the gentleness laced with lust
that makes him the man for me
i put it here now
as our daughters rest
as we move to Spain
as we post on Facebook
the reality of everyday life
but no one ever writes
the reality of everyday life
just the marriages we see
the ones only we
deep down in our closets
know for the painlovepain
that seeps out
that seeps into our souls
i have hidden from you my family
(the largest portion of myself)
in a (dream-filled) hot air balloon
we will travel the world,
place our feet on
never-before-seen soil,
and you will never place the real me
so many dark hours
this screen has lit my life,
my only guiding light
to a hope i lost months back
when i fed words
(fits and fits of words in two languages)
tears ever-present
words you scrupulously screen
i speak, type, pound them out to you now,
my global disconnection bleeding
through a web of wish-wash weariness
as you question my connection,
my commitment to a job you won’t quite offer
don’t you see the white light
that brought me to your screen?
oceans cannot compare
to the depths of loss i carry
heavy inside my belly,
the greatest weight (wait)
i’ve ever known
you don’t see my now-teary-eyed girls
all these months later
just realizing the loss they’ll face–
you just see my face,
stolid for you, eager, ravenous,
so i may feed them,
feed myself on a dream
i just cannot let fade to darkness
fingers search for love
if the keys could bring answers
i’d be satisfied
school starts tomorrow
hallways filled with anxious kids
my absence unknown
you will not respond
our words cotton in your mouth
truth to chew, swallow
we drive into the night,
the beauty of a curvacious road
lost among nauseating bumps,
our passionate words
filling the air of the car
(even he shouts out
his usually-quiet opinion)
you might never see this side of him
or the one that opened up lips
along the lines of lakes
our passion moving from anger to lust
our hands discovering a new side
of the world’s version of wealth
i think about the 8500-mile drive,
the quiet moments on the sea
where bland as eucharist crackers,
his words slowly, almost silently, slipped out
you might make a judgment,
but you will never see the side of him
that mitigates me
the third day
of the job i no longer have
(its nightmare clutching my morning).
the gossip regurgitated
from freshly painted new faces.
the perfection in concentration
resulting in my words
tossed back at me from
the digital keyword demon.
the ball that flies into the sky
never making contact with my arms.
my game lost
in an argument
a dream
a choice that burns me
with each rising ball of fire
give me a new day
a bright-starred moment
to know that
the person i have become
is more than a digitized rejection letter
flashing failure in too few words
it hits me when
i can’t shorten the syllables of this day
like ants along a honey line
cars creep along the dam
shadows immersed in lake sparkle
the afternoon of childhood
sun sets over a new sign
the Chipotle that began on Colfax
Time Magazine didn’t mention the street name
the longest running artery
the heart of my city
only the important facts
(a fast food all-natural revolution)
the reporter didn’t taste
sour whipped cream in a failing
Dolly Madison
nor did he see the long line of lights
run from plains to foothills
bright like a glowing snake
from atop of Lookout Mountain
he isn’t from the city i love
the city i’ll soon leave behind
for a penniless carless Cartagena
where we will walk
until Spain burns blisters in our blood
and remember the blue and orange sunset
the mountain framed skyline
the artery that bled a new generation of love
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