You move; I move

(date unknown)

You move and I move

Like sheets of Teflon

That creates heat

Without friction,

This heat boiling up

From inside

To burst out

And subside,

Our lives bent around

These volcanic eruptions

Needing the feel of it

As we stir up the lava,

And the bliss of it

When it all breaks free

Each phase

A perilous adventure

We might not survive,

The climb to the top

The sacrificial plunge,

The lost moments

When we cease being

Who we are

For whom we become,

Broken on the sharp

Shards of loved and lust,

Then reborn,

Like a phoenix

We rise from our own ashes

To repeat it again

And again,

The insanity of pending death,

Defying feat we need

To perform in order

To feel as if we are alive

You move, then I move

Then we both move

Together,

Somehow managing

To find moments when

We can feel inside

And outside

As we stoke up

A fire neither of us

Can control,

Or would want to,

Learning that the best part

Is when we have

No control at all

Getting a grip

Wednesday, July 22, 2015

I sweat just to think about it

This climb up and down

With nothing more than

Fingers and toes to grip with,

The lip of it hanging over me

Like a cliff that might tumble

Down at any time,

This life of risk,
this grip on the tip of it,

Both hands too moist

At the palms to keep me

From slipping
and still I climb,

Pushing myself up

And into each crevice

Feeling the fabric against me

As I move one precious inch

After another,

Aching over progress made

Fearing a back fall so I cling

The sweat dribbling down

From brows to eyes to mouth

So I taste the salt of it,

Get drunk on it,

And the pursuit of it,

The ache to over come

And keep climbing,

Often with no other purpose

Than to see what lies
over the other side,

To see if I can reach it,

Knowing that there will always be

More of it to climb

And stare over

When I finally manage it.

Mummy

Mystery wraps around her

A mummy with only the glint of her eyes

In this dark placed filled with phantoms

I cannot make out,

Her shape the brightest

As if death’s second life

Has already consumed her

And we live with the blaze

Of her existence

Feeling it scorch our bones

We, the unnamed masses, who

Get buried in the glorious tomb

As tribute to who she was

And who she will become,

Our lust for her life meaningless

Against the praise we must cast upon her,

And do so out of some deeper

Compulsion we cannot resist,

We consumed by her flames

Slave to her life

Chained to her fate

Stumbling into our own doom

Just to heap praise on her,

We foolishly believing

We have wills of our own

And might – if we wanted – do

Something other than what she demands

The whole time feeling her flames

Engulf us.

Morning dew

Beads of morning rain’s residue linger on the pink lips of the meadow rose petals like tears half cried from an overnight storm I only dreamed about, the aftermath of this shaken world filling me as I stroll the meadow path.

The air is heavy over me and inside of me, my thirst barely quenched from sipping these lingering leaves, the pink petals spread to expose their yellow interiors while all around green and purple thistles make it them impossible to touch.

A kiss brings me blood and bliss to my ever hungry lips, and still I sip the tips of leaves to linger and look at, but not to touch, blistered of thirst on my lips, instead of a kiss, as the pink flowers drip.

Study hall

 (date uncertain)

Her long blonde hair

Drips over the back of the seat

In a study hall that is not in a hall at all

But in an auditorium

And we seated like spectators

Waiting for a movie to start

That will never start,

The tips of her hair dusting my knees

Like a tease,

She is so pretty my eyes ache

Just to look at her,

With me so shy

(when I was still shy)

I can barely speak,

But study every move she makes

As if she was my text book,

Catching glimpse of her lips

Or eye lashes each time

She turns to talk to this friend

Or that friend

On this side or that,

Her lips so pink they make me bleed

Her eyes so blue, I drown

She is not a mirage

For a boy stumbling from a dry

Dry desert,

I could touch her if I dared,
I would kiss her if I could,

I’m just too scared to ask,

And so I nearly explode

When she turns to me

And wants me to take her

To the dance,

Me, the shy kid from study hall,

The long-haired beatnik type

Not her type at all

In a school full of cool kids

And jocks,

She a dream come true,

Long hair framing a perfect face

And my head filled with visions

Of being so close

I might embrace,

She asking me to meet

Beyond this hive of echoes,

Beyond a study hall

That is not a study hall at all,

Me, the kid seated behind her,

And she reading me

Like an open book.

Sigh to sigh

(date unknown)

I watch you watch me

As I started at the top

The first button

Popping open

Between my thumb

And forefinger

You do not ask

Where I am going,

The road map

Is clearly marked,

The first followed

By the next

Until it opens

Before me

Like a gate,

And still you watch

Wide-eyed like a doe

But not naïve

We have come

This way before

If not together,

Our need mingling

With the heat

So we both sweat,

Your eyes like

A temperature gauge

Telling me exactly

When I’m getting warm,

Moisture on your brow

As my fingers feel

The soft landscape,

Circling the tips

Of these twin peaks,

A glorious explorer

Lacking any sense

Of shame

Pushed on

By my own

Rise thermometer

Until the heat threatens

To blow its top off

I watch your eyes

Watch mine

As I breathe into you,

Eye to eye,

Mouth to mouth,

Thigh to thigh,

Sigh to sigh

Lost soul

(date unknown)

I stare into her eyes

Because I care look no where else

And still I drown

Like a drunken sailor

Staggering over

The shape of her lips

Or the part in her blouse

Her curves making me

Swell up like a sail,

Feeling myself driven

By a wind I cannot control,

While I sink deep into her eyes

Despite my best efforts

To stay afloat,

Hearing her song inside my head,

A poor man’s Odysseus

bound to the mast

to keep from straying,

and still I stray

a glance down, a wish for a kiss,

or touch of hand,

a lost soul in an endless sea

of my own desires

rising and falling to her tides

as I stare into her eyes,

knowing the whole time

I cannot help but drown

And breathe her

deep anyway

Purposely

When nice is not enough

(Date unknown)

This is not the way it is supposed to be,

I think, but do not stop,

Nice is a four letter word I hate hear

When nice is the last thing I ache to be,

And vow not to become one of those

Lonely old men who want but can’t

Get up the nerve to take what they need,

This balancing act between proper

And profitable spoiling their lives,

When we can live our lives only once

And better to push in and feel strong

Than to miss it altogether,

My hands lingering with the scent of you

While my thoughts know I many

Never breathe it in again,

Thinking of that old cliché about

Better to have had and lost than not

To have had at all, said by some

Poor fool who knew nice

Would never do at all,

But where’s the edge, the point

After the plunge when nice guys

Pick up the pieces

Nice but not nice inside,

Where all men know well the truth,

And so I reach in and feel it

While I still have fingers to feel,

Not carrying what I’ll think

About in the morning.

First touch

(With Sandy in the balcony of the Fabian Theater, 1967)

I always thought it would be hard

Or firm before I slipped my fingers

Between the buttons that first time

In the dark long ago

I still think that way

Each time I reach in

Even when I know better

The tip of it the only part

That ever gets hard

Oozing out like a maple tree’s sap

So that my fingers get moist

Though the taste is not as sweet

As I always think it should be,

Yet better than I often imagine

So that I need always

To get my mouth around it

To get some more

A ritual, I never weary of,

Reaching in to gather the fruit

I eventually must consume

Not always in the dark

Like that first time,

But always with the same

Unquenchable hunger

This need to feel

To feel, to taste, to touch

With whatever part of me

I can, to feed this rage

Inside of me that won’t stop there

But goes deep,

All the way to where

The sweetest sap flows.

Consumed

Aug. 30, 2014 

The juice dribbles down my chin

From where I bite through the skin
The prick of flesh
And the rush of sweet bliss
The aftermath of a lovefest,
Of feeling the flesh first
The smooth curve against
The palm of my hand,
The hard place
Where the step detached,
Rough against hand and tongue
The wanting, the waiting
The need to have what is
Deep inside where my fingers
Cannot reach, nor my tongue
Until I break through
And let it rush over me,
My mouth unable to contain
All it has to offer
But I want it all,
And drink deep until
I drown in its sticky dripping
Like a honey bear
Consumed by what
He aches for most

Existence itself

Friday, July 03, 2015

I press against you

As if the world depends upon it

And it does

This contact like crash of continents

Before time divided them

This press against

This heavy caress,

This kiss filled with the need to survive

Knowing that to lose it

Is to cease to exist

In a universe that makes us

All feel so small,

Life is not measured by big things

But by tiny moments – and movements

You breathing as I breathe,

Taking me inside so I feel what you feel

And I move inside your skin

In a cosmos filled with supernovas

And exploding suns,

Where planets collide in cataclysmic intensity

This touch we touch does as much

Vibrations that move out

From where we embrace

The universe itself

Our heart bets pressing against each other

The reason the universe exists

More than mere a big bang

Out from which existence starts

But the only reason to exist

I press against you because

Existence depends upon it.