Paul

Before we met, I heard your laughter
running through mountains
loud as thunder, bright as music,
fresh and happy as the first rain
Before we met, I heard your laughter
frolicking with swans, strong as a brass band

I followed your crooked smile, shaped like a brook,
through forests and hills, down skipping cliffs
running over with shells and seeds
Seeds holding whole futures in their hollowness
Our future waiting to be born and
spread its limbs over widening skies
that we might climb the ladder and build our kingdom

As we grew older, the children talked and laughed
about your mouth full of mirth
Too big for a man your size, they said
And they climbed high upon your laughter,
fell down in fits of giggles, then crumbled
trying to keep up with your fat, furious laugh
They wrestled you to pin it down—claim it as their own

Whole families rode within your wild laughter
in roller coaster curls at the beach, through ocean spray,
splashing in foamy bubbles upon the shore
The night your crooked smile cradled me,
shaped like the soft curve of a neck
I followed that smile on tip toes and traced its mysteries
Its plain and simple secrets
that led to the surprise of you
and simply ended in the surprise of us

So beautiful.

Lips

Lips exploring, lapping at freedom
and newness, crimson pillows in bloom
bursting ripe berries of delight
singing red notes sweet as candy
Stinging hot drops that billow
with the vastness of being
Hungry buds nestled in caves of glory—
wide cactus of whiteness
I drink greedily at your gateway to the unknown
Your breath,
like warm ocean breezes,
quenches my eternal thirst
in tickling, rushing waves breaking
on pinkness,
suckling the roof of heaven
with sweetness
The abyss expands, surrounding emptiness
like velvet melodies
Your kisses, my descent
into silken warmth—the forgotten womb

Eyes

You hide like youth
behind lashes thick as pine forests,
camouflaging your dark, lush eyes
Eyes of the deer elope
through glaring constellations
I plunge into the wilderness there,
run blindly through your savage world

Your eyes excite me,
like a flash in a skillet
Dangerous, boiling hot, ready to explode
I sizzle under your bituminous eyes
Coils aflame with energy and heat
Gestic eyes, musical, complete—
they envelop me

Under your eyes I feel whole and light,
a paradox, their genesis,
bursting with spark and life,
which serenades my soul—
whole within your soul
How many others have found themselves
completely in your luminosity?

Multiplying in folds of resonance
until absorbed invisibly, like never before
Lost to the otherworldliness inside us
I somersault from worlds within worlds
within bottomless eyes
Held by their silence, I am suspended

I cast off cumbersome time,
its senselessness,
as I wade through your cabala
Drawn into you,
the mythological instrument
of falcons and splendor—
complete sustenance
within the sacristy of those eyes

Ecstasy’s Villanelle

I longed to hold it always near
in whispers gentle as the night
It offered hope delivered fear

Its plan for me was never clear
yet drawn into its perfect light
I longed to hold it always near

Expecting passion to appear
with promise growing warm and bright
It offered hope delivered fear

In such a tender atmosphere
surrendering without a fight
I longed to hold it always near

So sure it was my destiny
No care I gave to wrong or right
It offered hope delivered fear

Spellbound by beauty's mystery
an agony of such delight
I longed to hold it always near
It offered hope delivered fear

This Silent House

I knew you once, or so I thought
When silence filled this house
Your emerald eyes lit up all the corners
And you came to me gently,
on the paws of midnight,
licked deep my wounds
and never looked away

I can not find you in hushed insentience
I hear your voice pelting
like bullets in some forgotten war—
shot into deep rivers
Rivulets of tears have carried you away
to that distant place,
where memory’s forgotten,
but hands remember the way

I long to take you into silence,
let the wind dance on your smile,
unleash your rigid reticence,
chase away rightness and doubt
The twilight is too short,
my sorrow too long,
to wedge between your heart and mine
The day isn’t ours
but belongs to this silent house

My blood runs freely now that
I’ve turned fragile
I no longer hunger for your black coat
to nuzzle my ankles—all shackled and chained
You are the face of freedom
and loneliness and beauty
You are the high reaching notes of the violin
and the bow of wonder
But when I try to sweep your strings,
all I hear is this silent house

You are not the key to tomorrows
or the misunderstanding of yesterday
You are the taste of distance—
what can not be—and things carried away
in light green bottles,
sending my heart’s melody to distant isles,
where music looks like courage
and all that’s lost ends up here
to sing awhile before being swallowed up
by this silent house