Witching Hour

If I allow my eyes to unfocus just so
in the bluing light I can remake you.

You are weeping, next to me in bed.
We face each other,
mouths soft and silent.
Looking into your eyes as we lie
together is like peering through
the branches of a silver maple
just as the light fails.

All the fist weight of day recedes, leaving room for night to seep
into the air like a bruise.
Light is an overbearing lover,
but when he sleeps dream-forms wake,
protean, changling demons
of a thousand faces chanting
every constellation of night song:
etcetera, mad cricketing,
slow dirge-airs rising and falling, long unbroken brush strokes.

In this moment the walls of the world
wane thin a delicate as rice paper,
and if your eyes do not fail
with the light you can see shades
behind that creasing veil:
clutch unfurl wait.

Zach West
Unknown "Protected Beauty" Hopeless - 15 years, 11 months, 21 days ago

Not Eden

In a book with a yellow cover, I found
the name of a plant that I'd found in our wood
one February morning when an early melt
unshrouded the brush. The berries were small,
pink, and clear as dawn over the rise
of our mounded land. When we moved in,
my father looked at the mounds and said,
"We've got ourselves a burial ground
or two." But for the dead, I'd have roamed
farther afield, and it was then that I found
the berries cold in a pile of leaves
that my brother hadn't cleared in the fall.

They told me never to taste—no, not at all
for any reason—

but they were sweet, iced mint and sharp
as the season.

Adrienne J. Odasso
Unknown "Protected Beauty" Hopeless - 15 years, 12 months, 2 days ago

The Same Deep Water As You

kiss me goodbye
pushing out before i sleep
can't you see i try
swimming the same deep water as you is hard
"the shallow drowned lose less than we"
you breathe
the strangest twist upon your lips
"and we shall be together... "

"kiss me goodbye
bow your head and join with me"
and face pushed deep
reflections meet
the strangest twist upon your lips
and disappear
the ripples clear
and laughing
break against your feet
and laughing
break the mirror sweet
"so we shall be together... "

"kiss me goodbye"
pushing out before i sleep
it's lower now and slower now
the strangest twist upon your lips
but i don't see
and i don't feel
but tightly hold up silently
my hands before my fading eyes
and in my eyes
your smile
the very last thing before i go...

i will kiss you i will kiss you
i will kiss you forever on nights like this
i will kiss you i will kiss you
and we shall be together...

The Cure
Unknown "Protected Beauty" Hopeless - 15 years, 12 months, 2 days ago

Untitled

hopelessly drift
in the eyes of the ghost again
down on my knees
and my hands in the air again
pushing my face in the memory of you again
but i never know if it's real
never know how i wanted to feel
never quite said what i wanted to say to you
never quite managed the words to explain to you
never quite knew how to make them believable
and now the time has gone
another time undone
hopelessly fighting the devil
futility
feeling the moster
climb deeper inside of me
feeling him gnawing my heart away
hungrily
i'll never lose this pain
never dream of you again

The Cure
Unknown "Protected Beauty" Hopeless - 16 years, 2 days ago

The Funeral Party

two pale figures
ache in silence
timeless
in the quiet ground
side by side
in age and sadness

i watched
and acted wordlessly
as piece by piece
you performed your story
moving through an unknown past
dancing at the funeral party

memories of childrens' dreams
lie lifeless
fading
lifeless
hand in hand with fear and shadows
crying at the funeral party

i heard a song
and turned away
as piece by piece
you performed your story
noiselessly across the floor
dancing at the funeral party

The Cure
Unknown "Protected Beauty" Hopeless - 16 years, 2 days ago