taking in

I can keep keeping you away, locked away as though in a dreamlike state, where edges blur, faces are forgotten. I can keep you far from here, as likely as you are far from here. Without doubt, intermingled and crass humor, where starched shirts, buttoned and proper, do not apply.

You are haunting me. You engulf my dreams. I awaken enraged. I am always so angry, so unsatisfied. You leave me empty in the process. You never give me a reason; you never give me an answer. This is how it has always been, it seems. Perhaps it’s simply a suggestion for me to let go. I just felt my heart stop, momentarily, because while that thought comes along quite often enough, I never really entertain it.

Ghosts.

Ghosts that walk across the street as I pass through their glitter. Ghosts that hold me still as I recognize that curve convincing me to go north. Ghosts that draw me toward the forest, magical, just to show me. Because they might have shown me what I want to know.

Can this be my transition? Does it get to be this simple? Truly, it’s all standing right before me. I always say I know that there really is no question.

Wine that lingers on my tongue, just as it always had here. Candlelight that never gets broken. Keeping graceful, though it is only my own mirage. I shape me to me being my own.

I desire breaking me off of you. Those strings of gold that, tight and caught, link us together. I do. I will. You just hold the line.

So I see you here. I want to follow your path, this trail of crumbs you leave, but it leads me so far away. It carries me, my body, my heart, my mind, and I get absorbed into the ocean depths of your own great unknown. I would be too far away from the safety and warmth of what I have within arms reach. He keeps me safe, warm. He holds me when I cry for you.

Hunter.

Blueprints of what this was supposed to be into the fire. Everything that I thought I knew was wrong. If I were them, I’d keep you too. I don’t think I know anyone better fit, more suited for the role.

Can you shine like I shine? You’re masked in darkness and I’m his sun. He made me the center of his universe and I’m taking in.

I see you there. I see you as you turn away from me, I see you go. When I can’t touch you and I can’t be something tangible, I want to go. Holding my hand and I’m sliding down hills three inches high. Safety fits here and here she will be. I’m not going to force something to exist when it’s so easy to give in.

Handsome, sweet boy who watches me have red and smiles. I see that in you. I take it with me, everywhere I go, without question. Indubitably. I’m chasing that Vermont day, the stairwell where you pulled me back into your arms and wanted to hold me, wanted me to understand. That stairwell where you wanted me to understand that you were pulling me out of you because you wanted to keep me safe from you. I tried then, I tried again and again, and I think it’s time for me to go now.

You’re more than welcome to leave. But I’m going to keep this in me. It goes cellular. Disintegration of being, you watch me watch what you do to me. Slowly tracing my bloodlines. Feeding desire of knowledge. Giving in, piece by piece, and I’m taking in.

I can be hunter and nurturer in the same flesh. Cool and calm, in from the sea. Grey clouds heavy overhead. Early morning, linen barefoot on the sand. Awaiting December. Dragging fingers through grains turns to gripping in panic. Sea turns red. Gun smoke burns in my nose. Some place we destroy. We destroy here and here, my sweet destroyer. And self.

He smiles at me, and I let your ghost hand go with you back into your darkness. He takes me by the hand and moments later my hand is at my neck and my cheeks are rosy. Because this is happiness. You and your right wrist and the way you hold your phone, the way you rage over quality, the way we talk about the American flag, patriot. Keeper.

He smiles at me, and I let me dance for him. I let whatever holds me back go. This is his dream. I choose to become involved. I tell you because you should know. You know me, you know how I need.

I watch the moon in the mornings. You appreciate her like few others I know. I teach her to appreciate her as well. She said, ‘the moon is walking with us.’ And I think of you.

I escape to that place where I’m watching you, fascinated, employed. Where you disassemble your machinery directly after the disintegration of me over the course of the hours it takes to disassemble machinery and girls. Make metal and flesh into what you will.

He lets me into daffodils and flower gardens of the sort. I watch pink suede engulf everything I want and take over. Velvet red in rose. I accompany bees to trees in the sunlight. He wants everything to be crystalline. Perfection. Divinity. Insisting it to do so, I let me out the window.

On time now, I hear your voice. I hear you calling my name.