Sisyphus On the Down-Angle

If words were like water, I could drink them from you,
No fear would split the night, or slice a mind in two.

If words were like food, you could take them inside,
They'd assuage all doubts, and the faint heart, override.

If words were like crimson, paint the soul they would
In red's fiery tempest, and blue's serene hood.

If I were more beautiful, there would be ne'er a grasp,
Tears would not flow so easily,
and a parched throat of desire wouldn't trouble you so
with doubt's ugly rasp.

My mind, it's own worst enemy, t'wood not wrench and twist,
Love would find contentedness, here, not a cuff 'round the wrist.
A cuff that lashes back
 to a winter's discontent,
When broken and battered,
 the heart was almost spent.

If words were like weapons, and sliced through time,
they could be blocked, by your strong arms, at once, so sublime.
This average waif would not need you to often reinforce,
what others pulled asunder through searing discourse.

If words were like time, regardless of care,
No thoughts of loss or tempest-toss would blast with trumpeted blare.

Yet they ring in my ears,
on the days that I dwell,
within this cold outcrop,
o'er the sea's raging swell.
Here, my feet are like vines, they cannot move with haste,
instead they creep slowly into light,
but many days, they waste.
Waste in an agony so needless . . .
 and I curse myself
for not being stronger, for being a glass vase on a shelf.

I do not know why, there is need for such things,
I am not special, nor made precious,as rare a gem
as one find in silvered rings.

In fact, at times I think of no reason you love me at all.
Im part-broken, part-mended,
  but how easily I fall!
Fall into pain, into heartache and doubt. 
One's surprised you don't brush it all away and say to hell with this lout.

Nevertheless, were words as so many ribbons of steel,
Yours would ring back, on forgetful ears they'd peal.

The thoughts you've given, not frequent, I confess,
have been genuine and heartfelt,
nevertheless . . .
Words are often lost when the mind is a-blaze
with angst and panick, bricking forward into a road of malaise,

Why in the wide world
a woman's heart needs such reiteration,
her love must wonder,
and wait with anticipation.
She must question as to why her statements are not recalled,
She seems to forget them,
One supposes she's most appalled. 
Appalled at how often,
she needs her to say,
Why she needs her, why she loves her,
what the hell needs MORE say? 
She's said it before, why does she not now hear,
Does she have no memory?
Do things not recall in her ear?
If words were like the stars, they'd never disappear,
They'd simply re-group still alive in another sphere.

Word unbroken, and this plain, unworthy woman wouldn't question your mind.
Based on her own baggage,
she'd just leave it behind.

Not easily done, though . . . sloughing off pain and fear
The heart seems little more than scarred tissue,
When thoughts are unclear.

At long last Dear Heart
I'm sorry to need such things as I do. 
Forgive me, my love, but this much is true.

To say I love you, is not adequate by far.
I see you for the woman, the person, you are.

Im a pale shadow, around you I creep.
Imagining myself lucky if dreams I enter, as you sleep.

Ill be worth it someday, on this you have my vow.
I love you for always, forever, and especially right now.
Forgive my weakness, my hysteria, and fear. 
If one weren't so broken at times, they'd never be near.

Unfortunate for you, they are mine when sorrow pours,
I'm not nearly what one should be, but I offer what is here,
without a doubt,
I am yours.


I love you

The Creakings of the Door

I am old news.

Once my pages were not thin and worn, but crisped the fingertips with mystery and stories yet to be read.

My writing was not worn; the strokes, unblemished.

Like a crunch and crack of a bite into whole fruit, I invited you without even knowing. 


Now, my quickening has ceased and it does not matter that the way of all things ushers it so.  

Your eyes seek newness, and a bloom of words on the tongue that I cannot strike.  
It seems my stories have become withered, unlike our hands that I hoped would stay clasped until we were old.  
They shake before our time, Dear Heart.

Loneliness was not a familiar guest in my modern pages until moments ago, in our time.  
Yet, it warms my cup now and nestles in, as two friends who continue a conversation of yore.  
It knows milk and no sugar for me, lights a fire in the brick, and begins to read the familiar stories in my pages of which IT never tires.

Mysteries must be zigs and worlds of zags, it seems.  
Else, they reek of an Old Queen's blankets and her luggage rides heavy.  
Wisdom flees in this light and recedes backward, away from us, you and I, leaving two children one with outstretched hand, the other with Janus's eyes looking into two.  

I want for you though you are near me.  My heart aches to hold the whole of yours again.  
You think I do not know.
You think I do not.
You think.

Nevertheless, I refuse abandon the sojourn.  
I am.
I am still the one who will remain, my love, though I recognized many times ago that it is my place to never be too far from sorrow.  
Yet, in these moments it came in your letters, quite unexpected.  
The base and bulwarck of my feet and hands shook.
  
Convincing the doubt is monumental.  
It was thought these things had passed this in life.  
It was a happy, forgotten time until the ghosts and shadows crept into my parlour unannounced, and sat in your chair. 

I am.  
You may see.  
For without it, my heart is sad.  
Of your bread I eat the crust and the whole, the heel and the loaf.  
Yet, there is always sorrow.  
It greets me in passages of words you speak without my ears hearing.  
Angst both wild and alarming that never stumbled leaps around my room with abandon, sounding its klaxon and shrill shriek of fear.

I never thought again, it would find me.  
I did not even think I need run.  
Yet, the Raven's promise of Nevermore shattered all to pieces like so many shards 
of sun-weathered, plastic bowls, and faded yellow rooms.
  
I pondered over you, never forgetting your lore.  
But mine no longer vibrates and hums beneath the veil.  

It lies still in your eyes though its pulse runs as sure and fast as ever.  
It needs your recognition to live, and with every moment of loneliness, 
the heart of it creaks down a stairway of hidden sorrow.  

I no longer am.  
I am old.  
I am past.

I have always known that I would be never too far from sorrow.  
But your inscription of it stings, my love.  

We sit still and dormant, waiting for the spring's return of a fortifying new grace.


 -G.