oh, but if only

oh, but if only you'd sleep
naked more often
then i could enjoy your warm
silky softness
which the most luxurious of bedclothes
cannot match -

and i cannot
resist

hot

petite but potent
my Chihli Padi
sends spicy texts

some about memories
some about fantasies
some about promises

as i blush
sometimes in remembrance

all around me -
as i imagine
and i anticipate -
suddenly turns sultry

and i'm soaked

right
down



there

short message service

after thumbing option "1 Send" i wondered
why i am swamping you with text messages
inconsequential and prosaic kilobytes
of tele-communiqué in a tongue we adapted
for ourselves -

      i's walking to bus stop. you has good rest?
      i buys breakfast now. you has lunch? /
      i's in office logs on in a bit
      don't forget to get dinner /
      <3

(et cetera) - wherefore the compulsion?


do these little bits of information
begin to bridge even a little
the physical distance between where you are
   and where i am
one seemingly-trivial short message at a time?

smile

i miss so much to feel
the warmth of your body next to mine
the smile our bodies made on the bed
(the one i wore)
as we drifted off to sleep

alone in my bed
there is no smile to be found
only - perhaps -
a little forlorn frown
i make by my lonesome self

star star

the star that walked me home tonight
- the first i saw
  the one upon which i wished i might -
i hope it's the same star
that watches over you
as you lay asleep in bed
tonight

lying in bed without you

a line from a thousand lovesongs
(insipid, sappy, and wallowing quite happily
 in its own misery)
but late into the early morning
in the stagnant blindness of my bedroom
i - lying in bed without you -
remember the 'C' of your body
into which mine so perfectly fits
and the leg - yours - which slips
so naturally between mine
how your arm will try to pull me
closer still to you

lying in bed without you
i remember all this

or

perhaps

all this reminds me that i am
lying in bed without you

i love listening to you sleep -
especially when you're softly snoring away,
or grunting, or mumbling incomprehensibly -

(i just want you to know that)

but not as much as i like falling asleep
next to you

since that first night
you came over and held me
and it felt all so familiar
so comforting and oh-so
right

yes it did

and still does

um

i don't know why i feel so unsettled every time you leave
so unsteady, rattled as if i were on a high cliff peering
over the perilous edge, my balance precarious
my stomach upsets from the vague but urgent panic
of a traveler stranded on an arid plain
having drunk their last drop of water by accident
thinking there was more water in the bottle than there really is

will you please let me know when the bottle empties?

pilferage

my head now seems emptied
of the thoughts and the ideas
and the dreams within
my heart now echoes hollowly
with every beat
and my lungs oh my lungs
i am left breathless
breathless

if you have stolen them all
my thoughts my ideas my dreams my breath
i should not report the theft
for they are yours for the taking
and if you had not taken them
i would have given them to you anyway

but if i should steal from you
now and again
a touch a kiss a hug
would you mind my every pilferage?

more than welly

i would like       to be there      with you       squeezed       into that space       between       one attosecond       and       the next       where       (i think)       it is timeless       and       it would be       just you and me

would you want       to get lost       in that moment       with me?

fill_in_the_blanks

a a a a a a a e e e i i i i i i i i i i o o o o o o o o o o u u u u u

f_r     _s     l_ng     _s     y__     w_nt
_     w_ll

b_t     _ll     _     c_n     d_     n_w     _s
w_rk     _t     g_tt_ng     _nt_     y__r     l_f_
_nd     w_sh     y__     _nt_     m_n_

counting

i've started counting the weeks
watching the days
the minutes
since you left

oh why must February have 29 days this year?
that's a whole extra 24 hours
1,440 minutes i must find a way to fill
or whittle away

and when will you set your clocks back
so that the 1 incorporeal hour would be emptied
and we are 1 hour closer to each other?

my clock is already set ahead -
its time has never been changed -
because even though it reminds me
of how far ahead you are
somehow it makes me feel closer
to you too

sleep

in the bus on my way home
after trying to convince you
to sleep to rest
and thinking i had succeeded
i closed my eyes to think of you
lying in bed with your teddy
and dream of you lying in bed
beside me
holding you
being held by you -
the strange familarity
and unsettling ease -
over and over again in my mind ...

wake me up when you get here

but now
just let me dream of you

spent

i don't need tickets
that money can buy
easily affordable
because cents & dollars
can be set aside
to accumulate
and be spent at a go

but no matter how many
seconds & minutes & hours
i set aside every day
they do not carry forward
do not accumlate
into the days & weeks
months & years
i'd like to spend at a go
with you

06:44 your time

i'm still awake on my tiny island
not daring to text you
in case i woke you
before your alarm does

but i feel compelled to
somehow
connect with you
even if through meaningless words
that don't exist in real life

a reality
that precludes us
not you
not me
us

so that all i can do
now
and the only time i think
of you
     which is
     when i take
     a breath
all i can do
is send strings
of words
     such as

(01:44 my time)

i miss you
to distraction

numbers:apart

5 hours at a time
4 at another

5,305 air miles
(but not enough frequent flyer miles
 to be claimed
 for tickets
 to see you)

4,610 nautical miles
the Pacific Ocean
(largest of the world's
 five oceans)
the body of water
in between

the number of seconds, minutes, hours,
days, weeks, months, and years
as finite and infinite
as our schedules allow

but in my memories
and in my dreams

oh-so close
together

drowning

come drown me
in kisses

or
let me dive right in
and lose myself
in you

watching you sleep

too far away from me
remembering the nights
how close you were

like that teddy you clutch
in your arm
you'd hold me to sleep

but would roll away
when you finally fell
asleep

and i'd wake up
to move in close
to you

watching you sleep
a mere kiss away
distance i could close

Short List

when you go
i will take away with me
the following items:

1. the nights on which i'd kept you up
   
   
   1. refusing to let you close your eyes for even the slimmest scintilla of a second
      
      1. because i wanted you with me
         
      2. all of you
         
      3. all the time
         
      4. if only for that seemingly infinite moment
         
      5. that stretched and wrapped itself around the small finite universe
         
      6. only we two occupied
      
      
      
   2. when my blind fingertips beheld you
      
      1. remembered and recognized you
         
      2. more than my unseeing eyes did
         
      3. remembering my remembering you
         
      4. everything else was immaterial
         
      5. to the feel of you
      
      
      
   3. and i breathed you in
      
      1. one part oxygen and five parts you
         
      2. so i could submerse and had willing drowned
         
      3. in you
         
      4. carefully lining the center of this
         
      5. our infinite moment
         
      6. in our finite universe
         
      7. with the delicate fichu of your honey-scent
         
      8. within Mnemosyne's transient walls
         
      9. for as long it would be possible
      
      
      
   4. because, really, all i wanted was to kiss you
      
      1. which was to learn the feel and texture of you
         
      2. and lock all that knowledge up
         
      3. in Mnemosyne's frangible boudoir
   
   
   
2. the scant hours and minutes and seconds of days you offered
   
   
   1. when i was allowed to have you all to myself
      
      1. in the front-seat of the car
         
      2. when you reached your hand for mine
         
      3. and i learned the sign language
         
      4. exclusive (i hope) only to us
         
      5. be marked by the graze and imprint of your lips
         
      6. on my fingers and palms
         
      7. more kisses i'd held in these two hands
         
      8. than my ten fingers can count
      
      
      
   2. skimmed off surreptitiously in the company of others
      
      1. in the back-seat of the car
         
      2. in the dark
         
      3. or hidden from view in daylight
         
      4. shoulder-to-shoulder - or shoulder on shoulder -
         
      5. joined at the arms
         
      6. sometimes the hands
         
      7. oh so silently
      
      
      
   3. i brushed past you
      
      1. bumping shoulders
         
      2. glancing arms
         
      3. by accident
         
      4. only occasionally
   
   
   
3. the marks you'd left
   
   
   1. all over seen on me
      
      1. all too few
         
      2. unfortunately
      
      
      
   2. unseen in me
      
      1. all over
         
      2. so completely
         
      3. oh so fortunately
         
      4. for me

taste

i taste
with my fingertips
the texture of your arm and neck
      and back
the goosebumps that trail behind
my fingertips
the little fountains of shivers
that drench them upon
arrival

whatever these fingertips do not seek
(always travelling blindly)
whatever they do not look for
they find in surprise
- and spades -
wherever they
stop

or
not