I Bloom for You Only

I know I write about girls being loved in the light but
In that moment
I was bonfire,
Jack o lantern
Harvest moon
Things you can only appreciate in the dark
when the leaves are falling
and the chill is
animated anticipation.

You were “Sunday Morning”
personified:
hands cupping my face
So gentle
So certain
So soft
Unwinding scarf
and searching fingers.

And I am all
puddle in a passenger seat,
morning glory opposite;
hitched breath
and tender touch.

Seeking exhalation—
Still.

Memory in
flickering glow;
unabashed,
but only in shadow.

Pillow Talk

My parents are talking in their bed
and I wonder about a time like this,

where the surface you come to rest
becomes the surface you come to confess
in between the arms of each other.

How a bed is a cage of secrets
and regrets;
a chest that holds moments of both
bliss and sadness.

How the quiet of the night
doesn’t still your tongue,

how one crawls day after day
back onto the mattress,
to curl up next to who they call
love.

Finding Love in Art

I picture the thought of future somebody,
the same way I picture future me:
From the back,
staring at
art,
a park,
lights hanging from trees
like technicolor fireflies in the dark,
me:
wrapped in some too big sweater,
you
with hands in pockets,
nose covered by scarf,
holding ourselves together,
but feeling larger than life.
Hearts like hearths
melting all the extra ice,
kindling blushes
and glowing eyes.

I picture future us
the same way I picture eternity:
everlasting;
yes, finally;

bright.

Dear Future Love

I want to know
What you love on your tongue
what you touch to feel alive
what scents
what sounds
what sights
do you thread through your veins
because each composes your pulse?

I want to know how you see it
The moment
have you ever pictured me?
what if
you’re creative—-
combines with my combustible
are you willing for this to be
abstract
Artistic tragedy?

I want to know
if you practiced my name—-
if the very thought causes your lips to frame it

The way I’ve whispered yours into my pillow at night

Hoping
Praying

Sugar (Simile Poem)

Love like
sweet cream;
like first sip of coffee
with something syrupy sweet.

French vanilla
love,
all movie nights
and bottom lip bites
and waiting for pinkies
to accidentally cross.

Sweaty palms
welcome here.

Innocent
love,
again.
All first glance,
first touch,
first kiss.
Arms are
enough to be wrapped in,
no need for tangled limbs.

Sunlight caress,
love.
All soft and warm.
Gentle, but not
scared love.
Dreamy, sleepy smile
love.

Love like
first ice cream in the spring.
Like re-opened drive through
and catchy pop songs
old and new.

Love
so sweet.

Tangible Tenderness

I miss the softness,
the comma curling of
two bodies.
My hair fanned out on a pillow
and the look in his eyes.

If I’m called “beautiful” then
I might believe it.
The way I’ll tuck my head
against his chest,
the way he’ll press a kiss to crown.

The soft murmurings,
even the silence.

Tangible tenderness,
it’ll come again.
I wait for it.

Consume

You swallow
and I hear the crack
–
of waves breaking against rocks,
of lightning splitting trees,
of all my resolve splintering into
a million
tiny

–
You swallow
and my mouth is dry
–
like sandstorm in Sahara,
like shelter in monsoon season,
like heat unfurling through
every limb,
every sinew,
every cell.
–
You swallow
and I am so, so thirsty.
–
You swallow
and I wish I was
tasting you.

Wood Chippings

He says he has the hands of a carpenter, not soft, like my past lovers.
By this he means: “Not good enough”.
I tell him to carve me;
whittle me with his words until I am nothing
but sawdust kissing the ground and he
is the one sweeping me up.

Star-Gazing

Tell me what the hood of your truck feels like.
I think I want to melt into warm metal.
I think I want to look at the stars so much
that my love for constellations
causes them to tremble.
I think I want the sky to fall on me.

Tell me that that is a kind of love.

See us sitting in a field,
flannel blanket amidst wild flowers.
You murmur about life’s imperfections and I laugh a garden.
We entwine under an indigo sky
and there are vines connecting with pinpoints of life.
I think I want to root into earth.
I think I want the soil to take our fingerprints
twist our DNA
until we are nothing more than dandelion fluff
and children are wishing on the fantasy of us.

Tell me that that is a sign of blooming.

Tell me we can be something
under a dark sky
amidst swaying stems.
Tell me that summer is more than just “I think”
and “are wishing”.
Show me more than
“kinds” and “signs.”

Promise me
that we, too, can be wonderful.

Stay, just a little bit longer.

It is 12:07AM and I am
listening to Dion’s cover
of “Dream Lover” and
writing about graveyards.

Tell me in the future,
when I rake my fingers through my bangs,
have the pen behind my ear
and the desk light focused on the manuscript,
you’ll join me in the study,

Tell me
you’ll sing
“I want a dream lover,
so I don’t have to dream alone.”

Tell me
you’ll come up behind me,
kiss my head
and then retreat to the couch
that sits in my secluded space.

That you won’t leave
when the well is running low.
That you will stay when the ink
on the quill has dried.

Promise me
that you’ll stay
even if the writing’s dark,
even if Johnny Mathis fills the space
meant for shadows.

Promise me
you’ll stay when the ghost take over the pages
and the heads roll between the lines.

Love me
because even though I write death scenes
on nights like these,
when the music is happy
and my fingers are crying,

I’m a simple girl
who lives for fairytales
and wants her own happy ending.