We may cheers over beer
Dive in to share tastes
Giggle with bubble tea
Lick sweet sorbet
Delve into song and dance
To lighten the way
The world leaves its mark
On our souls with its weight
Heartbreak and grief
Wander on waterfront
Winding tales of loves
Future dreams and wants
While the night is young
Evening light is on the lee
Talk to the trees
Tell them what you wish of me
When lives are woven
Together
Time picks stitches apart
Bodies borrow another
To try on like an Emperor
Parade down side streets
Exposed
Inside seams of the core
Of our being
Butterflies alight
A bird sits on shoulder
To whisper incantations
To tell me things
Are not right
When will I listen?
Sometimes, only
Appropriate response
To prolonged pain
Is unending silence
Landmarks and monuments
Memories hold a space
For absent friends
Our minds work - something like-
Predictive text and internal GPS
If I sense a state of potential
Belonging, intimacy, a resonance
Quickly, I calculate the length of time
Till I am alone, lost and abandoned
How often these sums add up
So it seems, I am waiting- longing, even -
For someone who might
Be brave enough
To prove me wrong
So long to have lived
With tiny indifference
Savour stale bite
A lack of substance
Silence to question
Deaf ear to conversation
Closed eyes to presence
Denied a way out
So starved of kindness
Robbed of affection
The bitter chill of winter
All we know of love
Sun-burst braid of nerves
Melding thoughts chased
By gut reasoning
Breathe in deeply
Sense its signal
A visceral axis
When I see her walking
Down yesterday's pathway
The sun inside lights up
Warms the belly
Tingling spine
Heart stops a beat of time
Left speechless, still and wanting
Solitude seems socially unacceptable
Depending on the setting
Is it mysterious to wander along the beach
In interminable solitude?
Not a single bark could break.
Or solo cinematic scenes
Where similarly independent
Movie-goers give
Knowledgeable nod
No crime of post-show criticism to endure
Obnoxious conversation and laugh-out-loud bores.
No, the only antidote to such affliction
Of unmet needs in company left wanting
To explore the world through these eyes
No intolerable distractions
To sense, feel alive again, to learn and pay attention
Solitude a saving grace
For the tender hearted
So easily bruised by heated exchanges.
My body is not a commodity
A kiss is not a currency
In too-familiar territory
Heavy feather of expectation
In all the natural world
We are enamoured by a species
Whose female decides
By right and reason
How exotic ~ a bird, frog or spider
For exercising will to allow or deny
Whose freedom to foster new life?
These warm grey days
Staccato rain, occasional
Blasts of wild west wind
Drop down the lee of the mountain
Resonating with inner barometer
Warm, still body
Turbulent thoughts, occasional
Gusts of the past kick up
Sting the eyes, dry the mouth
Waiting for a warm spring downpour
Persistent trill, soft beat of drum on skin
Melds with melancholy strings
A Symphony of meteorological sounds
Without and within
