She, in my Mysterious Ways

 

I tell her that I love her
in all the mysterious ways
this is what I will do on mostly sunny days...
I will tell her she means the world to me, when the truth is that she means more than reality. 
I would tell her that she's a photograph I found on the internet, but I want to to feel that she is still there for me and that hasn't actually happened yet.

She tells me that I should find someone else because she isn't the one for me.
I will laugh at this because it is true and that then realize I don't want to be set free
She mentions meeting my mother and for the first time in a long time, I can safely say it can no longer happen- Mom's death no longer brings grief, which I have to say is sublime

It is sublime,
It is sublime,

I will tell her that I love her
in all my mysterious ways
She will laugh at me mostly on cloudy days

I will swear that there is no other place
I long to be. She will try to explain that it
is as much true for her as it is the same to me.
We're in my studio on yet another rainy day
I am trying to give her dimensions, whilst
she smiles coyly at me from the shadows of
my LCD display.

She mentions that I should call my brother
as if she understands that we talk now since
we both have lost our mother, I tell her I will call
him tomorrow or the next day, I just want to stay here
with her photograph as I think of words to put on
my first book cover.
She asks me what is it like to have a lover, as if I
had the time, time to find such a tangible insubstantial
relationship then that, too would be sublime

It would be sublime-
It would be sublime.

We were all there...

Square of the Artists in Parisby ricardomassucatto

We were all there, at the cafe in Paris, on deck chairs
Drinking and laughing, Ginger dancing with Fred Astaire.
Toulouse painted Hookers as Queen Aretha sang,
Riley wrote lyrics, I sat next to her in the evening air.
Hemingway toasted us Bourbon, ignoring our faults
whilst Offerman sipped his aged double malt
Marlowe sang in time with Will a bawdy tune
Emily said that our deaths would come all too soon


We were all there, Americans and ex-pats in the movie
set in a timeless year, in the city of lights in France
daring to rebel, find the secrets of artists, romance
maps of adventure, mystery on sun painted streets,
Riley and I asleep on tie-dyed rainbow sheets.
The world an oyster of words, the rhythm of
Ice-T and Eminem ever staccato alliterated repeats
Byron lording over his odious melodies while
Browning mocks him, his grin framing her smile
fading in my head, soon I'm to bed, deluding denial.

We were all there, standing silhouettes in the Louvre
like Platonic shadows with nothing else to prove
Riley and Armin stepping into the groove.
Jackson paddling on the car, lawyers in love,
Mona Lisa singing Ava Maria from above
Amanda rolls the ivory belting out defiance
Rembrandt paints it black, Jagger to dance
Gaiman himself summoned Wednesday to bleed
while Anansi weaves, Pan on his wicked reeds
a sacrifice, the papers rifled, the ink stifled, King
does his standup routine, a Welsh whisper to
unnameable indescribable weird things said
to remind me it's all in my head,
soon I'm to bed, counting sheep to sleep.

Cezanne is in the Boat.
Riley and I holding hands
along the Seine
Stewart dances in the rain
Statues in the Or'Say Park
Rodin caught kissing Freda
after dark.

She Whispers

She whispers her apologies as I let her cry

her tears cutting my soul in two

all the regrets, all our fears, 

in the darkness between us

She stares at me, will I be the one to break

my silence, can our love survive such

infidelity?

She whispers to me, I hold her hands in mine

forgiving all and nothing, forgetting every

line save that I can still feel every lie as it 

carves out a hollow in my chest, I would shut

her out but I cannot force myself to regret

that I have loved her always even now as she

tears my life apart, this is the pain of sharing

lives, rooms in the caverns of the heart.

She whispers the final refrain.

picture credit Anna Shakina (self portrait)