I Cannot Have You

I cannot have you through the silt of
history, your soft skin drifting with the tug of tides,

and the sky folds black and in the creased darkness
my longing hands find only warm empty air; they flutter and glide in
the silence of the night, till they tumble into there
private history,

touching phantoms that breathe and leak a bitter
brine sea. and you no longer traveling the line between history
and the sea.

my longing grows thin and transparent
as the air throbs with your absence

and the ghost of my eyes tear the fabric of night
and places you there. my hands swim the darkness
waiting for the memory of skin, waiting for the revolving of
the wheel.

to bring it back around, so that my empty hands
can hold your warmth and the history that your
body whispers,

But I cannot have you.



-----------------------------------

In the syrup of the sun
My eyes warm and stinging
Grow tired of the excursions
The smooth fugue of other voices
Slick trout in an anxious stream
The surface tension only broken
When my eyes drift with the
Current and capture the white of
Crested waves.

In the sticky sun, currents of
Water and shadows, I search
Myself, eyes rolled inward
Into the gray creases and white
Explosions that flow and jump
Under the surface tension
Of aging wrinkled skin


My eyes fall down into
The dust that drifts from
Air, a soft folding desert
Edges and ends smoothed over
blanketed and streaked out,
I forget the twisting of
Clocks and little hands
That grasp and claw gently
Tearing bits of me pulling at the
Dust and letters that capture my name.


The bareness of snow drifts
Undulate into the twirl of
Worlds, and I monochromatic
Reminds me that eyes and
Sight clash, and which is to be
The lure and which to be the snare,
As I unravel in the blister of
Sun.


Through my new squint into
The shine and bright the
squeeze and sting is tolerated
With the new warmth and heated
Shaft.


I still skim along the tension surface
Of the cloying air moving from and to
With no voice to tremble the blue
The steps down the flow that cascades
And falls, barriers from the spawn

The curves and roles green and
Brown, dappled in the drip of
Light, the slake of shadows traps
The eye, and I linger in the current
Treading air and stream as my eyes
Surround the white bubble and froth
That captures, and I wonder the snaps of
Pupils and shut of lids.


The salmon leap, thrash then splash
And spasm in there desperate drive
Breaking water and clime the rushing
Changing stability
Leap after leap to the sluggish
Calm to empty then fade from
Gold to pail and the blinking out.

And I return to spawn the light
To dark to fill the row
And I turn surrounded by the
Flow the ripples and foam slips
By, the current pulls grasps
Loosening my hold on the pebbled
Bottom

The swim and tumble in
Floundering and frantic till
the ticking down and the paling
of eyes and the sticky light
oozes finally out, the rough tumbles
down and I still gaze with shattered
eyes into the swaddling dark
of the least explored, those damp
caves filled with the echoing drip
of desperate stalactites slowly growing
Invisible.

This is the time of water, a day
Of erosion peeling the slicing
Edge, dulling the sharp, piercing
To a dull blunt blade,
And I pendulum down through the
Dark secrets of my self falling beyond
The rivers and lakes running away
Leaking out till my eyes grow
Dry and pail, knowing that I cannot have you

----------------------------------------


My hands long for the warmth of touch.
They hunger for more than sleep in the comfort
Of cloth.

More than the labor of creation, they long to discover
The vast unknown territory of your body.

My hands long to see more than chores and scraping labor
They hunger for the spices of cloves and nutmeg , they dream
Of breathing in the dust of the vanilla of your desire.

My hands long to taste more than prayers and books,
They want to run there lips and tongue down the lines and
Curves of your rolling tenderness and to sup the liquid of your lust

My hands long to taste more than necessity and commitment
They ache and throb for the cool gulp of your hips and the warm
Sting of your thighs

My hands need to consume more than days and distances,
They yearn for the sea of your body to drown themselves in the depth
Of your endless embrace.

My hands long for more than the earth and loam of this world
They dream of he ghosts of thunder that slumbers in your breasts,
They long for the fires that burn and the coals that smolder
In the palms of your hands, but in there longing they know they cannot have you.


--------------------------------------

what is this a sea without shore? no whispering rocks
or lamenting sand to roll and slide along the lip and tongue of water

no legs to open in welcome to find solace in the
wet heat of ocean tides; the sea surges in your hands
fingers knobby thin and bony,

and of strength and compassion that hold the
passion of planets and the light of million spiral stars

in the tips of your hands and you spill your change
into me and my lips blush with the dew of your desire

your hands the breezes that move my sea to rise and
surge and rise again to to drew new hips and lines.

the fruit of wine and eyes dark as desire and as
consuming as the silver phases of the moon.

drawing the sea to its suckling breath, to feed and travel the
the crests of waves and foam and sea and shoreline
the unifying of earth and water.

hips grinding lust and creation as the streak of white caps
glint there passing in the convulsive sea. rubbing stone to nothing
in your slow passing.

and your hands surround me and drew me to your mouth
and in the crucible of the sea your hands hold me until
the final emotion and the sea takes us.

and rubs us to nothing in the lustful grinding of the sea.
and when the tide rolls out, in the salt air the tang
whispers that i cannot have you.