Missing – It lives in me

“Anyway, it doesn’t matter how much, how often, or how closely you keep an eye on things because you can’t control it. Sometimes things and people just go. Just like that.” – Cecelia Ahern

“Waiting here for you.

A long, long time for you.

Through the night,

‘Till the morning,

‘Till the dawn of a new day
For you, to come, to me”

– Sylvia Doyle

 

Missing, it has personality, a heartbeat, it lives in me. With hope it builds up, then crashes down in sharp shards that rip across my mind; holding my chest I vainly try to keep in my soul that which is flowing freely through my fingers with no respite. The distance, so hard, the missing so heavy. No fuel for the fires of comfort in this moment, aching to hold you again. No way to make time hurry, it pursues me mercilessly, as I spend my days running one step ahead of the ache. When I stop, it collides with my soul, running through it with full force, leaving the hollow echo of you. Your alive, not dead, your gone, but your still here. There’s no resolution when love is taken by force and held away against my will.

01262012

Skin – Yours feels good on me

Be forewarned: This is a creative application of an analogy

“The finest clothing made is a person’s own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.”  – Mark Twain

 

“It’s a sad man my friend who’s livin’ in his own skin and can’t stand the company.”                             – Bruce Springsteen

 

ad libitum

Pulling out my favorite skin, one of the many I’ve gathered over the course of years, I pushed one foot through, then pulling it over my head, stood up and turned around. There, now I’m complete. I looked in the mirror, this skin is tight, it doesn’t quite fit. “After all my hunting to find the perfect fit, damn.” These things change you know, in the night while your sleeping, they shrink and grow taking on their own wild destiny. It’s hard to pull out the men, the women, from their skins. I yank and tug, making little cuts to release the flesh, loving when it just falls off, but that usually meant someone else had the same idea, using it to hide, or rather, to enhance their look. My collection is extensive and ever changing. I pulled some off of religious fanatics, some from thugs, some from pretty boy hair bands. I yanked a couple off some bikers and even a lawyer couldn’t escape my scheming thievery. All skin is beautiful by virtue of hiding mine. I sit looking in the mirror at my latest acquisition. I sure look good in it, wish I could move though, it always rips when I go outside. No worries though, I’ll keep yanking and saving them and perhaps sew them together. I’ll find one that fits and works eventually. I wish they wouldn’t leave marks on me, it blows my cover when you see pieces that obviously don’t fit on me. I’ll make excuses and hold it on while I scurry to pull another skin over the unfinished parts of me.

Also Published in: Wingposse Magazine, April 2013

12202012 

Dying in the Witch

 “I love you,” he whispered, and that was the moment he knew what he was going to do. When you loved someone, you put their needs before your own. No matter how inconceivable those needs were; no matter how fucked up; no matter how much it made you feel like you were ripping yourself into pieces.” ― Jodi Picoult, The Pact

 

The light vacated her eyes and left a dull black, dull like wet rocks dried in the sun. I saw it, and ran to stay clear of that magic, only the most vile of curses could pull the life from the eyes of wizards. Hurrying to my home in the tangled roots and quickly pulling my herbs and potions from the cellar, I began making a remedy against this foe, glancing out the window at the dark eyes as the wizard became the witch. I knew she smelled my cure, her nose in the wind as the ears of the night prowlers pushed out beside her once beautiful face. How does this happen? Can purity be so easily chased from the soul? Crushing the ingredients, small clouds of dust surrounded the bowl as I poured in the cure. She crouched on all fours now, all innocence gone, the grimace of hunger replacing her kind and gentle smile. I poured in the oils of remedy and brought them to a rolling boil. She gazed intently at my door, the instincts from another world directed her to my haven. Picking up the pot from the fire, a sudden slam at the door almost made me drop the concoction, that and a frantic clawing and growling made my task all the more urgent as the sweat of my concentration dripped down my nose and into my brew. The door splintered under her assault, just as I filled a small bottle, and ran, tripping over my feet and stumbling into the cellar. The door here was made for protection and had a spell on it to prevent entry but I knew no incantation would keep me safe now. She saved me not so long ago, as I endured a moment with with wicked things of night and now I would die for the chance to repay that kindness. Shadows crept around the entrance as the smoky tendrils flung open my last refuge. I knew she would kill me, though she loved me, and with that impetus, I swallowed the cure. The potion ripped through me like freezing water, taking my breath and leaving me helpless before her mauling fangs. As the life slipped from me, I saw that the flesh she bit off allowed more of the cure to repel the evil that overcame her. With my last breath, I saw the light come back to her, and as she stood, beautiful and glorious, her lovely eyes glistened with the tears of my death.