P.Y.T.

The type of confidence she has on Thursdays is the kind that could ruin homes, monogamy, hearts.

She doesn’t follow through, but barely. That’s what they know when they come over. The allure of possibility without the allure of definitely.

She gives you everything your imagination needs and none of what your body wants. She will always walk away, for which you will both always be thankful.

Oh, but you watch as she goes.

The coast guard boys stationed here for two months walk by her a few times, glancing forlornly, shaking their heads. They know it is pointless but watch because it is.

She has exactly the amount of self-worth to always talk to you but never to go home with you. She won’t be yours, you feel, until you are aware to your core that she is the be all, end all to your entire life. Should it end, you will look back for the rest of your life, wondering about that one girl you could never quite pin down but always wish you had.

You don’t follow through though, but barely. Watching her leave, you notice she begins to walk even faster.

Acrophobia

She wore her sports bra around the apartment –

left the door wide open.

He couldn’t tell if she was daring the world to look

or assuming the world would not.

 

Her confidence gave him vertigo –

He felt green with envy and diziness for the way life picked

her first, gave her aura an extra sheen.

Not that he wanted it, but that he had to witness it

Be near, but not close enough

to live inside it too.

 

Some weeks, he hid from her. Buried himself

in work, in other friends. He could not bear the sight

of her smiling, laughing, but not with him.

 

Other weeks, he walked through that open door

hoping to himself she was brazen

enough to cook ramen with her torso bare.

 

Green though he was, he could not stay away from the edge

of where their friendship would explode into… what?

It felt large – larger than the universe he studied, larger than space-time.

He needed time to figure it out, first. What equation

can calculate how love will change the experience

of waking up every morning?

 

Numbers and symbols and late night tapping at key boards, eyes

drowning in computer screens – all faded the second

she sauntered past his window, dreaming

probably

of flight.

Othello Complex

He was mine.

 

Oh, the poison of that faint light from an iPhone screen.

The playful hair toss in his direction and the way he didn’t shut his eyes

and turn away.

 

The months I spent straining

convincing myself it was in my own mind,

that my mind could not be trusted – a whisper in my ear

the faint sound of wind, only.

 

The creeping sense that corrodes the looks

he gives you in the morning, between sheets.

I turned in on myself, criticizing my inability

to suffice.

 

Driven mad the most by dreams – he lives

with her. He holds her. Kissing her neck with all the tenderness

I had hoped would find its way to my navel,

shoulder,  ankle, elbow.

 

Then came the hunger, the animal

creeping silently enough to avoid detection at first

then consuming me until all I wanted was what it wanted.

 

He was mine.

 

Before I Had to Start Yoga.

Do you remember that day we took a ride with

Two disposable cameras,

And no destination?

Walked into buildings we weren’t allowed in like

We owned them.

In three dollar v-neck t-shirts from Walmart

In knock off Ray Bans.

We owned the place.

Funny thing is, no one told us to get out.

They nodded:

“Look, they own the place.”

Man, and I could drive.

I knew the song to play for which highway

Which grove of trees

Just how far to roll the window down

Based on smell.

I always went too fast and sometimes too slow

But when I felt it, I knew how to go.

All I ever needed was gas and one hand

Or a knee

On the wheel.

Multiplication Tables

This city is saturated with faces.

When I was small, it was so simple. I found one kid with a ginger afro attractive. He was lovely and my laser-focused developing brain poured all my hormones onto him. Simple.

But here, oh, here I am inundated – drowned each day in these faces that flash by so quickly you can believe they are perfect and have a perfect heart behind them.

I develop mini-crushes in split seconds and elaborate upon them like the digits of pi. If a guy walks right, smiles right, has the right eyes, tells one joke right or has some magnificent hands that make you believe he could probably mine coal or toss bails of hay like they’re baseballs, an instant vibration of amour proliferates in my mind.

The women effervesce like Alka-Seltzer on the sidewalks – in a second promising to cure all your woes while giving you a brand new one – that you’ll never walk that way with those legs and text with those fingers that show off perfect jewelry. I can’t fool myself here, into thinking that jeans and a t-shirt are enough. I can’t feel confident in my attractiveness while wearing sneakers.

I am overwhelmed, put simply, by the diversity of the beauty and am put to shame by the sizzle, the sass, the sixty thousand models commuting to work.

Pep Talk

I crack my bones

like pebbles fall

down a ravine –

stones shift on the riverbed

spelunking in my capillaries.

I am the mic check, the tune

up – orchestral swell of chaos

out of which the universe

emerged like

the build, arrival of thunder

at your door.

That lightning storm spills out

my stiletto

on the walk to work.

My rock tumbler voice

shakes – shouts out even

as I whisper, popping

eardrums from here to

Arkansas.

Without speaking,

my sass is hot pink.