Untitled [04]

Maybe it's love,
Love at first slightly drunk
Now I'm walking with the sun
In my mouth

Was there no one, no one at all, they'd ask.

You were a different thing entirely, I'd reason in my mind. You are the scribble in green ink at the last page of my notepad, the page I refuse to tear off, the page I refuse to write anything else on. You are behind the wheel of every ashen red car that passes by. You are the first greeting in the morning and the last before bedtime, the pointless volley of text messages that makes idle hours bearable. You are every three-digit number that ends in 4. You are beach campfires and windy nights when the milky orb is waxing and the stars unabashedly glitter in the sky. You are the calm voice trying to instill reason in my haphazard ways. You are the silly board games and sillier jokes during night-outs. You are my first bottle of beer, the incessant beat of the drums in my head, the unread book on my bedside table. You are the companionship I thought I had and never will know anymore. You are solitude and the hope I harbored.

No, I'd say, there was nobody.

Why, they'd ask. The voice in my head would answer, I guess because I didn't try. You have been no one yet you were so many things.

What's your middle name?
How do you play the game?
I'll the be the first to leave*

---
* from Midnight Coward by Stars (In Our Bedroom After the War, 2007)

A ship to nowhere

I look at you as you look at her. From across the table she's every bit your dream--her long silken hair glowing with the light abovehead, her eyes twinkling in laughter. I see you become disarmed as she smiles at the jokes she's being told. You have been so keen to her whims--a platter of onion rings, an extra fork, a glass of water (without ice, please). She's having fun listening to the others' stories amid the convivial cacophony, and you, the usual bard of the group, contently sits in silence watching her. Once, in the same place, you sat beside me while everybody else was on the floor singing and dancing the night away. Out of the blue and as if I needed telling, you muttered, "I really really like her," your eyes focused on one single person, unobstructed by the dizzying colored lights and the haze from cigarette smoke. And sitting beside you again this time, I wonder why all I could do is look at you as you look at her.


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Experimenting, I guess? Haha.