Desperado

I can’t explain it —

Maybe I refuse to finesse the infinite words

How do you describe a feeling so deep it leaves an imprint?

Partial footprints on our paths,

never before walked upon

Part of yourself,

Part of myself

Parts of us dancing

Bodies tightly wound together

— though never with our hands,

Chests splayed apart,

Ribs showing the careful way our hearts beat in sync with one another,

Sewn back up and hemmed so neatly

No one notices the scars of our wishful loneliness

in rooms full of familiar faces

Then,

out of sync when distanced

Each heart thump thump thumps one right after another

a rhythm unto their own,

when combined creating new songs of reverence,

Each one unsung right until it escapes

open lips in our tender ritual.

It’s no wonder I can’t think a thought all the way through,

Can’t sing a song without fumbling up the words,

Won’t eat, can’t fall asleep,

and when dreaming

Only dreaming of you and your mouth,

Your hands,

Never on mine

Yet always holding me the way I need to be held

Right as I harness a shield to fight the feeling,

I won’t let it go —

And again, maybe I refuse?

Because

deep down I know one day we’ll be gone

You say we’re rebellious and maybe that’s true

Our names printed neatly on an outlaw poster — in invisible ink, too! —

Beware

It says

Felons of the heart

It says

and we laugh with but not at each other’s best rendered

sketches in black coal,

too smudged at the eyelashes,

nose and pupil

Are we damned in a sense,

Cautious in another?

Generous and unwavering,

beautifully smiling outlaws with wandering souls?

And there, smack dab in the middle of my memory of first laying eyes on you,

a simple tear rises up from my throat and drops from my eye,

splats on the page and dries up as quickly as it sprung from nothing

Neither you or I can make sense of our story —

if there is a story —

(Who cares about the past when the plot is this thick and juicy?)

as it unravels down our blocks and across our adjacent corners

One careful trip down the sidewalk

and black, back-alley ways to our promising doorsteps,

With halls full of greetings and hugs and wet kisses

and heavy, heavenly, happy sighs)

You take a bite of an Envy apple,

You smile

and I lose my mind at the sight of the liquid juice

wet on your lips

Noting to no one in particular how lucky the apple is,

to have been fully consumed by you.