within

my span of wings in trepidation,
resembles the beat of African drums
heard from below
on a warm afternoon:
mid-may or mid-summer, among a circle of people
whose very lives to mine,
no more than tangents to the exponent of y.
and beating wildly with the rhythm of life,
i long to keep on rising,
rinsing out of water like venom rinses out of blood
because, whatever the reason to this life,
within these veins runs music,
slipping gently in and out of life.

39. loving a lie

oh yes, last night was great. i love the way life works you know: on the night you were away, X was told about you and me.
poor boy.
what sort of friends kick you when you’re down? evidently, his.

i heard you have a new boyfriend.
you used to mention his name so much.

and so what if i talked to him about you?  so what if i talked to you about him?
i tried to show you people the whole of me and not the parts you wanted to see. i wanted to prevent you from loving a lie. who knows how i fared? maybe you still are.

but i won’t lie. i never have and i won’t lie to you now – i still give a damn about what’s going on in his life and i never want to let go of this translucent thread between him and me, spanning like a spider’s web into realms of nothingness.
me and X, we don’t see eye to eye, we don’t speak on the phone, we barely exchange a word electronically, but i still don’t want to let go of this remnant. the remnant of my past that lingers like a memory of rich perfume in the cold night air. because there were good times. there were.

and i guess that’s selfish of me, and i guess i’m weak, but i never asked for forgiveness, just acceptance, so when he asks and you need to be gone, why are you still here? and i reply because i still care, i need you to believe me that it’s you i want, not him.