The Sweet, Familiar Ground

I’m all right, I’m all right.
I’ve said it seventy-one times today,
Paced the hard wood floors
In my bare feet,
Watched the cardinal
Through my upstairs window. She
Waits for her red-coated lover
From the oak tree.

He’s busy fighting wars, flying
Circles around the other suitors.

I don’t own a pair of pointe shoes,
But I want to wrap my feet in them
So I can dance closer to the sun.
My arabesque might feel like flight,
Pirhouettes like dreams,
Endless and glassy.

Seven nights a nomad,
An albino gypsy decorated
In the smallest fourteen karats
Braided into a heart.
The centered rose was gifted to me
And I hope to give it to you.

I hide it beneath my shirt until
Your eyes are fully opened,
Until you see me dancing here
On the sweet, familiar ground.

[Living] Room

Why do we speak in code inches from each other? I breathe your breath, share your straw and your living space. But my words come out as zeroes and ones, afraid to bare my inner bird and that tiny beating heart. No one knows my secret language. It keeps a careful fence around my nest at night.

Blood and fog stream through the valves of my heart, separated like water and oil. Globules of fog escape, dark and active and reaching. I’m afraid to show you my blackness. It needs to be understood like a child with a story to tell. But I fear it’s too dense to pass through your filters. I wrestle under an old quilt at night next to the dark, doubting fog.

I’ve got wings hidden in the threads of my camisole. They call me a gem, a wonderfully feathered thing that everyone desires to hold. You hold me. Not in the same way as others, you keep your hands open in case I want to fly again. I’ve never known this freedom.

Moments of clarity reappear, transparent patches on dirty windows. I see that I am an extraordinary being with a quiet strength. My mind is a many-sided crystalline structure. Its complexities shine through the greens and yellows of my irises, contrasted by the blackness of eyelashes and two pupils.

Bring me a daisy. It will match my bright eyes and eager limbs today.

I am a bird, a wonderfully feathered thing.