By Lisa Shields
Date: 15 March 2001
Souling
The delight in a lover
who can read your mind
dims when the heart twists
inside itself and the calm eyes
read your movements
even as you improvise the steps.
The path you wore by footfalls
over the years of self loathing
midnight despair
and bone deep lonely
is plain to her eye.
She doesn't follow you anymore,
but skips ahead
and when you have cut through
your desperate emotions
with a machete not sharp enough
to do the job neatly
you find her there,
waiting.
The path is not hidden, not from her.
And you regard her with hungry hesistant eyes
bastard child, monster spawn,something misbegotten
surely meant to seed the earth
for fresh growth---
does she not see what you are?
You grunt, snarl, grimace
and raise your hand to shove her away,
as if that will keep her from knowing
the bright lick of flame
that rises in you when you see her.
A warm unknown---yet half remembered.
And those soft hands close around yours
gentle as morning birds,
soothing
smoothing
forcing the warm into skin
you wished cold
because numb is better
than the shards of memory
that cut at you from inside.
And you fight the urge to crush her close,
to bury your face in hair maiden simple
that smells of honey and sweet comfort,
because you do not deserve such bounty.
And she shatters the crystal cold
you built so careful around your soul
and simply says
You do.
I hope this isn't a repost)
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