#emmelisbeth

[couchsitter]

355

I’ll never see Europe. Those small villages that dot the country in bright bursts of color like wild flowers in repose Literature for the eyes of the Alps who blindly stand by in waiting. While sea towns set deep into the Ocean arise from sand and stone never yielding to the breaking of waves which surround them. The people are friendly, at least I would think. Drinking bittersweet coffee in absence of espresso. The gritty taste of Turkish grounds allowed to settle How beautiful the work of thousands of hands that I will not touch with my own My future is set upon me in heavy grey stone I'll travel in dreams someday

[couchsitter]

353

I put on my best face.

All dolled up with no place to go.

While I lounge on this worn in couch,

flexing my bare toes.

In the dark of this room only I know.

Shadow body,

porcelain skin,

red lips parted as if

to exhale the smoke

you breathed in

moments passing between my lungs

and you, the illusion 

hardly staying among...

street lights,

blink right

through my window.

I hold tight to myself

better than most, though

and rest my head on my knees

shaking out of this shell.

Being me never fit well at all.

While the night is a mixture of

sadness and liquor

Here I am furiously

blotting the stain on my palms

like 1000 kilowatts

All lit up like time bombs.

It never leaves, does it?

What I didn’t want.

He never leaves, does he?

When I’m with someone I love.

Alone 

in the darkness

tearing myself apart

for having a heart

and it never leaves, does it?

What I didn’t want.

[couchsitter]

349

Instant coffee, full of grounds, stir the milk in Perhaps, they'll settle down at the bottom where the honey melts. Frozen in the time it took to percolate its own success. Like an empty stomach growling it disappears when filled with regret. I miss the things I used to love up on the shelf. I don't need to remember how I ever came to care for them. I know I won't fall in love because I have forgotten and I've learned that if I love I will be swallowed whole. I'll hurt for years but become too numb to know the difference between Pain and love. Bitter is the taste, dark is the color even with the milk that's skimming Slowly, swimming toward The center. I know I won't ever be myself again. So why pretend any longer? Might as well let it end.

[couchsitter]

347

She dreamed in darkness beneath the guise of feathered pillows and silken threads. all pulled and plucked from her heavy head. She yawns, turning over, with fluttering lids. It’s time for bed... to pretend we are dead

[couchsitter]

346

March came in like December Dotted lines of Christmas lights in and out they flicker on houses too ancient to stay. Broken in by the cold or buried in snow, they've torn away shutters. Ferocious the storms that torment the thorns of our roses climbing up from her trellis. Knock once, knock twice scraping glass and my elbows I look in delight of this storm that may swallow us whole but the dark of gray clouds dispels before I know the difference of living, existing solely for you. The sun cut from their belly all the thunder they had. Now they strike but not really and I ignite but I'm sad I imagine the image of blue in my veins mirrored their own weathered bodies by clear drops on the pane. One cannot see what they do but it's just as the future. Unknown yet, June is just as peculiar.

[couchsitter]

345

I didn't know him

at least not well enough 

to call me fluent

in the matters of his life,

his victories, or his failures

but he was this vague silhouette

between holidays;

staring-off between pauses

in light conversation or

clearing his throat a few times at the table.

Diaphanous almost but still resplendent. 

He was the exact definition of:

phantasmagoria,

Within the body of a man who lived life

to live and to love and to love and to live

in that same order every day he drew breath.

I'll regret it for sure 

Like the time, he met Elvis 

coming out from one of the men’s stalls.

No camera, no chance for a photograph,

to prove this legendary man

was real or imagined

just a dollar bill signed

‘Elvis Presley’.

I believe him, always have, I suppose and

“If I made you feel second best, 

I'm sorry I was blind.” 

I remember your stories

and I wish I could tell you now

“You were always on my mind“

[couchsitter]

344

I don’t know when it happened. The windows broken, locks picked through, and the doors bashed in as if they were our skulls. Sacrifices, they say Sacrifices as if we had never made one. They were clever like that thinking without ever wearing those silly caps, tongues split down the middle, voices sweeter than honey filled with the sting of words that cut deep but meant nothing It’s the glass shattering pieces dug into our flesh holes big enough to poke through useful peepholes for pitch iris All reminders each time we see them, feel them, How painful it is and she refuses to relieve them it’s her smiling face in a pure white robe, blood dripping silently onto our clothes While he breaks our bones. Funny, how we never saw it coming so close to home I suppose fear is like love and love is really fear What a wonder, they say but They’ve never lived here Inside this room, music box thrown at that wall We were just bone China broke, bought, and hauled The outside is pretty in this layer of shards and dust No one comes nor ever bothers cabinets full of moth and musk Sacrifices, they said never understanding what true sacrifice is.

[couchsitter]

343

Darkness,

a place where the light

comes through

often times to taunt us

or deliver us from ourselves.

I am its weakness.

The soft spot in which it resides.

Pulling, tearing and 

using its teeth as a vice.

I’ve no wisdom to give nor

am I a refuge.

I am only this --

A pin-hole to see through.

It’s those inky-eyes,

the pitch-black demise of

soul and vessel

with no ship or sail.

How sweet the dark is

when it kisses or tries to assail.

As stars comprise the moon tonight.

I wish for sleep within this dark night,

and perhaps the light will appear.

beneath heavy lids 

the color of seas and fear.

black,

blue.

contused.